STUART CHRISTIE DIES! Intro. by Brian Bamford

PART ONE - THE AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION:

Stuart Christie: a Scottish anarchist writer and publisher. Who when aged 18, Christie was arrested in Madrid while carrying explosives to assassinate the Spanish caudillo, General Francisco Franco. He was later alleged to be a member of the Angry Brigade, but was acquitted of related charges.

Born: July 10, 1946, Partick, Glasgow, United Kingdom

Died: August 15, 2020

Movies: The Angry Brigade: The Spectacular Rise and Fall of Britain’s First Urban Guerilla Group Organizations founded: Anarchist Black Cross Federation, Cienfuegos Press

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BEYOND an OBITUARY!:

STUART Christie was an anarchist who had quality and consistency as well as quantity and a prolific output. From the early 1960s when he first engaged with Bobby Lynn and the Glasgow anarchists to his death bed listening to 'Pennies from Heaven' Stuart sternly stuck to his beliefs dedicated to a classical version of anarchism.

My last contact with Stuart was an unusually brief e-mail from him last November in which he wrote: 'Bearing up, Brian. Hope you are too. Un abrazo!.'

However I must offer a health warning, as in the 56 years since we first became acquainted in Paris in 1964, our paths have been very different. His commitment was to internationalist view while mine since the 1960s when I lived and worked in Spain has been mostly more parochial. My engagement with the anarchist movement in Spain and later Gibraltar was very different from that of Stuart even though we were functioning in the same organisation: the FIJL (DI). My role was purely one of propaganda and intelligence, and at no time was I involved in the violent activist deeds which were designed to discourage tourism or strike at General Franco.

My task and that of my then wife, Joan, was the much more humdrum; in my case one of working on the tools as an electrician, and delivering Butane Gas to the villages on the Cabo San Antonio in Alicante. Much more boring than 'daring-do' and prison life, but a way of soaking-up Spanish culture and everyday life as it was lived by many young Spaniards at that time who migrated to the coast from places like Albacete and Andalucia: working a six day week and paid 750 pesetas. Meanwhile, our FIJL campaign against Spanish tourism clearly failed, yet fortunately less tragically than Stuart's failed mission to kill Franco.

Among the many obituaries published on Stuart the most perceptive that I have yet seen has been that of the historian Julián Casanova in El País 'El escocés de la FAI que trató de matar a Franco' Casanova argues that Stuart Christie believed that 'a fusion of different forms of resistance such as the workers, the students, the greens into the language of political anarchism. Just as Bakunin, thought it was possible to harmonise individualism with the socialist collectivism.' Casanova writes: 'He [Stuart] liked the men of action, but in reality he [Stuart] and his wife Brenda went on to propagate forms of idelogy with various cultural manifestations, which demonstrated the force of culture with ideas.'

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Stuart's wife Brenda died last year aged 70 years, from cancer. Casanova writes: 'The obituaries now record that his prime intention was to kill Franco. Yet he was a committed anarchist using his pen and the engaged in cultural aggitation, in times when the revolutionaries with "consciences" have past into history. Anarchist solidarity, that reflects on the concequences of industrial capilalism, nuclear disarmament, and abuses by the State. He was a Scot who would have loved to live in the golden epoch of Spanish anarchism.'

Julián Casanova knew Stuart Christie from when he met him at Queen Mary College, London, in the Autumn of 1985. At that event were other hispanistas like Ronald Fraser, and he speaks warmly of the seminars, dinners and debates over the Spanish Civil War, Franco, the monarchy, Juan Carlos and the transistion.

It strikes me that Casanova understood Stuart better than most of us.

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RUSSIA: WHEN THE NEEDLES GOT STUCK?

  International Brigade deplores EU Remembrance Resolution

 YOU'VE certainly got to hand it to those few people on the British left who still stick with the idea that Russia offers some form of hope for human civilisation.  It is an idea that somehow a remnant of a golden age ideal rooted in historical Marxist-Leninism, will emerge through the person of  Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin; (a former student of law at Leningrad University and later a KGB foreign intelligence officer going on to be Director of the Federal Security Service (FSB), the KGB's successor agency). 

In this country the International Brigade Memorial Trust (IBMT) is seemingly one of those bodies dedicated to upholding the myth of this new Russian Saint Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin.   As evidence of this on the 5th,  October 2019, at the LONDON AGM of the Chair Jim Jump moved a motion expressing dismay at the decision of the European Parliament to approve a remembrance resolution. 

The actual text of the EU resolution,  of which the IBMT so violently disapproves, reads as follows:

'This strand supports activities inviting reflection on European cultural diversity and on common values. It aims to finance projects reflecting on causes of totalitarian regimes in Europe's modern history (especially, but not exclusively, Nazism that led to the Holocaust, Fascism, Stalinism and totalitarian communist regimes) and to commemorate the victims of their crimes.

'This strand also concerns other defining moments and reference points in recent European history. Preference will be given to projects encouraging tolerance, mutual understanding, intercultural dialogue and reconciliation.'

Now the International Brigade resolution, which was agreed unanimously,  begins sa follows:  

'The European Parliament’s recent decision to equate communism with Nazism and to ignore British appeasement of fascism as one of the key factors leading to the Second World War has been roundly condemned by the IBMT.'   

