Mackenzie-Papineau veterans organize
Organization profile published 1991
Year Published: 1991
Resource Type: Organization
Cx Number: CX4195
Abstract:
Surviving veterans of Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion, the contingent of 1,400 Canadians who served with the International Brigades in Spain during the Spanish Civil War, are working to organize a permanent memorial to the brigade. Named after the leaders of the 1937 rebellions in Upper and Lower Canada, the Mac-Paps, as they become known, were part of an international effort to help Spain's elected government resist the drive of Franco's fascists to seize power. Franco's forces, helped by Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy, were ultimately successful in taking power after a bloody war in which the western governments, many of which included officials sympathetic to fascism, failed to provide comparable backing to the elected Spanish government. The International Brigades, including the Canadian Mac-Paps, consisted of men who, unlike their governments, believed it was important to try to stop fascism. After the war, the Mac-Paps never received any form of official recognition extended to Canadian veterans of other wars. For more information about the efforts to create a memorial to the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion, contact Association of Veterans and Friends of the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion, 175 Cummer Avenue Apt. 209, Willowdale, Ontario M2M 2E3, (416) 225-5276.
This organization no longer exists.
This abstract was published in the Connexions Digest in 1991.
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