The Spanish Civil War Read Free Page A

1939–45, with the world war raging in much of Europe, the government of General Franco could act more or less without criticism. The Law of Historical Memory was passed to try to put the consequent grievances to rest.
    Nothing in historical memory is ever obvious, however. Let us recall what happened with the understandable desire of well-wishers to bury honourably the corpse of the poet Federico García Lorca, who was shot in August 1936 by the organized Right in or outside Granada. His place of interment seemed to have been established by such worthy people as Gerald Brenan and Ian Gibson. A campaign for disinterment began which was initially opposed by the surviving members of the poet’s family. Eventually in 2010 the idea was approved and embarked upon. But despite elaborate digging no body was found.
    My solution to the problem of the memory of the Civil War is a simple one. A monument should be erected outside Madrid along thelines of the Holocaust monument in Israel. On this the names of all who died as a direct consquence of the conflict, either in battle or behind the lines, should be inscribed. There would be José Antonio as well as García Lorca, there would be Mola and also Luis Companys. Cornford, of course, and the famous Sevillano bullfighter El Algabeño 3 who were killed on opposing sides in the winter battle at Lopera in 1937. One was a falangista, the other an English poet and Communist. Both were heroes within their own worlds, who knew absolutely nothing of each other.
    H. T., 2012

Abbreviations Used in the Notes
CAB
British cabinet minutes (unpublished, in the Public Record Office)-with the appropriate reference thereafter
FD
French foreign policy documents 2 e Série 1936-9 tome III onwards
FO
Foreign Office, alluding to unpublished papers in the Public Record Office
GD
German foreign policy documents Series D vol. 3 unless otherwise stated
NIC
Non-Intervention Committee documents
NIS
Non-Intervention Sub-committee documents
USD
United States foreign policy volumes 1936-9

Some Groups and Political Parties
    with their abbreviations and approximate English equivalents
CEDA
(Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas)-Catholic Party
CNT
(Confederación Nacional de Trabajo)-Anarcho-Syndicalist Trades Union
FAI
(Federación Anarquista Ibérica)-Anarchist Doctrinal Vanguard
FIJL
(Federación Ibérica de Juventudes Libertarias)-Anarchist Youth
JAP
(Juventud de Acción Popular)-Catholic Action Youth Movement
JCI
(Juventud Comunista Ibérica)-POUM (see below) Youth
JONS
(Juntas de Ofensiva Nacional-Sindicalista)-Fascists
JSU
(Juventudes Socialistas Unificadas)-United Youth Movement
POUM
(Partido Obrere de Unificación Marxista)-Revolutionary (i.e., anti-Stalinist) Communists
PSUC
(Partido Socialista Unificado de Cataluña)-United Catalan Socialist Party-a pseudonym for the communists in Catalonia
UGT
(Unión General de Trabajadores)-Socialist Trade Union
UME
(Unión Militar Espanola)-Right-wing officers’ group
UMRA
(Unión Militar Republicana Antifascista)-Republican officers’ group

Preface to the Revised Edition
    This work was first published in 1961 and later that year and the next in several languages, including Spanish. The Spanish edition was, however, not published in Madrid because it was banned there by the censors in the Ministry of Information; so it was produced (as its first book, I think) by Ruedo Ibérico, a Spanish émigré publishing house in Paris, and subsequently smuggled into Spain. Revised editions followed in English. The fully revised edition of 1976 was published in English and Spanish. By that time General Franco had died and the new government led by Adolfo Suárez, on the designation of King Juan Carlos, was in process of abolishing the censorship. Thereafter, the book sold in many editions in Spain; there was an illustrated Version sold as a partwork in kiosks at railway stations and street corners.
    I think that the censorship in Spain in the 1960s helped the sales in