The Abraham Lincoln Battalion
consisted of volunteers wanting to fight for the Republic during the
Spanish
Civil War. The
first volunteers sailed from New York City
on 25th December, 1936 and joined the other International
Brigades at Albacete.
An estimated 3,000 men
fought in the battalion. Of these, over 1,000 were industrial workers
(miners, steel workers, longshoremen). Another 500 were students or
teachers. Around 30 per cent were Jewish and 70 per cent were between
21 and 28 years of age. The majority were members of the American
Communist Party whereas
others came from the Socialist
Party of America and
Socialist
Labor Party.
Robert
Merriman, who had spent two years in the Reserve Officers' Training
Corps at the University of Nevada, was recruited to train the recently
arrived volunteers from America. Working
under James Harris, a former sergeant in the United
States Army,
Merriman taught the men how to fieldstrip rifles and machine-guns.
He also organized a series of lectures on scouting, fortifications
and signaling.
After failing to take Madrid
by frontal assault General
Francisco
Franco gave orders
for the road that linked the city to the rest of Republican Spain
to be cut. A Nationalist force of 40,000 men, including men from the
Army of Africa, crossed the Jarama River
on 11th February, 1937.
General José
Miaja sent the
Abraham Lincoln Battalion to the Jarama Valley
to block the advance. Led by Robert Merriman,
the 373 members of the brigade moved into the trenches on 23rd February.
When the were ordered over the top they were backed by a pair of tanks
from the Soviet Union. On the first day
20 men were killed and nearly 60 were wounded.
On 27th February 1937,
Colonel Vladimir Copic, the Yugoslav commander
of the Fifteenth Brigade, ordered Merriman and his men to attack the
Nationalist forces at Jarama. As soon as he left the trenches Merrimen
was shot in the shoulder, cracking the bone in five places. Of the
263 men who went into action that day, only 150 survived. One soldier
remarked afterwards: "The battalion was named after Abraham Lincoln
because he, too, was assassinated."
International
Brigades suffered heavy casualties at Jarma. When Merriman was
wounded in the left shoulder, he was replaced by Oliver
Law as battalion commander. It was the first time in American
history that an integrated military force was led by an African-American
officer.
Steve
Nelson, Harry Haywood
and Joe Dallet arrived at Albacete in May
1937. The three men became political
commissars and were instructed to restore battalion morale. Nelson
later explained how he tried to do this "The men must learn the
basis of the whole struggle - the fundamentals of the whole war. You
must be one of the boys, concern yourself directly with their problems.
I trusted the men and they trusted me."
In July
1937 the Abraham Lincoln Battalion fought
alongside the George Washington Battalion
at Brunete. Oliver
Law was
one of those killed and Steve
Nelson now
took over as commander of the battalion.
Casualties
were so high at Brunete that on 14th July the two units were merged.
Mirko Markovicz, a Yugoslav-American, was appointed as commander of
the Lincoln-Washington Battalion and Nelson became his political commissar.
Soon afterwards,
Markovicz was ordered by Colonel Klaus of the International
Brigades to
move his men to protect a company of Spanish marines. Markovicz refused,
explaining: "I will not order the American battalion to carry
out this order because it will result in a disaster, like the one
in Jarama." Markovicz was arrested and Nelson became the new
commander. The next morning the order was cancelled and Markovicz
was released.
In August
1937 the American forces were reorganized. Steve
Nelson was
promoted to brigade commissar and Robert
Merriman
became brigade
chief of staff. Hans Amlie, who had now
recovered from the wounds suffered at Brunete,
became commander of the Lincoln-Washington
Battalion.
The next
major action involving the Lincoln-Washington
Battalion took
place during the Aragón
offensive
at the end of August 1937. The campaign began with an attack on the
town of Quinto. This involved dangerous street fighting against snipers
that were within the walls of the local church. After two days the
Americans were able to clear the town of Nationalist forces. This
included the capture of nearly a thousand prisoners.
The Lincoln-Washington
Battalion then
headed towards the fortified town of Belchite.
