Actress Liz Estensen was amongst the speakers at the International Brigade Memorial Trust’s annual commemoration in Jubilee Gardens on Saturday 2 July 2022. Liz is well known for her work as one of the “Liver Birds” as well as more recently in the long-running soap “Emmerdale”. But she is also the daughter of Otto Estensen – one of the thousands of British and Irish men and women who went to Spain 1936 to 1939 to fight fascism and defend democracy, and spoke of her pride in his contribution to the International Brigade.
Other speakers were Neil O’Riordan, son of the IBMT’s former Ireland Secretary Manus O’Riordan and grandson of Brigader Michael O’Riordan, Carmen Kilner, Secretary of the Basque Children’s Association 1937 that celebrates the British people’s response to the evacuation of nearly 4,000 Basque children to Britain after the horrific bombing of Guernica by fascist forces, and Alex Gordon, President of rail union RMT and a Trustee of the IBMT.
A range of individuals and organisations laid wreaths by the sculpture by the late Ian Walter commemorating the International Brigade, and music was provided by folk duo Na-Mara.
For more information on the International Brigade Memorial Trust and the memorial sculpture in Jubilee Gardens click here.
