to steward the big meetings taking place in Conway Hall, Farringdon Hall and Kingsway Hall. Appeals were made for money, food and support—they were very enthusiastic meetings.
I remember clearly, when the revolt started, how immediately the whole of the left-wing movement rallied in support of Spain. The majority of the people, however, didn’t take much interest and a good many were influenced by the press of the time, which condemned it as a Bolshevik, anti-Christian revolution. On our side we got to know early on about the real issues in Spain. The formation of the International Brigades gave it a personal interest, as people we knew began to make their way there. Very quickly we began to know the background to the Spanish struggle and the campaign in support of the Spanish Government grew in strength. Soon after the start of the civil war, Mussolini and Hitler sent Italian and German armies and air force over to help Franco. The Spanish Government, the legitimate government of the day, tried to buy arms. Britain and France were able to win the support of the League of Nations on a policy of so-called ‘non-intervention’. The reality of non-intervention meant that the Spanish Government was unable to buy arms, while the Fascists were free to buy what they wanted. The Spaniards were only able to get arms from Russia in a limited quantity, and from Mexico. Right through the war the army of the Spanish Government was far worse equipped than the Fascist side.
In Britain the movement grew in a number of ways. An organisation called British Medical Aid had been set up to raise money for ambulances. Very soon they opened first one and then another hospital in Spain. British doctors and nurses went to service these and other front-line hospitals. There was a great campaign to raise money and whole lorryloads of food were sent. There were also the youth food ships for Spain, which brought regular supplies. The British navy blockaded the coast and tried to stop the food ships, but several got through the blockade. Then, very soon, the refugees from the Basque country came over—we had several hundred Basque children in Britain who were looked after mostly in and around London. I think hardly a week went by without demonstrations and meetings taking place. Gradually the movement grew and became a very powerful crusade.
While this was happening individuals were going to Spain, isolated from each other, and joining one of the Republican units when they got there. Then the call went out throughout the whole world for volunteers to form the International Brigades.
One evening myself and Lilian and my dear friend Ben Glazer walked along the Embankment. We walked—stopped at many coffee stalls—talking, wondering what it would be like in Spain. We didn’t finally decide until we reached a coffee stall at Westminster Bridge, opposite the House of Commons. I think we had already decided to go, but didn’t say so in as many words. I think we were deeply fearful in our hearts, but none of us wanted to show our fears. What would it be like? Would we ever come back? What if we were captured? And when we decided—how we embraced! Lilian kissed us both. We linked arms and walked almost cheerfully down Whitehall to the all-night Lyons Corner House just off Trafalgar Square for more coffee and eggs and bacon. From there we decided that tomorrow morning we would go and volunteer.
Lilian and Ben both went off the next day. It was the last time I was to see Ben.
I was accepted, but the Party asked me to hold fire for three or four weeks while I cleared up the work that I was involved in as secretary. When I got to work next day I handed in my notice, and the Father of Chapel in charge of the print said, ‘What do you think you’re doing? You can’t just walk out, jobs are very precious.’ But I said, ‘I’m going to Spain.’ In those days an apprenticeship was so important—if you got a job you’d got it for life.
While Lilian went with the British Medical Aid Committee, Ben and the others had to make their own way to Paris, then through the Pyrenees. If you went through the British Medical Aid you could get your passport and the visa for Spain—but you also had to sign a document at the Foreign Office saying that if you were in trouble you wouldn’t call on the British Ambassador. That was fine. Lilian and I sold our home and gave our stuff away. I went to live in a room with Phil Piratin in east London, pending the time when I was ready to go. When I went along, blow me, they had changed the arrangements and they no longer, at least at that particular time, accepted anybody without military experience.
What to do? I went to the British Medical Aid and they said, ‘Yes, we will have you, if you can drive a lorry and service it.’ Again, what to do? So I went along to a garage in Walworth Road, offered my services free if I could be taught how to change wheels, change tyres, drive a lorry, etc. I went every evening after work and worked there for seven or eight hours. After about three or four weeks I felt competent enough to drive a lorry, went back to the Medical Aid and said I was ready to go on my motorbike but could also drive an ambulance or a lorry. I went off three or four days later.
My mother knew that Lilian had gone and kept asking, ‘Are you going?’ and ‘Must you go?’ and all the things a mother would say. I was anxious not to upset her, and, in the clumsy way most young people deal with these matters, I said that, if she was going to cry every time I came round before leaving, I wouldn’t come again—just go off. An awful thing to say!
I asked a friend to be present when I said goodbye. There was I, all packed, equipped with a new pair of leather leggings, leather gloves, leather jacket—which I had never had before. I kissed my mother goodbye, turned around the top of the road and waved. Later I was told she didn’t cry until I had gone, and then she broke down.
Came the day when I was going, word got round. I belonged to a club, the YCL (Young Communist League), and some dockers all came to the top of the street, Adler Street, between Whitechapel and Commercial Road, to see me off. There must have been several hundred, because I was still one of the first. I got on my bike, waved to them and started off. You won’t believe this: I didn’t have a map. I had no idea which way to go. All I knew was to get to the Elephant and Castle and head for Dover. I had my passport, visa and signed documents from the Foreign Office and knew I had to make my way to Barcelona. I can’t remember how I ever got there. I vaguely remember going right across France, making my way to the south.
I used to sleep by the roadside every night—I didn’t have money for lodgings. I had to get to Perpignan [to enter Spain] and how on earth I got there I don’t know. I had just a little money the crowd in London had collected for me so I could eat on the road. When I got to Perpignan I thought, ‘at last, Spain’. I looked and I couldn’t see any signs but I saw a crowd of workers having a cup of tea in a café. I went up to them and asked which was the way to Spain. They couldn’t speak English and I couldn’t speak Spanish, so I said, ‘Me, Spain, “Boom Boom!”.’ So when they stopped laughing they gathered round me, gave me a meal, and showed me the road to España, the first time I’d ever seen the sign for España.
My first real recollection of Spain was arriving at a great castle at Figueres—an enormous place—and outside the gates were two men on sentry duty. I stopped and asked them where to go. They spoke a little English and opened the gate. I rode in through this gate and the square of the castle was like a fort—as big as Trafalgar Square—hundreds if not thousands of men sitting around talking. I later learnt that was the first staging post for the people who had climbed the Pyrenees. I was the first one who had arrived on a motorbike. I think it was an American who first said to me, ‘If you want to keep that bike, never leave it, even to go to the bog—because there are so many people who would like to have your bike.’
There were literally hundreds who had found their way to the castle at Figueres. They’d walked over the mountains and they had their feet seen to and were given food. Each group from the different countries gathered together. There was a group from Britain and I went and joined them, and they were very keen to see a bloke with a motorbike. Several asked me if they could travel with me on the bike, but I said no—I was going to pick my wife up.
I went to Barcelona where the offices of the Brigade were. Remembering what the American had said, I saw a policeman and tried to explain to him—though