This is the opening wording with which the International Brigade AGM motion begins condemns European Parliament’s remembrance resolution as an ‘insult’ to anti-fascists!   What this IBMT motion blatantly ignores is the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact,^[a] officially known as the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics,^[b] was a non-aggression pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union signed in Moscow on August 23, 1939, by Foreign Ministers Joachim von Ribbentrop and Vyacheslav Molotov, respectively.^[8]

In the end it was the Germans that broke with this pact not the Soviets.  The British International Brigade.  However, it would good if we could conclude the crimes of the Soviet Union with a dodgy pact taken out with a neighbouring regime in the difficult circumstances of the1930s.  Any disinterested observer of 20th century history must know this cannot be the case.  As I write this I am reviewing a book 'THE RESPONSIBILITY OF INTELLECTUALS: Reflections by Noam Chomsky & others after 50 years' which which deals with what honest journalists and academics ought to be doing to tell truth to the powerful.  In this book Craig Murray* writes about 'The abdication of responsibility':  'It is worth noting the clear-eyed recognition in Chamsky's work that the Soviet Union was also a rival empire.  Even while deporing Russophobia and continual threat posture of encirclement - which Chomsky also note in his essay - I always find it is worth reminding people that Russia itself still is an empire.  Much of its current land - and I mean Russia itself, not the former Soviet Republics - was acquired in the nineteenth century by imperial conquest precisely contempororary with British acquisitions in India or indeed the westward expansion of the USA.  These territories are majority Muslim.  Russian imperialism is quite real.'  

This is indeed an inconvenient truth which the IBMT and those who sell the Morning Star may wish to forget.  It's harder to forget the mountains of  corpses in the  Ukrainian Famine of 1933-4 or Stalin's Show Trials and purges in the later 1930s, but George Orwell described in December 1945 in a penetrating essay entitled 'Through a Glass, Rosily', an attack on a Tribune's Vienna correspondent for revealing 100,000 rape cases owing to the inappropriate misbehavior of the Russian occupying troops with the local citizenship.  At that time Orwell argued that some readers of  Tribune seemed to imply that (even if true) the '100,000 rape cases in Vienna are not a good advertisement for the Soviet regime:  therefore, even if they happened, don't mention them.  Anglo-Russian relations are more likely to prosper if inconvenient facts are kept dark.'

What the wrong-headed motion, which originates from the International Brigade Memorial Trust, and is now being promoted by the Morning Star salesmen, is doing is to throw historical facts down the Orwellian 'Memory Hole'.  What these people are saying is 'don't reveal inconvenient facts' like the Ukrainian Famine in 1933-4 or mass rapes by Russian troops of citizens in occupied wartime Vienna or the purges, simply it because it will play into the hands of the enemy.

 But the trouble with this kind of cover-up is that when it gets out that it is false then people tend not to believe you even when you are telling the truth.  The Morning Star itself has few readers and it little credibility in intellectual circles.  By contrast the International Brigade has retained some degree of integrity over the years, but now by associating itself with the motion it risks bring its own organisation into disrepute:  any body who is willing to weigh the management of the Russia's Soviet gulags more favourably than the gas-chambers of Nazi Germany has surely an unenviable task?

Orwell introduced the term 'Inverted Nationalism', to explain how some people came to embrace either Germany or Russia in contrast to their own countries in the 1930s.  With some people on the left somehow the needle got stuck, and despite Russian regime now being committed to the Orthodox Church and passionate Slav nationalism these same people still cling emotionally to this Oriental despotism.  It's as if there is some deep physological need for these attachments.

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*  Craig Murray is author of Murder in Samarkand (Mainstream Publishing, 2006).  Became well known when he resigned as British ambassador to Uzbekistan in protest against British collusion with the Uzbek dictatorship during the 'war on terror'.  He received the Sam Adams Award for Integrity in Intelligence in 2006.

Manchester Anarchist Bookfair Review 2019

 by Christopher Draper

AFTER years of uncomradely bans and exclusions that led to the organisers themselves being banished from this favoured venue it is good to see the Bookfair back at Manchester’s Pumphouse Museum.  Saturday December 7th’s 2019’s fair was efficiently organised with a good range of books, associated literature as well as music, tee-shirts, badges etc on offer.  Admission was free and with a café on site a good time was had by all, or nearly all (more of that later).


Six hour-long talks were advertised:  “Anarchism and Education”; “An Introduction to IWW”;  “What is the Anarchist Party?”; “Marie Louise Berneri’s - Journey Through Utopia”;  “The Government of No One” and “Chav Solidarity” respectively.


Having practiced anarchist education within and without the state system for 50 years I was especially interested in the first talk.  The speaker, Dr. Nick Stevenson, a sociology lecturer at Nottingham University, promised to discuss “more humanistic alternatives” but confined most of his speech to elucidating the ideas of Ivan Illich.  He seemed a nice bloke but this was woefully inadequate as even a basic introduction to “Anarchism and Education”.  Nick seemed blissfully unaware of the numerous practical anarchist educational initiatives that have taken place in Britain since Louis Michel founded her “International School” in London in 1891.  Instead of ivory-towered philosophising about Illich we would have been much better occupied analysing the rise and fall of the dozens of living and breathing free schools that flourished all over Britain in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, never mind the continuing libertarian education on offer at Summerhill.  When I met Nick afterwards he spoke movingly of how his own children had suffered at the hands of the state system and it struck me that this would have provided a better starting point for discussion of real life anarchist alternatives, past, present and future.


My fears of abstract philosophising only increased after attending Dr. Matthew S Adams, Loughborough University lecturer’s talk on Utopias and then Dr. Ruth Kinna’s (another Loughborough lecturer) talk about her book, “The Government of No One”.  I wasn’t reassured when I googled Mr Adams and discovered he’s just published a “Handbook of Anarchism” (Palgrave-MacMillan 2019) that costs £199.99!


Unfortunately the “International Workers of the World” couldn’t even manage to organise themselves so their talk never happened and consequently for the second hour the valuable discussion space remained empty and unused.  I took the opportunity to walk around the hall and chat to stallholders. Despite my lack of affection for Marxism I found the “International Brigade” stallholder most comradely and appreciated our discussion about the decline of politicised working class culture and the collapse of the Clarion movement.   I similarly enjoyed comradely conversations at the Hunt Sabs, PM Press, and West Yorkshire Communist Anarchist stalls and was particularly impressed by the latter’s newsletter that wittily describes Hebden Bridge as, “A nice little drug-town with an unwelcome tourist problem.” 


