1920s SOCIETY IN TURMOIL  (2nd DRAFT)

BARCELONA 1917-1923

Manel Aisa

Published by: Ateneu Enciclopèdic Popular de Barcelona

Barcelona 1999

AEP/CDH-S

Passeig Sant Joan 26, 1er, 1°

08010 Barcelona

Tel./Fax: 93 265 05 8

INTRODUCTION

Ever since the rebuilding of the Ateneu Enciclopèdic Popular de Barcelona we have been sensible throughout of the need to recover a memory that has almost always been muted, forgotten and misrepresented, and this is no easy undertaking, in that our tiny grains of sand are almost always swallowed up by the maw of a society that turns a deaf ear and blind eye to past histories that ought to echo still, at least in the memories of those who owe it to family tradition not to forget.

However, our enthusiasm for contemporary history has prompted us to reconstruct it, our intention being to share - with any willing to do so - the historical inheritance of a people that sometimes fought just to survive and sometimes on the basis of belief that a different world offering equal access to resources might be achievable.

And this should be seen as nothing more than the grateful, thankful recognition and tribute we owe to earlier generations of men and women who, keeping faith with their convictions, found the strength to say No! to the great injustices of their day.

 The Barcelona of the first third of the 20th century was a city racked by a flurry of events that triggered a situation of ongoing confrontation between a tremendously buffeted labouring people with scarcely any rights but obligations aplenty and a bourgeoisie determined at any cost to protect its interests and which, turning to Church, army and whatever other weapons it found suited to the purpose (like the Somatén, Sindicato Libre, etc.), was hell bent on crushing a working class that was all but defenceless and which had no option but to organise itself as best it could, on a basis of mutual aid and solidarity.

The exhibition - L'efervescencia social dels anys 20. Barcelona 1917-1923 (Social Unrest in the 1920s. Barcelona 1917-1923) - is based on the text we offer below, a text that opens with the events of Tragic Week when the populace of Barcelona, opposed to defending the interests of the Spanish oligarchy in the war in Morocco, refused to stand idly by as its children were dispatched to their deaths in North Africa.  The CNT was formed as a state-wide instrument of the workers in their refusal to embrace and determination to rectify the Madrid government's wrong-headed approach in citing the events of Tragic Week in support of charges of separatism against Catalonia, an accusation that could not have been further from the truth. Ferrer i Guardia was unjustly executed as a scapegoat by a most atavistic, oligarchic Spain.

The Catalan bourgeoisie, which made enormous profits during the First World War and yet could not or would not countenance the workers having the opportunity to assuage their hunger - quite the opposite, in fact - surrounded itself with gangs of thugs that seized upon every development as a pretext upon which to give provocation and stain the fabric of society.

Bravo Portillo, the Lasarte File, the ley de fugas, the Baron de Koening, Arlegui and Anido, the Somatén, the Sindicato Libre, the police, the army, etc. were - all of them - mobilised to crush those who were, essentially, merely lathe-operators, printing workers, milling machine-operators, barbers, locksmiths, bricklayers or whatever. In what was, unquestionably, a repression too far for a people that was forced to defend itself as best it could, for the sake of the dignity of a juster cause.

Manel Aisa Pàmpols

EXHIBITION CREDITS

L'Efervescencia social dels anys 20. Barcelona 1917-1923

Organised by: The Ateneu Enciclopèdic Popular

Documentation by: Centre de Documentació Histórico-Social

Opening: at the Centre Civic Fort Pienc, Barcelona, on 10 November 1999

Coordination and documentary support provided by: Manel Aisa

Design and staging by: Montse Jurnet

Photocopies provided by: Copy-Ros

Text by: Manel Aisa

Catalan translation by: Ramon Gabarrós

Contributors:

Assumpta Verdaguer

Juanjo Alcalde

Carles Sanz

Adolf Castaños

Andreu Aisa

Antonio Hidalgo

Victor Arellano

*****************************************************************************************************************

Revolutionary Syndicalism. The Years of The Shadow of the Gunman. Barcelona 1909-1923

Because of the unrelenting conflict into which the Spanish army was being drawn in the Moroccan Protectorate, it was not uncommon even for reservists to be summoned to the colours and July 1909 was one such occasion, after the Spanish army suffered a severe defeat usually referred to simply as Barranco del Lobo.

As it happens the drafting of recruits for the war in the Rif created great unease among the workers across Spain who looked upon the war in the Moroccan Protectorate as nothing more than a few Spanish aristocratic families clinging on to their privileges and economic interests in the protectorate - families like that of the Conde de Romanones or the Marqueses de Comillas and Castellflorite, which enjoyed the backing of the Jesuits.

