Uniting against fascism

Unite’s legacy unions in Ireland and the Spanish Civil War Unite’s legacy unions in Ireland and the Spanish Civil War PPPPP May 2017 ¡NO PASARÁN! Preface

“When the vile creed of fascism is again raising its ugly head it is vital for the young people of today to learn the lesson taught in Spain – the great lesson of unity. We need that unity more than ever today when fascism is on the rise all over the world, even in Germany. We must again say “Never!” to racism and fascism. No Pasaran! Salud!”

Waterford-born Brigadista Peter O’Connor , a member of Unite’s legacy union MSF, speaking at Jarama in 1994

Fighting against fascism and all its manifestations is oDf uabcltiniveer Mtraaxd Le evitas speaking at an event organised by It was also difficult for the trade union hardwired into Unite and the trade union Unite Community in 2016 to mark the 80th anniversary of movement, and for Unite’s legacy unions, to movement, a movement built on the principles the Battle of Cable Street maintain a united front in support of the Spanish of solidarity and equality. From the 1930s to the Republic in Ireland, North and South. present day, Unite and our legacy unions have been at the forefront of the battle against ultra- Yet, despite the obstacles – and despite mistrust nationalism, racism and xenophobia – just some manufactured by both political and religious of the ingredients which, mixed together, can give forces – the Irish trade union movement birth to fascism. provided vital support not only to the Spanish Republic, but also to individual brigadistas Eighty years ago, our legacy unions and many following their return. individual members were not only working to defeat Fascism in Spain, but were engaged in Eventual unity in the battle against fascism was battles closer to home – whether against Oswald only achieved following analysis, engagement Mosley’s British Union of Fascists in London, or and persuasion – and that is one of the Saint Patrick’s Anti-Communist League and the lessons the 1930s hold for us today. Irish Christian Front in Dublin. unionists and socialists, one of whom was to serve in The rise of fascism in the 1930s taught us the need for It was a universal struggle, and ongoing emigration the Connolly Column in Spain. active vigilance – and in 2017, there is much to be meant that young men from Belfast and Dublin could vigilant against: hate crime is on the rise, and perceived find themselves fighting fascists in London, Liverpool In remembering the past, we must avoid mythologizing national self-interest is being pitted against values of or Manchester. it: there were fractures in the unity which defeated solidarity and internationalism. the fascists on Cable Street, as Levitas remembers: Last year, Unite Community played a central role in Today, Unite Community mobilises trade union and events organised to mark the 80th anniversary of the Mosley wanted to march through Whitechapel because it community activists in campaigns as diverse as the Battle of Cable Street, when around 7,000 people was where a large number of Jewish people lived and struggle against homophobic hate crime in Northern wearing the black shirts of Oswald Mosley’s British worked, and I knew the only way to stop him was to have Ireland and solidarity with refugees and asylum Union of Fascists attempted to march through unity of the people. I approached a number of unions, seekers in the Republic. London’s heavily Jewish Whitechapel area, despite a Jewish organisations and the Communist League to band petition of over 100,000 signatures calling for the together against the Fascists but although they agreed what What follows is a brief, and necessarily incomplete, march to be banned. Jews and Irish, dockworkers and I was doing was right, they wouldn’t support me. overview of the role played by Unite’s legacy unions tailors, socialists and communists, trade union and some individual members in the struggle for the members and those without work – they all came But […] there were thousands that came together in Spanish Republic. together to send a clear message to the fascists: No Aldgate, and when we heard that Mosley’s intention was to Pasaran! You shall not pass! march along Cable St from Tower Hill into Whitechapel, The fight against fascism in all its guises continues. large numbers of people went to Cable St and barricades ¡No Pasarán! And, on October 4 th 1936, the fascists did not pass but were set up. The police attempted to clear Cable St with were vanquished by solidarity. horses, so that the march could go ahead, but the people of Len McCluskey , General Secretary 1 Cable St fought back and the police had to give in . Jimmy Kelly , Regional Secretary The use of the slogan ‘No Pasaran!’ by the residents of Whitechapel that day indicates that progressives saw Trade unionists demonstrating in support of migrants, Belfast 2017 a clear link between Mosley’s Blackshirts and Franco’s Falange movement. They knew that the fight against Fascism was and is universal and indivisible. And they knew that fascism poses an existential threat to all our freedoms – including trade union freedom.