I’d only half completed my circuit of stallholders by 12.30 so missed “The Anarchist Party’s” talk but as I later learned they advocate voting Labour it’s just as well I didn’t attend.  Unfortunately I had to leave before the last talk to catch a train back to Wales so can’t comment on the “Chavs” although that might well have proved the most useful event of the day (perhaps someone could enlighten us?).

Overall the Bookfair was a great achievement by the organisers. In today’s political climate it’s easier to sit back and do nothing, they dared to bring anarchism back into a venue that is precious but fraught with problems (more of that in a forthcoming article).  They had to steer a difficult course between providing lively debate but avoiding the destructive antagonisms that have so blighted recent anarchist bookfairs.  Unfortunately I learned afterwards that even this event wasn’t free from censorship.  When a group of women from “Make More Noise” attempted to distribute leaflets on gender politics they were asked to leave on the basis that only approved stallholders could distribute literature (there’s more of this on Twitter).  Apparently there was no consequent violence or blacklisting but neither was this an entirely satisfactory conclusion.  Couldn’t the leaflets have been left on a stallholders table or perhaps a table provided for non-stallholders to leave “non-authorised” leaflets?

The organisers must be congratulated but anarchism requires more than sycophancy and the “Freedom” website regrettably treated the “Make More Noise” women and their Twitter supporters with contempt.  My main concern is that the predominance of academic philosophising in the discussion space (3 out of the 5 talks delivered). In the 1960’s Feminism was a revolutionary, libertarian movement (I was there when Germaine Greer spoke at the Warwick University occupation in 1970!) but it spawned “Women’s Studies”, provided safe academic careers, was increasingly commodified and now “Women’s Hour” compiles an annual list “Women’s Powerlist”!  Is anarchism going the same way, with ever more academic chiefs and fewer activist Indians? We mustn’t let professors define our politics or encourage the emergence of an academic “Priest-Class”.  These ivory-towered experts share their musings in the journal “Philosophical Studies” (available at the Bookfair), but how many working class activists are going to read it, let alone write for it, at £14 an issue?   I’m not anti-intellectual but Kropotkin, Russell and Chomsky were also activists and theory must surely be constantly refreshed and informed by struggle to be useful. Anarchist theory and anarchist activism cannot flourish if conducted by separate groups with the former leading the latter – we are not Marxists.


The problem is wider than the Bookfair and I don’t doubt that the academics and the organisers are all nice people but that doesn’t preclude constructive criticism.  I would suggest two modifications for next years Manchester Bookfair.  Firstly no more than one philosophical talk with five more practical workshops led by everyday, down-to-earth anarchists and secondly an open-to-all “Free Speech” stall including material that may well shock and offend, perhaps supported by a “Free Speech” workshop?

For Peace, Love & Anarchy……………………Christopher Draper, Llandudno

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Memorial to Crewe's Spanish Civil War volunteers

¡No Pasaran!

A poignant event took place at Crewe Cemetery on Saturday 4th May, with the unveiling of a bench to commemorate George Fletcher and Edward McQuade, both volunteers in the 15th International Brigade fighting fascism in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39.  Both men are buried in Crewe Cemetery just a few yards away from the bench that now bears their names.

The result of a long and determined campaign by Councillor Joy Bratherton, the ceremony was attended by relatives of the two men, representatives of the International Brigade Memorial Trust, and local civic figures including Laura Smith MP and Cllr. Brian Roberts, Mayor of Crewe and representatives from Unite the Union, Crewe No.1 RMT Branch and ASLEF.

A big shout out has to be made to: Unite (NW region), NW/64 Wharton and Salmesbury, NW/1400/5 Wigan, NW0269 and NW/0270,Crewe and NE/0604 Manchester Central.  All of whom made financial contributions towards the purchase and future maintenance of the memorial.

The Spanish Civil War of 1936-39 is largely eclipsed by the two monumental struggles that went before and immediately after it, and yet it represents a crucial episode in the fight against fascism, militarism and dictatorship.  It is all the more remarkable in that those who fought - some 2,500 of whom came from Britain and Ireland - were volunteers.  They were fighting to uphold democracy and social justice, at a time when Governments (including that of the UK) were actively appeasing fascist dictators in Europe.  Many of them died for the cause and lie to this day in Spanish soil.

Delores Ibárruri, the republican heroine of the Civil War, said of the International Brigades' volunteers - "You are history. You are legend. You are the heroic example of the solidarity and universality of democracy."

George and Edward finally have a proper and fitting recognition of their bravery.

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Quien es el último?:

WHO IS THE LAST ONE?

 The last shall be first. A saying of Jesus; in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus declares that in the world to come, “The last shall be first and the first last.”

by Brian Bamford

A MONTH ago I was Bavaria with some women discussing the English art of queueing and I introduced the Spanish solution to the problem by saying that the Spaniards avoid queueing in an orderly way by standing in a crowd and when someone new turns up they simply ask:  'Quien es el ultimo?'  To which the Germans said:  'No German would ever admit to being the last one!'

I was put in mind of this discussion when I recently had occasion to point out to a lady councillor from Crewe involved with the International Brigade Memorial Trust that the International Brigades had left Spain on the 28th, October 1938 not 1939 as she had proposed on an inscription to commemorate two local volunteers.  Perhaps with justification she quickly argued:  'I would suggest that there were those who remained fighting alongside their Spanish comrades right up to the end after the IB had marched out of Barcelona.'

On their official departure the in October 1939 the International Brigaders had left behind 9,934 dead, 7,686 missing and had suffered 37,541 wounded.  But more than that it was later discovered by the international commission of the League of Nations overseeing the withdrawal of foreign volunteers, were to find about 400 International Brigaders in prisons in and around Barcelona, including Montjuich and the 'Carlos Marx' prison'.  Colonel Ribbing. the Swedish member of the international commission reported:  'As regards the international volunteers, they had sometimes been convicted for pure trifles, sometimes for definite and serious undisciplined behaviour.  Many stated they were accused of espionage and sabotage; most of them protested their complete innocence.'

