Robert Merriman Monument to Be Installed on Berkeley Campus
Claude Potts and Donna Southard with the replica of the Catalan plaque, February 2025. Photo Richard Bermack.
The crowdfunding for the installation of a plaque honoring Robert Merriman, the legendary commander of the Abraham Lincoln Battalion, has reached its goal. The plaque, which will be affixed to a boulder and placed at the center of campus near Memorial Glade honoring Berkeley veterans of World War II, is a copy of one installed since April 2018 in the Catalan town Corbera d’Ebre, close to the spot where Merriman went missing in April 1938. When he left for Spain, Merriman was pursuing a PhD in Economics at UC Berkeley.
The crowdfunding effort was led by Claude Potts, the UCB librarian for Romance Language collections, and Donna Southard, who teaches in UCB’s department of Spanish and Portuguese.
The monument at Corbera (Catalonia).