The Marquesa de Comillas on the dockside in Barcelona handing out scapulars to soldiers about to take ship was not an uncommon sight. In addition to all of which workers had to endure the discrimination entailed in the  2,000 peseta charge for exemption of the sons of the bourgeoisie from military service (or, in this instance, war service). The sons of the bourgeoisie could well afford the exemption charge whereas working class families could never hope to raise that sum.

In the summer of 1909 the government deployed its army to dragoon Catalan reservists, many of whom had families to support, with the conscript often the sole bread-winner.  This was the context from which there erupted what came to be known as Tragic Week, 26 July to 1 August 1909. [1]

From Madrid, however, the national government would strive to misrepresent these developments, portraying the events in Barcelona to the rest of Spain as an act of provocation and rebellion by Catalan separatists. Nothing could have been further from the true facts about the men who manned the barricades who were deserted even by radical republican politicians once the latter cottoned on to the magnitude of the conflict, whereupon they latter vacated the political stage, leaving the Catalan workers to their fate.

The confrontation and the repression of it would be harsh and very one-sided, with 104 civilian lives lost as against the lives of 4 military personnel, 4 Red Cross personnel and 3 priests, with 52 religious buildings torched and upwards of 2,000 people placed under arrest. 17 of the latter were sentenced to death, although only 5 of these sentences were carried out. 50 people were sentenced to life imprisonment.

Antonio Maura's government needed a whipping boy, however, and was once again presented with a heaven-sent opportunity to implicate Francisco Ferrer i Guardia in the events of July 1909. Ferrer's educational methods were unquestionably showing up the bourgeois system and the Catholic and regimented education on offer in  'darkest Spain' , the Spain still mourning the loss of her colonies.

In spite of everything, Ferrer i Guardia was able to show that at no time during July 1909 had he been present in Barcelona, but it was inevitable that the state would once again vent its spleen on the founder of the Modern School.

Ultimately, the motive was the fear inspired by the methods in use in secular schools and by Ferrer as their figure-head. The Modern School, with its questioning approach to (among other things) religion and such basic notions so vital to capitalism as selfishness, property, etc., plus its ongoing contact with nature and co-education of the sexes, was an irritant to a society anchored in the past and where the clergy exercised great sway.

And so it was that, after 2 August 1909, when the beaten workers returned to work, the repression continued in the shape of courts martial. The very first accused was to be the anarchist Ramón Baldera Aznar who would receive a life sentence.

On 6 August Evaristo Crespo Azorín was appointed civil governor of Barcelona, taking over from Ossorio y Gallardo.

Throughout August and September, drumhead court martials followed one upon another.

On 31 August Francisco Ferrer was arrested on his return from France. A drumhead court martial of Ferrer opened on 9 October in Barcelona's Modelo Prison.

Within 4 days, by 13 October Ferrer had by been sentenced despite huge demonstrations in Europe and the Americas urging that he be freed. These were ignored and Francisco Ferrer i Guardia was executed  in a ditch in the Montjuich fortress by the forces of the state.

A further four people - Ramón Clemente, Antonio Malet, Josep Miquel Baró and Eugenio del Hoyo - would suffer the same fate. Many others were banished or imprisoned.

On 18 October 1909, by which point Ferrer and the others who had been executed were beyond help, the Spanish Cortes held a political debate on the Ferrer case. Two days later, on 21 October 1909 this would prompt Alfonso XIII to accept the resignation of the Maura cabinet; Segismundo Moret was asked to form a new, liberal government.

In the meantime, many Modern School associates were banished to Aragon (to Huesca) where the female libertarians Teresa Claramunt, Antonia Trigo and Teresa Nogués pressed on with their struggle, denouncing the war and organising rallies and demonstrations against the Spanish army's Moroccan campaign, for which reason they were to be arrested and put on trial in Zaragoza before being sentenced to four years' imprisonment. [2]

Constitutional guarantees were not restored in Barcelona and Gerona until 7 November 1909: they had been suspended since day one of the revolt back in July 1909.

On 3 February 1910 the secular schools in Barcelona resumed normal operations, except for Ferrer's Modern School which had been closed since 1906 and Mateo Morral's attempt to assassinate Alfonso XIII on the king's wedding day.

Six days later, on 9 February 1910, Segismundo Moret's government fell and José Canalejas was called upon to form a new national government in Madrid.

At the opening of congress on 15 June 1910, Canalejas announced the introduction of the draft Ley de Candado (Padlock Law) which was not debated in the Cortes until some months later. This particular bill was an attempt to set down a fresh regulation governing clerical associations, the object being to take the ground out from under the radical parties, although the Church and the oligarchy who saw the bill as government intrusion into church affairs were not of the same mind.

On 22 June 1910, in  retaliation, the 18 year old Manuel Possa attempted the life of Antonio Maura as the latter arrived in Barcelona en route to a holiday in Majorca. The assassination bid came at the Gracia railway halt, leaving Antonio Maura slightly injured in one leg and Manuel Possa was arrested.

