A Man Called Brian

Brian Haw
Haw in August 2007
Born	Brian William Haw (1949-01-07)7 January 1949 Wanstead Hospital, Woodford Green, Essex, England
Died	18 June 2011(2011-06-18) (aged 62) Berlin, Germany
Nationality	British
Known for	Activism

Brian William Haw (7 January 1949 – 18 June 2011) was an English protester and peace campaigner who lived for almost ten years in a peace camp in London's Parliament Square from 2001, in a protest against UK and US foreign policy. He began the Parliament Square Peace Campaign before the 2001 United States attacks, and became a symbol of the anti-war movement over the policies of both the United Kingdom and the United States in Afghanistan and later Iraq. At the 2007 Channel 4 Political Awards he was voted Most Inspiring Political Figure. Haw died of cancer in Berlin, where he had been receiving medical treatment.

Haw was born in Wanstead Hospital, in Woodford Green, Essex a twin and the eldest of five. He grew up in neighbouring Barking and in Whitstable, Kent.

His father, Robert William Haw (1925-1964), served as a sniper in the Reconnaissance Corps in the Second World War, and had been one of the first British soldiers to enter the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. He later worked as a railway clerk, and also worked in a betting office. He committed suicide by gassing himself when Haw was 13. Haw's mother was Iris Marie Haw (née Hall).

Haw's family were involved in an evangelical Christian church in Whitstable, which Haw joined when he was aged 11. Haw was apprenticed to a boat-builder from the age of 16 and then entered the Merchant Navy as a deckhand. He travelled widely before spending six months at evangelical college in Nottingham, after which he preached world peace. Haw visited Northern Ireland in 1970 during The Troubles, as well as the Killing Fields of Cambodia in 1989.