For the fallen
Author’s Note
List of Illustrations
List of Maps
Preface
Introduction
Dramatis Personae
PART ONE
‘A CROWD OF BOY SCOUTS’
Chapter 1 – First Blood
Chapter 2 – Departures
Chapter 3 – Training
Chapter 4 – The Advance
Chapter 5 – White House Hill
PART TWO
DEATH STALKED THE OLIVE GROVES
Chapter 6 – ‘The bodies were rolling down the hill’
Chapter 7 – Retreat!
Chapter 8 – ‘The Moors were mowed down in scores’
Chapter 9 – The Dark
Chapter 10 – Dawn
Chapter 11 – The Feint
Chapter 12 – Capture!
Chapter 13 – The Second Night
Chapter 14 – Tank Attack!
Chapter 15 – The Great Rally
PART THREE
CONCLUSIONS
Chapter 16 – From Jarama to Brunete
Chapter 17 – The Nationalist Breakthrough
Chapter 18 – The Ebro Offensive and the Farewell Parade
Epilogue – Back to Britain
Appendix 1 – The Battlefield Today
Appendix 2 – Order of Battle
Notes
Bibliography
The following account is compiled entirely from first hand sources. In the days, weeks and months after the battle, several volunteers wrote diaries, memoirs, letters or newspaper articles detailing their experiences. Four decades later the Imperial War Museum began a series of interviews which added a wealth of detail to the existing accounts. Whilst I am confident that what follows is an accurate description of the events of 12–14 February 1937, memories fade and some veterans may have embellished their exploits. Furthermore, although they largely agreed on what happened, precisely when each particular event occurred, and in which particular order, proved far more difficult to ascertain.
The scope of any work of non-fiction is limited to the sources available. Whilst the British participants at Jarama left copious material, the Nationalist sources are sparse. The reasons are various. Although they won the war, the Nationalists lost the battle for hearts and minds that followed and therefore the market for their memoirs has been limited. Furthermore, after Franco’s death, Spain underwent a period of deliberate forgetting (el pacto del olvido) and as the veterans entered their twilight years, the desire to record their reflections was lacking. Finally, although several of the British veterans were well read and educated and predisposed to writing about their experiences, the men they faced at Jarama were from different backgrounds. The vast majority of the Spaniards who made up the bulk of the rank and file of the Foreign Legion were barely literate and the Moors who fought alongside them were even less well equipped to leave a written record.
They Shall Not Pass! is a micro-history. The narrative is constructed from a worm’s eye point of view. It is not an account of ‘great men’ whose decisions altered the course of history. Instead, it aims to immerse the reader in the lives of a select number of ‘ordinary’ individuals over a brief period of time. As such, it inevitably overlooks the contributions of others, chief amongst whom are the Spaniards themselves.
On a related note, in an attempt to make the characters come to life from limited resources, I have included references to individual’s ages. However, in several cases, whilst the year of birth was possible to ascertain, I was unable to find the exact date. Where this was the case, I have assumed that the individual’s birthday occurred before the start of the battle. Therefore, a volunteer whose year of birth was 1900, is assumed to have been 37 on 12 February rather than 36. Although this supposition is unsatisfactory, it avoids over complicating the text.
One of the problems facing any writer of history is the use of terminology. Truth is always more complex than fiction and applying labels to the various groups of men involved at Jarama is fraught with difficulty. Nevertheless, I have chosen to make a few generalizations to avoid becoming bogged down in detail. ‘The British’ were not all British; amongst the ‘Republicans’ were communists, socialists and anarchists; and those they fought were certainly not all fascists. For the benefit of objectivity I have chosen to use the less emotive epithet of Nationalists for the enemies of the British Battalion. Even though the volunteers referred to them as ‘Fascists’ in their letters and memoirs, to label the Moroccan mercenaries and professional soldiers of the Foreign Legion in such a way would be to do them a disservice.
This project would not have been possible without the cooperation of numerous archivists and librarians in England, Spain and Russia. I would also like to thank Kate Moore, Emily Holmes and Philip Smith at Osprey; Richard Baxell, the author of the meticulously well researched British Volunteers in the Spanish Civil War; Jane and Dave Hughes, Tim Dalrymple, Jamie Cowper and Julia Winslet for their comments on various drafts and DeeDee Cunningham for her invaluable insights into her great uncle Jock, to my mind the greatest of all the unsung British heroes at Jarama.