The organic links between many of those who battled Mosley’s Blackshirts on Cable Street in London, those who battled anti-Communist mobs on North Great Strand Street in Dublin, and those who fought and died in Spain are therefore unsurprising.

The picture above shows Cable Street veteran Max Levitas, born in Dublin over a century ago to a family Unite’s legacy unions in Ireland and the Spanish Civil War May 2017 ¡NO PASARÁN! PPPPP A tale of two workers

In 1933, 17-year-old Dubliner Bob Doyle was among those attacking Connolly House in Dublin’s Great “I’m still determined to stay here until Strand Street, just a few metres away from where Unite House stands today, while Belfast-born William Fascism is completely crushed” Tumilson was among the defenders of Dublin’s communist headquarters. William Tumilson writing to his fiancée Kathleen Walsh, March 11th 1937

Both men were, at different times, members of Unite’s William (Liam) Tumilson was born in 1904 in East Belfast; his father was a legacy unions – Bob Doyle of the print union SOGAT, shipyard riveter and there were six children in the family. There are unconfirmed and William Tumilson of the electrical union ETU 2 . stories that Tumilson had been a member of the Junior Orange Order in his Both men fought on the Republican side in Spain. youth. What we do know, however, is that he was politicised by the 1932 Belfast William Tumilson died at the Battle of Jarama, while Outdoor Relief Riots. In 1933, he was among those defending Connolly House, Bob Doyle died in 2009 following a lifetime of trade the headquarters of the Revolutionary Workers’ Group [precursor of the union and political activism. Communist Party of Ireland], against an attack by adherents of the Irish Christian Front. In 1934 Tumilson joined the Republican Congress, and in the same year helped carry the banner of the Shankill James Their stories mirror the Irish trade union movement’s Connolly Socialists to Bodenstown. In 1935, probably while working in Liverpool, he joined the Communist complex history in the fight against 1930s fascism. Party of Great Britain, and left for Spain in December 1936. William Tumilson was killed in action at Jarama on March 14 th 1937. In his memoirs, Doyle explained what motivated him to join the assault on Connolly House: Tumilson was a crane driver and at one time a member of one of Unite’s legacy unions, the Electrical Trades Union . “I had attended the evening mission on Monday 27 March 1933 at the Pro-Cathedral [….] I remember him [Jesuit preacher] saying – which scared me – “Here in this holy Shortly afterwards, working in London, Doyle met Kit Catholic city of Dublin, these vile creatures of Communism Conway, whom he was to follow into the Communist are within our midst.” Immediately after the sermon Party of Ireland and the Republican Congress. His everybody then began leaving, singing and gathered in politics were now firmly of the left, and he spend much a crowd outside, we must have been a thousand of the intervening period engaged in street politics singing “To Jesus Heart All Burning” and “Faith of our before going to Spain. Fathers, Holy Faith”. The attack on Connolly House was just one of many We marched down towards Great Strand Street, to the demonstrations of pro-Fascist power during the 1930s headquarters of the socialist and anti-Fascist groups in by organisations such as St. Patricks’s Anti-Communist Connolly House. I was inspired, if you could use that League and, later, the Irish Christian Front and expression, by the message of the Jesuit. There was no General Eoin O’Duffy’s Blueshirts, as well as by 3 attempt by the police to stop us” . ostensibly unorganised or spontaneous groups. Police officers on guard in one of the rooms of Connolly House following the attacks

“I didn't know much about Spain, but I knew my thoughts were that every bullet I fired would be against the Dublin landlords and capitalists.”

Robert (Bob) Doyle was born in Dublin in 1916 and grew up in a t enement on North King Street. He became politically active in the 1930s, suffering a beating from Eoin O’Duffy’s Blueshirts which left him with permanent damage to one eye. He joined the Republican Congress in 1935 and volunteered for the International Brigades in 1937, reaching Spain in December of that year. Taken prisoner in 1938, he spent a year in a camp before being released as part of a prisoner exchange agreement in 1939. After the war he became a print worker and shop steward with one of Unite’s legacy unions, SOGAT, and was one of the leaders of the 1959 printing strike which lasted for six weeks and secured a 40-hour week for workers in the sector.

