December Bride's Domain

Simmy Island from Island Taggart

Sam Hanna Bell, MBE,  the celebrated Ulster-Scot novelist and playwright, was brought up at Strangford Lough, County Down, a part of the Province that I know fairly well.

In 1951, he wrote the acclaimed December Bride, a story based in the vicinity of the lough about a servant girl and her relationship with two brothers in conservative Ulster.

Sadly, he died just before the said book's film première.

The 1991 movie was shot in and around Island Taggart, at the derelict farmstead on the top of the island.

Yesterday I was on the beloved 85-acre island again, with eleven other volunteers.

It has been owned by the National Trust since 1985, when it was the property of Paddy Mackie.

I shan't bore you with the details of what we were doing (gorse!), though I shall post a few photographs.