On the road again

Tomorrow early, to guide a tour of (most of) the battlefields where the British Battalion fought in the Spanish Civil War. Seeing where they fought, badly trained, ill-equipped and more often than not horrendously badly led, one can only feel sorrow that the cause they believed in so passionately turned out to be as bad as the one they fought against.

Members of the "Tom Mann Centuria", the first organized group of British volunteers, in Barcelona, September 1936.

Left to right Sid Avner (killed 20 December 1936 at Boadilla serving with the Thaelmann Battalion), Nat Cohen and his future wife Ramona, CPGB organizer Tom Wintringham (wounded twice but survived), Italian journalist George Tioli, Aussie Jack Barry (killed 19 December 1936 at Boadilla serving with the Commune de Paris Battalion) and David Marshall (wounded with the Thaelmann on 12 November 1936, repatriated).