The end of the Spanish Civil War - Jonathan Whitehead

The Spanish Civil War ended in Alicante. After Catalonia fell to the Hitler andMussolini backed military rebellion of Franco's Nationalists at the outset of1939, the legitimate Republican government of Dr Negrn was faced with achoice between apparently futile resistance or unconditional surrender to thetriumphant Nationalists. Choosing the path of continued defiance until theycould force concessions or at least implement a mass evacuation of thoseRepublicans most at risk in Franco's new Spain, the government withdrew toElda in the province of Alicante.However, their plans were thwarted by a new rebellion of Republican officers,led by Colonel Segismundo Casado, who resented Negrn's reliance on theCommunist Party and the USSR and believed themselves better equipped tonegotiate a peace settlement with Franco. They were misguided, Franco hadno wish, and ultimately no need to negotiate. Meanwhile, faced with theimminent risk of arrest by the new junta, the Prime Minister and his cabinetwere forced to abandon Spain from the tiny aerodrome of Monvar.A relatively quiet port on the eastern, Mediterranean coast of Spain, Alicantehad remained at some distance from the frontlines throughout the fighting onthe ground, but swiftly became a target for Italian bombers operating out ofbases in the Balearic Islands. In May 1938, at the height of the air offensive,Italian bombers attacked the marketplace, causing a massacre as tragic as theevents in Guernica, yet largely ignored by historians.As the war drew towards its conclusion, Alicante became increasinglysignificant as attention focused on the plight of the defeated Republicans. Inthe second half of March 1939, the fronts collapsed, and Madrid finally fell to theinsurgents. Tens of thousands of refugees descended on Alicante in the forlornhope of rescue by French and British ships that had been promised but whichfailed to materialise. Amid the tragedy, as the British and French governmentsdeclined to engage in any humanitarian intervention that might offend Hitler andMussolini, a single hero emerged; Captain Archibald Dickson, the Welsh masterof the Stanbrook who ditched his cargo and transported 3,000 refugees tosafety in North Africa.On 30 March 1939, Franco's vanguard, the Italian 'Volunteer' Corps underGeneral Gastone Gambara, occupied a town already under the control of theFifth Column. Two days later the Generalsimo issued a communiqu from hisheadquarters in Burgos, declaring that the war was over. The bulk of theRepublicans surrounded and captured in the port were marched to animprovised internment camp, known as the Campo de los Almendros (Field ofAlmond Trees). They were then transferred to the infamous concentration campat Albatera to share the fate of defeated Republicans across Spain and toundergo the programme of ideological cleansing of the new fascist authorities.