Between pages 112 and 113
1. Los Nacionales, an early propaganda poster. (akg-images)
2. Moroccan regulares awaiting transportation to Seville, July 1936. (Topfoto)
3. ‘The Spanish See-Saw’. (Topfoto)
4. ‘No Pasarán’. First used during the 1936 campaign in defence of Madrid, ‘No Pasarán’ or ‘They shall not pass’ became one of the Republic’s most powerful slogans. (Courtesy of Francis Lannon)
5. The British Battalion banner. (Mike Chappell © Osprey Publishing)1
6. Tom Wintringham, Madrigueras, July 1937. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
7. Frank Ryan. An IRA activist and ardent Catholic, Ryan was a senior figure in the International Brigades. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
8. The Jarama River. The photo was taken on the west bank a few hundred yards south of the San Martín Bridge. (Author’s Collection)
9. The Jarama River. (Author’s Collection)
10. The I-16 or Mosca was the Republicans’ most advanced fighter plane. (Corbis)
11. Two members of Harry Fry’s company manning a Maxim machine-gun. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
12. Sam Wild. Wild was wounded whilst retreating from the Conical Hill on the first day at Jarama. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
13. The British Battalion on parade behind the front line at Jarama. (Topfoto)
14. Moorish Infantry, Spain 1937. The British feared and demonized the dreaded Moors they faced at Jarama. (Keystone Images)
15. T26 tank. The Russian-built T26 was the most advanced tracked vehicle operating on either side during the Spanish Civil War. (Keystone Images)
16. The Sunken Road. (Author’s Collection)
17. A view from the Sunken Road looking west towards the ridgeline. (Author’s Collection)
Between pages 192 and 193
18. William Ball. At twenty years old, Ball was one of the youngest volunteers to join the British Battalion. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
19. Walter Gregory recovering from the wound he suffered at Jarama. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
20. George Nathan, a veteran of the Great War. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
21. John ‘Bosco’ Jones. Before travelling to Spain, Jones had fought Oswald Mosley’s Black Shirts at the battle of Cable Street, the British Union of Fascists’ biggest defeat. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
22. Donald Renton. The political commissar of the 2nd Company, Renton was wounded then captured on the second day. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
23. A well-earned break. Members of the British Battalion resting behind the lines at Jarama, 1937. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
24. Wounded from Jarama. Walter Gregory, the 3rd Company’s runner, is second from the right in the bottom row. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
25. Members of the 2nd Company captured at Jarama on 13 February 1937. James Maley is second on the right, partially obscured next to him is Jimmy Rutherford. George Leeson is fifth from the right. Harry Fry, the company commander, stands two places to Leeson’s right. Bert ‘Yank’ Levy is standing alone on the left wearing a cap. Two places to Levy’s right is Tommy Bloomfield and beside him is Donald Renton. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
26. Burial of a British soldier amongst the olive groves. (IWM HU 34695)
27. The Farewell Parade, Barcelona, 29 October 1938. (Image courtesy of the Marx Memorial Library)
28. Members of the British Battalion leaving Victoria Station on their return from Spain, December 1938. (Corbis)
29. Officers and staff of the British Battalion, most likely taken in 1938.
30. The ruins of Belchite. The most fought-over town of the war, Belchite played host to the British Battalion in September 1937. (Author’s Collection)
31. The International Brigade Memorial at Jarama. Before the author’s visit, the plaque was vandalized by members of the Falange, a Spanish fascist movement. (Author’s Collection)
32. The Conical Hill. (Author’s Collection)
33. The peaks of the Pyrenees seen from the battlements of the Castell de Sant Ferran in Figueras. (Author’s Collection)
34. This humble memorial to the British Battalion overlooks the valley where the first two days’ fighting took place. (Author’s Collection)
35. A close-up of the memorial. The plaque reads ‘To Kit Conway and the other 200 internationals of the British Battalion who died for liberty’. (Author’s Collection)
1. Spain: February 1937
2. Overview of Jarama
3. The British Battalion’s Area of Operations: 5.30am, 12 February 1937
4. The Advance: 10.00–12.30am, 12 February 1937
5. The Retreat: 5.00pm, 12 February 1937
6. The Morning Feint and the Afternoon Attack on the Machine-Gun Company: 13 February 1937
7. Tank Attack! 14 February 1937
8. The Great Rally: 14 February 1937
9. Spain: February 1937–August 1938
According to the historian A.J.P. Taylor, socialists seeking admittance to heaven in the aftermath of the Second World War were asked just one question: ‘What was the turning point in the battle against fascism?’ Those who replied Stalingrad were banished without further discussion. Any who named the Battle of Britain were given a second chance, but only the enlightened few who answered ‘on the banks of the Jarama’ were immediately ushered inside.1 This near-forgotten struggle, which took place in February 1937 amongst the olive groves south-east of Madrid, proved for the first time that fascism and its ilk, which up until then had steamrollered all opposition from the Rhineland to Addis Ababa, could in fact be stopped. Although the Republicans would lose the Civil War, their efforts, and those of the international volunteers who fought alongside them, paved the way for the more celebrated victories that followed. Without them, twentieth-century history might well have taken a very different path indeed.
Many contemporaries saw the Spanish Civil War as a straight fight between fascism and communism. The truth was far more convoluted. In fact the conflict’s origins stretch back to the early nineteenth century, long before either doctrine existed. Ever since the Napoleonic invasion of 1808 had overthrown King Ferdinand VII and given rise to the Cortes (or Spanish parliament), those who believed in progressive ideals had been locked in a struggle with the reactionary forces of old Spain, spearheaded by the monarchy, the church and the landowning elite. In the years that followed the picture grew ever more complex: the 1830s saw the birth of Basque Nationalism; forty years later, Bakunin’s anarchist movement was enthusiastically adopted by thousands of disenfranchised peasants in Andalucía, Catalonia and Extremadura; and at the turn of the twentieth century Catalans began to call for independence and the industrial proletariat of Madrid, Barcelona, Bilbao and Santander found a voice with the foundation of the Socialist Party and the establishment of the trade unions.1 In the 1920s and 1930s these divisions came to a head. The period was punctuated by the rapid rise and fall of coalition governments of both the left and the right. Coups, assassinations and uprisings became commonplace and three further forces emerged: the Carlist Requetés, armed defenders of the traditional role of the church; the Falange, a fascist paramilitary organization inspired by Mussolini’s Black Shirts; and the Spanish Communist Party. Although relatively insignificant before the conflict, the last of these would rapidly gain influence once hostilities began.
