José Brocca

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Jose Brocca (Professor José Brocca Ramón) was a pacifist and humanitarian of the Spanish Civil War, who allied himself with the republicans but sought non-violent ways of resisting fascism. He did this at great personal sacrifice.

Always a political activist, he was at one time the village schoolmaster in Viator, near Almeria in Andalucia, where Brocca earned a reputation as a respected community leader. For example, he was instrumental in defying local landowners to bring water to a public fountain in the village. His five children were: Arnulfo, Helio, Irma, Olga and Humberto.

Almeria was shelled by Hitler's navy and Andalucia was quickly caught up in the violence and confusion of the Civil War. As is both metaphorically and literally the way with civil war, brother fought against brother. Arnulfo found himself on the rebel side, rose through the ranks, and eventually had a post-war career as a senior officer in the regular Spanish army, mainly in La Coruňa, before retiring to Huelva then Sevilla to live with his daughter and family. Humberto was drawn in on the republican side, died of wounds, and his grave has not been located. In spite of the horrors of war and the divisive nature of this war in particular, the four surviving brothers and sisters throughout their lives held warm memories of their childhood in Spain, and kept in touch in the post-war years. Helio died in Mexico in 1968, Olga in Wales in 2004 and Arnulfo in Spain in 2005.

Brocca aligned himself with the socialist segment of the complex political spectrum in Spain, and represented Spanish pacifists at international meetings of the peace movement (Orden del Olivo and War Resisters' International). He was a colleague of feminist doctor Amparo Poch y Gascón. He believed that pacifists had to support the republican cause, but he was first and foremost a humanitarian. There is a local legend in Viator which suggests that he helped a Catholic priest escape assassination by giving him his car. After Viator, Professor Brocca worked in Madrid, where he taught at the University, in Barcelona and other locations. (It is believed that at one stage, preceding the republican era, he also spent some time in Argentina where his brother was living. The reasons for this are not clear, but one source indicates that he was in 'exile' due to political circumstances in Spain).

Many people's perception of the Spanish Civil War is one of two monolithic 'sides': a war of democracy against fascism. In fact it was by no means as simple as that, and although it was the republican cause that was more seriously undermined by internal power struggles, there were many factions and sub-groups within both the main groupings. Almost completely overlooked by mainstream historians, there was also a vigorous element of pacifism, and the work of the Spanish arm of the organisation War Resisters' International (WRI) is almost totally forgotten in popular history and neglected by academics.

Most active pacifists found it difficult or impossible to take a neutral view of the fascist uprising in Spain. Some prominent members of pacifist organisations, like Dr. Albert Einstein, had already renounced pacifism altogether, as a reaction to Hitler's rise to power in Germany. Brocca's activism in response to the armed insurrection in Spain was widely quoted by pacifists in the UK and elsewhere as respresenting a role model. Herbert Runham Brown, Hon. Secretary of the WRI, asked 'What should I do if I were in Spain?' and in answer reproduced parts of a letter from Brocca in which he stated:

'In Barcelona, in Valencia, in the province of Caceres and in Madrid I have acted, and continue to act, in such interesting tasks as stimulating, directing and organising the peasants so that instead of abandoning their agricultural work, even in those areas abandoned by the fascists in their flight, they work to avoid interruption in production and provision of supplies for the towns; in establishing and organising schools and homes for the children of those citizens who have fallen or who are fighting on the various fronts, and in general taking advantage of all opportunities to spread among the combatants our humanitarian ideals and our repugnance to oppression and cruelty' (Brown, 1937).

In the later days of the war the French Catalan town of Prats-de-Mollo-la-Preste (near Perpignan) in the Pyrenees was the location of a refuge financed by the War Resisters' International and run by Professor Brocca and his wife. Helio, Irma and Olga were also there for a time, but were then sent, in the care of Brocca's sister-in-law, to stay with sympathisers in Bois Guillaume, Rouen, until the fall of France necessitated their escape back south from Normandy.

The Prats-de-Mollo refuge housed orphans and widows who had escaped from Spain. During his time there Professor Brocca became expert in finding pathways through the Pyrenees and crossed the border many times on various missions. In the early days of World War II he was of assistance not only to Spanish refugees but also to escapees en route in the other direction via Vichy France.

