translated from Mujeres Libres, las anarcofeministas … (illustrations added)

The Marienea de Basauri Center (Bizkaia) has hosting an exhibition on the struggle of the historic anarchist women’s movement

“Mujeres Libres (1936-1939). Precursors of a new world “

1936 piquete de trabajadoras durante la huelga mercantil en barcelona

In the end of summer, 2018, the face of Sánchez Saornil was part of an exhibition that opened in the Marienea de Basauri center (C / Kareaga Goikoa, 54), a few kilometers from Bilbao.

Her profile appears in one of the rooms of the Marienea center that hosted the exhibition

“Mujeres Libres (1936-1939). Precursors of a new world “, organized by the Anselmo Lorenzo Libertarian Studies Foundation (FAL), the CNT union and the Emakume Askeak group from Bilbao.

Anarchist delegates presenting the Demand to legalise the first ever Women’s General Strike in Spain, 2018 which was called by the CNT and CGT anarcho syndicalist unions.

“It wasn’t easy: everything related to anarchist women is difficult to find,” says Carmen Gutiérrez, Roki, one of the people in charge of Emakume Askeak.

She has worked to assemble this exhibition and who knew the process followed by the FAL to make this exhibition possible in homage to the historic Iberian anarcho-feminist movement, which became the most important worldwide. The Women’s General Strike 2018 was a landslide success

Not in vain is the history of Free Women an indissoluble part of the feminist struggle in this country and, at the same time, of the anti-Franco resistance.

Its history goes back to the end of 1935, when “the Women’s Cultural Group of Barcelona was created with the purpose of promoting culture, education and relations of solidarity among women”, can be read in one of the panels that make up the inaugurated exhibition this week in Marienea. “They faced the situation of inequality as workers,” she continues, “taking an active part in labor and social decisions in factories and workshops.”

Some months later there was news from Madrid. In the heat of the events that pervaded the whole geography, CNT militants in the Spanish capital decided to create a similar group, “formed by Amparo Poch y Gascón, Mercedes Comaposada and Lucía Sánchez Saornil”.

“It would be them who, in April 1936, began to prepare a magazine dedicated to culture and social documentation,” the exhibition highlights. The germ of Free Women was already in the environment.

The key step came in the convulsive 1936, when the groups from Barcelona and Madrid decided to join to form, now, the pioneering anarcho-feminist movement. The group, called Mujeres Libres, began to grow rapidly in neighborhoods and cities.

The response seemed unstoppable: in 1937, when the National Federation of Free Women was structured, there were already 28 thousand affiliates.

“If we analyze modern feminism, we will see that it is completely linked to what this group was,” says Gutiérrez a few minutes after the exhibition opened its doors. With the rooms of Marienea still empty, this member of Emakume Askeak is thrilled to remember those who preceded them in the femwanist fight. “Not even during the war did they abandon their objectives of instruction and liberation of women,” he says.

Paneles informativos de la exposición ‘Mujeres libres’

In this sense, the fight of this anarcho-feminist collective was aimed at “raising awareness among workers to emancipate women from their triple slavery: ignorance, production and being women”.

To try to achieve this, “they based their efforts on training, with education, culture, and recruitment, with programs to encourage women to join the anarchist movement,” says another of the panels.

Persecuted and shot.

This got on the nerves of the Franco regime, which viciously persecuted the Mujeres Libres militants.

“They suffered repression, prison and murders,” says Gutiérrez. In that last chapter is the case of Encarnación Magaña, the only woman shot by the Francoists in Almería.

Others managed to flee into exile, where, some decades later, they managed to put the Mujeres Libres magazine back into circulation.

“When the so-called ‘transition’ arrived in the 1970s, some of them reorganized the movement in places like Barcelona or Madrid, adapting the historical objectives to the situation of modern feminism,” says Gutiérrez, who today is part of the Mujeres Libres group in Bilbao, one of the many that exists in the State.

All this was discussedin the talk that took place on Wednesday 19th at the same center that hosted the show.

A feminist house

The Exhibition is now touring to other cities.

original en castellano (con más ilustraciones)

Mujeres Libres, las anarcofeministas que Franco no logró doblegar



El centro Marienea de Basauri (Bizkaia) acoge una exposición sobre la lucha del histórico movimiento de mujeres.

Primero tocó huir. Luego, volverse invisible. Nada más instaurarse el reino del horror franquista, Lucía Sánchez Saornil tuvo que escapar primero y hacerse clandestina después. Nunca, pero nunca, dejó de ser quien era: una militante anarcofeminista comprometida hasta su última célula con el cambio social. Por eso huyó y por eso tuvo que pasar varios años de forma desapercibida ante los ojos asesinos del régimen. Por eso, también por eso, fue una de las fundadoras de Mujeres Libres.

En este final de verano, el rostro de Sánchez Saornil forma parte de una exposición que acaba de abrirse en el centro Marienea de Basauri (C/Kareaga Goikoa, 54), a pocos kilómetros de Bilbao. Su perfil aparece en una de las salas del centro Marienea que hasta el próximo 27 de septiembre acogerá la muestra “Mujeres Libres (1936-1939). Precursoras de un mundo nuevo”, organizada por la Fundación de Estudios Libertarios Anselmo Lorenzo (FAL), el sindicato CNT y la agrupación Emakume Askeak de Bilbao.

“No fue fácil: todo lo relacionado con las mujeres anarquistas resulta difícil de encontrar”, dice a Público Carmen Gutiérrez, Roki, una de las responsables de Emakume Askeak que ha trabajado para montar esta muestra y que conoció de cerca el proceso seguido por la FAL para hacer posible esta exposición en homenaje al histórico movimiento anarcofeminista ibérico, que llegó a convertirse en el más importante a nivel mundial.

