Dear Friends in the KFSR
Advance notice
We are writing to invite you to the opening event of the International Brigade Memorial Trust
(IBMT) Annual General Meeting in Belfast City Hall on the Friday 3rd of October 2025 in
the evening. The actual AGM will take place on the Saturday the 4th October. The local
organisation in the North of Ireland are hosting the AGM this year.
As a fraternal organisation we would like you to join us for the opening and other events that
will take place. We have a social event in the Dockers Club on Saturday 4th with a number of
singers.
We are preparing a programme of events for the weekend and I enclose a draft outline of the
programme which will be produced in September. We hope that you will put this date into your
diary, and let us know if you can come. As you know the IBMT represents relatives and
supporters of the International Brigaders from Ireland, England, Scotland and Wales, who
fought against fascism in Spain 1936-1939. You may already have received details of the AGM
from the IBMT.
You may know that the IBMT held its AGM in Belfast in 2007 and Brigaders Bob Doyle, Jack
Jones and Frankie Edwards unveiled a memorial in Writers Square, sponsored by the
International Brigade Commemoration Committee. (IBCC) Sadly, they are no longer with us
for this AGM, but we hope that relatives, friends, supporters will be. (The IBCC is the local
organisation who are hosting the 3-day event.)
Since then IBCC have held events to keep the values and memory of the brigaders alive. Every
year we hold an event in the Féile an Phobail in the Shankill Road Library and in 2014 we
placed a plaque in the library to the brigaders. In 2015 we initiated the placing of a stained
glass window in the Belfast City Hall.
We are concerned that the Brigader’s fight against fascism is seen as history; Bob Doyle put it
correctly when he spoke at the launch of his book in Belfast in 2006. “Some of you may wonder
why a 90-year-old veteran of a war that happened a long time ago in a far off country is here
speaking to you today. Some of you who know a little about the Spanish Civil War may see it
as a glamorous episode in working class history. Perhaps you have come to see me, a decrepit
romantic relic. I am here to make your blood boil with anger; the powers that supported Franco
in are still active, and today their reach is global.”
We hope that you are able to join us on for events the 3rd -5th of October, but especially the
opening event in the City Hall where we would ask the KFSR to give a short greeting along
with others that we have asked. Please let us know if you can come.
In comradeship,
Lynda Walker and Luke O’ Riordan-IBMT-- Joint secretaries for Ireland
Ciaran Crossey: Chairperson IBCC------Ernest Walker: Secretary IBCC