In July 1936 two of the country’s senior generals, Emilio Mola and José Sanjuro, sought to put an end to the uncertainty. Their plan was to use elements of the armed forces to overthrow the Republican government of Manuel Azaña, a ‘Popular Front’ of loosely allied centre and left-wing parties. Having won just 34 per cent of the vote in the general election earlier that year, Azaña’s government had only the flimsiest of mandates to rule. The generals, however, were overconfident. They thought the left would crumble swiftly, considered the people an undisciplined rabble and believed the government only needed a push to collapse entirely. On 18 July they put their plan into effect. Although the coup was successful in some areas, people’s militias, backed by elements of the security services, defeated the rebellious military in the key cities of Madrid, Valencia and Barcelona. Fearing destruction, the generals united with the Falangists, Monarchists and Conservatives under the loosely defined banner of nationalism. In the chaos that ensued, 50,000 were executed by death squads working for both sides. A front line later emerged, splitting Spain in two. Starting midway across the Pyrenees, it cut south through Aragon, turned west at the mountain stronghold of Teruel, skirted Madrid and then proceeded south-west to the Portuguese border, terminating just south of the city of Badajoz. The government controlled the majority of the population, over half the armed forces and the country’s entire industrial output. The Nationalists, on the other hand, held one trump card: Francisco Franco’s Army of Africa. Made up of Moroccan regulares (regulars) and the tercios (battalions) of the Foreign Legion, it was an elite force, tempered in the ashes of Spain’s final colonial war. As they were on the far side of the Gibraltar straits and the Republicans controlled most of the navy, however, the generals had no way of deploying them. Help was needed. It would come from abroad.
Mussolini was the first to offer his support. Within weeks of the coup Italian planes were on their way to Tetúan, the capital of Nationalist Morocco. Later, Hitler also became involved. Enthused by a Wagner recital he had just attended, the Führer named the operation to aid the Spanish Nationalists Unternehmen Feuerzauber (Operation Magic Fire). Twenty Junkers transports, the first detachment of the Condor Legion (an elite unit of Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe volunteers), were soon on their way to Morocco.2 On arrival, the German pilots were met by an extraordinary sight. Thousands of Moors, ‘wearing flowing Chilaba robes ... red fezzes or tightly wound turbans’, had gathered at the airport. Others were camped in the hills beyond. ‘Unencumbered, by German efficiency ... [the Moors] stormed the planes’ as soon as they touched down, piling into the back until an adjutant cried “Voll” – the signal for the pilot to take off for Seville.’3 Thus began the first military air-bridge in history.
Meanwhile, in Britain, Stanley Baldwin’s Conservative government concentrated on attracting signatories for its international policy of Non-Intervention. Like many Conservatives in the mid-1930s, including Winston Churchill, Baldwin saw communism as a greater threat than fascism. He was content to turn a blind eye to Hitler’s and Mussolini’s excesses whilst hoping they would help keep Stalin in check. Although denying arms to both Azaña’s democratically elected government and the rebellious generals, Non-Intervention effectively played into the latter’s hands. Whilst Franco et al were receiving aid from both Hitler and Mussolini, who although joint signatories to Baldwin’s pact had no qualms about breaking their promises, the Republicans were poorly supplied. Forced to rely on unscrupulous arms dealers, Republican Mexico and the half-hearted and intermittent support of the French Popular Front headed by Léon Blum, their armies would prove no match for the Nationalists in the opening exchanges of the war.
Around 14,000 men, 44 pieces of artillery, 90 machine guns and 500 tons of ammunition and stores were taken across the Straits of Gibraltar by German and Italian planes and blockade-defying Nationalist launches. Franco, who had flown from Morocco on 6 August, marshalled his troops in Seville before sending them north under Lieutenant Colonel Juan Yagüe y Blanco. With that the advance on Madrid began.4 Led by a column of 3,000 men, Yagüe’s troops punched their way through isolated units of the people’s militias, advancing 500 miles in a matter of weeks. At each captured town, scores of suspected Reds were rounded up and shot. On 11 August Merida fell. Then came the city of Badajoz, which proved the Nationalists’ sternest test yet. Nevertheless, it too was captured after a day’s fierce fighting breached the walls that had held Wellington’s redcoats at bay for three weeks over a hundred years before. The reprisals that followed were atrocious. Hundreds were executed in the bullring. The shots rang out for weeks, both day and night. By the time the Nationalists had finished, the floor was said to run ankle deep with blood.5
With the Republicans seemingly at his mercy, Franco committed a strategic mistake. Rather than finishing his enemies with an attack on the capital, his troops were diverted to relieve the besieged garrison of Toledo. Trapped in the Alcazar, an ancient fortress cum palace built on a commanding height above the banks of the river Tagus, the Nationalists had been holding out since the rebellion began. It is thought that Franco’s motivation for this move was political: by saving these well-publicized heroes, who had been a much-needed focus for Nationalist pride since the failures at Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia, he was able to boost his popularity at a time when he was merely the junior element of the triumvirate leading the rebellion. If politics was indeed his motivation, the move proved remarkably astute. After driving off the encircling militia and massacring those left behind, the Army of Africa lifted the siege on 27 September, two months after it had begun. Amidst a flurry of publicity, photos of Franco flooded the right-wing press. It was the perfect publicity coup. From that point on he became the de facto head of the Nationalists.
