Mystery of the Neath plaque

Can anyone help with information about the plaque in Neath Old Town Council Offices (Orchard Street, Neath, West Glamorgan SA11 1RT), which is dedicated to three local volunteers who died in Spain?

Until recently the memorial (pictured above) wasn’t on the IBMT’s online directory of nearly 200 memorials around the country. Gregory Page, a researcher looking into local memorials, says that approaches to Neath Antiquarians and the municipal archivist have failed to shed any light on the matter.

To add to the mystery, the Neath plaque doesn’t appear in the 1996 book ‘Memorials of the Spanish Civil War’ by Colin Williams, Bill Alexander and John Gorman. The authors list 38 memorials throughout Britain and Ireland. Its absence from the book suggests its existence may not have been known about beyond Neath.

The town has another memorial (pictured above) to the same three men named on the plaque. It is a granite remembrance stone unveiled on 19 July 1994 in Victoria Gardens.

If anyone has any information about the Neath plaque, such as when it was unveiled and on whose initiative, please contact the IBMT.