Memorial plaque to brigadistas Jack Jones and Bob Doyle in Unite’s Belfast offices Unite’s legacy unions in Ireland and the Spanish Civil War PPPPP May 2017 ¡NO PASARÁN! Union faultlines

In 1936 it was clear to many in the European trade rally of the Christian Front on Ballybricken, and he was union movement and the broader Left that Spain was nearly lynched because he would not raise his arms in the on the front line of the battle against fascism. Christian Front salute”.

In August 1936, The Irish Times reported that nearly 100,000 French trade unionists took to the streets of John O’Shea was one of eleven men from Lille in solidarity with the Spanish Workers and their Waterford who went to fight in Spain. A construction Republic 4. In Britain, the TUC raised money from worker, he emigrated to London during the 1920s affiliated unions for its “Spanish Workers Fund” , which where he was a member of the TGWU , one of was used to send medical aid and food to Spain, and Unite’s legacy unions. O’Shea arrived in Spain in was also prominent in the Basque Children’s February 1937 and fought at Jarama (where he was Committee, established to assist Basque refugees wounded), Caspe and on the Ebro front. following the bombing of Guernica in 1937 5.

In the Republic of Ireland, however, faultlines between O’Connor goes on to recall a support meeting for the the instinctive Republican sympathies of many trade Christian Front chaired by Archdeacon Kelleher and unionists, and the religiously-inspired pro-Nationalist attended by many trade unionists including the sympathies of others, were to become more apparent President of the Workers’ Council 8. It should, of as the 1930s progressed, and were reflected in Unite’s course, be noted that support for the Irish Christian legacy unions and the wider trade union movement. Front was not confined to the Republic; meetings in These faultlines were complicated in Northern Ireland Belfast also attracted significant crowds. Peter O’Connor (top left) with members of the Lincoln by tensions between the North’s two traditions. Battalion in Spain, probably 1937

Belfast man Fred McMahon served as an ambulance driver in the Spanish Medical Service during the Civil War, and is quoted in Raymond Quinn’s A Rebel ‘Statement of solidarity’, funds raised Voice : A History of Belfast Republicanism 1925-1972 from Ireland (TUC archives) as saying that “the average trade unionist tended to be apathetic . There were a few of the keen trade unionists, the shop steward type who were pro-Republican 6”.

Thus, although in 1934 the Irish Trade Union Congress and the Labour Party produced a leaflet entitled This ambivalence was not confined to Ireland. Republic. Nor was this hostility confined to the Manifesto to the Workers of Ireland – Fascist Danger , Although, in 1936, it was clear to many in the European ATGWU; the Workers’ Union of Ireland, with James highlighting in particular the threat posed by Fascism trade union movement and the broader Left that Spain Larkin Sr’s approval, forbade officials of the union to to trade union activity, and Dublin’s May Day parade was on the front line of the battle against fascism, the speak on anti-Franco platforms 9. the same year saw an estimated 10,000 people attend British trade union movement was rather more an anti-Fascist rally, just a few years later the Dublin ambivalent about the Spanish Civil War than is often Trades Council refused to assist in organising a food assumed today, with some trade unionists espousing a ship for Spain 7. ‘non-interventionist’ policy.

Brigadista and union activist Peter O’Connor And in Ireland – North and South – there was hostility described the atmosphere in his native Waterford in to the Republican side among some sections of the 1936: trade union movement, including within Unite’s legacy unions such as the ATGWU. “Reaction was strong at the time and many people had not the moral courage to stand up against it. I remember my That hostility reflected the wider political and trade brother Francis telling me that he was passing an O’Duffy union environment in both Northern Ireland and the Irish Christian Front meeting, Grand Parade, Cork Unite’s legacy unions in Ireland and the Spanish Civil War May 2017 ¡NO PASARÁN! PPPPP

Dubliner James (Jim) Prendergast had been a group of Irishmen to go to Spain, at the end of 1936. “Although the Labour Party and the Trade Union movement participant in the International Lenin School during the After the Spanish Civil War he returned to his position leaders kept a quiet silence, with here and there some of its early 1930s and at one point was an organiser with the with the CPI 1, but then emigrated again to Britain prominent members actually speaking on pro-Franco CPI in Dublin 1. In 1930, in London, Prendergast joined where he became an official with the National Union platforms, many individual trade union leaders made the Amalgamated Engineering Union , one of of Railwaymen. Prendergast died in 1974. generous but anonymous personal subscriptions to the Irish Unite’s legacy unions, but appears to have been back in Aid Committee for the Spanish Republic” 10 . Dublin in 1933 when , like William Tumilson, he was Brigadista Mick O’Riordan, who was to become involved in the defence of Connolly House. General Secretary of the Communist Party of Ireland, Prendergast was a member of the first organised wrote in 1979 that: Intimidation

