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
October 2026 Kate Sharpley Library Bulletin online
KSL: Bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library No. 122, October 2026 has just been posted on our site: https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/59zz32. The pdf is up at https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/59zz32.Contents
An anarchist in the archive : Remembering Barry Pateman by John Patten 'For Barry anarchism was all about getting to anarchy, and anarchy was all about everybody being able to realise their full potential. He warned about what we lose if ‘we raid the anarchist past to justify the anarchist present’.' https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/w0vwm5
Barry Pateman: An Appreciation by Martin H. 'Barry was brimming with ideas, whether about anarchist history, theory and practice, sport or wider culture' https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/c2ft1b
Remembering Ron Marsden (1937-2026) 'The tributes we’ve read talk about his long track record as an anarcho-syndicalist in the Syndicalist Workers’ Federation, Direct Action Movement and Solidarity Federation. They also emphasise how approachable he was'. https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/cnp7kn
They inspired the Bristol Radical History Group #5 – Ian Bone by Roger 'Funny as always, he introduced us to books like the The World Turned Upside Down and The making of the English working class. If you had only done history at school in the 1970s, then these opened our minds to a whole new world. I was hooked and the rest is history.' https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/ncjw81
The Pet Voter : An Incident of the Recent Elections by 'N.' 'I’ll pass ten thousand laws, if you to vote agree: / It would be good for you and very nice for me.' https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/31zfks
A Humble Reminder : To the Propertied Classes ['We have fed you all for a thousand years'] by 'N.' 'We have fed you all for a thousand years, / And you hail us still unfed, / Though there’s never a pound of all your pounds / But marks the workers’ dead' https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/qrfmk0
We Have Fed You All for a Thousand Years : Travels of a Protest Poem 'As ‘We Have Fed You All for a Thousand Years’ this poem is possibly the most widely reprinted item from Freedom.' https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/0p2q91
Library News (Oct. 2026) - Lots of anarchist history https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/ngf45c
Barry Pateman 1951-2026
We'd like to thank everyone for their kind words and condolences. There's a brief notice at https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/8kptrm.A longer tribute 'An anarchist in the archive : Remembering Barry Pateman' is at https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/w0vwm5.
We've also posted 'Barry Pateman: An Appreciation' by Martin H. https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/c2ft1b
You can read a transcript of his talk 'Tensions in Anarchism' at https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/h44m7w.
You can listen to Barry's talk about the early history of anarchism in San Francisco at the first meeting of the Alexander Berkman Social Club (26 June 2008) here: https://archive.org/details/barry-pateman-absc-20080626
Radical History Zone at the Bristol Anarchist Bookfair
"Our main theme is to mark the 90th anniversary of the Spanish Revolution in July 1936 when an anarchist inspired, working-class union movement successfully resisted a fascist coup, and seized control of the fields and factories in a social revolution. This realisation of workers’ control of production, collectivisation of agriculture from below and armed working class power on the streets, was achieved whilst fighting a war against fascist forces at the front. [...]"We bring together historians who have critically studied this social revolution and interviewed women participants, for a day of talks, panels and discussions about this important moment in working class history. Speakers include Danny Evans, James Yeoman, Isabella Lorusso, Lee Groves and Nick Soulsby."
Radical History Zone, at the Central Friends Meeting House in Champion Square (near Cabot Circus). Saturday 24th October, 2026 See https://www.brh.org.uk/site/event-series/radical-history-zone-at-the-bristol-anarchist-bookfair/
The bookfair itself is on 24 October 2026 10:30-17:00 Trinity Centre BS2 0NW See https://bristolanarchistbookfair.uk/
London Anarchist Bookfair 2026
The London Anarchist Bookfair 2026 is on Saturday 26 September, at Rich Mix and nearby venues. https://anarchistbookfair.london/August 2026 Kate Sharpley Library Bulletin online
KSL: Bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library No. 121, August 2026 has just been posted on our site: https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/b5mnpm. The pdf is up at https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/mgqqw4.Contents
Agnes’s Candle by N. O. Bonzo (and Agnes Inglis) "And they will peruse these old records of voices and they will repeat your words and speak your names" https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/xwdf99.
Clara Gilbert Cole: brief notes "Parliament is used to keep the rich rich, and the poor poor, and the Labour Party is impotent to alter this." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/95x893.
Prison Knitting by Clara Gilbert Cole "With the click of my needles I knit, knit, knit, / Not like Madame Defarge for heads to be cut" https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/s4mzn2.
María Bruguera Pérez (1915-1992) by Joan Pinyana Mormeneo "She is and will remain identified as one of the many who fought from within the Libertarian Movement for the much-needed emancipation and comprehensive equality of all women." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/q83dwq.
Albert Meltzer, Our Comrade – Thirty Years On by the KSL Collective "he still influences how we think about anarchism and history, and what the Kate Sharpley Library does." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/z8wczj.
Ariane Gransac is dead: a life that was intense, rebellious and anarchist by Tomás Ibáñez "For upwards of ten years, she threw herself body and soul into the libertarian struggle against Francoism, alongside Octavio Alberola, taking part in nearly every action mounted by the FIJL, many of them under the aegis of the First of May Group." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/mpg6nj.
Anarchist solidarity with the Miners' Strike : call for interviews [2026] "Were you involved ... Would you be up for talking about it?" https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/83bn2g.
Notes on the Cologne anarcho-syndicalists and the Miners’ Strike by Ralph Aurand "Cologne has only a million inhabitants. And we always made sure, we were not just moving around in our own bubble." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/s4mzmw.
Into The Valley… by A Bristol Miners Support Group "The culture-shock when we refused the meat sandwiches led onto a discussion about veganism and we managed to explain why we weren’t dying of malnutrition. This was quite amazing, as before the strike we would have been run outta town for being deviants…." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/3ffdd2.
Some Sources on the Spanish Revolution of 1936 [Digitised accounts by Augustin Souchy, Gaston Leval and (Glasgow's) Workers’ Free Press; Cipriano Mera, Suceso Portales and Mika Etchebéhère; and 'Versus the State : Theses on War, Revolution and Proletariat', a new book of essays by Agustín Guillamón] https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/c868x9.
Library update (July 2026) [Suceso Portales (again), The Libertarian Maquis in Catalonia, free pamphlets for subscribers, Stuart Christie profiled by the BBC in 1981, and thoughts on libraries: "Luigi Balsamini […] has some interesting thoughts on why materials might not be preserved: ‘The troubled history of many activists […] fear of falling into a web of repression […] a general distrust must be recorded towards anything with a hint of “museumification”’"]. https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/gqnngx.