On this day, 26 August 1921, workers in the mills and bakeries declared a soviet (aka: a workers’ council) in the small Irish township of Bruree. The businesses were owned by the Cleeves family, who, since the establishment of the “Knocklong Soviet” a year earlier, had faced a series of workers’ revolts. A rare photograph features a sign workers affixed to one of the mills, which read “Bruree Soviet Workers Mills. We make bread not profits.” When a reporter from the Limerick Leader newspaper visited Bruree, he found the soviet had total control, “both industrially and otherwise.” The soviet ended on 3 September after the revolutionary nationalist Constance Markievicz threatened to use the Irish Republican Army to suppress the revolt. https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1793144597537349/?type=3