By the time Franco got round to attacking the capital, Azaña’s ineffectual government had been replaced by a wartime cabinet headed by Largo Caballero, a socialist leader inappropriately nicknamed the Lenin of Madrid. His appointment stiffened the people’s resistance against the Nationalists and their hopes were given a further boost in November with the arrival of the first consignment of Russian aid. Although Stalin’s interest in Spain was self-serving and his policies would lead to a civil war within the Civil War, he was also the only national leader to supply up-to-date military aid to the Spanish government on a large scale. T26 tanks, biplane and mono-wing fighters, bombers, advisors, small arms and ammunition were followed by the first International Brigades, volunteer units organized by the Comintern, a body originally conceived to spread the revolution beyond Russia’s borders, which had since been bent to Stalin’s will. As the columns advanced down the Gran Via, Madrillenos spilled out of their houses to yell ‘No Pasarán!’ (they shall not pass) and ‘Viva Los Rusos!’, unaware that they were actually cheering Germans, French, Belgians and Poles. Some of the most intense fighting of the war followed. For seven days, the 4th and 6th banderas (battalions) of the Foreign Legion battled Polish anti-fascists for control of the Clinical Hospital, a prominent building caught on the front line. Whilst the Poles occupied the upper floors, the Legion held the basement. Countless bayonet charges were made up the staircase. Each was repulsed by showers of grenades.
Amongst the Internationals were a handful of British pioneers. Too few to form their own unit, nineteen fought with the 4th Section of the Commune of Paris Battalion, whilst a group of twenty-one were with the German Thaelmann Battalion, in the XII Brigade.6 According to one of their number, Esmond Romilly, a young aristocrat who had rebelled against his conservative upbringing, the British were made up of a variety of types. Amongst them were ‘Lorrimer Birch, a brilliant scientist and Oxford graduate, [a] sincere and wholehearted communist; Joe Gough, [an] unemployed Luton humorist; [and] Tich, an ex-sergeant of the Buffs, with a kind heart, and first class ability as a quartermaster’.7 Also present was a tough young Scot named Jock Cunningham, who would play a decisive role at Jarama. In November 1936 the fighting grew increasingly bloody. As the Moors tried to cross the streets below, the British poured volleys of rifle fire upon them, hiding behind stacks of library tomes which swiftly became riddled with bullets. ‘I ... had the Everyman series around my window,’ one later recalled.8
On 23 November after his troops had suffered 50 per cent casualties, Franco called off the offensive.9 The direct assault on Madrid had failed. In the next three months the Nationalists would concentrate on encircling the capital and cutting it off from resupply. The change in tactics would prove effective. Whilst the chaotic nature of street fighting had been a great leveller, the militias could not match the Army of Africa’s organization in the open field. In the weeks to come road after road leading out of Madrid would be severed.
At the end of November the Nationalists attacked the Corunna Road to the north-west of the capital. The offensive began with an artillery bombardment. Then the Nationalist infantry moved in. On 14 December they captured Boadilla del Monte, a village 20 miles to the west of Madrid dominated by a small monastery. A counter-attack led by Russian T26 tanks forced the Nationalists to withdraw, but, after reforming, they attacked once more. Opposing them were the German volunteers of the Thaelmann Battalion, including the remnants of the British section which had fought with them at Madrid. Esmond Romilly detailed the fighting that ensued:
It started with two men falling dead from close-range bullets in a dug-out nearby. Then the real hailstorm of lead came at us. I was lying flat on my stomach. We shoved in clip after clip of cartridges until the breeches and barrels of our guns were red hot. I never took aim. I never looked up to see what I was firing at. I never heard the order to open fire. I never saw the enemy – never knew for certain where they were... My head was in a whirl – I was almost drunk with the smell of powder. I remember a young Spaniard next to me, wondering what he was doing and how he got there; but there was no time to work it all out. It was a mad scramble – pressing my elbows into the earth, bruising them on the stones, to get my rifle to my shoulder, rasping back the bolt, then shoving it home, then onto my elbows again.10
By the time the fighting had finished, the Nationalists had only managed to advance five miles. The Corunna road had been held, but at a terrible price. Hundreds of Republicans had fallen and, of the ten British volunteers who had survived the battle of Madrid while fighting with the German volunteers, eight had died. Only Romilly and one other had lived to tell the tale.11
Meanwhile, 150 miles to the south at the town of Lopera, in an attempt to take some pressure off the beleaguered Madrid front, the Republicans were about to launch an offensive of their own. Having travelled by train from Madrid, the newly formed XIV International Brigade was to spearhead the advance. Amongst the troops was a detachment of 145 British volunteers under the command of George Nathan, a Great War veteran who would serve on the Brigade staff at Jarama. Most of the others were new arrivals, but some had fought at Madrid.
