«Nuestros humildes renglones». Cartas del exilio republicano español en Francia (1939-1940).

López Izquierdo, Marta; Yusta Rodrigo, Mercedes; Martínez Martínez, Alba: «Nuestros humildes renglones». Cartas del exilio republicano español en Francia (1939-1940).
Institución Fernando el Católico, 2023.

This book contains a selection of letters from the so-called Moscow collection of the French National Archives, written by Spanish refugees from the French internment camps and reception centres where they were interned after crossing the French border in the winter of 1939, shortly before the end of the Spanish Civil War.

These letters, unpublished to date, were written mostly by women of different ages and origins, and are dated between February 1939, coinciding with the Retreat, when nearly 500,000 people left Spanish territory to escape the advance of Franco’s troops, and the summer of 1940. In them, the signatories address the CAEERF (Commission for Aid to Spanish Refugee Children in France), an organisation that provided aid to the thousands of Spaniards interned in very precarious conditions.

This collection of letters therefore offers first-hand material to help us understand who these thousands of refugees were, representing a broad spectrum of the Spanish social spectrum at the time. This edition also provides an insight into the solidarity networks that were mobilised to welcome them in the neighbouring country and the difficulties encountered by the aid organisations in the face of French institutions overwhelmed by the massive arrival of refugees, firstly, and then by France’s entry into the Second World War.

In short, this edition and its introductory study seek to provide an insight into the history, still insufficiently known and recognised, of a part of the Spanish people and the difficult conditions in which their exile to France took place, from which many of them would never return.