Dennis Hollingsworth

Through the Garden, We Left for the Mountains

"In 1938, twenty-one-year-old Fransisco P?rez L?pez, born in Spain and raised in France and Algeria, joined the International Brigades to fight the Nationalist armies of Franco and became part of the bloodiest guerilla war in Spanish history..." So introduces the author in the front flap of Dark and Bloody Ground, A Guerilla Diary of the Spanish Civil War.

When night fell the young one went out back to watch for the two men, who were to meet her a the end of the garden. They came in and we shook hands. We sat down at the end of the table and while we ate I told them who I was, what I had done during the war, how I had been a prisoner and escaped. Then, I unfolded my plan.

One man alone had little chance of getting across country occupied by the enemy. He could not cover himself from ambush by Civil Guardsmen when he went to fill the canteen at a spring. It was the same when he went up to a farm to ask for food and didn't know whether he would find friends or enemies. And he couldn't attack; and to get through enemies you had to attack without cease. A man who was running away was a dead man. You must always be the hunter, never the rabbit. Only as guerillas could we make it to the frontier, and for that we had to gather a band, as we were starting to do this evening, from all the Republicans hidden in the villages or mountains who wanted to join us to continue the fight and find liberty or death. But all those who wanted to come along had to obey me. They had to follow the law of the guerillas: no pity for the mercenaries, the Civil Guard of army officers, for if a guerilla fell into their hands it would be torture and death. But the guerillas must respect women, children and old people, and if they met girls in the mountains, they must never touch them -- that was sacred. If you had to kill a civilian, it must be because he was a spy, a person who had others arrested or a Falangist leader who had brought Republicans to trial and imprisonment. Then it would be his turn to be condemned and punished. But even then only with the accord of all, like a tribunal marked with the great R of the Republic. As for money found on enemy corpses, I alone would guard it. It would be returned in full to the poor peasants who helped us.

I told them how I had commanded a group of guerillas in the International Brigade, how I had learned by actual fighting the special tactics of this kind of combat. It was because of my experience that I would give the orders and by following them they would save their own lives and do the most possible damage to the enemy.

Both men agreed. They told me what they had done in the war. Vicente, the younger, medium in build and rather beefy, had served as an artilleryman in the Durruti Column. He didn't say much but listened with eyes moving restlessly in all directions. The other, Luis, talked on and on using his tobacco-stained hands as much as his mouth. He was a big, quick man and had been, he said, political commissar in Lister's corps. Vicente was an anarchist.

After supper I took them upstairs. Big Luis was surprised by the quality of my arsenal. He ran his fingers along the dagger and admired the way it cut like a razor. Vicente only had an old five-chamber revolver which he said he couldn't use very well. He was good with with all other weapons including knife and dagger. But he wasn't good at the revolver. Big Luis was armed with a hunting rifle and two hundred cartridges. It was behind the garden gate with his ammunition belt. He admitted he too was a bad shot with the revolver.

I explained the orders to them, cries for rallying in case of surprise, cries of attack, cries of command. We talked until one in the morning. They thought we would leave at night, but I decided to take the mountains in full daylight after dinner. We went to bed and slept till ten.

I got back into my Francoist uniform with the Red Cross armband. Dagger in its pants pocket, knife and grenade in the packet pockets, another grenade and canteen in new pockets sewn into the rucksack. Then a Mauser and two clips. My rucksack was packed with the pharmacy, bread and sausages.

Vicente jand Luis wore dark brown peasant corduroy, Vicente's rucksack contained a can of lard, a large load of bread, three large sausages, a big chunk of dried ham, big box of salt, pepper, a small bottle of vinegar, a bottle of wine, three packages of cigarettes even though he smoked little. Big Luis had another large loaf, another big chunk of dried ham, some sausages, two chocolate bars, shaving soap, a razor with five blades and two towels. I said no fruit; to protect your movements you had to load yourself down as little as possible. I gave Luis the other Mauser with a full clip and a grenade. He had an ordinary but very large knife. He also had his pockets full of tobacco and cigarettes, and a pipe hung at his belt. On his shoulder was his hunting rifle, at his waist the ammunition belt, and, slung on a bandolier, a two-liter canteen of wine.

When our preparations were finished, we went down to the kitchen. We ate and drank well. We smoked a last cigarette. I gave Vicente's revolver to the old woman telling to hide it; one day she might have to use it. About three o'clock, going out through the garden, we left for the mountains.