Once again the Americans had to endure sniper fire. Robert
Merriman
ordered
the men to take the church. In the first assault involving 22 men,
only two survived. When Merriman ordered a second attack, Hans
Amlie at first refused saying the task of taking the church was
impossible. He help Amlie, Steve
Nelson led
a diversionary attack. This enabled the Lincoln-Washington
Battalion to
enter the town. The Americans suffered heavy casualties, Nelson and
Amlie received head wounds and amongst the dead were Wallace Burton,
Henry Eaton and Samuel Levinger.
In March 1938 the Lincoln-Washington
Battalion lost two of its most senior officers, Robert
Merriman and David Doran, when they
were killed at Gandesa on the Aragón
front. Milton
Wolff
now assumed command of the battalion and John
Gates became battalion commissar.
The following month the
Nationalist
Army broke through
the Republican defences and reached the sea. General Francisco
Franco now moved
his troops towards Valencia with the
objective of encircling Madrid and the
central front.
Juan
Negrin, in an attempt to relieve the pressure on the Spanish capital,
ordered an attack across the fast-flowing Ebro
River. General Juan Modesto, a member
of the Communist Party (PCE), was placed
in charge of the offensive. Over 80,000 Republican troops, including
the 15th International Brigade and
the British Battalion, began crossing
the river in boats on 25th July. The men then moved forward towards
Corbera and Gandesa.
On 26th July the Republican
Army attempted
to capture Hill 481, a key position at Gandesa. Hill 481 was well
protected with barbed wire, trenches and bunkers. The Republicans
suffered heavy casualties and after six days was forced to retreat
to Hill 666 on the Sierra Pandols. It successfully defended the hill
from a Nationalist offensive in September but once again large numbers
were killed.
On 23rd September, Juan
Negrin, head of the Republican government, announced at the League
of Nations in Geneva that the International
Brigades would be unilaterally withdrawn from Spain.
That night the 15th Brigade and the British
Battalion moved back across the River Ebro and began their journey
out of the country.
During the battle of Ebro
the Nationalist
Army had 6,500
killed and nearly 30,000 wounded. These were the worst casualties
of the war but it finally destroyed the Republican
Army as a fighting
force.
By the end of the Spanish
Civil War there
were only 150 American soldiers left in the Lincoln-Washington
Battalion. Over the course of the war over one-third of the
volunteers from the United States had been killed.
(1)
Bill
Bailey wrote to his mother explaining
why he was fighting in the Spanish
Civil War (1937)
You
see Mom, there are things that one must do in this life that are a
little more than just living. In Spain there are thousands of mothers
like yourself who never had a fair shake in life. They got together
and elected a government that really gave meaning to their life. But
a bunch of bullies decided to crush this wonderful thing. That's why
I went to Spain, Mom, to help these poor people win this battle, then
one day it would be easier for you and the mothers of the future.
Don't let anyone mislead you by telling you that all this had something
to do with Communism. The Hitlers and Mussolinis of this world are
killing Spanish people who don't know the difference between Communism
and rheumatism. And it's not to set up some Communist government either.
The only thing the Communists did here was show the people how to
fight and try to win what is rightfully theirs.
(2)
Manchester
Guardian (5th April 1937)
Twenty-nine
Americans who are alleged to have tried to cross the French frontier
into Spain to enlist with the Spanish Government forces were detained
last night at Muret between Toulouse and the Spanish frontier. The
Americans had landed at Havre maintaining, it is stated, that they
were genuine tourists. They have been brought to Toulouse for questioning.
(3)
Canute Frankson, member of the Abraham Lincoln Battalion, letter from
Albacete (6th July, 1937)
I'm
sure that by this time you are still waiting for a detailed explanation
of what has this international struggle to do with my being here.
Since this is a war between whites who for centuries have held us
in slavery, and have heaped every kind of insult and abuse upon us,
segregated and Jim-Crowed us; why I, a Negro who have fought through
these years for the rights of my people, am here in Spain today?
Because we are no longer
an isolated minority group fighting hopelessly against an immense
giant. Because, my dear, we have joined with, and become an active
part of, a great progressive force, on whose shoulders rests the responsibility
of saving human civilization from the planned destruction of a small
group of degenerates gone mad in their lust for power. Because if
we crush Fascism here we'll save our people in America, and in other
parts of the world from the vicious persecution, wholesale imprisonment,
and slaughter which the Jewish people suffered and are suffering under
Hitler's Fascist heels.