Harking back to Tragic Week and following the misrepresentation to which Catalan labour had been subject in July 1909, the Solidaridad Obrera (Workers' Solidarity) association, a provincial body set up in 1904, with a membership drawn from among republicans, socialists and anarchists, summoned a congress for 30 and 31 October and 1 November 1910, inviting a range of delegations and organisations from around Catalonia and Spain, the purpose being to launch a nationwide trade union organisation capable of close liaison for the plain purpose of grappling with established society in every corner of Spain. And so the CNT came into existence in November 1910, with Josep Negre (proposed by the republican Lostau)as its first ever general secretary. It would take the form of a Con-federation of trade unions.

Nearly a year later, on 8-10 September 1911, the CNT held its first congress in Barcelona. But the CNT was promptly driven underground for the first time on 16 September 1911. It was scheduled to hold a rally in the La Marina theatre - where, it was anticipated, it would throw its weight behind the general strike then under way in Bilbao - but the rally was banned, as was the organising agency, the CNT, by order of governor Portela Valladares. Leading militants of the CNT were rounded up and others were forced into exile in France. [3]

It was agreed at the first CNT congress that the national committee should relocate to Zaragoza but the new circumstances of clandestinity made implementation of that resolution unfeasible, so, once again it was the Barcelona anarchists who took charge of the overhaul of the Confederation. Francisco Jordán and Francisco Miranda took it upon themselves to reassume the responsibilities of secretaries to the underground CNT national committee.

29 December 1911 saw the return of assets impounded from the Modern School; Lorenzo Portet took charge of these and others were able to return from exile. One such was Anselmo Lorenzo who was to launch phase two  of Modern School Publishing.  [4]

By 1912 the subject of "free love" had been dealt with at some length in a number of libertarian reviews. Civil society, however, had been unable to take such an advance in free, mutual relationships on board and it was against this backdrop that the anarchist Rosario Dulcet caused widespread scandal by entering into a free union with her sweetheart.

On 12 November 1912, José Canalejas was assassinated by the libertarian Manuel Pardiñas. Two days later the Conde de Romanones formed a new government.

In early 1913 (23 January to be exact) legislation drafted by the Conde de Romanones allowed a small trickle of CNT prisoners to walk free from the prisons and to return to some measure of normal trade union activity. The new legislation triggered debate within the CNT as to whether the organisation should stay underground or embrace legality, which is why Catalonia  was to hold a regional plenum on 23-25 January at the Centro Obrero in Barcelona, at which discussions were to result in the decision to resume operations within the law.[5]

April 1913 saw an attempt on the life of Alfonso XIII in Madrid; the anarchist Sancho Alegre was arrested on the spot, and condemned to death by a court martial, although sentence was commuted a short time later.

The First World War which erupted in August 1914 sparked debate in Spain between supporters of the Allies and supporters of the Germans, whilst within the libertarian movement across Europe as well as in Spain, the argument was chiefly between supporters of the Allies and (anti-war) peace-lovers of unmistakable pacifist and anti-violence leanings, the latter being a revulsion against the irrationality of all warfare. In neighbouring France the driving force behind the pacifists was the anarchist Louis Lecoin.

At the time, the anarchist Rosario Dolcet, living in exile in Paris as a result of a textile strike in Sabadell in 1913 mounted an anti-militarist campaign, as a result of which she was forced into hiding and then fled the capital with the gendarmerie hot on her heels.

The new circumstances within Spain, however, favoured the Spanish oligarchy and, largely, the Catalan bourgeoisie. Easy profits peaked thanks to Europe's misfortunes as industries such as textiles and metalworking secured huge order-books and resultant profits, but at no point did this surge in work and capital bring benefit to the workers who were still earning wages that barely covered their most basic needs. And so the numbers of the 'breadless' swelled with every passing day.

In short, in a supposedly wealthier Spain the average or lower class Spaniard was growing more impoverished by the day.

As the war progressed, the Catalan workers were still seeing little economic benefit, although they were brazenly exploited and humiliated. Meanwhile they looked on as the Catalan bourgeoisie paraded its pomposity, conspicuous consumption and startling luxury, carousing and partying the night away in venues such as La Rabassada, American Lake in Gavà, the Lyon D'Or, the Edén, the Maison Dorée, etc.

