Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs Correspondent, has no doubts as to the responsibility for the turnaround from peaceful parade to violence in Drumcree
It was short. It was nasty. It was brutish. And - let us be absolutely clear on this - the responsibility for yesterday's riot at Drumcree bridge lies squarely with the leadership of Portadown District Loyal Orange Lodge and their facilitators in the Church of Ireland.
What happened was sickening in its savagery, but as disgusting was the cynical irresponsibility of those who first stoked the fires and then disappeared, trailing words such as "peaceful", "dignified", "our democratic rights".
And don't let them tell you that the people throwing rocks - not stones, though some of those were thrown, too - were thugs, and unrepresentative of the Orange Order. The thugs were there, of course, with their beer, tattoos and chants of "scum", "scumbags" and "SSRUC" at the police, but so, too, were some doughty sons of Ulster, proudly wearing their Orange collarettes as they pelted sundry missiles at "their" police force, "their" army, in pursuit of "their" rights. Men who, just moments before, had been praised by their leaders for the peaceful dignity of their protest.
Even Assistant Chief Constable Stephen White had commended the Orangemen and their leaders a short time earlier for their efforts in maintaining "the dignity of the day". His was a different tune last night. With 24 officers injured, as many as nine of them hospitalised, "dignity" had disappeared from his vocabulary.
Indeed, his own agreement to accept a letter of protest from the Orangemen may have contributed to what followed. The comparatively (with other years) flimsy barricade had to be opened to allow both sides to meet. Just over six feet high and hardly half-an-inch thick, it was immediately apparent that the barrier was a pushover for the determined.
But the yobbos were satisfied first to hear the speeches from Portadown district master Harold Gracey and his deputy, David Burrows. The ailing Mr Gracey did his thing, a by now familiar ritual to Drumcree aficionados. He lambasted Brendan McKenna (of the Garvaghy Road Residents), Brid Rodgers of the SDLP - who got a particular roasting yesterday - and clergy who were not sympathetic to the Orange Order.
David Burrows followed. He spoke "sadly" ("tragically" would have been a better word) about being "banned from walking in dignity and peace from our church to our hall along a public road".
He was followed by district secretary Nigel Dawson, who was pithy. "We saw off Mo Mowlam. We saw off Peter Mandelson. And we will see off John Reid. Here we stand, we can do no other."
Then all sang God Save The Queen.
There was ferocity in the air and rocks were pelted at police as young men in football shirts wrenched silently at the flimsy barricade, which began to give way as the Portadown district officers blithely retreated.
Camera crews were systematically threatened as some rioters complained about a shortage of stones and men tugged at stakes in the ground to use as missiles against the police, egged on by fiery women, one of whom took her husband's umbrella as she set off to attack the police.
Throughout this mayhem there was no sign of any one of Portadown district's 24 marshals, no sign of any member of the select vestry of Drumcree church or of the Rev John Pickering, the rector.