Skip to main content
NEU job vacancy
The revolutionary life of Noreen Branson
From aristocratic upbringing to undercover communist courier and finally respected labour historian, MAT COWARD chronicles how personal tragedy and socialist conviction shaped an extraordinary activist’s journey

WHILE his men were out in force, searching in vain for a notorious communist courier, the police chief spent the night dancing with a charming young Englishwoman at a New Year’s Eve ball. His dance partner was, of course, the very agent his officers were hunting. They never caught her; nobody ever did.

Noreen Branson knew how to dance in respectable company — she had, after all, been a debutante. But her aristocratic upbringing at her grandparents’ house in Berkeley Square had not been as untroubled as it might sound: at the age of eight, in 1918, she was suddenly orphaned when both her parents died within days of each other.

Her mother fell to typhoid and then her father was killed in combat. Little Noreen Browne developed a loathing of war which never left her, and which perhaps determined the course of her adult life.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
TALK OF THE TOWN: (L to R) John Wilkes caricatured by Willia
Features / 25 January 2025
25 January 2025
Despite his wealthy background and membership of a secretive aristocratic occult club, the radical politician forged an alliance with the working class to fight for democracy and free speech against the Georgian elite, writes MAT COWARD
Labour MP Philip Noel-Baker had a Nobel Prize and an Olympic
Features / 30 December 2024
30 December 2024
MAT COWARD offers a roll call of refuseniks – some for political reasons, others for quirky reasons of their own
A massive gathers in Hyde Park for a meeting during the the
Features / 10 December 2024
10 December 2024
From swimming pool soviets to piano factory occupations, early 20th-century radical organiser Lillian Thring chose street battles and mass action over the electoral path, writes MAT COWARD
ICON OF STRUGGLE: Charlotte Despard speaks to a crowd in Tra
Features / 14 November 2024
14 November 2024
Taking up social work after being widowed transformed a Victorian liberal into a lifelong fighter for causes as wide-ranging as Sinn Fein and Indian independence to the right of women to drink in pubs, writes MAT COWARD