ABSTRACT
Introduction Early 1938. Nancy Cunard, famous English heiress, activist and editor of Negro Anthology, writes a set of dispatches from Spain to Sylvia Pankhurst in London. They are for publication in the latter’s influential newspaper, New Times and Ethiopia News. The Spain that Cunard is travelling through is now in the grip of a civil war, and, buoyed by his invasion of Ethiopia, being part of a colonial fascist project, Mussolini is now in military league with the Spanish nacionales. But, aside from Mexico and the USSR’s official support, the republicans, on their side, are complemented by ‘international brigades’ - groups of fighters who have crossed borders without the official sanction of their governments. Amongst them are Russians, Italians, Irish and British, to name a few. An American contingent forms the American Lincoln brigade, and in its ranks are around ninety African-Americans.