The Worker was quick to ascribe blame for this state of address by General Organiser Gilbert Lynch, in affairs, announcing that: which he was at some pains to distance the aid from the Republican cause – while still ensuring “The latest landfall of the 'Irish Independent' and its that the donation stood: 'Christian Front' is a campaign of disruption in the Trade Unions. The Amalgamated Transport Union is meeting the “Mr Lynch said that the charge was made against full blast of the 'New Christianity'. It is having trouble with them that the Union contributed £1,000 to the Reds some of its country branches in Galway and Tyrone. in Spain. That statement was not true. The Central Labour Council issued an appeal to the various unions The playboys of Lombard Murphy's 'Christian Front' - to make contributions towards providing medical young lady from Geneva, the lad from Merseyside, Lord treatment for the wounded, no matter what side they ffrench and Paddy Belton - are now giving their orders to were on. Their Union gave £1,000 in order to provide the Trade Unions. They demand that th e ATGWU should assistance for the wounded” 13 . repudiate the policy of sympathy for the Trade Union movement of Spain. Instead of being on the side of the While the efforts of Lynch and Regional Spanish workers, the Irish Trade Unionists are asked to be Secretary 14 E.P. Hart prevented further overt on the side of the Spanish landlords and Fascists” 11 . splits, the union’s leadership apparently remained concerned to smooth matters over in advance Mick O’Riordan also cited intimidation, noting that: of the all-Ireland conference. A statement by “When the London Executive of the Amalgamated Hart (who had initially denied that the £1,000 Transport and General Workers’ Union granted £1,000 for donation had been made) was published humanitarian ‘Red Cross’ help to the Spanish Government, together with a telegram from TGWU General there began a campaign of intimidation to force Irish Secretary Ernest Bevin: members of that Union to repudiate the action” 12 . “Regret misunderstanding regarding attitude of Union The biennial all-Ireland delegate conference of the in relation to Spanish Civil War. See Congress debates ATGWU was due to meet in Dublin some weeks in to-day’s press, which will explain our attitude and later, on September 17th. our desire to see civil war brought to speedy end.

The intervening weeks were to prove exceptionally Union has always stood for freedom of conscience difficult for the union: the National Executive’s and will continue to stand for it. Past action of Union in decision resulted in branches in Limerick , Athenry, Ireland is best proof of this. £1,000 granted is for Galway and Londonderry/Derry disaffiliating and/or medical and humanitarian requirements, with definite disbanding and, as noted above, trouble was also instructions that medical supplies are to be available reported in Tyrone. The union’s officials had to use all for either side whoever are the victims of the awful their negotiating skills to retrieve the situation. struggle [….] At all-Ireland Conference I will explain in detail steps we have taken as a Union […] Union On September 14th, the Irish Times reported that the also firm in its opposition and resistance to Ernest Bevin, General Secretary of the 15 Athenry branch had been ‘reformed’ following an dictatorships, both Communist and Fascist” . Transport and General Workers Union

Donegal-born Philip Boyle was living in London’s Shepherd’s Bush before leaving for Spain in 1937. A member of the Communist Party of Great Britain and formerly in the IRA, Boyle was wounded at Teruel in January 1938. He was a member of one of Unite’s legacy unions, the Amalgamated Society of Woodworkers. Philip Boyle’s entry in the TUC list of International Brigade veterans and casualties Unite’s legacy unions in Ireland and the Spanish Civil War PPPPP May 2017 ¡NO PASARÁN! “This freedom is as the breath of our nostrils”

In the event, Bevin’s opening address to the movement by Fascist dictatorships which destroyed This freedom, Edwards is quoted in the Irish Times as conference made no explicit mention of the freedom of conscience, freedom of the Press, free telling delegates, was “as the breath of their nostrils” 16 . controversy, merely reassuring delegates that, as the speech and freedom of association. Irish Times put it, “the cards would be on the table at On September 17th 1936, 53 delegates to the the conference and would be face upwards” . One of the first institutions it suppressed, he pointed biennial all-Ireland delegate conference of the out, was the free trade union, proceeding to jail the ATGWU in Ireland voted to endorse a decision However, in his closing address the Chair of the leaders, establish concentration camps, and resort to made several weeks earlier by the TGWU’s National union’s General Executive Council, Harry Edwards, methods that they had hoped had been relegated to Executive, which had voted to contribute £1,000 to did refer to the threat posed to the trade union the past. relief work in Spain.

