Welcome to the Kate Sharpley Library

The Kate Sharpley Library exists to preserve and promote anarchist history. (More information.)

Everything at the Kate Sharpley Library - acquisitions, cataloguing, preservation work, publishing, answering enquiries is done by volunteers: we get no money from governments or the business community. All our running costs are met by donations from members of the collective, subscribers and supporters, or by the small income we make through publishing. Please consider donating and subscribing.

We also try to promote the history of anarchism by publishing studies based on those materials - or reprints of original documents taken from our collection. Check out our books and pamphlets available for sale or explore our online documents or browse back issues of our Bulletin.

Our physical library (in California) includes books, newspapers, pamphlets, manuscripts and ephemera documenting the history of anarchist movements. Contact us to arrange a visit.

Recent news

Help AK Press & Friends Recover from Fire

Our comrades at AK Press in Oakland are currently dealing with the aftermath of a major fire. They're appealing for donations to spread between between AK Press, their neighbors at 1984 Printing, and building residents who have lost their homes and belongings.
Details are at: http://www.akpress.org/fire-relief.html. The direct link to the fundraising page is: http://www.gofundme.com/akpressfire.
Please help!

February 2015 Kate Sharpley Library Bulletin online

KSL: Bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library No. 81, February 2015 has just been posted on our site.
The PDF is up at: http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/h18bdv

This issue contains:
“Nameless in the crowd of nameless ones...” Some thoughts on The Story of A Proletarian Life, by Bartolomeo Vanzetti, 1923 by Barry Pateman http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/vhhp2j
The slow burning fuse: the lost history of the British anarchists [Book review] http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/rfj87m
Strikers, Hobblers, Conchies & Reds : The Bristol Radical History Group book http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/5hqd16
Updates on the history of Russian anarchism (February 2015) http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/nk9b8h
Friends of the Kate Sharpley Library (2015) http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/4j10ps
Anarchist Research: A Postcard from Berta Tubisman http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/hx3grd

Senya Fleshin Papers

The Senya Fléchine [Fleshin] Papers at The International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam are a primary source on Bolshevik persecution of the Russian anarchist movement. They also show the dynamics of the anarchist solidarity efforts with their imprisoned and exiled comrades. An incomplete set of scans from the Fleshin papers can be seen at: http://senyafleshinpapers.wordpress.com/

New publication: Los Maños : the lads from Aragon ; the story of an anti-Franco action group

The Kate Sharpley Library collective are pleased to announce the publication of another study of the anarchist resistance to Franco's dictatorship.
Mariano Aguayo Morán (1922-1994) was one of the members of the ‘Los Maños’ group. This group of friends from Zaragoza joined together to fight the Francoist regime in the optimistic days after the second world war. Originally active with the Socialist Youth, they soon joined the anarchist resistance alongside militants like Francisco ‘Quico’ Sabaté and José Lluís Facerías. Betrayed by one of the group members, Wenceslao Jiménez Orive was seriously wounded in a police ambush in Barcelona on 9 January 1950. Rather than be captured, he took cyanide. Simón Gracia Fleringán, Plácido Ortiz Gratal and Victoriano Muñoz Treserras were arrested the same day, and executed on 24 December 1950.
These interviews throw light not only on the story of the ‘Los Maños’ group, but the nature, motivations and difficulties of the anarchist resistance to Francoism.

Now available from the Kate Sharpley Library in the UK (North American copies available soon).
See: http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/rn8r13
ISBN 9781873605318, £3
This translation first published as an ebook by Christiebooks

October 2014 Kate Sharpley Library Bulletin online

KSL: Bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library No. 80, October 2014 has just been posted on our site.
You can get to the contents here http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/fn30cz or read the full pdf here http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/m6406g

This issue contains:
Emma Goldman in Saint Louis by “an old hand from the furniture removal trade” http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/2bvr6d
Antonia Fontanillas Borrás (1917-2014) by Librepensador Acrata http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/547f75
Albert Meltzer quotes http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/1g1ksd
José Ignacio Martín-Artajo Saracho – b 1932, Madrid; d 14 April 2005, Gerona – Anarchist, diplomat, blasphemer, poet and man of letters by Stuart Christie http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/hdr94j
Library News (October 2014) http://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/0gb6hd