To any decent person it must have seemed quite shocking that even though the Negrin republican government had agreed to the repatriation of the International Brigade prisoners, the international commission was to find some 400 had been left behind as late as January 1939 just as the nationalist troops were advancing on Barcelona.  

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The Fall of Madrid: March 1939

by Brian Bamford (Sec. of Taneside TUC)

IN SPAIN on this day 80 years ago, the Republican defenders of Madrid raised the white flag over the city, bringing to an end the bloody three-year Spanish conflict entitled the Spanish Civil War  (30^th, March 1939).

In his reflective commemoration of this event Tom Sibley in the Morning Star (Thursday, March 21, 2019) wrote: ‘Until the end of February 1939 Prime Minister Juan Negrin and his only reliable allies, the Communists, were determined to fight on despite a series of crushing military defeats in Catalonia.’

Tom Sibley entitles his column 'The betrayal of Madrid & the triumph of fascism in Spain' but much of his argument seems to be rooted in an earlier article by Paul Preston attacking Orwell's Homage to Catalonia as 'bad history' published in The Observer (7th, May 2017).  

Yet what are we to make of the Spanish Prime Minister Negrin, who while urging the Spanish republicans to stand firm, moves to live close to the port of Alicante and make preparations for evacuation and exile?  No wonder people were puzzled, and even his generals were not convinced complaining of the lack of arms and supplies, and with Admiral Buiza, commander of the fleet, suggesting that without an immediate solution the fleet would have to abandon Spanish waters.

The distinguished military historian, Antony Beevor, in his book The Battle for Spain [2006] wrote: ‘Despite his calls for resistance, Negrin did not install his government in either Madrid or Valencia. He went to live in a villa near Elda, close to the port of Alicante, guarded by 300 communist commandos from XIV Corps. From there, by telephone and teleprinter, he sent a frenetic series of instructions, on the one hand attempting to invigorate the defence of the republican zone, and on the other making preparations for evacuation and exile.’

The International Brigades had already been removed from Spain in October 1938; although the International Brigades are often presented by some as a kind of cavalry saving the Spaniards from Fascism, by September 1938  only 7,102 foreigners were left in the International Brigades.   Antony Beevor in his observation of this decision to withdraw writes:   'It [the withdrawal] was an astute propaganda move, because both the Republic and the nationalists had greatly exaggerated their role'.

All this will have escaped Tom Sibley's attention because in his Morning Star diatribe he is all too anxious to deploy his scatter-gun approach to target George Orwell and his book Homage to Catalonia claiming Orwell 'knowingly misleads his readers to this day'. 

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Tameside TUC joins THE ORWELL SOCIETY

North West trade unionists merge with poet of common decency
by Brian Bamford

THIS year, Tameside Trade Union Council [TUC] in Greater Manchester became the first corporate affiliate of the ORWELL SOCIETY.  This SOCIETY is dedicated to the understanding and appreciation of George Orwell's life and work as one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century.

The Society is a registered charity in the UK and it aims to keep the study of Orwell alive through its educational activities.  The Orwell Society is without political affiliation,and was founded in 2011, and though it is based in the UK its membership is worldwide.  George Orwell (the pen-name for Eric Blair; 1903-1950), was the author of Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four.

The Society's intention is to embrace a grasp of Orwell's life and writings, from his literary criticism to his diaries, and from his political writings to his poetry. . 

Last Friday, the President of Tameside, Derek Pattison, announcing this said:  'In an Age of Post Truth, Fake News, and Alternative Facts, we need George Orwell's guidance more than ever.'  

When I attended the Annual General Meeting of the Orwell Society on the 28th, April this year, I spoke to Richard Blair, the son of George Orwell, and to Quintin Kopp, the son of George Kopp Orwell's commander as captain in the general staff of the 45th Mixed Brigade of the Spanish Republican Army.  Both were anxious to get more participation in the Society from trade unionists such as ourselves.

Since Tameside TUC  first published our booklet commemorating the 70th anniversary of the Spanish Civil War in 2006, and followed this up with the unveiling of a blue plaque for James Keogh in 2011 who died fighting with the republicans in the Spanish Civil War, this trade union council has had a special interest in both George Orwell and his experiences of the Spanish Civil War.

Malcolm Muggeridge in his essay 'A Knight of the Woeful Countenance' wrote about this:
'I FIRST became aware of the existence of George Orwell in the middle thirties when I read some articles of his on the Spanish Civil War which appeared in the New English Weekly, a publication founded by A.R. Orage to expound the principles of Social Credit.  They provided the basis for Homage to Catalonia, one of his best books.  These articles made a great impression on me.  I liked their clear, simple style, and the obvious honesty of purpose which informed them,  They touched a chord of personal sympathy, too.  I saw in Orwell's strong reaction to the villainies of Communist apparat in Spain a compatible experience to my own disgust some years previously with the Soviet regime and its fawning admirers among the intelligentsia of the West as a result of a stint as Moscow correspondent of the Manchester Guardian....'

When we at Tameside TUC began to produce and publish a balanced account of the Spanish Civil War  in 2006, we were confronted with resistance from some elements within the more narrow-minded political left of the trade union movement in Greater Manchester.   These people deliberately tried to stiffle our efforts and those of other local trade unionists to bring about publication.  Both Orwell and Muggeridge had had difficultes getting their articles published by the so-called progressive publishers like Kingsley Martin at the New Statesman and C.P. Scott at the Manchester Guardian, and perhaps even more absurd, was the Victor Gollancz rejection of Animal Farm.

Muggeridge relates how when Orwell and he were lunching together in a Greek restaurant in Percy Street, Orwell asked if he would mind changing places?  When Muggeridge asked him why?  Orwell just said 'he just couldn't bear to look at Kingsley Martin's corrupt face, which, as Kingsley was lunching at an adjoining table, was unavoidable from where he had been sitting before.'

I feel much the same when I am forced to gaze into the faces of Ronald Marsden and his friend Mike Luft of the International Brigade Memorial Trust:  two people who did their utmost to undermine the production of the Tameside TUC memorial booklet about the Spanish Civil War.

