Audrey Beecham [letter]

Just thought I’d drop you a little note having read the latest Bulletin [Audrey Beecham was mentioned in ‘‘Not a good look’? Reading Dave Cope on British anarchist publishing history’ in KSL 110-111]. I remember Audrey Beecham from Oxford back in the early 1980’s. There was a group of us working on the local alternative paper, The Back Street Bugle. We formed an anarchist discussion group in the very early 1980’s, as I recall. Not sure of the date. Our first meeting was in the Carpenter’s Arms and we were approached by this posh elderly woman who turned out to be Audrey. We were all in our early 20’s at the time, so it seemed unusual, but she was obviously interested and when she talked about her time in Spain we all got on fine. We even had one meeting round at her flat in North Oxford somewhere. There was an anarchist conference in Oxford round about that time and again Audrey stuck out a bit from the crowd, some London anarchists being particularly suspicious. I’m afraid none of us kept in contact with her after the group dissolved, which I regret in retrospect.

Kevin E