Casualties at Lopera were heavy. As soon as the men alighted from the train on the 28th, enemy planes dived out of the cloudless blue sky to strafe them. Nathan Segal, a Jew from Walthamstow, took cover with the rest, but was killed when an explosive bullet ‘entered his back and tore open his chest’.12 Advancing overland to Lopera the battalion had to capture a 400ft fortified hill. They took the feature twice, but were repulsed on both occasions by furious counter-attacks. John Tunnah recalled the fighting: ‘[As we got closer to the village] the resistance stiffened ... at times I could see ... [buildings] just coming out of the trees ... [and] it seemed as if every point of it was spouting fire’.13 In the first two days of the fighting, fifteen of the British Company were killed and twenty-eight wounded. On 30 December, the brigade was ordered to retreat. Machine guns raked their lines and Nationalist artillery caused further losses. That afternoon the British halted and dug in along a series of lightly wooded hills, here they received a visit from Dave Springhall, the battalion’s senior political commissar. Jumping into a slit trench dug behind a tree, he found himself face-to-face with several men who would go on to fight at Jarama. Maurice Davidovitch, a Jewish communist who would take charge of the stretcher bearers, was ‘as perky as ever’ and Ken Stalker, a Scottish communist who was always to be found with a lit pipe clenched between his teeth, had just had a lucky escape. Earlier in the fighting a bullet had hit his helmet. Passing straight through, it struck him on the forehead, momentarily stunning him, but otherwise doing no lasting harm.14
After their withdrawal from the front, André Marty, the chief political commissar of the Internationals, hailed the men of the British 1st Company as the best fighters in the brigade. George Nathan, ably supported by his section commanders, Kit Conway and Jock Cunningham, had particularly distinguished himself. Leading from the front, the Englishman had shown bravery and discipline, and the British company had been the only one to withdraw in good order from the field. Colonel Delasalle, the French commander of the XIV Brigade, paid dearly for the defeat. Looking for a scapegoat, Marty had him arrested on trumped up charges of colluding with the enemy.15 He was court-martialled and shot the next day. Nathan was promoted in his place.16
The XIV Brigade was then transferred to Las Rozas, the new front line to the north-west of Madrid following the Nationalists’ minor gains at Boadilla. After a few days’ rest in the capital, the British company were back in action. 10 January saw them climbing onto lorries and being driven into the Guadarrama mountains. One veteran remembers how ‘cold, wet and tired’ they were as they formed up in thick woods and marched to the front through ‘swirling mists [that] made it impossible to see more than a few yards ahead’. On reaching the outskirts of Las Rozas, the fighting began. ‘Deadly sniper fire came from the church tower. Then, bang on target our artillery scored a direct hit.’17 The Nationalists made repeated attacks over the next five days until a heavy snowfall finally brought their offensive to a standstill on the 15th. Despite suffering heavy casualties, the Nationalists had achieved their aim. The road to Corunna had fallen and Madrid’s supply lines were now teetering on the verge of collapse. British losses had also been significant. Jock Cunningham was amongst the wounded and by the time the unit returned to their base at Madrigueras, just sixty-seven of the 145 who had set out on Christmas Eve remained.18
By January 1937 the only major road in Republican hands leading to Madrid was the Valencia highway. Heading south-west from the capital to the Republicans’ main port on the Mediterranean coast, the road carried vital supplies, arms and ammunition to Madrid’s besieged defenders. If it were cut, the capital would surely fall and the Republic’s international credibility would suffer a blow from which it would be impossible to recover. Although originally planned for mid-January, the Nationalist offensive to take the road began on 6 February when the late winter rains had finally ceased. General Luis Orgaz Yoldi, the commander of the front, and Colonel José Varela, the senior officer in the field, had five brigades, each of between four and six infantry battalions, at their disposal. With artillery, anti-tank, armoured car and cavalry support, and a further four battalions in reserve, they commanded a total of 25,000 men. The shock troops spearheading the attack included eleven Moroccan tabores (battalions) and five tercios from the elite Foreign Legion. There were also two German heavy machine-gun battalions, 100 Mark I Panzer Tanks and a battery of 88mm guns under the command of Colonel von Thoma, whilst the planes of Mussolini’s Legionary Air Force (Aviacion Legionara) and Hitler’s Condor Legion soared overhead.19
Initially the Nationalist advance went well. Each brigade moved forward independently along a 10-mile front running due south from Madrid. Colonels Rada, Barrón and Buruaga started at the town of Pinto, whilst colonels Asensio Cabanillas and García Escámez began at Valdemoro, three miles to the south. Caught by surprise and faced with overwhelming odds, the government troops stood little chance. On the first day, Rada’s brigade assaulted the hill of La Marañosa. Two Republican battalions, dug in on the summit, defended stubbornly, but were driven back with heavy casualties. To the south, Buruaga’s brigade captured the hamlet of Gózquez de Abajo, Asensio’s troops took the village of San Martín de la Vega and García Escámez, on the far left of the line, captured Ciempozuelos. By the morning of 8 February, when fresh rainfall again put the operation on hold, the Nationalists were within a few hundred yards of the western bank of the Jarama River. Grateful for the respite, the Republicans reorganized and the Spanish Lister Division and the XII International Brigade were rushed to the front.20 High command also reinforced the north bank of the Manzanares, towards which they believed the Nationalists were about to switch their attack. At dawn on 11 February, the rains stopped. The second phase of the battle was about to begin.
Bypassing the Republican build up, Orgaz continued to advance east, concentrating his forces on the two crossings over the Jarama. To the north, Barrón’s brigade launched a successful pre-dawn assault on Pindoque Bridge. As the rest of the brigade enlarged the bridgehead, the Garibaldi Battalion of Italian anti-fascists counter-attacked, supported by T26 tanks. Their efforts were repelled, however, and the bridgehead was secured. The next day the Republicans lost the San Martín Bridge to the south in a near-identical attack.21 At 4.00am the 3rd Tabor of Tetuán from Asensio’s 4th Brigade fell upon the sentries before they could react, then crawled up the plain to the east of the river. Moving behind the government trenches dug on the high ground, they hurled grenades amongst the defenders. The slaughter was prodigious. After the wounded were finished off with triangular bladed knives, the rest of the brigade crossed and formed up on the far bank.22 By 11.00am on 12 February the 4th Brigade was ready to advance. Asensio Cabanillas, a forty-one year-old career officer who had joined the rebellion at the outset, ordered one of his two regiments, the 7th, to attack to the north of the Morata road. This would bring it into contact with the XI International Brigade and the Franco-Belgian and Dimitrov battalions (the latter a unit of Balkan volunteers) of the XV.23 The 8th Regiment, meanwhile, was sent to the south. Within the hour it was to have a fateful encounter with the XV Brigade’s final component: the British Battalion.
