The story of the impassioned era of the Spanish Civil War is being spotlighted in an area-wide series of events beginning this week.

by Leland Hawes - History Heritage
Baylife - Sunday, November 9,1997
The Tampa Tribune Times
TAMPA

In the late 1930s, Tampa became known as "the rear-guard" for the bloody civil war raging in Spain.

With one of the largest Spanish immigrant populations in the United States, the Cigar City became deeply embroiled in the struggle on the Iberian peninsula, which proved to be a prelude to World War II.

From the first outbreak of hostilities in July 1936, when Rebel army units sought to topple the Republican regime, Tampa's Latin communities rallied to support the beleaguered government.

The story of that impassioned era is being spotlighted in an area-wide series of events beginning this week under the general title "No pasaran! [They shall not pass] The Spanish Civil War Remembered."

About two dozen volunteers from Tampa fought in the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, the unit that suffered heavy casualties in Spain as the United States maintained official neutrality.

THE LINCOLN BRIGADE is the focus of many of the events sponsored by the University of South Florida on its Tampa and St. Petersburg campuses.

But the 1936-1939 "home front" will be the highlight of a community exhibit at Centro Asturiano at Nebraska and Palm avenues in Tampa. And it owes much of its success to the scholarship of a USF graduate student.

Ana Varela-Lago, a native of Vigo in the Spanish province of Galicia, came to Tampa in 1989 as the wife of a USF professor, James D'Emilio. They had met at the University of Santiago in Spain, where he was studying Romanesque architecture.

Varela-Lago, 32, whose academic background was in education, became interested in Tampa's ties to Spain. She decided to take USF graduate courses in history and last December received her master's degree.

Her thesis, "La Retaguardia de Tampa [The Rear-Guard of Tampa]: The Response of the Tampa Latin Immigrant Community to the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939)," won a special prize from the university.

WHY DID THE Loyalist regime draw such ardent support from Tampa's Hispanic families? Varela-Lago attributes its appeal to a number of factors: its efforts to separate church and state, attempts at agrarian reform and a break from the monarchy's establishment ties.

Many of Tampa's immigrants had left Spain to avoid "miserable" living conditions, with few educational opportunities and high taxes. They resented the favored status of the army and the Catholic Church under the old rulers.

With a tradition of radicalism engendered by periodic strikes in the cigar industry, most of Tampa's Latins were attuned to the Loyalist government's aims.

Victoriano Mantiega, a former cigar factory reader born in Cuba, became a key figure in marshaling support. La Gaceta, the Spanish language daily he started in 1922, published regular exhortations for the cause.

His role earned him the epithet "red" from Andres Iglesias, a former Spanish consul in Tampa who supported the Rebel leader, Gen. Francisco Franco. In turn, Iglesias was viewed as a "fascist" by the Loyalist partisans.

What started as an internal conflict in Spain had taken on international implications. Germany's Adolf Hitler and Italy's Benito Mussolini soon pitched in planes and munitions to assist the Rebels. Russia's Joseph Stalin sided with the Republicans.

While the totalitarian dictators had no hesitancy at joining in the bloodbath, the democracies -- England, France and the United States -- professed neutrality. The United States passed an Embargo Act, making it illegal to send arms to Spain.

Varela-Lago tells how local backers sought to provide aid. A mass meeting at the Labor Temple in Ybor City in August 1936 resulted in the Committee for the Defense of the Spanish Popular Front.

The committee included representation from labor groups, mutual aid societies -- including the Italian -- and the Socialist and Communist parties. Fundraising became its prime function, but morale-boosting ran a close second.

Mantega's paper, called the "official organ" of the committee, ran regular letters from Spain -- from travelers stranded there early in the war and Tampa volunteers on the scene.

Emilio Vinas, a Galician who had lived in Tampa several years, sent a graphic account of seeing "40 corpses of leftists who had been shot" and left alongside a road in his area.

Jose Garcia Granell, a Tampa volunteer in the Lincoln Brigade, became "something like a war correspondent for La Gaceta," according to Varela-Lago.

In Tampa, weekly collections at cigar factories met opposition from the Cigar Manufacturers Association, which cited the Neutrality Act. But contributions were sought outside the factories, from merchants and other donors.

"Each week, the list of donors appeared in La Gaceta," Varela-Lago writes. "Through nickel-and-dime contributions the committee sent to Spain an average of $5,000 a month. It also shipped badly needed food, clothing and medical supplies."

The bombing by German pilots of the Basque town of Guernica on April 26, 1937, stirred outrage in the wake of the slaughter of 800 civilians. Tampa's "Popular Committee" announced plans to raise money to send an ambulance to Spain.

Guernica so inflamed Loyalist supporters in Tampa that they mustered 5,000 marchers in a parade from the Labor Temple to City Hall downtown. They met Mayor R.E.I. Chancey with a resolution protesting the "ruthless killing of women and children by Franco's forces."

Children's groups collected discarded paper and lead foil from cigarette packages in their efforts to raise money. Youngsters dressed in Spanish militia uniforms to show their support of the Republic at fundraising picnics.

By late 1937, a women's committee sent more than 6,000 pounds of clothing to Spain from Tampa, and instead of one, four ambulances went to the Spanish Red Cross.

The Catholic Church's support of Franco prompted boycotts not only of Sunday services but also of parochial schools. Grace Pelaez recalls that her father would not permit her sister to be baptized for years because of his intense feelings against the church.

Several Protestant ministers appeared on the platform at a Loyalist rally at Municipal Auditorium in 1938.

Franco supporters formed a Hernando De-Soto Club in hopes of forming a counterforce to the steamroller effectiveness of the Popular Committee in Tampa.

But correspondence discovered by Varela-Lago in government archives in Spain showed the Franco group made little headway gaining backers. It appeared Rebel sympathizers felt silence was the best approach here.

As the war ground down, Madrid fell, and other Loyalist redoubts came under siege. Those who had been following daily battle reports by short-wave radio became increasingly depressed.

Gus R. Jimenez, a retired school administrator whose grandfather, Gustavo Jimenez, was the Republic's consul during much of the war, remembers the map in the family home where the grandfather traced the battle lines:

"I used to change the flags back and forth, and I'd always ask him, "When are we going to win, Grandpa?" and he would say, `Don't worry, we are gonna win.'"

The elder Jimenez died in 1938, before the war ended in March 1939. Gus Jimenez added, "It would have crushed him to know that. He was so sure that there was going to be victory."

Surviving Loyalist forces who sought refuge in neighboring France wound up interned in virtual concentration camps, according to lawyer William F. Garcia, who marched in Loyalist parades as a child in Tampa.

Financial aid continued from Tampa to refugees for years to come, Varela-Lago found.

When World War II erupted later in 1939, many of the "defeated" Spanish troops wound up in units fighting the Axis powers in Europe.

Reprinted with permission, The Tampa Tribune Times. Copyright 1997.