Sources
Belfast Memorial to Volunteers
Winner of the "The shortest lived SCW memorial" contest
Updated, November 8th 2007
The International Brigades Commemoration Committee was pleased to erect their memorial to the 78 men born in Northern Ireland who participated in the 1936-39 Spanish Civil War.
The Memorial was designed by Anto Brennan, of Open Window Productions, and is comprised of an Armagh granite base with a bronze sculpture of a volunteers head on an map of Spain.
For various reasons the memorial has faced delays over the past 2 years and 8 months - that's how lnog we've been trying to get a memorial And at the last minute there were more problems, delays with the planners.
The IBCC is linked to the overall veterans group, the International Brigades Memorial Trust and when the IBMT said it was going to have it's annual general meeting in Belfast on October 13th, we said we'd have a memorial. And we did, no matter how briefly. The memorial was unveiled by Bob Doyle, the last surviving Irish Brigadista, he fought in Spain. [There is one other Irish veteran of the war, Paddy Cochrane, a medic.] Bob was accompanied on the trip to Belfast by Jack Jones, President of the IBMT and Jack Edwards, a Liverpool volunteer.
There was a sizeable attendance at the unveiling, with representatives of at least 18 families of Irish veterans present - along obviously with representatives of numerous British volunteers as well.
Irish Veterans represented included the following. I'm sure I've missed some names, please get in touch to let me know, Saturday was a bit on the busy side of things | |
| Those volunteers indicated by BOLD either died in Spain or during World War 2 as they continued the anti-fascist struggle. | |
| Frank Edwards - by his son | Gerry Doran - by his daughters - Ann and Gerry |
| Joe Boyd - by his daughter Liz Shaw and other family members | Fred McMahon by his daughter Paddy and son Alan |
| Henry McGrath - by his nephew Tommy and other family members | Dick O'Neill - by a nephew |
| James Domegan - by his sister and nephew | Liam Tumilson - by his cousin Paddy |
| Jim Stranney - by his sister, Maureen and other family members. | Patsy McAllister - by his niece Eileen. |
| Mick O'Riordan - by his son Manus and other family members. | Peter O'Connor - by his son Emmet. |
| Tommy Hyndman - by Tommy Barr, a cousin. | Richard McAleenan - by niece, Carmel Hanna |
| Charlie Donnelly - by his sister and other family members. | Frank Ryan - by his cousin Cecilia. |
| Jim Haughey - by Sean and Brendan - 2 nephews | Ben Murray - by his great-nephew Brian |
A fuller report will be added later, but here are a few photographs from the unveiling, etc. There WILL be a follow up rededication event when we can finally erect the memorial, literally put it in concrete, etc. Anyone who wants to be notified should get in touch.
Ciaran Crossey, Belfast, 15th October.
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BBC News report, 15th October This links thru to the BBC webpage which has another couple of photographs as well. |
Opening remarks by IBCC secretary, Kevin Doherty. |
| Address by Joe Donnelly to the IBMT/IBCC events. He is the brother of Charlie Donnelly but was unable to attend the weekends events due to ill health. | Extracts from Speech by Minister Margaret Ritchie at the unveiling |
| Morning Star, October 16, 2007 Marking the Brigades, by Ann Douglas. |
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| New Worker International News, 26 October 2007 Belfast celebrates International Brigades, by Dolly Shaer |
This is class war |
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