Letter (copy) : International Brigade ; Letter : International Brigade

              International. 
HVT/AC/DT/265.
9th November, 1942.
Mr. L. Fawcett,
Amalgamated Union of Building Trade Workers,
"The Builders", 
Crescent Lane,
South Side, Clapham Common, 
S.W.4.
Dear Mr. Fawcett,
INTERNATIONAL BRIGADE.
Many thanks for your letter of 6th November in which you inform us that your Executive Council has had under consideration resolutions from two or three of your branches requesting action to be taken for the relief and release of former members of the International Brigade who are now interned in France.
Our General Council, and I may add the National Council of Labour, have not in mind any action on this matter.   It may serve to explain the position if I attach herewith an extract from the Official Report of the House of Commons for the 1st October, 1941.
Proposals which have been made by the International Brigade Association would presuppose relationships between the Governments in question on a more cordial plane than existed in the Autumn of 1941.  You will appreciate that the position with regard to the relationships between the British (or United States) and Vichy Governments has certainly not improved since then.
The events of the last three or four days culminating as they did over the week-end with the breaking off by Vichy of relations with the U.S.A. have, I think, ruled out all possibility of diplomatic action.
Yours sincerely,
Assistant Secretary.
Statement.