In 1943, four years after the Francoist victory in the Spanish Civil War, a book was published in England on the origins of the conflict. The author Gerald Brenan, (1894-1987) had lived intermittently in Spain in the 1920s and 1930s; the book, The Spanish Labyrinth soon became a classic in the English-speaking world. [You may … Continue reading Eighty Years of “The Spanish Labyrinth”
In 1935 a British couple Nancy and Archie Johnstone opened a hotel on the Catalan coast in Tossa de Mar. Unlike most foreign residents, the Johnstones stayed on after the Civil War broke out, finally leaving in early February 1939 as Republican resistance to Franco’s forces collapsed in Catalonia. Nancy recounted her experiences in two … Continue reading Tossa de Mar in Peace and War 1935-1939
In a previous article we reviewed The International Brigades: Fascism, Freedom and the Spanish Civil War, Giles Tremlett’s exhaustive and wide-ranging account of the 34,000 foreign volunteers who fought in the International Brigades during the Spanish Civil War. Hot on the heels of Tremlett’s book comes this latest volume, Voluntarios por la Revolución: La Milicia Internacional … Continue reading International POUM volunteers in the Spanish Civil War
Between 1936 and 1947 almost half a million people were detained in 188 Francoist concentration camps, the last of which, at Miranda de Ebro, finally closed in 1947 (Javier Rodrigo, Cautivos, 2005, p. 308). One of the most important camps occupied parts of the ancient monastery at San Pedro de Cardeña, about 10 km south … Continue reading The San Pedro de Cardeña concentration camp
In a previous article [Memoirs of the War & Post-War by female writers] we discussed the memoirs of Constancia de la Mora, the grand-daughter of Antonio Maura (Spanish PM under Alfonso XIII) who became director of the Foreign Press Office during the Civil War. Her memoirs were first published in English in the United States … Continue reading Memories of Spain in the 1930s
In 1961, 25 years after the military coup that sparked off the Civil War, two important books on the conflict appeared, one in English (The Spanish Civil War by Hugh Thomas) and the other in French (La Révolution et la Guerre d’Espagne by Pierre Broué and Emile Témime). These were perhaps the first books written … Continue reading Writing the History of the Civil War in 1961
Today, 15 June, is the anniversary of the 1977 general election, the first elections held in Spain after the death of General Franco and an important landmark in the Transition which followed the Dictatorship. To mark this date IHR is publishing this review of a new book by Sebastiaan Faber, Professor of Hispanic Studies at … Continue reading The Weight of the Absent Past
If you read this article and find it useful please consider making a donation to enable us to continue our work by following this link Thank you! In a blogpost in 2019 we reviewed Tomasa Cuevas’s book Carcel de Mujeres 1939-1945. We mentioned that her book had been published in English in 1998 under the title Prison … Continue reading “Prison of Women” by Tomasa Cuevas
If you read this article and find it useful please consider making a donation to enable us to continue our work by following this link Thank you! During the Civil War thousands of people from other countries volunteered to fight for the Spanish Republic against the insurgents led by General Franco. Most of these joined the International … Continue reading The Devout and the Displaced: A new History of the International Brigades
On 24 January 1977 three extreme-right terrorists stormed into the offices of labour lawyers working for the trade union Comisiones Obreras (CCOO) in the Calle Atocha in Madrid. They opened fire murdering three of the lawyers, Enrique Valdelvira Ibáñez, Luis Javier Benavides Orgaz and Francisco Javier Sauquillo. They also killed a law student, Serafín Holgado, … Continue reading The Atocha Massacre: 44 Years After