All we have to do is to
think of the lynching of our people. We can but look back at the pages
of American history stained with the blood of Negroes; stink with
the burning bodies of our people hanging from trees; bitter with the
groans of our tortured loved ones from whose living bodies ears, fingers,
toes have been cut for souvenirs - living bodies into which red-hot
pokers have been thrust. All because of a hate created in the minds
of men and women by their masters who keep us all under their heels
while they suck our blood, while they live in their bed of ease by
exploiting us.
(4)
Robert
Merriman diary entry (28th February
1937)
Boys
had little to eat and drink, and it meant death to carry food across
the road. We waited without promised machine gun support, without
telephone, artillery going to the left and not helping us. The armored
cars were behind the hill, no tank in evidence, no horses, no planes.
(5)
Jack Freeman, member of the Abraham Lincoln Battalion, letter
(29th June, 1938)
Last
winter we had the coldest winter in about twenty years and now it
seems, we're headed for the hottest summer in a long time. From eleven
in the morning to 3 or 4 in the afternoon it is simply physically
impossible to do anything. The slightest motion brings oceans of thick,
stinking sweat rolling down your body. The civilians sleep their famous
siesta, but for us, living in trenches or in open fields, even this
is almost impossible. For along with the hot weather came the flies.
Not flies like the delicate, frightened creatures we have in the states.
Oh, no. Big, heavy, tough, persistent things that you can't shoo away.
They swarm in thick clouds over every square inch of your body that's
exposed, buzzing ferociously, creeping across your skin so heavily
you can feel each individual footstep, biting so that you almost forget
the lice. And when you swing at them, they don't scatter like properly
civilized American flies. They merely fly off two or three inches
and are back on you before your hand is at rest. If you lie uncovered
they torment you to distraction and if you put even the most sheer
piece of material over you, you drown in your own sweat. And the lice,
thriving on the rich sweat, grow fat & bloated like well-fed pigs
and dig fortifications in your skin.
(6)
Salaria
Kea was a
memner of the American Medical Unit that established a field hospital
at Villa Paz near Madrid.
She wrote about her experiences in Health and Medicine (Spring,
1987)
The Second American Medical Unit, authorized
by the Republican Government of Spain, at once turned the cows out
of Villa Paz, cleaned the building and set up the first American base
hospital in Spain.
The beds of Villa Paz
were soon filled with soldiers of every degree of injury and ailment,
every known race and tongue from every corner of the earth. These
divisions of race, creed and nationality lost significance when they
met in a united effort to make Spain the tomb of Fascism. I saw my
fate, the fate of the Negro race, was inseparably tied up with their
fate: the efforts of the Negroes must be allied with those of others
as the only insurance against an uncertain future.
The Negro men who fought
for Loyalist Spain never tire of telling how they celebrated when
they got news that the Second American Medical Unit included a Negro
nurse. Their battalion had been in the trenches 120 days of continuous
fighting. I am told that during the entire First World War a fighting
unit was never required to be under fire longer than this. Their clothing
was shabby and worn. Many had so little to wear they could not appear
in public.
I was so excited over
going to Spain I did not realize that many other Negroes had already
recognized Spain's fight for freedom and liberty as a part of our
struggle too. I didn't know that almost a hundred young Negro men
were already fighting Hitler's and Mussolini's forces there in Spain.
(7)
Steve
Nelson, Steve Nelson:
American Radical (1981)
Our purpose throughout three years of civil war was not
to set up some sort of workers' republic, be it socialist, anarchist,
or what have you. There was clearly a progressive content to the political
program of the Popular Front that
would have extended civil liberties, strengthened the bargaining power
of workers and spurred land reform. And there were openly revolutionary
currents within it. Yet the goal of the Popular Front was not a socialist
republic.
(8)
Robert
Merriman wrote about the offensive
at Jarama
Valley to his friend Martin Hourihan
(1st March 1937)
Our
men advanced under impossible conditions and did it without murmur.
Our boys plenty brave. Great boys and it grieved me to see them go.
