Read Hotel Florida: Truth, Love, and Death in the Spanish Civil War Online
Authors: Amanda Vaill
Tags: #History, #Europe, #Spain & Portugal, #Biography & Autobiography, #Artists; Architects; Photographers
Hotel Florida: Truth, Love, and Death in the Spanish Civil War
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For those who died in Spain, or left their hearts there; and for Tom
CONTENTS
Part I: “They are here for their lives”
August 1936: Paris/Barcelona/Madrid
September 1936: L Bar T Ranch, Wyoming
October 1936: Madrid/Cartagena/Moscow
Part II: “You never hear the one that hits you”
March 1937: Madrid/Valencia/Madrid
March 1937: Barcelona/Valencia/Madrid
June 1937: Segovia Front/Madrid
July 1937: New York/Washington/Los Angeles
September 1937: Aragon/Valencia/Teruel Front
December 1937: Playa de San Juan
December 1937: The North Atlantic
January–February 1938: Key West
January–February 1938: Post Agency lecture circuit, United States
January–February 1938: Barcelona
March 1938: The North Atlantic
February–March 1939: Key West/Havana
Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations
You could learn as much at the Hotel Florida in those years as you could learn anywhere in the world.
—Ernest Hemingway
Cómo se pasa la vida,
Cómo se viene la muerte.
Tan callando:
Cuán presto se va el placer,
Cómo, después de acordado,
Da dolor,
Cómo, a nuestro parecer,
Cualquier tiempo pasado
Fué mejor.
—Jorge Manrique
For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?
—Matthew 16:26
CHRONOLOGY
1931 King Alfonso XIII leaves Spain, ushering in the Second Republic, a coalition of Socialists and liberal middle-class Republicans; the new government gives women the vote, legalizes divorce, cuts the size of the army
1932 General José Sanjurjo attempts a right-wing coup against the Spanish Republic; Anarchist uprisings take place in Andalusia, Aragon, the Basque country, and Madrid
Franklin Delano Roosevelt elected president of the United States; U.S. unemployment at 25 percent
1933 Adolf Hitler becomes chancellor of Germany; all political parties except National Socialists (Nazis) are banned; the first Nazi concentration camp is opened at Dachau
Spanish right-wing parties win a majority in the Cortes
1934 General Francisco Franco leads suppression of miners’ rebellion in Asturias
Austrian Civil War causes street fighting in Vienna and other cities; conservative premier Dolfuss outlaws the Social Democrats and Austria becomes a proto-fascist state
1935 Andrés Nin and Joaquin Maurin form the Workers’ Party of Marxist Unification (POUM) in Catalonia
Prime Minister Benito Mussolini sends Italian troops to invade Abyssinia
Stalin initiates the first purge of what will be called the Great Terror
1936
February
Newly formed Popular Front coalition of Socialists, Communists, and Republicans narrowly wins Spanish general elections; the new government relieves Francisco Franco of his command and posts him to Canary Islands
March
Hitler reoccupies the Rhineland
May
Popular Front wins general election in France; Léon Blum narrowly escapes assassination by fascist militia, becomes premier
July
Concerted military uprisings take place all over Spain; Franco flies from Canary Islands to Morocco to take charge of the Army of Africa and invade the Spanish mainland; the government arms civilians to combat the mutiny
August
European nations, joined by the United States, declare a Non-Intervention Agreement for Spain; Nationalist (rebel) army, aided by secret gifts of war materiel from Germany and Italy, advances steadily; Socialist leader Francisco Largo Caballero becomes premier of Spain
September
Spanish rebels take Toledo and San Sebastian; Franco is appointed supreme political and military commander of the rebels
October
Spanish gold reserves transported to Russia; first International Brigades arrive in Spain
November
Nationalist forces advance to outskirts of Madrid, but are halted; government relocates to Valencia; Germany and Italy recognize Franco
1937
January
Moscow trials of Old Bolsheviks and current army officers begin; U.S. Congress forbids all arms sales to Spain
February
Nationalists take Málaga, begin offensive in Jarama Valley
March
Government forces push back Nationalists at Guadalajara
April
German Luftwaffe bombs Guernica
May
May Days in Barcelona; Juan Negrin replaces Largo Caballero as premier
June
Bilbao falls to Nationalists
July
Battle of Brunete; USSR enters Sino-Japanese War
August
Fighting begins on Aragon Front
October
Government forces take Belchite in Aragon; Nationalists win control of north; government moves from Valencia to Barcelona
December
Teruel offensive begins. In China, Japanese besiege and take Nanking
1938
January
Government forces take Teruel
February
Nationalists retake Teruel
March
Nationalists retake Belchite, start drive to Mediterranean; Italian planes begin bombing Barcelona; France reopens border with Spain; Germany annexes Austria in the Anschluss
April
Nationalists take Lérida, then Vinaroz, cutting the Republican zone in two; Franco privately signs the Anti-Comintern Pact with Japan, Italy, and Germany
June
Léon Blum resigns as French premier and is succeeded by Édouard Daladier; French border with Spain closed
July
Spanish government begins counteroffensive along the Ebro
September
Munich conference among France, Britain, Germany, and Italy permits Hitler’s annexation of Czech Sudetenland
October
Spanish government agrees to withdrawal of all foreign volunteers; International Brigades have farewell parade in Barcelona; in China, Hankow falls to Japanese
November
Rio Segre offensive; Battle of the Ebro ends in government defeat and retreat back across river; in Germany, Kristallnacht results in destruction of 7,500 Jewish shops and 400 synagogues
December
Franco begins offensive on Catalonia
1939
January
Nationalist troops take Barcelona
February
Fall of Catalonia; Britain and France recognize Franco
March
Franco marches into Madrid; Germany annexes all of Czechoslovakia, demands the free city of Danzig in Poland
April
Franco announces the end of military hostilities, makes public his agreement to the German/Italian/Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact
PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS
THE SPANISH
For the government (also known as Republicans, Loyalists)
Julio Álvarez del Vayo, foreign minister of the Spanish Republic, September 1936–May 1937 and April 1938–March 1939
Arturo Barea Ogazón, patent engineer, press censor, would-be writer