Pigeon

Pigeons were a constant in Michael McConville’s childhood and the reason for some of his most daring excursions through the combat zone. His family had kept birds for as long as he could remember; searching for roosting pigeons, then carrying them home beneath his jacket, gave him a private pursuit amid the unpredictability of the Troubles.

A family tradition

The pigeon, known in Ireland since the nineteenth century as the “poor man’s racehorse,” entered Michael’s life through his father and older brothers. Keeping birds was already part of family life, and his attention to them became a defining preoccupation: he spent much of his time thinking about pigeons.

Searching the combat zone

Michael went out into the combat zone looking for places where pigeons might roost. When he found them, he took off his jacket and cast it over the birds like a net, then smuggled the warm, nervous creatures back to his bedroom. The account makes the capture concrete and physical: his jacket becomes a makeshift net, and the birds’ warmth and nervousness accompany them from the dangerous streets into the home.

The old mill

The search sometimes led Michael into derelict buildings, where he could not know whether squatters, paramilitaries, or bombs might be waiting. At an old mill whose façade had been blown out, he and a friend climbed to an upper floor in search of pigeons and instead found British soldiers encamped there. The soldiers aimed their rifles and ordered the boys to halt or they would fire; Michael and his friend climbed back down to safety. The episode shows how the pursuit of birds carried him into the ordinary hazards of a city at war, where a search for a roost could bring a child face to face with armed soldiers.