World War II
During the Second World War there were a number of raids on Belfast by the Luftwaffe, the German Air Force. On one occasion, during the infamous Belfast Blitz of Easter Tuesday, 15 April 1941, a bomb landed in front of the Church and, while it did not cause any structural damage to the Church, many of the windows were blown in. A second bomb landed at the nearby Gasworks. The explosion caused a huge vacuum in the local area which literally sucked out the remainder of the windows and the original Irish Oak frames were destroyed. Being a time of war, it was impossible to replace the oak window frames and so they were replaced in concrete, something that was to prove more damaging than the German bomb. The strength of the concrete has, over the last 60 years, destroyed the bricks surrounding these frames (the Church was built with handmade bricks) and by the time the Restoration work was complete upwards of 80,000 bricks needed to be replaced.
Read more about this topic: Saint Malachy's Church, Belfast
Famous quotes containing the words world war, world and/or war:
“Fifty million Frenchmen can’t be wrong.”
—Anonymous. Popular saying.
Dating from World War I—when it was used by U.S. soldiers—or before, the saying was associated with nightclub hostess Texas Quinan in the 1920s. It was the title of a song recorded by Sophie Tucker in 1927, and of a Cole Porter musical in 1929.
“Never is a historic deed already completed when it is done but always only when it is handed down to posterity. What we call “history” by no means represents the sum total of all significant deeds.... World history ... only comprises that tiny lighted sector which chanced to be placed in the spotlight by poetic or scholarly depictions.”
—Stefan Zweig (18811942)
“What would you do in my position? Would you drop the war where it is? Or, would you prosecute it in future, with elderstalk squirts, charged with rose water?”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)