Volunteer Dee Delaney laid to rest
THE Belfast Brigade IRA Volunteer tragically killed a week ago as a result of a premature explosion while on active service was buried on Wednesday in the Republican Plot in Milltown Cemetery. Kevin Dee Delaney, although only 26 years old, was a veteran of the republican struggle both in the military and political fields.
His death evoked a hysterical reaction from the Catholic Church, which barred his remains from three chapels in West Belfast, and which claimed Dee Delaney acted outside the law of God, a pre-judgement which incensed his family and people throughout West Belfast.
Not surprisingly his burial also provoked a predictable reaction from the British Government. Their `normalisation' policy was put into cold storage for a day while hundreds of British soldiers erected a ring of steel blocking the Falls, Glen and Whiterock, Andersonstown, Monagh and Springfield Roads.
But despite one of the biggest military shows of strength for some time by the British, the IRA successfully paid their last respects to one of their most active Volunteers. A three-man firing party fired three volleys of shots over the Tricolour-draped coffin shortly after it left the family home and then disappeared quickly into the vast crowd of mourners.
Phoblacht, Saturday 26 January 1980
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