Ángel Pestaña has left us a very fine description of the position during those years when he tells us: "Money flowed like water and alongside that inexhaustible flood, the insatiable craving to have some grew too. The indulgence of vanities and cravings was gradually pushing things in that direction and since there was no great effort required to make the few pesetas needed to indulge such vices and cravings, many people enlisted in the service of one or other of the warring camps."[6]

Added to all this, for the duration of the world war, Barcelona became a haven for broad swathes of European society, folk ranging from labour activists and pacifists and deserters to men and women from Europe's cultural and artistic movements, people such as Francis Picabia. But above all, complementing this motley crew there was the underworld of industrial and political espionnage, the ultimate exponent of which was the Baron de Koenning. Hardly surprising that Barcelona turned into the world capital of spying. Indeed the Catalan bourgeoisie accused the CNT of being in the hire of the German government which was trying at all costs to stir up trouble in the Catalan factories, the vast bulk of which were working for the Allies.

Meanwhile the 'grand old man' of Spanish anarchism, Anselmo Lorenzo, passed away (at No 32, 2° 2° of Barcelona's Calle Casanovas) on 30 October 1914. This was a heart-rending event of some significance for the Catalan labour movement, since the disappearance of its 'grand old man'  also robbed it of an apostle of tolerance, the noble figure who might have held all the strands of worker opinion together.

During 1914-1915, libertarian publications like Solidaridad Obrera, Tierra y Libertad, Bandera Roja, etc. began to resurface.

In 1915 Manuel Andreu was appointed secretary of the CNT national committee; he also produced the newspaper Solidaridad Obrera, virtually unaided.

In May 1916, José Borobio was to be appointed director of Solidaridad Obrera, a post he would fill for some time and resume again in 1917.

On 9 December 1916, the UGT and CNT signed a revolutionary compact in Zaragoza. Men like Salvador Seguí, supporters of trade union unity, tried to bring about an amalgamation of the two associations but to no avail.

18 December 1916 would signal the beginning of the "General subsistence strike" throughout Spain and in Barcelona most of the workers followed suit except for the tram-workers who were closely monitored by the Civil Guard. The strike committee had set up shop at No 25 in the Calle Mercaders, in the Centro Obrero. The strike lasted a day after an agreement was thrashed out between the governor and the CNT membership, entailing the release of all prisoners, including the director and editorial staff of Solidaridad Obrera who had been arrested a few days earlier for alleged incitement to strike. [7]

In 1917 Felipe Cortiella's name was put forward for director of Solidaridad Obrera but he declined the position when the CNT refused to issue Solidaridad Obrera as a Spanish-Catalan bilingual newspaper, implicitly opening within the libertarian movement's ranks a phony debate about linguistic "internationalism", a debate that we would argue has yet to be resolved.

On 5 March 1917, in a piece carried by Solidaridad Obrera, the CNT's regional committee, with Salvador Seguí at its head, tendered its resignation.On 27 March 1917, as they left a rally held in the Casa del Pueblo in Barcelona, the speakers at the rally - Salvador Seguí, Ángel Pestaña and Ángel Lacort - would be detained for a number of days.

On 30 March 1917 Ángel Samblancat was put on trial for insulting the Catholic religion and holding it up to ridicule.

1917 was also to prove a turbulent one for the country. Around mid-March, the king's government was headed by García Prieto, with General Aguilar holding the Defence portfolio. Meanwhile, within the ranks of the army there was a faction that included the bulk of the officers and whiçh clashed directly with the Defence ministry. The leading light of that faction was Colonel Benito Márquez, attached to the Barcelona garrison; on 25 May 1917 he was arrested along with some of his men and they were jailed in the Montjuich fortress. Five days later, on 1 June, a declaration from the "Defence Juntas" burst like a bombshell upon political circles, pressing as it did for the release of Márquez and his comrades and affirming the highest moral and patriotic standards vis à vis the country and declaring respect for the incumbent monarchy, but querying the waywardness of the government then headed by García Prieto.

The government had no option but to cave in to the pressure and free the detainees and it resigned en masse, its place being taken by a new cabinet headed by Eduardo Dato.

From Catalonia, Francesc Cambó's Lliga party was to greet the "Defence Juntas" sympathetically even though, just a few years earlier, those very same officers had raided the editorial offices of the newspaper Cu-Cut and La Veu de Catalunya. However, as might have been expected, the republicans, socialists and anarchists of Barcelona were to prove a lot more wary in their response to anything emanating from the army.

On 9 July the president of the CNT's chimneysweeps {fumistas?} and allied trades union, Josep Climent, died of a bullet wound to the abdomen, having been shot in the Calle La Luna very near to the union hall.

In a tense Spain, the Conde de Romanones asked the king to dissolve Congress and this made deputies (especially those from the left or nationalist factions) uneasy, so a meeting was convened in Barcelona that came to be known as the Assembly of Parliamentarians. After several attempts it managed to go ahead on 19 July at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Barcelona. The Assembly was dealt with by Eduardo Dato's government as if it were lawful but it was to be banned by Barcelona's civil governor, Matos, in the course of an audience that he had with the speaker of the assembly, Raimundo de Abadal.

