CHAPTER XXIII. The Murder of Fermín Galán

The CNT would soon become the country’s most important proletarian organization, thanks to the dramatic reorganization of its unions, the impact of its rallies on the workers, and the widespread distribution of publications. The renewal of the anarcho-syndicalist movement began not only to fill the monarchy’s ruling classes with fear, but also the politicians conspiring against it. For their part, the exiles in France and Belgium were brimming with excitement, thinking that the hardships of the past were justified by the new turn of events. It was harvest time and the harvest looked good. Indeed, many of these refugees were so excited by the developments in Spain that they did not wait for the declaration of the Republic—and, with it, political amnesty—but decided to return to Spain secretly. Juan Manuel Molina, head of Tierra y Libertad and its press Etyl, was among those who made such a determination in Paris. He later became famous under the pseudonym “Juanel” after enduing multiple trials for “crimes of the press.”

The CNT and anarchist resurgence in Spain was also tantalizing for the exiles in Brussels and they too were tempted to rush back into the country. The more prudent comrades, like Liberto Callejas or Emeterio de la Orden, had to curb Ascaso and Durruti’s immediate impulses. Indeed, their hour still had not arrived. The old order still stood and its judicial apparatus could still go after them, if Martínez Anido’s assassins didn’t riddle them with bullets first. They had to wait. And the wait was not only long, but also laden with doubts and worries. The CNT’s reorganization was going well and the anarchist movement was recovering, but there were also contradictory tendencies at work. The two antagonistic forces that were pestañaism and anarchism each pulled in their own direction, hindering the CNT’s progress.

But the news from Spain was quite good: the CNT rebuilt itself quickly in Valencia, was gaining ground in Aragón, and opened way (with difficulty) in Madrid. It was only faltering in Sevilla, thanks to the Stalinist schemes of ex-CNT members José Díaz and Manuel Adame, who wanted to make the local CNT an appendix of the Communist Party. The CNT reached its greatest level of growth in Catalonia, especially Barcelona. The Construction Union, with its forty-two thousand members, made Ricardo Sanz president and the Metalworkers’ Union, which had also recovered, declared its opposition to Pestaña as CNT secretary. Barcelona’s powerful Industrial Art and Textile workers joined the CNT in a decision made in a general assembly held on April 29, 1930 in the Meridiana Cinema in the El Clot district. Two thousand workers representing the diverse sides of the textile industry approved their entrance into the CNT with acclaim.

The other Catalan provinces were not lagging behind the capital. A CNT regional meeting took place on May 17 and participants discussed the need to publish a Confederal newspaper. Representatives from twenty-two localities participated in another regional meeting on July 6 and set August 1 as the date that they would release of the first issue of Solidaridad Obrera. The CNT National Committee was named on June 27 without Pestaña. Progreso Alfarache became the organization’s secretary and another National Committee member, Manuel Sirvent, also belonged to the Peninsular Committee of the FAI. [208]

While the CNT reorganized, anarchist groups were busy planning an uprising with Captain Alejandro Sancho, a close ally of the FAI. The plan was to instigate riots and strikes in several large cities and then provoke rebellions in Bilbao, Logroño, Zaragoza, Calatayud, Teruel, Sagunto, Valencia, and throughout Andalusia. The government would have to respond to many areas simultaneously and, with Catalonia isolated from the rest of Spain, the revolutionaries would only have to arm the people. They would do so by storming the Barcelona Armory and Artillery Park, where there were abundant rifles, ammunition, and other instruments of war. [209] They formed a Revolutionary Committee in Catalonia to lead the rebellion, which would operate in conjunction with the CNT’s Catalan Regional Committee. Its members were Captain Alejandro Sancho, Ricardo Escrig for the students linked to the FAI, Manuel Hernández, for the FAI Peninsular Committee, and Bernardo Pou and J. R. Magriñá for the CNT’s Regional Committee.

The resurgence of the anarcho-syndicalist movement was an aspect of the social process that began when Dámaso Berenguer took the reigns of government. But, at the same time, there were also very troubling tendencies; specifically, counterrevolutionary forces that disguised themselves as revolutionary.

The counterrevolution found its ideal man, who managed to make both the Republican opposition and the monarchy revolve around him. His name was Miguel Maura, son of Antonio Maura. As they say, “like father, like son.”