Following the battle of Las Rozas in January, the survivors of George Nathan’s company had been ordered to return to the village of Madrigueras. Awaiting them were over 300 new recruits. Together they went on to form the first British Battalion. Assigned to the XV Brigade, along with the Dimitrovs and Franco-Belgians and two Spanish units, by the time the British battalion left Madrigueras on 6 February 1937, it was over 500 strong. With orders to join the Reserve Brigade on the Jarama front, the men travelled by train to Albacete, headquarters of the International Brigades, then by lorry to Chinchon, a village 10 miles from the River Jarama.24 On the afternoon of the 11th, little realizing that the Nationalists would soon cross the river and penetrate the Republicans’ first line, Captain Tom Wintringham and his scouts moved out to occupy an old villa close to the front designated Battalion Headquarters (HQ). The rest of the men were woken before dawn on the 12th, herded aboard lorries and driven to join them. Although most had never fired a rifle in anger in their lives, they were about to be thrown into the bloodiest encounter of the conflict so far, the like of which had not been seen in Europe since the Great War. This book focuses on their first three days under fire.
Aitken, George – Battalion Commissar, British Battalion (b. c.1895, Glasgow)
A ‘rugged Scots Commissar’ and Great War veteran, who had been wounded at the battle of Loos, Aitken was ‘strong in his communist convictions, but by no means uncritical. If he thought that the leadership was wrong he did not hesitate to say so’.1
Asensio Cabanillas, Carlos – Colonel, Commander 4th Brigade (b.1896, Madrid)
A career soldier loyal to the military uprising from the start, Asensio had earned the respect of his men during Spain’s final colonial wars against the Rif rebels of Spanish Morocco.
Azaña, Manuel – President of the Spanish Republic (b.1880, Alcalá de Henares)
An accomplished writer and translator who was reluctantly drawn into public life, Azaña was an admirer of Cromwell and regarded ‘politics as an art, with the people as the palette’.2
Ball, William – Private, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b.1916, Reading) A twenty-one year-old graduate of Reading public school, Ball had served in the military cadets and was a fine marksman having passed his rifle shooting qualification with an ‘A’ grade.
Beckett, Clem – Section Leader, 4th Company, British Battalion (b.1900, Oldham)
‘Never tidily dressed’, Beckett was a communist and ex-speedway champion, who ‘looked as if he had come [straight] out of the garage. When not on parade he always had a little stub of a cigar in his mouth.’3
Blum, Léon – Prime Minister of France (b.1872, Paris)
Jewish socialist and head of France’s left-leaning Popular Front from 1936.
Bowler, Kitty – Journalist (b.1908, Plymouth, Massachusetts)
Champagne socialist who visited the Soviet Union, Italy and France before travelling to Barcelona to report on the Civil War. There she met and fell in love with Tom Wintringham, who went on to become the commander of the British Battalion from early February 1937.
Briskey, Bill – 3rd Company Commander, British Battalion (b. c.1890, London)
A sergeant in the Great War who went on to become a London bus driver and leading figure in the Transport Trade Union, Briskey was ‘a quiet ... gentle man, a most unmilitary type to look at but ... most dedicated to the fight against fascism’.4
Charlesworth, Albert – Private, 4th Company, British Battalion (b.1915, Oldham)
A metal polisher and engineer’s apprentice from Oldham, Charlesworth was a member of the local Socialist League. Always one to back those he saw as the underdogs, he left for Spain in late 1936.
