Honorary Freemen of Ballymoney

Freedom of the Borough — Honorary Freeman — is the highest award Ballymoney Borough Council can grant, recognising outstanding achievement or service to the town. It has been awarded only a handful of times.

Joey Dunlop, OBE

Granted the Freedom of the Borough on 29 September 1993, in recognition of the honour brought to Ballymoney through his motorcycle racing career — 26 wins at the Isle of Man TT, 24 at the Ulster Grand Prix, and an MBE (1986) and OBE (1996, for humanitarian work in Romania). See Famous Faces of Ballymoney for more.

Dr Robert Dunlop

Granted the Freedom of the Borough on 23 April 2007, in recognition of over 100 national and international motorcycle racing victories, including a record 15 wins at the North West 200. He raced with a bike specially modified after a severe 1994 crash — brake and clutch both on the left-hand side, operated by a thumb grip — and kept winning major races for another decade.

Mrs Mary J. Holmes, OBE, JP

Granted the Freedom of the Borough on 30 April 1986, after eight successive years as Mayor of Ballymoney and thirty years of continuous local government service. Elected in May 1955 as the first female member of Ballymoney Urban District Council, she served as an independent, earning cross-community respect through three decades in public life. She was awarded the OBE in 1978 and has served as a Justice of the Peace for County Antrim.

Dr Ian Paisley, MP, MEP, MLA

Granted the Freedom of the Borough on 21 October 2000, recognising thirty years representing North Antrim in the UK Parliament (from 1970) and twenty-one years in the European Parliament. Born in Armagh on 6 April 1926, Paisley was ordained in the Reformed Presbyterian Church in 1946 and co-founded the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster in 1951. He founded the Democratic Unionist Party in 1971 and led it for nearly four decades, becoming one of the most prominent — and most polarising — figures in Northern Ireland politics through the Troubles. In May 2007 he became First Minister of Northern Ireland in a power-sharing government with Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness as deputy First Minister, an arrangement few would have predicted earlier in his career. He died in 2014.

The Royal Ulster Constabulary and RUC Reserve

Granted the Freedom of the Borough on 1 June 1983. The RUC was formed on 1 June 1922 as Northern Ireland’s police force and served through the entire period of the Troubles, during which over 300 officers were killed, more than 100 of them members of the RUC Reserve. In 1999 the force was awarded the George Cross in recognition of its officers’ collective service and sacrifice. That same year, the Patten Report recommended wide-ranging reform of policing in Northern Ireland, including a change of name; the RUC was formally reformed as the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) on 4 November 2001.

The Royal British Legion Northern Ireland

Granted the Freedom of the Borough on 22 February 1997, recognising the Legion’s support for ex-servicemen and women and their families since its founding in 1921. Its work — funded mainly through the annual Poppy Appeal — includes residential and convalescent care, war-grave pilgrimages, and pension advice. Ballymoney’s own war memorial, at the Royal British Legion building, is covered in Historic Sites Around Ballymoney.

The Royal Irish Regiment

Granted the Freedom of the Borough on 12 May 2012. The regiment traces its lineage through three centuries of Irish regiments — the Inniskillings, the Royal Ulster Rifles, and the Royal Irish Fusiliers among them — formed in its current shape in 1992 through the amalgamation of the Royal Irish Rangers with the Ulster Defence Regiment’s Home Service battalions. It has served in Kosovo, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

152 (Ulster) Transport Regiment RLC (Volunteers)

Granted the Freedom of the Borough on 1 September 2012. A Territorial Army logistics regiment with roots in the 36th (Ulster) Division’s Army Service Corps of the First World War, it has provided volunteer logistic support through Korea, the Falklands, the Gulf, and more recent deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.