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M/c Communist Party Commemoration:

Mrs Brown's Boys

‘From Manchester to Spain’: a commemoration of the life of George Brown; 2pm-4pm at the Waldorf Hotel, Gore Street, Manchester M1 3AQ; organised by the George Brown Commemoration Committee, Greater Manchester Communist Party and local IBMT members.

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LAST Saturday, the Manchester communists held a commemoration to George Brown who died fighting for the republican government in Spain during the Spanish Civil War.  

The event was introduced by Liz Payne, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Britain,

Slimmer and less charismatic than Boris Johnson, but with a similar shade of hair and equally plummy-voice, she introduced the event which with 30-odd in attendance was notable for its lack of young people.
Charles Jepson, a cheeky mustachioed J.P. from Blackburn, gave the talk on George Brown stressing his Irish roots and Communist Party connections.  It seems that George was distressed about the support for Franco prevailing in Ireland at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War.  The Roman Catholics were he said concerned about the attacks on the churches by Catalan and Spanish anarchist trade unionists.  Mr. Jepson himself taught at a high class Catholic school in Lancashire, and has sympathies for the IRA.
Mr. Jepson did not mention George's brother Michael Brown who was one of the earlier volunteers in the Spanish conflict, but who is sometimes classed as a 'deserter'. 

One account describes Michael experience thus:
'While Michael Brown was among the first group of British-based volunteers, arriving before the International Brigades were set up. He joined the No. 1 Coy. XIV Battalion at Lopera in late December 1936, a battle where the newly arrived volunteers were brutally attacked by the fascist troops. Having gone through this battle, Michael returned to Britain,...'

Tameside TUC & its enemies

The Tameside TUC booklet to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Spanish Civil War, first published in 2006, which interestingly was immediately confronted by elements in the Manchester International Brigade Memorial Trust such as Mike Luft who initially tried to suppress its production, but when they failed it went on to described Michael Brown as living in Harperhey, Manchester as follows:  'Deserted in December 1936, declaring:  'this isn't a war, this is bloody madness.  I've had enough.'

Tameside TUC's booklet states:  'George Brown from Platting, Manchester:  Secretary of Manchester Communist Party Branch.  Political commissar in Spain.  Killed at Villanueva de la Cañada in July 1937.'

Mr. Jepson said George Brown was wounded in Madridand he pointed out George Brown was a well-established leader of the workers’ movement in Manchester, who is on record as being the most senior member of the Communist Party of Great Britain to be killed in action in Spain.  He was a full-time worker for the Party and a member of its national leadership, the Central Committee.
The mood music in George Brown's birth place the Irish Republic in 1936, was supportive of Franco, and the Irish Brigade (Spanish: Brigada Irlandesa, "Irish Brigade" Irish: Briogáid na hÉireann) fought on the Nationalist side of Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War.  The unit was formed wholly of Roman Catholics by the politician Eoin O'Duffy, who had previously organised the banned quasi-fascist Blueshirts and openly fascist Greenshirts in Ireland.
Jepson said that all this seeing General Franco as a saviour of the Roman Catholic Church disturbed George Brown, and he backed the 320 volunteers – both resident in Ireland or members of the ‘Irish Diaspora’ from the far-flung corners of the globe -  were part of a 45,000 strong army of private individuals from all walks of life resolved to stem the rise of fascism.  The majority of these volunteers served with the International Brigades, others were involved with various militias, and still more were engaged in medical and other support services. Over 55 different nationalities were represented.

'Sentimental Tripe' !

Another speaker talked about his aunty Evelyn Jones who was George Brown's wife, and who later after Georges death married Jack Jones, the man who later was to become the leader of the Transport & General Workers Union.  She was for a time a member of the Communist Party, and had been a Comintern courier during the Spanish Civil War.  
The talk was of interest but given that 10,000 police from other regions of Spain had been moved into Catalonia on the eve of the Catalan referendum the whole event had the feel of a Sunshine Club for elderly folk.  I was put in mind of what George Orwell wrote in his review of 'Volunteer in Spain', the book by international brigader John Sommerfield:  which Orwell described it thus:
'it may seem ungracious to say that this book is a piece of sentimental tripe; but so it is.'  
Sentimental tripe dogs these commemorations of the International Brigade Memorial Trust to this very day, as we witnessed last Saturday, and as we experienced when Tameside TUC published its own publication which tried to give a fair and balanced account of the local contributions of the international brigade volunteers in the struggle against Franco's fascists.  The problem with the International Brigade Memorial Trust is that it tries to present the British contingent of the International Brigade volunteers as a kind of cavalry, which stood in defence of democratic values between the people of Spain and Franco's fascists and the Moors.  In playing up the contribution of the international brigade at the expense of the Spanish working-class it often borders on hispanophobia.

Why was Spain the first country to seriously resist Fascism?

Ignazio Silone wrote in his book 'School for Dictators':

'Compare the respective attitudes towards fascism of the Spanish workers and the Germans.  The difference in national character can explain only part of the different way of reacting to the enemy's attack.  The growth in big industry has been a powerful help in reinforcing the tendency of Germans - workers included - towards zusammenmarschieren (mass-man marching together).... Individual initiative has been reduced to zero.'

The fact is the Spaniards were the first to seriously resist fascism because of the history and rural roots, which allowed anarchism to develop in cities like Barcelona to influence the labour movement.  We see the effects of this today in the general strike that is now taking place against the police brutality that took place during the Catalan referendum.
Pedro Cuadrado who was in the republican police in Barcelona in 1936, and later lived in Bolton, said that Barcelona was the first city to halt the march of fascism.

Because many, if not most of the members of the International Brigade Memorial Trust are super-annuated former British communist party members, they have difficulty understanding a cultures such as that of the Catalans and the Spaniards.