(9)
Edwin
Rolfe,
The Lincoln Battalion (1939)
Jarama
was a complete success, in a way which none of the Americans who took
part in it could then foresee. For the attack on February 27th impressed
the insurgents with one inescapable fact: that the Jarama front was
too heavily, too perfectly defended. From that day until the very
end of the war, the rebels never succeeded in advancing another meter
along the line which, they had hoped, would cut the Madrid-Valencia
highway, effect the encirclement and the capture of Madrid.
(10)
Oliver
Law, interviewed by a reporter after
the offensive at Jarama
River (February, 1937)
We
came to wipe out the fascists. Some of us must die doing that job.
But we'll do it here in Spain, maybe stopping fascism in the United
States, too, without a great battle there.
(11)
Alvah
Bessie,
Men in Battle (1939)
I
wanted to work (for the first time) in a large body of men, to submerge
myself in the mass, seeking neither distinction nor preferment - the
obverse of my activities the past several years - and in this way
to achieve: self-discipline, patience and resignation, unselfishness.
In fine, to complete the destruction of my early training in order
to build again a life that would be geared to other men and the world-events
that circumscribed their lives.
(12)
Paul
White deserted from the Abraham Lincoln
Brigade in March 1938. He
drove to the French border. However, on hearing that his wife had
given birth to a son, he began to feel remorse for what he had done.
White wanted his son to be proud of his father and he returned to
the front where he made a full confession of his actions. White was
court-martialled and became the only American to be executed for desertion
in the war.
After Belchite I knew I was afraid to go into action again.
I tried all this time to overcome my feeling of fear. I felt we were
doomed and fighting futilely. I dropped out of line and made up my
mind to desert and try and reach France. As I ran towards the Ebro
and met more deserters and routed troops, my fear grew. If I succeeded
in getting to France, I still would have to face everyone at home
but I had lost all control.
I kept going and debating
whether or not to turn back. I spoke to the mayor at the border town
in which I was arrested and asked where the command post was located.
He told me and I decided to eat and make a final decision. I was arrested
before I had done this. Once I was in custody I decided that I had
been saved from wrecking my life completely.
I realize that "safety"
of the kind I was seeking would never compensate me for the loss of
everything and everyone I
value. I ask for one chance and that is to serve in the lines and
wipe out this stain on my military and Party record.
I am 29 years old and
am certain that I can serve in the ranks for many years as a class
conscious worker. I have had plenty of time to think before making
this statement and sincerely believe I will be stronger in my work
and devotion if given the opportunity to redeem myself. I regard my
position now as the most serious crisis in my life and am ready to
meet it.
(13)
In 1938 the Medical Bureau and North American Committee to Aid Spanish
Democracy in New York published Salaria
Kea: A Negro Nurse in Republican Spain.
The hospital beds were soon filled with soldiers of every degree of
injury and ailment,
of almost every known race and tongue and from every corner of the
earth. Czechs from Prague, and from Bohemian villages, Hungarians,
French, Finns. Peoples from democratic countries who recognized Italy
and Germany's invasion in Spain as a threat to the peace and security
of all small countries. Germans and Italians, exiled or escaped from
concentration camps and fighting for their freedom here on Spain's
battle line. Ethiopians from Djibouti, seeking to recoup Ethiopia's
freedom by strangling Mussolini's forces here in Spain. Cubans, Mexicans,
Russians, Japanese, unsympathetic with Japan's invasion of China and
the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo axis. There were poor whites and Negroes from
the Southern States of the United States. These divisions of race
and creed and religion and nationality lost significance when they
met in Spain in a united effort to make
Spain the tomb of fascism. The outcome of the struggle in Spain implies
the death or the realization of the hopes of the minorities of the
world.
Salaria saw that her fate,
the fate of the Negro Race, was inseparably tied up with their fate;
that the Negro's efforts must be allied with those of other minorities
as the only insurance against an uncertain future. And in Spain she
worked with freedom. Her services were recognized. For the first time
she worked free of racial discrimination or limitations.
There were not too many
skilled hands to make the wounded comfortable. Everybody's services
were conscripted. Nurses taught carpenters to make hospital supplies
- shock blocks, back rests, Balkan frames for fractured arms, Fire
and fuel they needed desperately.
