“As everyone knows this was our first season so to be honest i wasn’t expecting any wonders in anyway apart from a little effort from the lads. As I was the one who reformed the Ballymacash Young Conquerors F.B it was always going to be a gamble that I had to take and with fingers crossed I hoped for the best. So this is how it all started and finished .

Before I start everyone always asks us the question why do we carry the skull and crossbones and we have been slated for it for years and not just the band but the football team as well.

The story behind it all started back in the early 1980′s when both the Ballymacash Rangers F.C and the band were formed. It was one night while on parade in Comber (I think), the band forgot the flags so on the back of the window there was a skull and crossbones flag so the lads decided for a laugh to somehow borrow someone’s brush shaft, they then attached the skull and crossbones flag to the shaft and walked with it at the front of the band. So the next night at band practice everyone decided to get a proper flag made with the bands name on it and a skull and crossbones, now near 30 years later nearly everything to do with Ballymacash has a skull and crossbones on it, dart teams, football teams, band etc. Last year we even flew 80 skull and crossbones flags from lampposts but due to complaints and continuous hassle from the council and even local councilors, we have reduced the numbers dramatically.

At the start of October 2007 me and a very close mate got talking on the subject of what a good idea it would be to reform the B.Y.C in the Ballymacash estate, although there is already a band from North Lisburn (Pride Of Prince William). We still thought the only thing the estate was missing was a band actually named after the estate as we’ve already got a football team which includes 1st and 2nds and youth system, we also have a snooker team, a Men’s and Ladies Dart’s Team and many more named after the estate. Anyway after my mate and I had our chat I decided to go the next day and get 2000 ballots made for the reformation of the band, I then sat with my mate and another friend and wrote out every person we knew who could play an instrument on one page then wrote a list of names of people we thought would be interested in anyway to either learn an instrument or support us in anyway possible, over the next two weeks we contacted every person on the list and I don’t think there was one person who refused to either join or support us in some way. Before the end of October we had handed everyone 40 ballots each and to our surprise we ordered another 2000 ballots so that was £4000 of ballots which we ended up selling the lot.

In November 2007 my mate and I were still running the lot on our own and refusing help at this stage from anyone as I knew if I was doing things myself then I knew it was being done right.
Anyway we arranged a battle of the bands in the Taughmonagh Social Club at the end of November 2007, we invited a number of bands and we ended up with five bands supporting us on that night,
the bands were,
Lambeg Orange and Blue,
Queensway,
Finaghy True Blues and
Lisburn Fusiliers and my sister’s band that was also reformed Ligoniel True Blues Accordion Band they opened the night with their first performance in public in near 12 years. On the night I reckon there was the hearts of 250/300 people supporting us which I thought was unreal considering a Lisburn band holding an indoor in Taughmonagh which is in Belfast.

By the middle of December 2007 we had a good lump sum of money raised and I decided if I was gonna make this work it was time to look for instruments asap even before I called a meeting for everyone to attend who had any interest at all. Reason I choose to buy instruments before we even had a meeting was simple, we all know what people are like when it comes to bands there’s not to many who are willing to do the running about so I thought if and when we had our first meeting that if I had all the drums and flutes etc on the table in front of everyone it would be a huge mental boost as in ” we mean business here”.
We got the instruments and a few pound left over towards some type of uniform already and we have just had our first gathering” so I kept searching the bands forum for the next four to five weeks until I found us a set of drums.

In February 2008 I finally came across an offer on 9 drums that I couldn’t refuse from a local band called Crumlin Young Loyalists. I then bought 25 new Millar Brown flutes two days later as they were the cheapest on the market to get us on our feet, by the second week of February I had called a meeting at the Ballymacash Rangers Football Club on a Wednesday night at 8pm, as you can imagine it was a nervous time for the first time in my life and for the 1st time I actually realised id a nerve system oj, id texted every1 I knew who was interested the week before and give them the date, time and location and decided not text them again until I saw them that Wednesday night, the reason for this was also simple, if any of them had an interest they would make the effort and be there and wouldnt forget. anyway by 8.30 we had over 40 people in the room and a further 10/15 people texting and letting us know they couldnt make it and would be giving us their full support. the following week we met again and we formed a committee etc and arranged our 1st band practice the following Wednesday night

March/April 2008

after a couple of practices we started to see who should be doing what with in the band etc and picked a band captain and a lead tip etc, we then had a poker night with 35 people taking part and a disco after which was messy by then end of the night after that it was heads down and learning tunes etc

June 2008

at the start of June we decided on a uniform and although not every1 was happy but we had no choice we ended up deciding to wear plain black trousors and grey polos and black rain jackets that a number of bands have started to wear. every1 just got their own trousors ec and I got sample sizes from a local company called reach limited, after I measured everyone up I then ordered the polos and jackets for not only band members but supportors it worked out for a polo and jacket both came to £43 per person. our 1st order was 70 jackets and 70 polos now months down the line I think weve sold over 100 of each.
2 weeks before our 1st parade on the 1st July we had a street collection in the estate unfortunately we got turned down for the collection but were allowed to go ahead with the parade, the street parade was on a Wednesday night and we walked with 5 colour party, 2 leaders, 7 drummers and 17/18 fluters, it wasnt exactly the prettiest of sights but we attracted a good crowd from all over Lisburn who came up and sat in the cars etc and followed behind us, to be honest I feel a lot turned up as a lot of people never believed that we were being serious, next was popw annual parade which we walked with 4 colour party, 2 leaders, 8 drummers and 20 fluters and I personally thought we done really well considering it was only our 1st competiton parade.“