Conway, ‘Kit’ – 1st Company Commander (Acting), British Battalion (b.1897, nr Burncourt, County Tipperary)
A ‘self taught’ orphan, who was ‘highly intelligent ... articulate [and] humorous ... with a generous capacity for friendship’, Conway fought on both sides in the Irish Civil War before joining the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in 1920. He was later jailed by the British and chose to live in the USA after his release. On his return to Ireland in the early 1930s, he joined the Communist Party and became one of its ‘most effective proselytisers’.5
Copeman, Fred – ‘Spare Officer’, 1st Company, British Battalion (b.1907, Suffolk)
Born into poverty, Copeman grew up in an orphanage before joining the Royal Navy at the age of fourteen. When Ramsay MacDonald’s government announced a cut in sailors’ pay in 1931, Copeman helped organize the Invergordon Mutiny and was dismissed from the service as a result. ‘An exceedingly large and brutish man’ prone to flights of fancy, Copeman was ‘a colourful bluffer’ who resorted to violence to get his way and was loved and hated by his comrades in equal measure.6
Crook, David – Private, 1st Company, British Battalion (b.1910, London)
A Cheltenham College alumnus, ‘university graduate ... [and] profound Marxist’ from an ‘impoverished middle class’ background, Crook fought Oswald Mosley’s Black Shirts at the battle of Cable Street before leaving for Spain.7
Cunningham, Jock – 1st Company Commander, British Battalion (b.1903, Coatbridge, nr Glasgow)
One of the first British volunteers to reach Spain, Cunningham was a veteran of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders who mutinied over pay and conditions whilst serving in Jamaica. Once in Spain he fought at the battles of Madrid, Lopera and Las Rozas before joining the British Battalion in January 1937. ‘Handsome and ... loveable, [and as] tough as they come’, Cunningham was a natural leader and adored by the men.8
Davidovitch, Maurice – Commander of the First Aid Section, British Battalion (b.1914, Bethnal Green)
A member of the Youth Communist League (YCL) and Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), before leaving for Spain Davidovitch had been a merchant sailor. ‘[His] life had been a hard one, spent in the forecastle of many a tramp steamer.’ Nicknamed ‘sailor boy’, his ‘particular blend of Jewish and Cockney humour ... [gave] him a capacity for clowning around and getting a laugh out of everyone’. One of the earlier volunteers, Davidovitch fought under George Nathan at Lopera and became a close friend of Jock Cunningham’s.9
Diamant, André – Private, 1st Company, British Battalion (b.1900, Cairo, Egypt)
Formerly a student based in Paris, Diamant volunteered for service in Spain in late 1936 and fought at Lopera. Wintringham thought him ‘the maddest, most mysterious little Levantine I have ever come across; but ... a natural born leader’.10
Dickenson, Ted – Second-in-Command, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b. c.1900, Australia)
With his ‘overcoat top-boots ... smartly clipped moustache, legs apart and back straight as a poker’, Dickenson was ‘every inch a soldier’. Blessed with a ‘calm courage’, the Australian had emigrated to England in the 1930s and ‘had been very active in the Jewish Ex-Serviceman’s Movement for Peace in East London’.11
Economides, Michael – Private, XV Brigade Guard (b.1910, Nicosia, Cyprus)
The son of a wheat merchant, Economides emigrated to London in 1929 where he worked as a waiter before joining the Communist Party in 1932. He went to Spain in December 1936 and fought at Lopera.12
Franco, Francisco – Commander in Chief of Nationalist Forces (b.1892, Ferrol, Galicia)
Before the outbreak of the Civil War, Franco served in the Army of Africa. He built a reputation as a cruel and ruthlessly efficient disciplinarian during the Rif War in the 1920s and was renowned for his bravery under fire.
Fry, Harry – 2nd Company Commander, British Battalion (b.1907, Edinburgh)
Formerly a ‘corporal in his Majesty’s Brigade of Guards’, Fry had served in India and China in the 1930s before returning to Edinburgh where he worked as a shoe maker. ‘A tall ... good-looking man ... he had ... very little formal education, but had a natural genius for organization and ... was an exceedingly pleasant man to talk to.’13
Gálicz, János, ‘Gal’ – Colonel, XV Brigade (b. c.1890, Hungary)
A naturalized Russian of Austro-Hungarian birth, Gal ‘had distinguished himself in the revolution’ in Hungary and had joined the Red Army in 1919. Sent to Spain in 1936 by order of Stalin, he had acquired the nickname Gal and a reputation of being a man who had ‘an easy, pleasant manner ... [but also] ... a passion for orders of an arbitrary kind’.14
Garber, Joseph – Private, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b .1911, Bethnal Green)
One of several London Jews with the battalion, Garber won a Royal Humane Society Medal when he was fourteen for saving a man who fell into the Thames. He later went on to join the Merchant Navy before volunteering for service in Spain.
Gregory, Walter – Runner, 3rd Company, British Battalion (b. c.1915, Nottingham)
A brewery worker and member of the Communist Party, Gregory had fought Mosley’s Black Shirts at fascist rallies in Nottingham. He was delighted when he was approached by the local Party organizer and asked to volunteer for Spain.
Gurney, Jason – Battalion Scout, British Battalion (b.1910, Sheringham, Norfolk)
Raised in South Africa, after leaving school Gurney found work on a Norwegian steamer and returned to Europe. In Paris he studied art at the Académie Colarossi before moving back to the country of his birth, where he worked as a sculptor out of a Kings Road garret in Chelsea before volunteering for service in Spain.
Hilliard, Robert – Private, 1st Company, British Battalion (b.1904, Moyeightragh, nr Killarney)
A Trinity College graduate, Olympic boxer, father of three and parish priest, the ‘Boxing Parson’ was ‘one of the most amusing characters’ in the battalion. Gurney, a friend of Hilliard’s who served alongside him, remembered him as ‘a great drinker’ who was well liked for ‘his sense of humour and consistently cheerful attitude’.15
Hyndman, Tony – Private, Company Unknown, British Battalion (b. c.1915, Cardiff)
An ex-Welsh Guardsman, Hyndman was formerly the secretary and lover of Stephen Spender, whom the poet referred to in his memoirs as ‘Jimmy Younger’. He was not cut out for service in Spain and hated it from the start.