Brigadista and former Transport and General Workers’ Union General Secretary Jack Jones, 2002 Unite’s legacy unions in Ireland and the Spanish Civil War May 2017 ¡NO PASARÁN! PPPPP Northern complexities

While opposition to Republican Spain was largely “The two Irishmen are members of the Socialist Party. They clerically-inspired in the Republic, in Northern Ireland gave up their jobs and volunteered to go to Spain to assist matters were further complicated by tensions all those who have been wounded in the fighting there. They between the two traditions. don't get any pay and they have given up their jobs. Now these two members of the Socialist Party, Joe Boyd and Fred Those tensions, however, had been lessened as a result McMahon, by a mere coincidence happen to be members of the unity engendered by the 1932 Outdoor Relief of two different religions, but that did not make any Strikes which united working class communities difference. They know that the struggle in Spain was not only against a form of workfare which involved unemployed the struggle of the Spanish workers but was the struggle of men participating in outdoor work schemes in return the working class the world over” for small cash payments or food parcels. “They went with the medical Unit because by doing so they Many of those who four years later were to become knew they were going to be of some service to those who active in solidarity with Republican Spain had been were sick, to those who were wounded, and to those

politicised by the Outdoor Relief strikes, including Pamphlet in support of the Spanish innocent victims of the Civil War into which the officer caste Malachy Grey who in 1986 recalled that: Republic issued by Harry Midgley has plunged Spain. The Unit has taken more than 100 miles of bandages and many large boxes of anti-gas and anti- “Hungry Protestants and Catholics united in angry protests addressed by members of the Northern Ireland tetanus serums.” to demand some semblance of decent living. It has been Socialist Party (at the time part of the NILP). estimated that there were more unemployed then than Victor Halley was subsequently to become a now (over 20% because thousands of men and women did Midgley’s story illustrates some of the Northern prominent lay member of the ATGWU, serving on the not even bother to register, or were struck off the register, at complexities: A Protestant representing a largely Irish Executive and as Regional vice-chair 19 . the Employment Exchanges). Few jobs were available; not Catholic constituency, his opposition to the Spanish ships but grass was showing on the slipways of Harland and Nationalists (sometimes expressed in rather Wolff’s shipyard. […] Poverty and misery abounded and inflammatory anti-clerical language) alienated many of The Spanish Civil War was a defining moment not young mothers aged long before their time”. his Catholic constituents – while some Protestant only in the personal histories of those who fought in constituents were suspicious of alleged (Irish) Spain, and the women and men engaged in countless Republican sympathies. solidarity initiatives, but also in the trade union Outdoor Relief strike, Belfast 1932 movement in Ireland and Britain. When trade union Midgley was to lose his Stormont seat in 1938, a defeat activists today engage on behalf of their comrades in which has been attributed to his support for the Cuba and Colombia, Palestine and Venezuela, or Syria Republican cause, but which was probably also a factor and Turkey, they are writing another chapter in a of more local constituency concerns. history of solidarity that stretches back to the 1930s – and even before, as seen when dockers in Liverpool Along with Harry provided aid to their fellow dockers in Dublin in 1913. Midgley and Betty Sinclair, ATGWU activist Victor Halley “They went to support the was prominent in Spanish people, based on ideas of In addition to being active in Belfast’s unemployed solidarity efforts for movement, from 1936 Grey was a member of several Republican Spain. Like internationalism and freedom committees trying to raise funds and support for the Midgley, Halley – who Spanish Republic and “counter the pro-Franco came from a working that have been carried forward to propaganda circulating in Ireland 17” . Malachy Grey class Presbyterian family persuade people to defend became an ATGWU shop steward and subsequently in Belfast – was an activist in the union’s Retired Members’ Branch. originally a member of freedoms elsewhere […] We must Betty Sinclair the NILP, and be vigilant in fighting fascism and The Belfast Trades Council was swift to oppose the subsequently became a Francoist coup in July 1936. At its next meeting, the founder member of the small Socialist Party of racism every day”. Council’s minutes show that it agreed to send a Northern Ireland. donation to the TUC fund and campaign in support of Jack Jones, Brigadista and former Spanish workers 18 . In 1936, Halley chaired a meeting of the Spanish TGWU General Secretary Medical Aid Relief Committee where he articulated a Among those most vocal in defence of the Spanish strongly non-sectarian, class perspective on events in Republic in Belfast were Harry Midgley of the Spain. The meeting was also attended by the police, Northern Ireland Labour Party and trade unionist who recorded Halley noting that two Belfast men Betty Sinclair of the CPI; meetings were also regularly accompanied a Scottish medical unit to Spain: Unite’s legacy unions in Ireland and the Spanish Civil War PPPPP May 2017 ¡NO PASARÁN! “You are history. You are legend”

