Dublin Opinion

The Third Annual George Brown Memorial Weekend takes place in Inistioge, Co. Kilkenny on Friday and Saturday, 25/26 June.

George Brown was the son of Francis Brown from Inistioge and Mary Lackey from Tullogher. George was reared in Manchester during the early decades of the twentieth century. At that time it was an urban area of high unemployment and appalling poverty and deprivation. As a young man, he became very involved in the campaign for the betterment of the rights of workers and their families and by the early 1930s was regarded as the leading member of the British Communist Party in the Manchester region. George’s commitment to working-class activism and democratic principles led to him growing increasingly concerned with the rise of Fascism throughout Europe. When the fledgling Spanish Republic found itself under threat from the forces of Franco, backed by German and Italian military might, he was among the first to enlist in the International Brigade in defence of Spain’s democratically elected government. George Brown arrived in Spain in January 1937 and quickly was to see action. In his efforts to stem the tide of Fascism he paid the ultimate price. He was killed at the Battle of Brunete in the defence of Madrid in July 1937. He was thirty years of age.