Wigan Pier'& the Spanish Civil War

The Spanish Civil War and Wigan

Museum of Wigan Life
Tuesday 28th February
12 noon – 1pm
Price: £2.50 per person (incl. tea/coffee)  booking required

We mark the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Jarama when the International Brigades helped stop Franco’s advance on Madrid during the Spanish Civil War.  What made local people up sticks and fight for democracy and socialism in another country?  What was the background to this international conflict?  Find out more about the passion and sacrifice of the young volunteers of the International Brigades and their supporters both here and in Spain.

George Orwell – The Road to Wigan Pier at 80!
Stephen Armstrong

Museum of Wigan Life
Tuesday 7th March
12 noon – 1pm
Price: £2.50 per person (incl. tea/coffee)  booking required

Stephen Armstrong, author of The Road to Wigan Pier Revisited, marks the 80th birthday of Orwell’s original book with this fascinating talk about Eric Blair (George Orwell) and his writing.  Orwell researched his book in the old reference library, now the Museum of Wigan Life, and his work has sometimes been controversial in the town.  Armstrong examines the context in which Orwell wrote and his approach to social reportage.  Come along and find out more about Wigan’s relationship with one of the 20th century’s most important writers.

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Our thanks to Community History Manager Lynda Jackson in Wigan for the details.

'Dare Devil Rides To Jarama'

Sponsored by the Trade Unions.

Marking the 80th anniversary of the Spanish Civil War, Dare Devil Rides to Jarama is a new play by Townsend Productions based on the experiences of International Brigade volunteers during the Spanish Civil War. In particular it focuses on Clem Beckett, a Lancashire blacksmith and famous star of the speedway track, who joined the International Brigade to defend freedom and democracy against Franco's rising fascist armies.
 This extraordinary story will be presented for two nights only at the Library - Friday 27 and Saturday 28 January 2017 at 7.30pm.   Tickets price £12 (£10 concessions) are available.  Further information from 07949 635910.

Townsend Productions, in association with IBMT Harrogate Theatre, The Place Bedford and Unite the Union, present

'Dare Devil Rides To Jarama' by Neil Gore

Go see 'Dare Devil rides to Jarama'.

Be entertained,be wiser,laugh & be angry. Fascism's not yet dead.' Rodney Bickerstaffe

An amazing story of Wall of Death motorcycle rider Clem “Dare Devil” Beckett and Marxist writer and poet Christopher Caudwell, at first sight two unlikely friends and comrades, who were thrown together by their shared determination to defend the Spanish republic against Franco’s rising fascist tide.

Marking the 80th anniversary of the Spanish Civil War, Dare Devil Rides To Jarama is a world premiere based on the experiences of The International Brigades during The Spanish Civil War. Looking at the powerful political and economic forces that engulfed 1930s Europe, Dare Devil Rides to Jarama follows the life of why so many ordinary people made the extraordinary choice to leave family and livelihoods and fight in a brutal war so far from home.
When Spaniards rose up to resist General Franco's military rebellion in 1936, it was an inspiration to millions of people worldwide.  Their heroic struggle alerted the rest of the world to the threat of fascism. Dare Devil Rides To Jarama commemorates and celebrates the contribution and sacrifice of the Volunteer International Brigades, including two and a half thousand from Britain and Ireland.
Compelling and humorous, Dare Devil Rides To Jarama focuses on the contrasting lives of Clem Beckett, born in Oldham and famous star of the speedway track around Manchester and the North, and Christopher Caudwell, a renowned writer, poet and philosopher.  Both men were killed together at Jarama in February 1937, having become friends as members of the British Battalion's machine-gun company.
Through stirring song, poetry and compelling movement and dance, Dare Devil Rides To Jarama captures the raw passions and emotions of the time. Musical direction is from acclaimed folk singer and squeeze box player John Kirkpatrick. The play has a particular resonance in our current climate as it examines how the economic pressures in the 1930s contributed to the rise of xenophobic tendencies throughout Europe and the failure of a unified left to join together to successfully challenge these forces. Dare Devil Rides To Jarama aims to bring the full story of the compelling dispute to life in this powerful and thought-provoking new play. This production follows Townsend Productions’ critically acclaimed United We Stand, The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists and We Will Be Free.
Director Louise Townsend comments, This project is a tremendous opportunity to tell this very intricate and extraordinary story of exceptional people. The challenge is twofold - to do justice to their achievements and to reflect the dense, turbulent political and historical times.
Writer Neil Gore comments, The play is an exciting and evocative piece about the incredible contribution made by the volunteers that made up the International Brigades to fight the forces of fascism and to uphold the power of democracy. It is also an important examination of the fascinating and brilliant life of Clem Beckett who achieved so much in such a short time as a top speedway rider and a rider in the Wall of Death around Europe.        

