Dr. Richard Baxell is a historian and former Research Fellow of the Cañada Blanch Centre at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Between 2015 and 2018 he was Chair of the International Brigade Memorial Trust and is currently the organisation’s historical consultant. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Publications
Ricahrd has written a number of books and articles on the British volunteers in the Spanish Civil War. Forged in Spain, a collection of ten biographies of British men and women who went to Spain, was published by Clapton Press in 2023. Unlikely Warriors, published by Aurum Press in 2012, was short-listed for the 2013 Political Book Awards’ political history book of the year.

With Jim Jump and Angela Jackson, he was a co-author of the IBMT‘s travelling exhibition, Antifascistas! and the accompanying book together with its Spanish edition, Help Spain. He is a regular contributor to the IBMT’s magazine, ¡No Pasarán!

With the IBMT‘s archivist and researcher, Jim Carmody, he compiled a database of ‘British’ and ‘Irish’ volunteers for the Spanish Civil War. An abridged version is available online.

Media
In addition to contributions to academic journals, Richard has written a number of articles on the British volunteers for the national press, including The Times, Independent, Guardian and Spectator. He has appeared in a number of podcasts and television and radio programmes, including live on the Channel 4 News and Sky News, on BBC Radio 3’s Proms Extra, Radio Four’s The World This Weekend and The Long View and on Robert Elms’ show on BBC London 94.9.

Lectures
Alongside university teaching, he has delivered a number of lectures and talks on the volunteers in the International Brigades, antifascism and 1930s Britain and given the Len Crome memorial lecture on four occasions. He has talked about Unlikely Warriors and the British volunteers in Spain at several literary festivals, including Woodstock, Aye Write and Cheltenham.

Book reviews
He has reviewed a number of books on Britain and the Spanish Civil War. <more>

Research
He is currently writing about the International Brigade Association’s conference in Loughborough in 1976 and a biography of Bill Alexander, Commander of the British Battalion in Spain and later author and Secretary of the International Brigade Association.