Two of my grandfather's Memorial Poems, printed in Kilmarnock.

Some readers will be aware that a few years ago I helped to publish a collection of my late grandfather's poems. He was well known in the Ards Peninsula area back in his day, and his poems were regularly published in the local papers. I re-found these two poems the other day, which he had written as memorials for the Palmer family of Portavogie, and which were printed as one-offs to be framed and hung on the wall of the bereaved homes. We have collected quite a few of these. What's significant about these two is that they were printed not here in Ulster, but (as the close-up image at the bottom shows) by John Ritchie in Kilmarnock, Scotland. Some copies of the book are still available, with all profits being donated to the RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution). Click here for info.The firm of John Ritchie still exists in Kilmarnock today, opposite the entrance to Dean Castle.