The “Catalans” of Burgos

Most of the Catalans who managed to escape from Catalonia by sea during the first months of the war or later by crossing the Pyrenees or by deserting, wound up in “Nationalist” Spain. Although most of them went to live in San Sebastián, Zaragoza, Sevilla, Palma, and other cities, they have been called the “Catalans of Burgos”, after Franco’s capital city. Largely Catholics and conservatives, they collaborated in the war effort by filling positions in the administration, starting businesses, or joining the army or militias.

They also rebuilt the regional versions of the only two political forces the regime allowed: the fascist Falange Española de las JONS and the ultra-Catholic monarchist Traditionalist Communion of the Carlists. They also created armed units: the First Virgin of Montserrat Company and the Our Lady of Montserrat Requeté Regiment, respectively. Both, and especially would distinguish themselves in combat. They also created women and youth sections and other auxiliary organizations. The Falangists also established a weekly paper, DESTINO. Politics of Unity which, after the war and disconnected from the party, would have a long life.

Those pro-Franco Catalans who spent the war years outside Spain also contributed to the “national” war effort. Their activities included raising plentiful funds, supplying credit and preventing the Republic from getting credits, and undertaking propaganda initiatives such as “Truth Radio” and Occident magazine. Members of the Lliga Catalana, a party that was banned in Franco’s Spain, such as financiers Francesc Cambó and Joan Ventosa i Calvell and publicist Joan Estelrich played an important role in these activities.

At first, and unlike what happened elsewhere in the “national” zone, more Catalan refugees were attracted to the Carlists, with their ultra-Catholicism and defense of historic special laws for regions, than to the Falange. The Catalan refugees also suspected the revolutionary fascism and hyper Spanish nationalism of the Falange.  However, Catalan Falangists would take advantage of the19 April 1937 Decree of Unification that created the regime’s official single party. Franco took control of the two organizations, declared himself National Leader, adopted the original program of the Falange, and put Falangists in positions of authority in Catalonia, marginalizing the Carlists.

As a result, when the conquest of Catalonia begin in March/April 1938 and the provinces of Lérida and Tarragona were occupied, the first leaders on the ground came from the Falange. The photograph shows a José María Fontana Tarrats, head of the Francoist official party, FET y de las JONS, for the province of Tarragona at an event in Valladolid on 18 July 1938 commemorating the military uprising that triggered the Civil War. The same thing happened in Barcelona when it was occupied in January 1939. Only in Gerona was a Carlist appointed provincial leader, and his tenure was brief.

When the war in Catalonia ended, and as 460,000 people fled to France - of whom 300,000 would return during 1939 - the much smaller group of “Catalan of Burgos”, between 40,000 and 50,000 people, returned to Catalonia or were progressively demobilized.