A monarchist to the bone, Miguel Maura saw from the outset that the best way to defend the interests of the privileged classes, and even the Monarchy, was by going over to the opposition and declaring himself a Republican. He told the King as much before proclaiming his “modestly liberal, Republican right-wing faith.” “If the others in our party follow my path,” he said, “we will not only create a ‘cushion’ that will protect the Monarchy when it falls,

The Murder of Fermín Galánbut also effect a political change that will be little more than make-up on the royal shield.” [210] However, the other members of Miguel Maura’s party, lazy to the bone, thought that everything would simply fall into place if they gave him a free hand. Only one of Maura’s friends, the assistant to the Count of Romanones, declared himself Republican. That was Niceto Alcalá Zamora, Alfonso XIII’s ex-minister of War, who made his own proclamation—even more modestly than Maura—in April 1930.

The CNT’s resurgence horrified Miguel Maura and Niceto Alcalá Zamora. Its increasing ability to impose its will on Catalan employers was an outrage to the two politicians. For Maura, the revolutionary process was like a wild horse that Dámaso Berenguer had freed but could no longer control. “If we let this process unfold without direction or restraint,” said Maura, “then there will be a deep revolution and nothing of the old monarchical state will remain: the popular wave will sweep everything away and Spain will become an immense ‘soviet’ and anarchist, no less.”

How could he guide the course of events and with what forces? How could he impose a direction on the popular movement against the Monarchy and compel it to obey his commands? It was no longer enough for Maura to be a Republican; he had to become a “revolutionary.” But relying on whom and on what?

Only the Socialist Party and its union, the UGT, could help Maura. During the last days of the Monarchy, these two forces had control over their members and nearly intact organizational structures, thanks to the fact that their subservience to the dictatorship had saved them from government persecution. Maura’s position would be particularly good if he could secure the support of Socialist Leader Indalecio Prieto: he had opposed the PSOE’s capitulation to Primo de Rivera and was thus more popular than Largo Caballero, who had been an adviser to the state.

Time was of the essence. He held talks with Prieto, the two came to an agreement, and together they crossed the Rubicon by calling the meeting of political “leaders” held on August 17, 1930 in San Sebastián. It was here that they would “cook up” the so-called Pact of San Sebastián.

The following individuals were in attendance: Alejandro Lerroux, Marcelino Domingo, Alvaro de Albornoz, Angel Galarza, Manuel Azaña, Santiago Casares Quiroga, Manuel Carrasco i Formiguera, Matías Mallol, Jaume Aiguader, Niceto Alcalá Zamora, Miguel Maura, Indalecio Prieto, and Fernando de los Ríos. This handful of men claimed to represent the following political abominations: Alianza Republicana, Partido Radical Socialista, Izquierda Republicana, Federación Republicana Gallega, Acció Catalana, Acció Republicana de Catalunya, Estat Català, and Derecha Liberal Republicana. Indalecio Prieto and de los Ríos represented themselves. Also present, as guests of honor, were Felipe Sánchez Román (jurist), Eduardo Ortega y Gasset (jurist), and Gregorio Marañón (doctor). These political representatives professions were: undefined (2), School teacher (1), Historian (1), Departmental head in Literature (1), Lawyer-writer, with a fondness for war themes in times of peace (1), Lawyers (3), Economists (2), Doctor (1), Undefined, but with journalistic pretensions and some education as an economist (1).

What did they discuss? “The preparation of a revolutionary uprising,” Miguel Maura explains, “in which few, very few, had any faith, but which we thought was necessary as a challenge to the dominant regime. We created an Executive Revolutionary Committee to define Republican policy and lead the rebellion. Alcalá Zamora presided over the Committee and Indalecio Prieto, Manuel Azaña, Fernando de los Ríos, Marcelino Domingo, Alvaro de Albornoz, and myself were members.” [211]

The committee’s first step was to make a deal with the Socialist Party, which endorsed the “pact” on the condition that they would receive four Ministries in the new Republican government. The Socialists pledged to declare a general strike (through the UGT) if the rebellion exploded, but only after troops sympathetic to the Executive Revolutionary Committee were in the street and taking up arms against the monarchists.