A general strike erupted throughout Spain on 13 August 1917. In Madrid the strike committee was made up of Francisco Largo Caballero, Daniel Anguiano, Julián Besteiros and Ángel Saborit. In next to no time they had been rounded up. They were all members of the Socialist Party and of the UGT. [8]

In Barcelona CNT barricades were thrown up, especially throughout the Raval quarter, or  so we are told by Adolfo Bueso. For instance there were barricades to be found at the intersections of the Calles Cadena and Hospital, Cadena and San Pablo, the Calle Hospital and the Pasaje San Bernardino, etc. The toll of those five days of strike in Barcelona would come to 17 lives lost, plus countless arrests.

That strike triggered a lot of sackings, especially of trade unionists who had been prominent in it. Thus we have the strange case of the CNT's Elías García who had been dismissed by the MZA railways for which he was working, but still showed up on pay-day every month at the company works to claim - successfully! -  his wages at gunpoint. As a result, come the third or fourth month, the company watchman and two police officers went for Elías and in the scuffle both officers died as did the watchman, whereupon Elías García had to flee to France.

Towards the end of 1917, the rationalist schools received an initial boost when Juan Roig Rodó took over the "La Luz" rationalist school in the Calle Alcolea in the Sans district. A year later, thanks to the efforts of the CNT's textile union, Puig Elías would follow suit by opening the "Natura" rationalist school in the El Clot quarter.

As 1918 opened, at 7.30 p.m. on 8 January, the Catalan businessman Josep Albert Barret was murdered. A number of CNT personnel were arrested as a result, whereas in fact the murder had been cooked up in the lairs of German spies, with the connivance of Bravo Portillo, for it seems that Señor Barret' s factory was churning out artillery shells for the French army. For the purposes of the murder, Bravo Portillo resorted to blackmail against Eduard Ferrer, the then president of the CNT's metalworkers' union. Ferrer was pressured into recruiting the actual gunman. And from that point on became a regular collaborator of Portillo's. [9]

There followed an immediate crackdown on CNT circles, from which point on anarchists banded together into affinity groups, with no more than 5 or 6 people per group; these operated completely outside of the trade union and with great discretion, but looking to the union from time to time for its support.

Thus ex-comisario Manuel Bravo Portillo became the number one enemy of the affinity groups and of the CNT. A document soon came into Ángel Pestaña's hands: written in Bravo Portillo's own handwriting, it was addressed to Baron Von Rolland, briefing him on Spanish ships laden with cargo bound for the Allies, the obvious objective intention being for the German fleet to be able to intercept and torpedo them.

Later in 1918 Madrid was the scene for the National Anarchist Conference that was to plants the seeds for what would become the FAI. And in Barcelona, the Sans regional congress met on 28, 29 and 30 June and 1 July at the Ateneo Racionalista at No 12, Calle Vallespir in Sans. Out of the latter came the proposal for a One Big Industrial Union that would embrace all the trades in a given sector. [Hence the reference to the CNT's sindicatos únicos.}

The concluding rally of this congress of the Catalan regional confederation of the CNT was addressed from the balcony of the CADCI building in the heart of Barcelona's Ramblas and the speakers included Salvador Seguí,  J. Mestre, Ángel Pestaña, Joan Peiró, Domingo Rueda, Enric Rueda López and Pablo Ullod.

A few days later, on 5 July to be precise, after the CNT's Barcelona local federation gathered once more, Salvador Seguí was to be elected as the new secretary of the regional committee of the CNT in Catalonia.

One of the first rallies held to explain the resolutions passed at the Sans congress was organised by the Printing Trades Union in the Asiatic at No 33 Calle Rosal in the Pueblo Seco district.

To publicise the resolutions passed by the regional congress, a number of propaganda tours were mounted right across Spain towards the end of that year. [10]

In August 1918 there was a strike at the CROS factory based in Badalona. On 26 August, when the workers demonstrated to press for the release of three jailed trade unionists, the response was a police charge that cost the lives of CNT members Pius Bel, Josep Gatell aka 'Jodepet', Emilio Segarra and Francesc Terrades. Emilio Belmonte, Josep Poblet and Salvador Ruiz Pérez were arrested and charged with inciting violence against strike-breakers. .

By early 1919 Barcelona was awash with ongoing strikes, affecting either entire industries or confined to small workshops. Thus industries such as metalworking, printing trades and the carpentry were restless. In January, the carpenters signed an agreement with the bosses who agreed to raise their ages by a peseta. They also - finally - secured the 8 hour day for workers and an eight and a half hour working day for apprentices. Another of the gains was guaranteed pay in the event of sickness. However the companies placed difficulties in the way of implementation of these agreements .

On 2 January, with the printworkers' strike at its height, Julián Sailan Zuzaya was murdered outside the Heinrich & Co. works. His CNT colleague were to open a fund for his widow  and children.

