Northern Ireland: In the summer of 1969, John Hume asked an Orangeman why the loyal orders insisted on holding marches they knew to be provocative to Catholics. The Orangeman replied frankly: "We have to show them who's master."
This story is recorded in Bill Brown's excellent Orange history, An Army with Banners, but you won't find it, or anything like it, in Brian Kennaway's account of the Order. His thesis is that the Order is a tolerant and honourable religious organisation that has been all but destroyed in the last decade because the wrong sort of people were allowed to take control.
A Presbyterian minister, Kennaway is nostalgic for the days when the doctor, the schoolmaster and the clergyman were the "natural leaders" in a community. Whereas the Order used to be led by the aristocratic and business classes, he writes, it is now "driven by the populace", with tragic consequences. "Individuals coming up through the structures of the institution lacked the ability to lead, though they sometimes had the gift of speech in the style which Shakespeare described as 'full of sound and fury, signifying nothing'."
It could be argued, however, that this tradition in unionism of "knowing your place", deferring to your "betters", has been disastrous for working-class Protestants. Orangeism promoted a notion of Protestant ethnic cohesion - the local gentry were in the same lodges as the ordinary people, and joining the Order was the way to ensure you'd be looked after. That has all but gone now. "The Institution is no longer the thing to join if you want to get on in society," Kennaway notes, without exploring further what this means, in particular for Catholics, who were, of course, excluded.
Kennaway properly deplores the descent into violence at Drumcree, and the fact that men wore Orange sashes over UDA T-shirts and marched alongside the likes of Johnny "Mad Dog" Adair. He denounces weak leaders who failed to face down the bigots and who failed to take action against Orangemen who broke the law, even when their crime was murder. However, he sees these developments as an aberration, when there is strong historical evidence that they are simply the most recent manifestation of the sectarianism that has been at the heart of Orangeism since its foundation in the 18th century.
Many young men were held back from getting involved in the Troubles because of "the wise counsels of their elders within the Institution", Kennaway asserts. This may be so, but the history of Orangeism is littered with anti-Catholic outrages. Henry Grattan spoke in 1805 to those who stirred up panic so that "then walk forth the men of blood" to commit "atrocities which he dare not commit in his own name". In the mid-19th century a Royal Commission found that the Orange system and its celebrations led to "violence, outrage, religious animosities . . . and loss of life". A magistrate noted that unruly Orangemen had gone "a considerable distance out of their way to pass a Catholic chapel on their march to Drumcree".
Kennaway makes much of advice given to the Orange Order by Sean O'Callaghan, a former IRA man turned informer, who saw nationalist residents groups as a trap set up by the Provisionals to lure the Order into confrontation. Kennaway pays scant attention to the views of nationalists, including the SDLP. He seems unaware of the deep offence taken over the "victory jig" danced by David Trimble and Ian Paisley after the 1995 Drumcree parade was permitted to go through the Garvaghy Road. The murder of Rosemary Nelson in 1999 isn't even mentioned.
The Order treated Kennaway badly. He was ousted by bigots and "super Prods" who were determined to use Orangeism to defeat the Good Friday Agreement. There is fascinating material about this process, and he unsparingly exposes the stupidity of the leadership. However, some of the arcane power struggles behind the scenes are described in far too much detail, and the book is badly structured, making it difficult to follow the chronology of events. The Order has issued a long, petty and poorly argued denunciation of Kennaway's book. He has stepped out of line and incurred the wrath of the brethren. It is a pity he did not go further to deserve it.
Susan McKay is the author of Northern Protestants: An Unsettled People (Blackstaff, 2000)
The Orange Order: A Tradition Betrayed By Brian Kennaway Methuen, 286pp. £15.99