Miguel Maura had planned out the defeat the Monarchy like a good lawyer, but there were still two groups with which he had neither dealt nor implicated in anything: the CNT and FAI. Furthermore, there were soldiers sympathetic to these organizations, like Captain Alejandro Sancho and Captain Fermín Galán, who were planning rebellions that had to be taken seriously. How to stop the anarchist plots and prevent the CNT from disrupting the transfer of power to the “Republicans”? Miguel Maura was at a loss. Perhaps they could have tried to control the CNT through the Pestaña faction, but the FAI’s influence in the Confederation rendered any attempt of the sort illusory. Given the circumstances, the best solution was the truncheon, which was in the hands of a very monarchical general and good friend of Maura by the name of Emilio Mola, the General Director of Security. With Mola’s skillful use of the club, and a dose of diplomacy from the Executive Revolutionary Committee, they could ruin the anarchist captains’ subversive plans, imprison the most rebellious workers, and disorganize the CNT. That was exactly what Maura and Mola set out to do. As a first step, Mola sent a circular to all the governors asking them to raid CNT and FAI circles on October 22. Police arrested Alejandro Sancho, who died in a military prison, as well as Ramón Franco, Ricardo Escrig, Angel Pestaña, Manuel Sirvent, Pere Foix, Sebastián Clará, and many members of union committees. These committees lost their organizational coherence after they were forced underground.

This raid on the anarchists and insurrectional soldiers helped the San Sebastián conspirators. It cleared the field for their political maneuvers and also attracted many of the troops under Mola’s orders to their camp. Miguel Maura was behind all of this, directing the action. Even Mola was among of his puppets.

History is often made and unmade by chance and on November 12 a fortuitous event occurred that would have an important impact on the course of events. There was a terrible accident that day in a poorly built house on Madrid’s Alonso Cano Street and four men working there died in the collapse. The entire country—already hypersensitive due to the recent politically instability—shuddered. Madrid’s construction workers declared a strike and held a massive public funeral for their comrades. Police tried to disperse them and shot two men to death in the process. Madrid’s proletariat declared a general strike and Barcelona expressed its solidarity by declaring one as well. The police repression in Madrid was tepid, but it was fierce in Barcelona: authorities shut down all the CNT’s unions and filled the prisons with militants once again. This harsh persecution practically shattered the CNT and dealt a heavy blow to Barcelona’s proletariat, the driving force of the Spanish workers’ movement.

General Mola struggled to contain all the discontent and disruptions, including the escape of air force Commander Ramón Franco [212] on November 25, who had been arrested the previous month for conspiring with the anarchists. Would Ramón Franco join Fermín Galán, [213] who was zealously carrying out preparations for the rebellion against the Monarchy? Mola felt a deep bond with Fermín Galán, dating from when they both served in Morocco. General Mola knew that the conspiracy plotted by Niceto Alcalá Zamora and the Executive Revolutionary Committee was a tall tale and that Fermín Galán would launch an uprising alone. How to stop him? Mola’s only recourse was the pen. He wrote Fermín Galán a letter on November 27, 1930. He said:

The government and I know that you intend to revolt with the garrison troops. The matter is serious and could cause irreparable damage.... I beg you to think about what I’m saying and let your conscience guide you, not fleeting passions, when you make your decision.

Was Fermín Galán simply looking to die? We will never know. The fact was that Galán had resolved himself in conscience and gave himself the right to think—at the cost of his life—that there were genuine revolutionaries among the members of the Executive Revolutionary Committee in Madrid. “Galán, as he expressly stated during those feverish days, was fed up with the failures of 1926 and doesn’t want to rely on pseudo-revolutionary generals in the style of Blázquez, or on the opportunistic politicians that, for him, make up practically all the “telephoners” [i.e., the members of the Executive Revolutionary Committee]. The majority of the Jaca soldiers adored him and would follow him wherever he led. He had the support of enough officers, and even conservative and Catholic men like machine-gun Captain Angel García Hernández. Others opposed his quixotic actions, but at least sixty officers and sub-officers in Jaca were with him.” [214]

Galán lost his most important source of support when authorities arrested Alejandro Sancho and the anarchist’s Revolutionary Committee, but he was still determined to go forward. That was the most open and frank way to put all the conspirators to the test. If they abandoned him, the working class would have to draw its own conclusions about the traitors from Madrid’s Executive Revolutionary Committee. Galán knew that his life hung in the balance.