On 4 January the CNT opened up a new premises at No 10, principal in the Calle del Olmo [11] where the Construction workers' union set up shop.

On 13 January, the CNT held a show of strength at the Teatro del Bosque, at which Paulino Díez (secretary of the local CNT federation), Fernando Castany (metalworkers' union), Calixto Garcia (manufacturing union), Ángel Pestaña (director of Solidaridad Obrera) and Salvador Seguí spoke. Both Pestaña and Seguí made a point in their speeches of rebutting Francesc Cambó's remarks in Madrid concerning the situation in Barcelona. Seguí wound up the rally with a cry of Death to Cambó! Long live the [Paris] Commune!

Also early in January 1919, at the height of he Mancomunitat's campaign for home rule for Catalonia, there were a number of incidents on the Ramblas and in the city centre between Catalanists and españolista gangs, prompting both the governor and the Captain-General Joaquín Milans del Bosch to lobby the premier, the Conde de Romanones, to suspend constitutional guarantees in Barcelona. Which he did, on 16 January 1919.

However,  the crackdown was targeting mainly CNT workers rather than the Catalanist of españolista bourgeoisie and middle class who, in the end, had triggered the brawls.

And so 16 January saw all CNT premises shut down, with every trade unionist found on the premises arrested and with raids being mounted on the homes of the leading lights who were taken to the Plaza Antonio López where police headquarters was located at the time; they were then taken to the Modelo prison or to the ships 'Pelayo' or 'Giralda' which seved as floating prisons in Barcelona port. And the civil governor imposed censorship of all newspapers so that no one could speak out on behalf of the arrested men.

The CNT went undeground again albeit that this time its structures were practically intact, with Solidaridad Obrera resurfacing after a few days thanks to the efforts made by Daniel Rebull (aka David Rey) in Vilafranca del Penedés, with a print-run of 100,000 copies and distribution guaranteed.

16 January also witnessed the start of what would later come to be called the "La Canadiense strike", so-called because the majority share-holder was the Canadian Bank of Commerce of Toronto. The strike more or less came about when the board of directors in Canada demanded increased profits and  cost-cutting, but wages were already very low. The dispute erupted when the plant' staff started to organise an Independent Union that the La Canadiense's managing director, Fraser Lawton never agreed to, so he adopted the ploy of taking eight casual  employees on to the permanent pay-roll, thereby cutting the wages bill.  The workers objected, arguing for equal pay for equal work. As it happened, those eight casuals had set up the Independent Union inside the company. They were promptly sacked by Lawton; five of those victimised worked in the billing section and on 5 February, in an act of solidarity, their workmates went on strike. Kicking over the traces, they refused to do any more work until such time as their sacked colleagues were rehired and did so at a rally in the Plaza Catalunya. The 117 employees from the billing section made for the Interior Ministry to speak with governor González Rothwas who undertook to put their case to the company, if they would go back to work. But once they got back to the Plaza Catalunya they found their way blocked by the police who denied them entry to the building. A number of incidents ensued and every last one of them was dismissed. The following day, the press barely reported the matter other than in a small item in the Diario de Barcelona. But the news spread through Barcelona like wildfire.

After 4 or 5 days the La Canadiense strikers turned to the CNT and it agreed to take charge of the handling of the dispute. A Strike Committee was set up, made up of a number of those dismissed and some CNT members, of whom the main one was the young Simó Piera.

The strike quickly spread to the white collar staff who  read the power-meters. The refused to set foot on the premises or in offices or homes to read the meters. All except one employee by the name of Joaquín Baró.

The company resorted to hiring strike-breakers, but the latter were often intimidated and failed to show up for work again, so the company was forced to switch tactics and started bribing a number of staff into caving in and returning to work.

Meanwhile the affinity groups were convinced that this strike might well prove the trigger to revolution, so one affinity group made up its mind to settle the hash of Joaquín Baró. Meanwhile, quite coincidentally, another group was planning an attack on Lluis Más, a textile overseer who had years earlier been a member of a gang off provocateurs. Naturally, the CNT personnel had not forgotten.

On 24 January, as part of the Mancomunidad's campaign - and with prior permission from the government - the latter held its Assembly for Catalan Home Rule; on that date, young nationalists demonstrated on the Ramblas, displaying Catalanist emblems and insignia. The Civil Guard to to come down heavily on the demonstrators. And gangs from the Liga Patriótica [Patriotic League] brawled with them in the vicinity of the Rambla, the Calle Pelayo, the Calle Tallers, the Calle Canuda, etc.

The next day, 25 January, there was a meeting in the Captaincy-General building between Captain-General Milans del Bosch, military governor Antonio de la Fuente and General Staff member General Manuel Toriné; they decide to put troops on the streets again. 