(14)
Edwin
Rolfe,
New
Masses (13th September, 1938)
The
war has ripped all illusions from even the youngest of the volunteers,
leaving only the reality. That reality is harder than anyone who has
never been under machine-gun fire and bombs and artillery fire can
ever know. Yet the men of the Lincoln brigade, knowing it well, chose
and continue to choose to fight for Spain's free existence. To be
true to themselves and their innermost convictions.
(15)
Bill
Bailey was a member of the International
Brigades parade in Barcelona
on 15th November 1938.
Everyone who was able to walk was
in the parade and the street was lined with people, throwing flowers,
running out to hug and kiss us, tears in their eyes. It was sad to
leave all these wonderful Spaniards at Franco's mercy. The last words
spoken to us were that we should continue the anti-fascist struggle
wherever we might be. And we did that to the best of our ability.
(16)
After the war Ernest
Hemingway wrote about the role of
the International
Brigades.
The dead sleep cold in Spain tonight. Snow blows through the olive
groves, sifting against the tree roots. Snow drifts over the mounds
with small headboards. For our dead are a part of the earth of Spain
now and the earth of Spain can never die. Each winter it will seem
to die and each spring it will come alive again. Our dead will live
with it forever.
Over 40,000 volunteers
from 52 countries flocked to Spain between 1936 and 1939 to take part
in the historic struggle between democracy and fascism known as the
Spanish Civil War.
Five brigades of international
volunteers fought on behalf of the democratically elected Republican
(or Loyalist) government. Most of the North American volunteers served
in the unit known as the 15th brigade, which included the Abraham
Lincoln battalion, the George Washington battalion and the (largely
Canadian) Mackenzie-Papineau battalion. All told, about 2,800 Americans,
1,250 Canadians and 800 Cubans served in the International Brigades.
Over 80 of the U.S. volunteers were African-American. In fact, the
Lincoln Battalion was headed by Oliver Law, an African-American from
Chicago, until he died in battle.
(17)
J.
Edgar Hoover, A Study of Communism
(1962)
One of the first opportunities to exploit political and social upheaval
abroad arose in Spain. When a civil war broke out in that country
in 1936, the Communists acted in line with the theory that the Soviet
Union should be used as the base for the extension of Communist control
over other countries. Soviet intervention in the Spanish civil war
was twofold in nature. First, in response to directions from the Comintern,
the international Communist movement organized International Brigades
to fight in Spain. A typical unit was the Abraham Lincoln Brigade,
organized in the United States. It succeeded in recruiting about 3,000
men. In all, the Communist parties of 53 countries were represented
in the International Brigades with a total fighting strength of approximately
18,000, the first of whom arrived in Spain during the latter part
of 1936. Second, the Soviet Union furnished direct military assistance
in the form of tanks, artillery, and aircraft flown by Soviet pilots.
For two years, Moscow pursued its objectives in the Spanish struggle.
However, Soviet intervention ended in the fall of 1938, when the national
interest of the Soviet Union forced it to turn its attention elsewhere.
In Europe, Hitler's strength was steadily increasing. In addition,
Japan's armed invasion of Manchuria posed a direct threat to Soviet
territory in the
Far East. At the end of 1938, the International Brigades withdrew
from Spain. Many Communists throughout the world who answered the
Comintern's call to fight in Spain were repaid subsequently by Soviet
assistance in their attempts to seize power in their respective countries.
Among those identified with Communist efforts in connection with the
Spanish civil war who subsequently gained prominence in the Communist
movement were Tito (Yugoslavia), Palmiro Togliatti (Italy), Jacques
Duclos (France), Klement Gottwald (Czechoslovakia), Erno Gero and
Laszlo Rajk (Hungary), and Walter Ulbricht (East Germany).
(18)
Milton
Wolff,
interviewed by Judy Montell in 1991.
Spain was only one battle. World War II was only one battle,
what's going on in Central America, South Africa, the Middle East
now is another battle, and we're into these things. Struggle is the
elixir of life, the tonic of life. I mean, if you're not struggling,
your dead.
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