The general strike declared by the Barcelona CNT in solidarity with Madrid lasted from November 16 to November 22. The repression came later. And it was in the middle of this clampdown that Madrid’s Executive Revolutionary Committee first made contact with the CNT. Miguel Maura and Angel Galarza went to Barcelona and met with Peiró. They asked him: “if there is a revolutionary uprising, will the CNT support it by declaring a general strike?” [215] Peiró said that he would relay the matter to the National Committee. The National Committee did not have the authority to decide on the issue and thus called a national meeting. Participants at the meeting decided that the CNT should “come to an agreement with the political elements in order to make a revolutionary movement.” [216] This was a clear step backwards. Until then the CNT’s position had been to conspire without forming alliances with political figures. What had happened? We believe that recent bitter strikes and also the government’s October 11 raid, which crushed the anarchist’s Revolutionary Committee, had weakened the CNT and also the FAI’s influence within it. With the more radical elements incapacitated, a more accommodating position rose to the surface. Both Peiró and Pestaña supported an entente with the politicos as a way of deflecting the persecution bearing down upon the CNT, but that was unrealistic: it was totally out of the question for General Mola, who thought Spain had no worse enemy than the CNT, whether Pestaña or Alfarache was at its head. Miguel Maura shared his view, which he did not hesitate to repeat in the work he wrote years later about the events. [217]

The Executive Revolutionary Committee set an ambiguous date for its rebellion: “toward the middle” of December, although it had previously set December 12. Clearly Niceto Alcalá Zamora and the Executive Revolutionary Committee hoped that no one would rise up. After all, with vague instructions like theirs, individual conspirators could select the date that seemed best to them or simply not select one at all and do nothing. Fermín Galán opted for the first date—December 12—and prepared to launch the uprising at dawn that day.

Galán began to worry as the moment drew closer because his liaison with Madrid, the journalist Graco Marsá, had not come to Jaca. He sent a telegram to Madrid in the early hours of December 11 saying: “Friday, December 12, send books.” In the agreed upon code, that meant: “I’m going to revolt on December 12.” The Executive Revolutionary Committee received the telegram on the morning of December 11, although by that time it had set December 15 as the date of the rising. What did the Executive Revolutionary Committee do with Galán’s telegram? The “telephoners” simply ignored it and, instead of telling him that they had changed the date to December 15, sent Graco Marsá and Casares Quiroga to Jaca to “dissuade that lunatic from doing anything crazy.” They left Madrid at 11:00 am on December 11 and reached Zaragoza seven hours later. What did they do in Zaragoza? A mystery! All we know is that they finally got to Jaca at 1:00 am on December 12 and immediately sought out a hotel. Galán was staying in the Mur hotel, but the emissaries from Madrid decided to take a room in the La Palma hotel on Mayor Street, just a stone’s throw away from the Jaca “lunatic.” “Marsá suggested contacting Galán, but Casares Quiroga dissuaded him: they were exhausted and the best thing was to go to sleep.” [218]

While Graco Marsá and Casares Quiroga slept soundly, several of the officers committed to the rebellion assembled in Galán’s room in the Mur hotel. They put the final touches on their battle plan, finishing around four in the morning. Galán then took off for the Victoria barracks and woke the soldiers up with a shout of “Viva the Republic!” The soldiers applauded him and the revolt began. The “Republicans” from Madrid slept for several hours more, dead to the world.

Bernardo Pou and J. R. Magriñá contacted the engaged soldiers in Barcelona on behalf of the CNT’s Catalan Regional Committee and urged them not to abandon the Jaca rebels. They shrugged their shoulders and did nothing. Pou and Magriñá reached out to the Lérida garrison as well, and the men there replied in the same way. [219] At dawn on December 13, the rebels began the fight in Cillas against the soldiers from the Huesca garrison and were soundly defeated. Fermín Galán told some of his comrades to flee while they had the chance. He could have done so himself, but choose to surrender instead. He and seven of his companions went before a court-martial several hours after the fighting had ended. Two of the eight defendants were condemned to death: Fermín Galán and his good friend Captain García Hernández. The sentences were carried out at 2:00 in the afternoon on December 14, 1930.

García Hernández asked for spiritual aid, whereas Fermín Galán respectfully rebuffed the chaplain. “You’ll understand,” he said, “that I’m not going to suddenly abandon views that I’ve held for a lifetime, especially now.” The two captains asked to die while facing the firing squad and without blindfolds. Just before they shot him down, Galán waved to his executioners and said “Until Never!” [220] García Hernández died moments later. On December 15, 1930, as expected, Niceto Alcalá Zamora’s uprising did not occur. The members of the Executive Revolutionary Committee, authors of the celebrated “Why We Rebel” manifesto, slept peacefully in their homes on the night of December 14. Police arrested them while they showered or ate breakfast on December 15. Authorities, with great consideration, brought them to Madrid’s Modelo prison, where the prison warden had prepared to incarcerate them in luxury.