28 January saw the issuing of a proclamation on the authority of governor González Rothwas and banning flags and emblems other than the official insignia of the Spanish state.

That very day Juan Canals Galle and Daniel Torrens Solà were arrested in the backroom of a dye-works in the Calle Conde del Asalto, accused of making Catalanist emblems.

Meanwhile, the La Canadiense dispute festered on, so the power company's treasurer, a Señor Coulson, reported the strikers to the courts, arguing that the strikers had kept money to which they had no entitlement by refusing to hand in customer payments. This when the workers had already informed the company that the receipts would be handed in just as soon as normal work resumed.  On 13 February attacks were mounted on textile overseer Lluis Más, felled in the Calle Juan de Malta in the El Clot quarter, and, as night fell, on the La Canadiense collector in the Calle Calabria.

The directors of La Canadiense exploited their chance to tighten the screw on the workers and they posted a 10,000 peseta reward for the capture of the killers and 5,000 pesetas for information leading to their capture.

In spite of everything, the La Canadiense strike had turned into a people's strike with the entire populace of Barcelona involved. In a single week, the strike fund raised some 50,000 pesetas, an astronomical sum at that time.

In view of the strike's popularity, the managing director of La Canadiense, Lawton, agreed to sit down and negotiate and this was arranged for 17 February 1919 on the La Canadiense premises. The meeting was attended by five delegates and Lawton, on discovering that one of them was from the CNT, refused to talk and walked out of the room before substantive discussions could start. The situation was the same with other disputes triggered by the La Canadiense dispute, for the employers exploited the situation to persist with their plans to strangle the CNT.

From that point on, the La Canadiense strikers began to turn off the power supply, which hitherto they had not done.

On 18 February, the civil governor and police inspector José Martorell were to give a press conference to announce that upwards of 70 trade unionists had been arrested since the suspension of constitutional guarantees.

At 4.00 p.m. on 21 February, the city was at a virtual stand-still, when the La Canadiense workers cut off the electricity, although another German-owned company, Energía Eléctrica de Cataluña managed to carry on supplying power to its customers. The walk-out by workers from La Canadiense's sub-stations on the Paralelo and the ensuing black-out caused panic in society, especially among the Catalan bourgeoisie which curried home to hide, barricading themselves inside. That night the forces of public order patrolled by torchlight but for all that nothing of any significance happened during the hours of the black-out, except that building contractor Joan Vila was attacked in front of his home, emerging unscathed.

By the following morning, the strike was all but general. Lawton, the managing director of La Canadiense, had a letter published in the city's newspapers in which he dared to claim that he had had any explicit demands from the workers.

Barcelona mayor Manuel Morales Pareja set up a small team in his office in an attempt to get the power back on in the Paralelo, whilst the commander of the Guardia Urbana and several of his men toured the main streets of the city trying to persuade businessmen not to shut up shop and promising them lighting for their establishments. The mayor also approached Madrid to get the nation's government to take a hand in the dispute and at the eleventh hour he made for the Captaincy-General building where he met with Milans del Bosch.

From mid-afternoon on the meeting in the Captaincy building included not just Milans del Bosch but also representatives from the Lliga Regionalista (Cambó, Puig i Cadafalch), business figures from the Fomento and military advisors. Out of it came the suggestion that La Canadiense be taken over, but that required the Conde de Romanones to apply to the British Embassy or leave to do just that, which he did, from Madrid.

The next day Colonel Madrid took over the headquarters of the company in the Paralelo, deploying the 4th Sappers and a number of sailors from ships anchored in the port.

By 11.00 p.m., they had managed to reconnect a tiny part of the city and thanks to this a number of newspapers were able to publish editions, but not until the following morning was there anything resembling a normal power supply, although there was restricted voltage supply for a time.

Once the power was restored the trams reappeared on the streets and the the Calle Pelayo there was an altercation in which one tram was pelted with stones and sniped at, injuring the driver ho died a few days later.

The next day, Barcelona's new military governor, Severiano Martínez Anido arrived in the city.

On 23 February the workforce of the other power company, Energía Eléctrica de Cataluña joined the strike, following while both power companies shut down completely.

On 26 February the workers from the water and gas companies (one of which, the Lebon company, was French-owned) also joined the dispute. At that point the bourgeois press was attacking the strikers, so the CNT's Printing Tades Union, at the instigation of militant Salvador Caracena, at the end of a protracted rally and debate, introduced "red censorship", vetoing articles critical of the strikers. Acrata Vidal, a linotype operator on the newspaper La Publicidad was elected delegate in charge of the red censorship of that newspaper and he brought pressure to bear on the editor-in-chief, informing him that a series of articles were not to be seen in print, and they weren't.

On 28 February some 30 army electricians were drafted in from Zaragoza to back up the troops already in place in the power stations.

