1937: Juan García Oliver Speech About Durruti and the time of Pistoleros and action groups

 

 

I found this speech given at some point in 1937 by Juan Garcia Oliver while looking for public domain footage of the Spanish Civil War and the years that preceded it. Oliver had joined the CNT Anarcho-syndicalist union in 1919 and in the early 1920s took an active part in the illegal action groups. The groups carried out reprisals for the murder of Anarchists and union members and with the group Los Solidarios Oliver took part in some high profile assassinations. In the 1930s Oliver took part in several abortive insurrections in Catalunya and was in prison until an amnesty in 1936. 

During the civil war he oscillated wildly between posts and ideological positions, initially supporting the full implementation of Libertarian Communism and joining a column at the front in Aragon, before being called back to be a CNT representative and later joining the Caballero republican government. During the Mayday's clashes between the Republic and the more revolutionary elements, he urged a ceasefire and unity with the government. In his tenure as Minister of Justice, he was associated with abolishing court fees and destroying court records, but also had a role in the establishment of work camps and prisons.

 

 

Link  

 

Text of the speech.

 
Our anarchist group was founded in the year 1923.

In circumstances that were very bad for our movement, very sad for the whole working class,
The pistoleros of the "Sindicato Libre*", sponsored by the bourgeoisie, were almost owners of the city.
The police hordes contributed to the destruction of our organizations and our men.
Salvador Seguí, the titan of anarcho-syndicalism, had fallen.
Old militants, the first men of our so splendid movement today, had fallen.
When we thought that the moment of being completely defeated was probably coming,
We united, in that moment,  we who I have no shame in saying, we who I have pride in confessing:
The kings of the working-class, pistol of Barcelona!
We lived and acted disunited.

But we made a selection!
The best terrorists of the working class
The ones who could best return punch by punch and deliver the final victory to the proletariat
We split from the other comrades, we united, and we formed an anarchist group.
A group of action, to fight!
Against the pistoleros, against the bourgeoisie, and against the government!
We achieved our goal: we won!
Our punches were harder, more towards the head, than theirs.
And the group was formed, and it was an oath of those who joined it, that, from that moment on, our group "Los Solidarios" we'd continue the struggle, until the total triumph of the working class, until the triumph of the social revolution and that only death could separate us.
The first to fall was comrade Eusebio, in Asturias.
Comrade Torin also fell, in Barcelona.
The comrades Suberviela and Torres Escartín suffered in prison.
And when we, after the Republic was established, came out of the prisons, and united once again in Spain, we continued the group, and then, we renamed to, "Nosotros".

We (Nosotros), who have no name!
We, who have no pride!
We, who are a mass!
We, who will go one by one!
We (Nosotros)!
We have a debt.
Durruti paid it.
For the revolution and in honor to his commitment.
We who are, like Durruti, to show Europe we stopped at the last compromise.
Time has been proving it:
It is not a test of a day nor a year.
It is a test of (???).
It was paid.
It was accomplished.
Durruti did his duty,
and we, who are still here, will also do it.
Death is nothing!
Our individual lives are NOTHING!
That's why we are "Nosotros".
And while one of us is left, "Nosotros" lives on.
That's all.

* A labour union set up by the industrialists of Barcelona in an attempt to break the much more militant CNT Union. Its leadership was complicit in the Pistoleros campaigns, informing on CNT members.

UPDATE:

Found a youtube channel affiliated with the CGT union in Valencia which has the full recording of the film online. 

It also has more information,

Documental realizado por la CNT en homenaje a Durruti en el primer aniversario de su muerte y dedicado a su viuda Emiliana Morín y a su hija Colette Durruti.  Comienza con unas imágenes del cementerio de Montjuich tras lo que se pasa a un acto de homenaje anarquista en el cine Tívoli de Barcelona. Vemos la intervención de cuatro dirigentes anarquistas, entre ellos a Juan García Oliver, que hace un discurso sobre la importancia de Durruti y la CNT en la lucha revolucionaria.  De nuevo en el cementerio, un antiguo miembro de la Columna Durruti, transformada en la 26 División, se dirige a la multitud prometiendo seguir la lucha por las ideas del líder caído. García Oliver da un inflamado discurso en el que recuerda a Durruti y al grupo de acción anarquista "Los Solidarios", la muerte de Salvador Seguí al que aplicaron la "Ley de fugas", y la lucha que mantuvieron contra los pistoleros del Sindicato Libre. Este discurso está intercalado con imágenes de ficción entre las que destaca una recreación de la aplicación de la "Ley de fugas".

Translation

 

 Documentary made by the CNT in homage to Durruti on the first anniversary of his death and dedicated to his widow Emiliana Morín and his daughter Colette Durruti.  It begins with some images of the Montjuich cemetery after which an anarchist tribute act is held at the Tívoli cinema in Barcelona. We see the intervention of four anarchist leaders, among them Juan García Oliver, who makes a speech about the importance of Durruti and the CNT in the revolutionary struggle.  Back in the cemetery, a former member of the Durruti Column, transformed into the 26th Division, addresses the crowd promising to continue the fight for the fallen leader's ideas. García Oliver gives an inflamed speech in which he remembers Durruti and the anarchist action group "Los Solidarios", the death of Salvador Seguí to whom the "Law of Fugitives*" was applied, and the fight they waged against the gunmen of the Free Trade Union. This speech is interspersed with fictional images, among which a recreation of the application of the "Law of Fugitives" stands out.

* The Ley de fugas or Law of fugitives was a law that authorised the shooting of prisoners attempting to escape. It was widely used by the police to execute prisoners out of hand.