[3] Scottish life in the 1930s was characterised by high levels of unemployment, threatened redundancies and living standards which had resulted in the highest death rate in northern Europe[4] Many volunteers had previously been involved in extensive labour struggles and protests against Oswald Mosely's British Union of Fascists, believing that left-wing politics offered an escape from poverty.
In aiding the Spanish Republican government against the military coup orchestrated by General Francisco Franco in the summer of 1936, Scottish volunteers identified with the potential for social progressive change that Spain represented at the time.
[14] The usual route was through Paris, evading the illegality of their actions through claiming that they were off to France for a weekend holiday before taking the train to the French border, and then travelled by foot over the Pyrenees into Spain.
International Brigaders captured by Franco's forces throughout the three-year conflict were either executed, repatriated back to Britain under threat of death upon re-entry, or held in Spanish prisons for the remainder of the war.
[18] In September 1938, republican prime minister Juan Negrin announced to the League of Nations that all foreign volunteers were to be discharged and repatriated, and Scottish military participation in the Spanish Civil War ended with a parade through the streets of Barcelona before the International Brigades were disbanded.
[19] While the International Brigaders were met widespread local appreciation upon their return to Scotland, the official view was considerably more frosty, with the Foreign Office requesting that the volunteers reimburse the government for the funds (3 pound, 19.3d) per head that had been required to pay their passage home from Spain.
[24] While an attempt to create a national support movement through uniting the CPGB, the ILP and the Socialist League wing of the Labour Party proved unsuccessful, local activity remained strong: at the Glasgow May Day Rally of 1937, 15,000 people turned out to march under the banner of ‘Solidarity with Spain’ while Dundonians in that same year raised enough money to buy and send an ambulance to the Republican front.
Extensive commemoration began in 1996 for the 60th anniversary and memorial plaques, pamphlets and exhibitions were produced in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee and Aberdeen by local Trades Councils, remaining International Brigaders and their relatives.
[33] In 2006, a day-long symposium at the National Library of Scotland sold out weeks in advance,[34] while STV produced a two-part documentary of previously unseen archival footage, interviews, and modern commemorative activity in 2009's The Scots Who Fought Franco,[35] and William Maley's play "From Calton to Catalonia" has been performed regularly in Glasgow theatres since its publication in 1990.