The Value of Eye-Witness Accounts

By Brian Bamford CENTRAL to Colin Ward's critique of anarchist analysis and practice in the 1960s, was his belief that it was too obsessed with history and historical accounts.  That is too focused on the historical narrative of what had transpired in earlier times, and lacking an awareness of the here and now, and what people like me who have been brought up in anthropological study or ethnomethodology may call 'the missing what-ness'.  In May 2011, I gave paper at the Bristol Anarchist Bookfair entitled:  'Pro. Preston and George Orwell: The varieties of historical investigation and experience'.  It was an attempt to access the qualitative value differing accounts such as that of the academic historian Professor Paul Preston and George Orwell's more ethnographic eye-witness studies and descriptions.  At that event a young lad asked me to define the meaning of 'ethnography' and, as I recall, at the time I fancy I gave a rather poor and unsatisfactory description. The cultural anthropologist, ethnographer, and author Brian A. Hoey has defined the term thus: 'The term ethnography has come to be equated with virtually any qualitative research project where the intent is to provide a detailed, in-depth description of everyday life and practice. This is sometimes referred to as “thick description” — a term attributed to the anthropologist Clifford Geertz writing on the idea of an interpretive theory of culture in the early 1970s (e.g., see The Interpretation of Cultures, first published as a collection in 1973). The use of the term “qualitative” is meant to distinguish this kind of social science research from more “quantitative” or statistically oriented research.'  That quote represents a rather overly technical explanation for what I wanted to deal with at my talk at the Bristol Anarchist Bookfair in 2011.  What I was asking was more straight forward: 'Is a modern history, written in a library by a professional historian such as that of Professor Preston's, to be preferred to a first-hand account of the conflict written almost in the heat of battle, or shortly afterwards? Will not the professional historian and scholar's account be more objective than that written by the former combatant and novelist? Is not the one clearly superior to the other? If not, how do we judge and value these differing contributions? '  These questions are important and not just to anarchists.  Pro. Preston himself has openly attempted to rubbish the work of George Orwell when some years ago at a gathering of the International Brigade Memorial Trust he declared George Orwell's  'Homage to Catalonia' , and said: 'It is not a bad book but the trouble is, it is the only book many people read on the Spanish Civil War' or words to that effect. Pro. Preston suggested that 'Homage to Catalonia' was a book written about the Spanish War from the narrow perspective of someone who had only spent six or seven months involved in the conflict on a quiet front in the North of Spain - Aragon & Catalonia - and, that it left out much which the professional historian could now encompass supported, as he is, by the enriched 'body of scholarship which has been published in Spanish, Catalan, English ... since 1996' (see Preface to Preston's ‘The Spanish Civil War’ [2006]).  Can the professional historian have a better insight into the nature of a conflict like the Spanish Civil War than a combatant who was actually there like George Orwell?  In one of his 'As I please' essays Orwell comments on Sir Walter Raleigh:  'who when he was imprisoned in the Tower of London, occupied himself with writing a history of the world. He had finished the first volume and was at work on the second when there was a scuffle between some workmen beneath the window of his cell, and one of the men was killed. In spite of diligent enquiries, and in spite of the fact that he had actually seen the thing happen, Sir Walter was never able to discover what the quarrel was about; whereupon, so it is said -- and if the story is not true it certainly ought to be -- he burned what he had written and abandoned his project.'   Orwell took the view that Sir Walter Raleigh was wrong to abandon the project.  I think that the two approaches to historical analysis are best described by Pro. Hoey below.  Pro. Hoey distinguishes the two approaches:  'Ethnographers generate understandings of culture through representation of what we call an emic perspective, or what might be described as the “‘insider’s point of view.” The emphasis in this representation is thus on allowing critical categories and meanings to emerge from the ethnographic encounter rather than imposing these from existing models. An etic perspective, by contrast, refers to a more distant, analytical orientation to experience.' and he continues:  'While an ethnographic approach to social research is no longer purely that of the cultural anthropologist, a more precise definition must be rooted in ethnography’s disciplinary home of anthropology. Thus, ethnography may be defined as both a qualitative research process or method (one conducts an ethnography) and product (the outcome of this process is an ethnography) whose aim is cultural interpretation. The ethnographer goes beyond reporting events and details of experience. Specifically, he or she attempts to explain how these represent what we might call “webs of meaning” (Geertz again), the cultural constructions, in which we live.'  Following another talk commemoration the anniversary of the Spanish Civil War, that I and the Anarchist Federation comrade Luis Mates gave in Newcastle at an event organised by Dave Douglass together with the International Brigade Memorial Trust up there, also in 2011,  one questioner pointed out that he had been to the spot in Barcelona where George Orwell had been confronted with the street fighting in Barcelona, and this questioner claimed that Orwell, from where he was standing, was not in a position to witness the events as he had claimed to do.  This represents another problem.  What can the eye-witness actually see?  Is the witness on the spot claiming too much in his account?  A recent example of this would seem to be Mr. Jason Holdway's comment on the post 'PENSIONER ATTACKED at ANARCHIST HQ!':  'I was there and frankly Brian's behavior was bizarre and completely counter productive. He caused his injuries when he tried to shoulder barge his way back in to the building, rebounding off someone half his age and fell sprawling onto the pebbled floor. I can only conclude that Brian's provocative behaviour was precisely designed to create a situation where he could make some claim to victimhood. on PENSIONER ATTACKED at ANARCHIST HQ!'  This above  is an eye-witness account of the events in Angel Alley on the 22nd, June this year.  Jason Holdway was indeed there in Angel Alley at the time, as he had been nominated for a place on the Friends of Freedom Press by the Secretary Steve Sorba, who was himself at the time of the attack on me presiding over the Annual General Meeting of the Friends of Freedom Press in an upstairs room at 84B, Whitechapel High Street.  Mr. Holdway makes some preliminary observations about my behaviour before going on to claim ' He caused his injuries when he tried to shoulder barge his way back in to the building, rebounding off someone half his age and fell sprawling onto the pebbled floor'.   How can he know that?  Did he see the blood begin to flow at that moment?  Perhaps he saw a fountain of blood smeared across the 'pebbled floor' in Angel Alley?  I have been witness to number of these kind of events - in sit-in strikes and sit-downs - and afterwards it is not so easy for the actual participant or 'victim' to say precisely when the damage occurred.  But Mr Holdway goes further to make an even more remarkable conclusion:  'I can only conclude that Brian's provocative behaviour was precisely designed to create a situation where he could make some claim to victimhood.'  What Mr. Holdway is doing here is claiming to have solved 'the problem of other minds'!   He is claiming effectively not only that the injuries were self-inflicted because of my 'behaviour [which] was bizarre',  but also that he has the insight to know my full intentions or what the solicitor's call the mens rea.  The notion of mens rea or intention is a problem for lawyers and the courts, but it is also a problem for social scientists.  Clearly the ethnographer has many problems no less than the professional historian, and slipshod treatment of the subject can always occur in our accounts.  But as has been pointed out it is probable that an ethnographic eye-witness account such as that of George Orwell's 'Homage to Catalonia' will probably survive better that many of the histories of the Spanish Civil War that are currently being written.  In short it possesses the 'missing what-ness'!