Dolores Ibárruri References (La Pasionaria), bidding farewell to 1 Interview with Max Levitas, 2011, available at members of the International http://spitalfieldslife.com/2011/09/04/max-levitas-anti-fascist-campaigner/ , Brigades, 1938 accessed 12 April 2017 2 Tumilson is listed in different records as having been a member of both Unite’s legacy union the ETU, and of the retail and distributive union NADAW. It is probably that he was a member of both at different times. 3 Doyle, B. (2006). Brigadista: An Irishman’s fight against Fascism. Dublin: Currach Press, pp. 32-33 4 Irish Times, 25 August 1936 5 Buchanan, T. (2016). The Trade Union Congress and the Spanish Civil War. Available at file:///V:/Dublin%20Office/Alex%20Klemm/Unite%20Aganst%20Fascism/ Some members of Ireland’s legacy unions from Northern Ireland and the Republic TUC%20Spanish%20Civil%20War.htm accessed 11 April 2017 who fought in the Spanish Civil War. William Tumilson and Richard O’Neill were 6 Quinn, Raymond J. (1999). A Rebel Voice, A History of Belfast both killed; the others survived and many went on to live lives of activism and Republicanism. Belfast: Belfast Cultural and Local History Group. Extracts service to democracy. available at http://irelandscw.com/docs-Quinn.htm, accessed 11 April 2017 7 Cody, S. O’Dowd, J; Rigney, P (1986). The Parliament of Labour: 100 years Boyle, Philip Amalgamated Society of Woodworkers of the Dublin Council of Trade Unions. Dublin: Dublin Council of Trade Unions Doyle, Robert Society of Graphical and Allied Trades 8 O’Connor, P (1996). A Soldier of Liberty: Recollections of a Socialist and anti-Fascist Fighter. Reprint. Dublin: Unite the Union, 2016 Goff, John National Society of Painters 9 Milotte, M. (1977). Communist Politics in Ireland, 1916-45, Belfast: Queens Lehane, Michael Amalgamated Union of Building Trade Workers University Belfast pp. 378-390 10 McElroy, James Amalgamated Engineering Union O’Riordan, M. (2005). Connolly Column. Torfaen: Warren & Pell, p. 41 11 The Worker 19 September 1936 O’Connor, Peter Manufacturing, Science and Finance 12 O’Riordan, Connolly Column, 36 O’Daire, Patrick Transport and General Workers Union 13 Irish Times 14 September 1936 O’Neill, Richard Typographical Union 14 Also referred to as ‘National Organiser’ in contemporary reports 15 Irish Times 12 September 1936 O’Regan, James Amalgamated Transport and General Workers Union 16 Irish Times 18 September 1936 O’Shea, John Transport and General Workers Union 17 Gray, M. (1986). A Shop Steward Remembers. In: Saothar, Journal of the Irish Labour History Society. Dublin: ILHS Prendergast, James Amalgamated Engineering Union 18 Crossey, C. (2007). No Pasaran: We Intend to Show the World. Belfast: Tighe, Patrick Transport and General Workers Union Belfast and District Trades Union Council. 19 Tumilson, William Electrical Trades Union Conversation with Mick O’Reilly, May 2nd 2017