Spanish Civil War Memory Project

Summary

Angustias Martínez Vicente was born on April 22, 1919 in the village of La Peraleja in Cuenca. Her father, a local head of the Izquierda Republicana, ran a general store in the town. The big landowners of La Peraleja organized their workers to rebel against the Republic. Martínez participated in the founding of the Juventudes Socialistas Unificadas (JSU) in La Peraleja, and she attended courses organized by that organization. During the Spanish Civil War she burned effigies of Franco. In 1939 she was detained, tortured and incarcerated for seven years. She spent time in various prisons, including at Cuenca, briefly at Uclés and finally at Ventas in Madrid. She provides a detailed picture of life in prison during the early 1940s, including overcrowded conditions, work, mandatory religious training, as well as clandestine news sharing from the outside and underground political activity. She aided two codemned female prisoners to escape from Ventas. Martínez routinely heard codemned prisoners singing revolutionary songs as they marched off to be executed by firing squad. Her father was executed in 1945. After her release in 1946 Martínez continued as an underground militant while struggling to make a living. In 1955 she left Spain for Chile, to join her brother Carlos who was already exiled there. In Chile she helped her brother establish a school which incorporated a progressive pedagogical philosophy. Martínez describes the Spanish exile community in Chile, work with the Communist Party in Chile, and ongoing anti-Franco political activity. Also she shares anecdotes of her friendship with Pablo Neruda, and recounts a visit to Chile by the Spanish exile poet Marcos Ana. Martínez returned to Spain soon after the 1973 coup led by Pinochet. In the 1990s she was involved in efforts to reclaim the school she helped found, as it had been taken over by the Pinochet government