50th Anniversary Service Hears Impact of Kingsmill Lasts To This Day

Almost 500 people packed into Bessbrook Town Hall yesterday afternoon, 4 January for a 50th Anniversary Memorial Service for the victims of the Kingsmill massacre.

Church representatives welcomed relatives and friends of the ten men murdered at Kingsmill on 5 January 1976 as well as Alan Black who survived the attack. Also in attendance were political and PSNI representatives.

Speaking at the event Rev. Keith McIntyre, Bessbrook Presbyterian Church explained that 5 of the 10 men murdered as well as the sole survivor were members of Bessbrook Presbyterian Church.

Rev. McIntyre said "The impact on our church lasts to this day. It resulted in a substantial departure of many Presbyterian families from the area. My predecessor, the Reverend Robert Nixon, bore a very heavy burden at that time as he sought to minister to all those families directly affected by this monstrous act, the pre meditative murder of innocent men - no-one will know what a toll it took upon him.

"We know only too well that since that time, none of those murderers has faced a moments earthly justice. All the inquests and inquiries have resulted in nothing, just a wall of silence, only adding to frustration and pain, being denied justice for the victims and their families."

A letter was read out from Alan And Sandra Freeburn the son and daughter of Robert Freeburn, one of the workmen murdered, who now live in Canada. The letter said "Sometimes it is easy to think that you have been forgotten, but this memorial service is a testimony to the fact that our loved ones have not been forgotten, and their memory is treasured. God has been faithful to our family and never left us nor forsaken us. I pray that our beloved country will return to God and his ways, and that no other family will ever have to travel the road that our family and many others have had to travel."

Rev Alan Synnott said "We would rather not have to have a service like this. We would rather that those awful events that unfolded on that evening 50 years ago hadn't happened. We'd must prefer that those men had gone home and had their tea and did whatever they normally would have gone about doing in the evening. We would much, much prefer that to be the case today, and many other days through the awful years of what we refer to as the troubles.

"So many other homes, so many other communities, so many other villages and towns, broken, broken apart by the wickedness of sectarian murder. Let's call it what it was. It's beyond me. It has always been beyond me and I'm sure you all share this thought. What possesses somebody to kill somebody else simply because of the church that they are affiliated to. It's incomprehensible to any right minded and reasonable person. It's beyond any reason at all that people might become so overwhelmed with hatred and evil that they would go out and do such a thing,"

Prayers were also said by the Rev. Louise Donald and music was provided by Tullyvallen Silver Band and Kirsten McMullan and Lisa Moffett.

At the conclusion of the event in the town hall a short service was held by Rev. Nigel Reid and Rev. Kenneth Henderson at the Kingsmill Memorial just outside the Town Hall when survivor Alan Black along with relatives of those who died laid flowers.

The ten men who died in what was one of the worst sectarian murders of the troubles were John Bryans, Robert Chambers, Walter Chapman, Robert Freeburn, Reginald Chapman, Joseph Lemmon, John McConville, James McWhirter, Robert Walker and Kenneth Worton.