BELFAST'S republican community will be saddened to hear of the death of Jimmy Jelley, a veteran from the Market area of Belfast, best known as the reliable and cheerful bus driver who ferried countless families to Long Kesh, Armagh and Portlaoise prisons during the worst years of the conflict.

Jimmy’s funeral took place from St Malachy’s Chapel in his native Market district on Monday December 16th. Known to many as Jimmy Jolly, he was just two years short of the four score when he died on December 12th.

I personally have very fond memories of Jimmy, as a regular feature of Sinn Féin’s Sevastopol Street where he was often to be seen with other veterans like Joe ‘Bingo’ Campbell and Paddy Loughran, both long deceased. Bingo to natural causes and Paddy to the bullet of a deranged RUC man who attacked Sevastopol Street in February 1992. Jimmy himself was a survivor of more than one attack launched by loyalists against the same building, but he was always irrepressible.

His wife Elizabeth Anne, known to us simply as Anne, was another great character. Both Jimmy and Anne were spoken of very highly by my late mother Rosie, who called them good decent people. A very high accolade from my mother which placed anyone given it on the side of the angels. Jimmy was predeceased by Anne and by their children, Catherine and James. He is survived by his children Eileen and Annie and by his grandchildren, Kerry, Daniel, Jasmin, Jamie-Lee, Nathan, Katie and the late Mark.

Jimmy, in his earlier days in the seventies, when his cravat and pocket hanky set him a cut apart from the other patrons, would have been a regular in the Holy Picture in Alfred Street, the Market Social in Russell Street and the Trocadero in Cromac Street. He did, however, eventually get his passport and reached the Falls Road via Short Strand.

Jimmy Jolly, another of Belfast’s dwindling supply of characters, will be sorely missed by his family and by those countless families whom he kept in contact with their imprisoned relatives in the worst of times.

Ar Dheis Dé go raibh a anam uasal agus go luífidh seanfhod na hÉireann go bog ar a ucht.