The Burning Of Skinny Lizzie’s Union Jack

The loyalists usually put out their flags long before the 12^th of July , but “Skinny Lizzie“, Mrs Gilmore, who ran the wee shop on the corner of Hooker and Chatham Streets, put hers out even earlier in 1969. I must point out, although Mrs Gilmore was known as “Skinny Lizzie” she was anything but skinny she was rather a plump woman. Her husband, Billy also had a nickname, “Billy Onion” , due to him having an onion like growth on his forehead, he was a little. timorous, thin man, whom Lizzie was often heard to roar and shout at. And on the day Billy put out the flag, Skinny was there holding the ladder for him and bellowing instructions up to him, They were quite a comical couple, and behind her loudness and loyalist viewpoints, she was quite well liked by her Catholic neighbours and no one would say her little shop was not an asset to the community.