No en vano, la historia de Mujeres Libres es parte indisoluble de la lucha feminista en este país y, al mismo tiempo, de la resistencia antifranquista. Sus antecedentes se remontan a finales de 1935, cuando “se crea el Grupo Femenino Cultural de Barcelona con la finalidad de promover la cultura, la educación y las relaciones de solidaridad entre mujeres”, puede leerse en uno de los paneles que componen la muestra inaugurada esta semana en Marienea. “Hacen frente así a la situación de desigualdad que tenían como obreras –continúa-, tomando parte activa en las decisiones laborales y sociales en fábricas y talleres”.

Algunos meses después hubo noticias desde Madrid. Al calor de los acontecimientos que impregnaban toda la geografía, militantes de CNT en la capital española decidieron crear un grupo similar, “formado por Amparo Poch y Gascón, Mercedes Comaposada y Lucía Sánchez Saornil”. “Serían ellas quienes, en abril de 1936, empezaron a preparar una revista dedicada a la cultura y la documentación social”, subraya la muestra. El germen de Mujeres Libres ya estaba en el ambiente.

El paso clave llegó en el convulso 1936, cuando los grupos de Barcelona y Madrid decidieron unirse para formar, ahora sí, el pionero movimiento anarcofeminista. El grupo, denominado Mujeres Libres, empezó a crecer rápidamente por barrios y ciudades. La respuesta parecía imparable: en 1937, cuando se estructuró la Federación Nacional de Mujeres Libres, ya había 28 mil afiliadas.

“Si analizamos el feminismo moderno, veremos que está completamente vinculado a lo que fue este grupo”, dice Gutiérrez unos minutos después de que la exposición abriese sus puertas. Con las salas de Marienea aún vacías, esta integrante de Emakume Askeak se emociona al recordar a quienes les antecedieron en la pelea feminista. “Ni siquiera durante la guerra abandonaron sus objetivos de instrucción y liberación de las mujeres”, reivindica.

En tal sentido, la pelea de este colectivo anarcofeminista estuvo dirigida a “concienciar a las obreras para emancipar a la mujer de su triple esclavitud: la ignorancia, la producción y el ser mujeres”. Para tratar de conseguirlo, “se basaron en la capacitación, con programas de educación cultura y formación, y en la captación, con programas para animar a las mujeres a unirse al movimiento libertario”, dice otro de los paneles.

Una casa feminista

La elección del sitio para realizar esta exposición tampoco parece casualidad. El edificio Marienea acoge habitualmente distintos actos ligados al movimiento feminista, e incluso ha promovido distintas investigaciones sobre el papel de la mujer en esta localidad vizcaína. “Marienea es un espacio que busca reconocer la historia y la memoria de las mujeres”, contó a Público el concejal de Igualdad, Asier Iragorri. Con los paneles de Mujeres Libres de fondo, el edil reconoció la importancia de “recuperar la memoria histórica” de las feministas “antes y durante la guerra”, algo que ha sido “tapado e invisibilizado”. La exposición recién inaugurada busca, precisamente, acabar con ese silencio.

Danilo Albin/Público (extraído de La Haine)

One case taken up is that of Mercedes and Daria, 2 nurses and sisters who, like very many, were brutally raped and murdered by the Spanish fascists in never before investigated gender crimes.

Rape by prison officers and the Fascist Party of women involved in politics or only for being relatives of men thought to be opponents of the regime; torture of political prisoners with a gender component, insults and blows (in the genital and reproductive areas); massive baby theft; hair shaving, forced poisoning […]

Daria and Mercedes Buxadé were two sisters working as nurses for the Republican side in Barcelona. They were detained and the authorities ordered them to be examined to check her virginity. A group of nuns carried out a gynecological examination to check. “They were brutal and afterwards they were raped repeatedly by a group of Falangist fascists. It is believed that the next day they were taken to the cemetery at Coletes, where they were killed, ” reads the complaint.

Margalida Jaume was arrested with her husband for no apparent reason in 1936, being seven months pregnant. They suffered all kinds of humiliation and torture and finally were executed. Years later, a villager admitted witnessing at least one of the rapes of Margalida by the Falangists . He also heard the rapist saying: “I’ve never enjoyed so much raping a pregnant prisoner”. Margalida is still missing.

Pilar Sanchez, whose testimony is presented by her great-granddaughter with the expertise of a historian, was arrested by members of the Falange fascist party. She was transported in a car with four of them: “When the vehicle stopped a man who was out hunting saw the four men take her from the car by force and began to beat and rape her. She was then taken to the cemetery of Sencelles. There, another resident of the same neighborhood as Pilar saw how these four men, who were also neighbors, rape Pilar again and then throw her to the ground and shoot her. ” They dragged her body to the cemetery gates …..

continues

Who were the Thirteen Roses?



On July 27, 1939, an attack was carried out against the commander Isaac Gabaldón, a former member of the fifth column – a clandestine network that worked for the national side in Madrid – which at that time was in charge of the ‘Archive of Freemasonry and Communism’ . The Franco regime attributed this deadly attack to a communist network and held a summary war council on August 4 in Madrid. …

Of the 67 accused, mainly from a socialist group, , 65 were sentenced to death , and 63 of these were shot the following day, among them the Thirteen Roses. In the following days other summary trials and more executions were made: in total there were 364 detainees for this attack, most of which were executed. Tens of thousands more people were murdered by the fascist takeover. The ‘Thirteen Roses’ (Trece Rosas) were shot in the cemetery of the East, currently the cemetery of the Almudena in the capital.

A film in Spanish has recently been made about the massacre.