While the members of the Executive Revolutionary Committee meekly entered prison, there were general strikes in Madrid and Barcelona, but they were pacific and barely evident. The workers’ movement was too depleted, and too confused about what had happened in Jaca, for it to do otherwise. There was an attempt to attack the Prat de Llobregat airfield, but it failed because the officers involved pulled back at the last moment. It was only in Asturias, particularly in Gijón, where the proletarian presence made itself felt through hard conflicts with the police.

The conclusion that the working class had to draw was the same one it drew after the August 1917 general strike, when it severed its ties opposition political parties. Presumably it would do the same on this occasion, after a period of reflection, and try to determine its own fate in independently. Antonio Elorza wrote the following about the consequences of the December rebellion for the CNT: “The unions, which had just begun functioning normally in Barcelona after the November strike, were closed on December 30 during the general political strike. And this time the Confederation gave Mola the pretext that he needed to crush the revolutionary syndicalists. He stated as much in a December 7 governor’s conference: ‘we used the CNT’s revolutionary posture to dissolve its unions, which was a great necessity.’” [221] Those who supported forming an alliance with the political parties at the CNT’s national meeting in December would now suffer for their decision: several of them, including Angel Pestaña and members of the National Committee, were among the hundred militants locked in the Modelo prison from December 1930 to March 24, 1931.

“In the first three months of 1931,” writes Elorza, “the primary concern in Confederal circles was once again reopening the closed unions. Except for the diminished efficiency of the oppressive apparatus, everything reminded one of the dictatorship, even the government’s orders to persecute those who collected dues.” [222]

”In the trimester before the proclamation of the Republic there were three prominent Monarchists who, consciously or unconsciously, worked for it: the Count of Romanones, Emilio Mola, and José Sánchez Guerra. The tripartite action of these figures was perfectly complimentary: Mola silenced the CNT through repression; the Count of Romanones provoked the February crisis and, with it, General Dámaso Berenguer’s fall and the entrance of Admiral Aznar; and, finally, Sánchez Guerra’s refusal to form a government on February 17 without the members of the Executive Revolutionary Committee, who were still incarcerated. With a Monarchy lacking real power, only two things were possible: either a popular revolt, whose consequences were unforeseeable, or the proclamation of a Republic, in which power was delivered to a team of men who had “sworn to remain united in order to proclaim a Republic that would in no way alter the social and economic foundations of Spain.” It was the latter that took place on April 13, 1931.

We can justly describe the political events between January and April 12, 1931 as a “comic opera.” The cowardice among monarchists is particularly notable (with the Count of Romanones leading the pack). This became manifest in February when he provoked the crisis that caused Berenguer’s collapse.

Berenguer and Alfonso XIII concluded that the only way to save the Monarchy was by calling general elections. It was a smart move, despite the Socialist Party’s announcement that it would abstain. What happened in the electoral campaigns? How did the “radical” politicians behave? What did they seek and what means did they use? Of course, we can take it for granted that the means were not revolutionary: opposition politicians always try to present themselves as “good brothers,” winking at the whole world to get the greatest number of votes. The only ones who could have upset the electoral campaign were the anarchists and Mola had pushed them to the margins. The results of the April 12 municipal elections were: 22,150 monarchist councilmen and 5,875 Republican councilmen. [223]

The Count of Romanones freed the men that would compose the future Republican provisional government and thus made possible the advent of the Republic. Miguel Maura himself makes it clear in his book that the opposition did not want a social or even political revolution and didn’t think that the proclamation of the Republic was imminent. He wrote:

Near dawn [on April 13], around five in the morning, Largo Caballero, Fernando de los Ríos, and I left the Casa del Pueblo. [224]

Fatigued and silent, we went out on foot, walking slowly toward Recoletos Avenue. Suddenly, Fernando said:

“Today’s victory permits us to go to the general elections in October. Our success there will bring us the Republic.” I looked at Largo and was astonished to see that he agreed with that strange argument. Apparently, neither of them had considered the inevitable consequences of what had taken place during the day.

Miguel Maura told them that they “would be governing within forty-eight hours.”

They called me naïve, and we said goodbye, arranging to meet a few hours later in my house, which had been the headquarters of the Committee since the beginning.[225]