Felicia Brown on 'Woman's Hour'

Sent in by Joe Bailey

FELICIA Brown was a British artist who was killed in 1936 while fighting Franco's fascist forces in Spain. She was the only British woman to have engaged in combat in the Spanish Civil War. She was also a very good artist. On the 80th anniversary of the Spanish Civil War we (on Woman's Hour)reflect on her life and work.

Presenter: Emma Barnett
Interviewed guest: Niamh Ni Mhaoileoin
Interviewed guest: Julie Gottlieb
Interviewed guest: Caroline Brothers
Interviewed guest: Karen Krizanovich
Interviewed guest: Rhianna Dhillon
Interviewed guest: Sonia Boue
Interviewed guest: Pauline Fraser
Producer: Lucinda Montefiore.

Crowd Funding & Townsend Productions

PLEASE CAN WE HAVE YOUR FEEDBACK? WE ARE THINKING OF USING CROWD FUNDING TO RAISE MONEY TO BE ABLE TO EMPLOY AN EXTRA ACTOR FOR OUR NEW PROJECT " DARE DEVIL RIDES TO JARAMA" Hello We are thinking of using a device that many artists and theatre companies use today to raise money for their project and it's called Crowd funding. How it works is that individuals/ companies can donate small amounts of money which after a period of time builds up into a bigger sum of money, hopefully! The reason we are thinking of doing this even though we have had some amazing sponsorship from our associates the IBMT & The Trade Unions NASUWT, FBU, UNITE, UNISON and the GMB  we are just short of being able to employ another actor in the show. However I would like some feedback on this to see if people /companies think this is a good idea, would you be willing to pledge and/or help share the information on social media. Please e mail me directly: townsendproductions@hotmail.co.uk Below is what the content Crowd Funding document will say. Many Thanks Louise - 07949635910  e-mail: townsendproductions@hotmail.co.uk TRAILER https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SqGCLotudo

'Dare Devil Rides To Jarama'

Townsend Productions in association with Harrogate Theatre and The Place Bedford  'DARE DEVIL RIDES TO JARAMA' A new play by Neil Gore TICKETS ON SALE NOW FOR AUTUMN 2016 UK TOUR. View this email in your browser

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DARE DEVIL RIDES TO JARAMA:  A new play by Neil Gore Spain 1936: Speedway star and daring Wall of Death motorcycle rider Clem "Dare Devil" Beckett felt his place was with Spanish people defending freedom and democracy against Franco's rising fascist armies. Commissioned by the International Brigades Memorial Trust, this play tells his extraordinary story as part of the 80th Anniversary of the Spanish Civil War and the formation of the International Brigades. AUTUMN TOUR DATES 2016:  TICKETS NOW ON SALE!!!!! SEPTEMBER 24 The Place Bedford (Box office: www.theplacebedford.org.uk; 01234718112) 26 -30 Harrogate Theatre (boxoffice@harrogatetheatre.co.uk; 01423502116) OCTOBER 1 Harrogate Theatre (boxoffice@harrogatetheatre.co.uk;01423502116) 4 Loganlea Miners Welfare (Box office: The Pitstop, 01501-763354) 5 North Edinburgh Arts   (Box office: 0131 315 2151; northedinburgharts.co.uk)    6 -7 Lowry Salford (Box office: 0843 208 6000; Groups Line: 0843 208 6003) 8 Waterside Theatre, Aylesbury  (Box office: 08448717607; www.atgtickets.com/shows/aylesbury) 11 Guildhall Derby (boxoffice@derby.gov.uk; 01332 255800) 12-15 Oldham Coliseum (Box office: 01616242829; www.coliseum.org.uk) 18-19 Castle Wellingborough   (Box office: 01933270007; www.thecastle.org.uk) 20 Chilwell Arts Centre Beeston (Box office: 07861 308044) 21 The Lansdown Hall Stroud (Box office: The Subscription Rooms 01453 760900) 22 The Seagull, Lowestoft  (Box office: 01502 589726; www.theseagull.co.uk) 24- 29 The Bussey Building Peckham (Box office: online www.clfartcafe.org; 02077325275) 30 The Marx Memorial Library London [extracts & songs] (Box office: 02072531485; www.marxlibrary.org.uk)                                                                                                     NOVEMBER 1 Hertford Theatre (Box office: 01992 531500; www.hertfordtheatre.com) 2 Wedgwood Rooms, Southsea (Box office: Wedgewood Rooms 02392863911  Kings Theatre 02392828282) 3 The Plough Arts Centre, Gt Torrington (Box office: 01805624624; www.theploughartscentre.org.uk)                                                                        4 Dorchester Arts Centre (Box office: 01305 266926; www.dorchesterarts.org.uk) 5 Bridport Arts Centre (Box office: www.bridport-arts.com; 01308 424204 7 Theatre Royal Margate (boxoffice@margatewintergardens.co.uk; 01843 292795) 10 Barnsley Civic (Box office: 01226 327000; enquirie@barnsleycivic.co.uk) 12 Cast Doncaster (Box office: 01302 303 959; castindoncaster.com) 13 Severn Theatre Shrewsbury (Box office: 01743 281281; www.theatresevern.co.uk) 14 -19 Lantern Theatre Sheffield (Box office: 0114 255 1776; www.lanterntheatre.org.uk) 22 -23 St Michaels Irish Centre, Liverpool (Box office: Box Office: 0151 263 1808 / www.stmichaelsirishcentre.org ) 24 - 26  Yorkshire rural touring scheme www.blaize.uk.net  dates to be announced. 29 Lighthouse Poole (Box office: 0844 406 8666; www.lighthouse poole.co.uk) 30 The Place Bedford (Box office: www.theplacebedford.org.uk; 01234718112) DECEMBER 1 Square Chapel Halifax (Box office: 01422349422; www.squarechapel.co.uk) 2 The Hat Factory Luton (Box office: 01582 878100; http://www.lutonculture.com/hat-factory) 3 Ruskin College Oxford (Box office: 01865 759600; www.ruskin.ac.uk)