Jones, John ‘Bosco’ – Private, 4th Company, British Battalion (b. c.1917, London)
A veteran of the battle of Cable Street, Jones left for Spain after leaving a note for his sister. He carried a single suitcase and wore a ‘nice, neat overcoat’. ‘I looked a bit like a tourist,’ he later confessed.16
Leeson, George – Lieutenant, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b.1907, County Cork)
Born into a ‘comfortable middle class ... devout Roman Catholic [family]’, Leeson joined the Royal Navy and served as a riverboat gunner in China. Later he became a London Underground worker and Transport Union member before volunteering for service in Spain.17
Levy, Bert ‘Yank’ – NCO, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b.1897, Hamilton, Ontario)
‘One of Fry’s best men’, Levy had already had an adventurous life before travelling to Spain. A chauffeur and printer by trade, he first saw action in the Great War, serving as a machine gunner in the Jewish Legion in the Jordan Valley in 1918. Two years later he was fighting alongside anti-government rebels in Mexico and later worked as a ‘fund raiser’ for Nicaraguan revolutionaries, a role which saw him imprisoned in the US for six years for armed robbery.18
Macartney, Wilfred – Battalion Commander, British Battalion (b.1899, Malta)
A veteran of the Great War, Macartney was arrested for spying for the Soviet Union in 1927. Upon his release from prison in 1936, the publication of his memoirs gained him respect amongst the far left and he was later appointed as the first commander of the British Battalion in Spain. His time in the role was short lived, however. He was replaced by Wintringham in early February 1937.
Maley, James – Private, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b.1908, Glasgow)
A lifelong Celtic fan, Maley left his native Glasgow for Cleveland, Ohio in 1929 to work in a car factory, but returned to Scotland after just one year. He later served in the Territorial Army and worked for the Communist Party as a soapbox orator before volunteering for Spain in late 1936.19
Marty, André – Base Commander of International Brigade Headquarters (HQ), Albacete (b.1886, Perpignan, France)
Having risen to prominence for his part in the French fleet’s Black Sea mutiny of 1919, Marty was appointed to a leading role in the International Brigades by Stalin. ‘Both a sinister and ridiculous figure’, Marty’s paranoia deepened as the war progressed.20
McDade, Alex – Sergeant Major, British Battalion (b.1905, Glasgow)
‘A prodigious liar and a natural clown’, part ‘orderly officer’, part ‘jester’, and part ‘mascot’, wee McDade ‘was the most popular man in the battalion and the only one who could get discipline’.21
Meredith, Bill – Private, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b. c.1910, Bellingham, Northumberland)
A member of the Northumberland Labour Party, Meredith was well-liked by his comrades and would perform well under fire.
Nathan, George – Assistant Chief of Staff (b.1895, London)
A veteran of the Great War who also fought with the Black and Tans in Ireland, Nathan commanded the British 1st Company at Lopera and Las Rozas. He was ‘a lean figure with a pipe and walking stick ... [whose] accent was sometimes too gentlemanly to be real. He swanked ... but ... proved himself a first rate soldier.’22
Overton, Bert – 4th Company Commander, British Battalion (b.1905, Stockton-on-Tees)
One of the battalion’s few apoliticals, Overton was an ex-Welsh Guard who performed well in training and ‘still looked the part’, but was later revealed to be ‘a fool, a romantic, [and] a bluffer’. He ‘wanted to be courageous, but had lived too easily, too softly’.23
Pollitt, Harry – Head of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) (b.1890, Droylsden, Lancashire)
‘A smallish, balding individual, with small dark eyes which looked as though he had never smiled in his life’, Pollitt was a deeply serious man and utterly committed to the communist cause.24 He oversaw the running of the battalion from his offices in London’s King Street and his work would take him to Spain on three occasions during the war.
Prendergast, Jim – Private, 1st Company, British Battalion (b.1914, Dublin)
Born of working class parents, Prendergast had worked from the age of fourteen as a machinist in a mineral water factory in Dublin, before leaving for Spain. He saw action at Lopera and Las Rozas before joining the battalion.
Romilly, Giles – Private, Company Unknown, British Battalion (b.1916, London)
A nephew of Winston Churchill and Oxford undergraduate, Romilly was ‘a very pleasant and unpretentious character ... who had come to Spain out of a spirit of bravado rather than from any deep political conviction’.25
Ryan, Frank – Assistant Commissar, XV Brigade (b.1902, County Limerick).
An IRA activist and ‘ardent catholic’ who was ‘experienced in leading banned demonstrations in Ireland’.26
Sexton, Cyril – Private, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b.1914)
A self-confessed ‘non-political’, Sexton left school aged sixteen to work as a junior clerk and shop assistant, but his true passion was for all things military. In 1936 he toured the battlefields of northern Europe, and was visiting Waterloo when he learnt of the outbreak of war in Spain.
Sprigg (Caudwell), Christopher – Private, 3rd Company, British Battalion (b.1907, London)
A prolific writer, Sprigg had published several novels, volumes of poetry and Marxist cultural and scientific studies including his best known work, Illusion and Reality, before volunteering for Spain. Known to his friends as ‘Spriggy’, he was ‘an exceedingly modest, pleasant man’ and a close friend of Clem Beckett.27
Thomas, Frank – Sergeant, 6th Bandera Foreign Legion (b.1914, Pontypridd)
Born into a middle class family, Frank Thomas was one of just a dozen Britons who fought for Franco. A conservative who was convinced that communism posed a grave threat to civilization, Thomas joined the Nationalists due to his disgust with the apparent anarchy of the government forces in Spain.
Watters, George – Private, 2nd Company, British Battalion (b.1904, Prestonpans, East Lothian)
A former miner who was barred from the pit following an active role in the General Strike of 1926, Watters was arrested for challenging Oswald Mosley at a British Union of Fascists rally at Edinburgh’s Usher Hall.
Wild, Sam – Battalion Armourer, 1st Company, British Battalion (b. c.1910, Manchester)
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