After the Civil War had officially ended Professor Brocca refused to leave Prats-de-Mollo until all the children in his care had been returned to safety in Spain; by this time his own life was seriously threatened by the Nazis occupying France and their sympathisers. An offer of asylum in Britain was made, at the instigation of prominent British pacifists such as H. Runham Brown and Grace Beaton, but Brocca was arrested before he could respond to this offer. Eventually, with the help of the French Resistance, he escaped from internment, finally arriving in Mexico, where after many severe difficulties his wife and one of his sons (Helio) later joined him. Funds towards their airline and boat fares were raised by supporters in the UK, and there was also considerable support from the USA coordinated by John Nevin Sayre of the Fellowship of Reconciliation in New York State. Brocca's other children settled in Wales (Olga), Sweden (Irma) and Spain (Arnulfo).

Professor Brocca never saw Spain again but lived in exile, and died in June 1950 in Mexico City where he was buried. In the early 1970s, with gradual liberalisation that preceded the death of Franco in 1975 and Spain's subsequent transition to democracy, Brocca's widow Rosa García López was able to return to Spain, living for part of that time with relatives in Madrid and with her sister Maria Garcia Lopez who ran a small newspaper and magazine shop in Calle Ecuador, in the 'Casa Blanca' district of the port city of Vigo, Galicia. Rosa was also able to spend some time reunited with her daughter Olga Brocca Smith and her family in the village of Pyle, near Bridgend, Wales.

In his book White Corpuscles in Europe (1939) the American writer Allan A. Hunter views the close of the Spanish Civil War and the opening of World War II from across the Atlantic, and despite the desolate outlook in Europe sees some grounds for optimism in the work of humanitarians including Philippe Vernier (France), F. Siegmund-Schultze (Germany), Pierre Ceresole (Switzerland), Muriel Lester (England), George Lansbury MP (former leader of the UK Labour Party) - and José Brocca, Spain. On page 76 Hunter states:

Professor Brocca seems to recognise that to fight fascism with the weapons fascists use is self-defeating. If we do as the fascists do then we only endorse fascism. To prevent fascism we have to prevent the desperation, the poverty, the chaos and the ignorance out of which fascism is produced.

If we replace the word 'fascism' throughout the above paragraph with 'terrorism', then we have a powerful and important message for modern politicial leaders.

[edit] Sources

H. Runham Brown (1937) Spain: A Challenge to Pacifism, London, War Resisters' International/ The Finsbury Press, pp. 5-6.

Allan A. Hunter (1939) White Corpuscles in Europe (foreword by Aldous Huxley), Chicago and New York, Willett, Clarke and Company, pp. 71-82.

Devi Prasad (2005) War is a Crime Against Humanity (foreword by George Willoughby), London, War Resisters' International, ISBN 0-903517-20-5, pp. 167, 179, 198, 205, 207, 212, 217, 230, 260, 462, 463, 482, 504. Prof. Brocca is pictured seated, far left in the photographs on pp. 522 and 523.

Also of interest is the Spanish language biography of Amparo Poch y Gascón, an anarchist doctor and co-founder of the Mujeres Libres: Antonina Rodrigo (2002) Una Mujer Libre: Amparo Poch y Gascón: Médica Anarquista (A Free Woman-Amparo Poch y Gascón : Anarchist Doctor), Barcelona, Flor del Viento Ediciones. Among other references, there is a reproduction of a poster advertising a 'grand meeting against the war' on 18 July 1936 at the Plaza Monumental, Barcelona, where the speakers were to be Fidel Miro, Max Muller, Professor Brocca, Dra. Amparo Poch, Hem Day, Felix Marti Ibanez, Manuel Perez, Augustin Souchy, Federica Montseny and Delso de Miguel. In the 1937 pamphlet by Runham Brown (see above) which reproduces a Peace News article of 1936, it is mentioned that this peace rally was cancelled because, in Professor Brocca's words, '...on the very night that it was to take place, there broke out the criminal militaro-fascist insurrection, the danger of which I had already notified to you.'