On 1 March, after passing the censor, a statement from the Strike Committee was published, criticising the bourgeois press for misrepresenting the facts and offering an alternative version of developments to date; the communiqué also noted that a letter had already been forwarded to the civil governor and the strikers' demands were fleshed out as follows:

Sealed union premises were to be reopened.

Those arrested since the suspension of constitutional guarantees were to be set free.

On 3 March the workers from the Sant Adrià de Besos power station joined the strike.

On 5 March Milans del Bosch issued an order drafting all men in the power industry aged between 21 and 38, but the edict, due to appear in all of the newspapers, appeared only in the Diario de Barcelona and in one or two other flyers, upon the publishers of which the CNT imposed a fine and which they paid.

After lengthy talks at the union, the CNT personnel affected by the call-up order strategically reported for induction on 7 March, only to refuse to follow orders laid down by the general, whereupon long files of prisoners were marched to the Montjuich fortress where upwards of three thousand prisoners were held.

On 13 March, troops occupied strategic positions in Barcelona whilst the Conde de Roanones's appointees arrived to mediate in the dispute; these were José Morote (under-secretary to the prime minister), police officer Gerado Doval and Carlos Montañés (engineer), the incoming civil governor of the city who was well acquainted with La Canadiense, having had a hand in its launch.

On 14 March, Lawton and Montañés met and Montañés finally managed to talk the Briton into agreeing to negotiations with the Strike Committee which was underground at the time. Then, through the good offices of deputy and lawyer José Guerra del Río, the committee was run to ground and he finalised the details leading to a meeting. The chosen meeting place was the Social Reform Institute's premises beside the Borne, at 3.00 p.m. on 15 March. But the Strike Committee arrived two hours late, which annoyed the employer side, although they eventually sat down to talks and the meeting dragged on for three long days.

From Madrid, Romanones urged Barcelona's civil governor to clear up the dispute within 24 hours; Largo Caballero had threatened that, otherwise, a nationwide general strike would be called, unless the Barcelona dispute was resolved.

Within an hour, managing director Lawton (under some pressure himself) acceded to all of the La Canadiense strikers' conditions, with no reprisals. An agreement was signed that very night. The dispute had lasted for 45 days.

Shortly after that, on 18 March, the committee met with the workers in the Teatro del Bosque where Simó Piera read out the agreement reached with the bosses; it was endorsed by acclamation. The following day there was a repeat of the meeting, this time in Las Arenas bullring, at which Simó Piera, Francisco Miranda and Salvador Seguí (freed from prison for the specific purpose of attending) spoke.

The CNT's success in the La Canadiense strike meant that both sides were now girding their loins for further clashes.

But on 22 March there were five people still behind bars because of the La Canadiense strike, so militants from the anarchist affinity groups began to lobby the unions for their release, reminding Seguí of what he had said at the Las Arenas rally, urging him to honour his promise and call a further general strike, something Salvador Seguí was not keen to do; his view was that calling a fresh general strike would mean further sacrifices for the workers who, being weaker this time, might lose the cachet of success.

However the most radical groups managed to form a new Strike Committee and on the night of 23 March it decided to mount a strike.

Barcelona awake at dawn on 24 March to find itself under occupation by the army and by the recently formed Barcelona Somatén which citizens of Barcelona would refer to as the "White Guard". They set about frisking passers-by and a CNT membership card if found, was promptly torn to shreds.

These White Guards wore a red armband but within days this had turned to yellow and later to blue as they viciously harassed those riding bicycles, the belief being that CNT trade unionists favoured that form of transport in moving from barrio to barrio.

Meanwhile, Seguí and governor Montañés were trying to talk the military, led by Milans del Bosch, into freeing Manuel Buenacasa (the CNT's general secretary)and another four comrades still being held in the Montjuich fortress.

On 27 March, the workers tried to return to work, that is, call off the failed strike, but at that point the civil governor Montañés, in cahoots with the employers, refused to mediate in the dispute, expecting the CNT workers to be defeated. At that point the army disappeared from the streets, leaving the Somatén in unchallenged control. Constitutional rights were suspended and again CNT personnel found themselves harassed and jailed in the Modelo prison.

By 28 March some food traders were reaping big profits from the strike in that the cost of basic items such as potatoes, sugar, etc., had soared by up to 200% in some parts of Barcelona.

Meanwhile, in Barcelona city centre, the banks, cafes and some businesses were reopening.

Moreover, the Somatén capitalised upon its impunity in order to hold a field Mass smack dab in the Plaza de Cataluña, wit rifles and revolvers at the ready throughout.

On 31 March 1919 the ley de fugas was employed for the very first time against the CNT's Miguel Burgos, secretary of the CNT Tanners' Union.

The last week of March 1919 saw the establishment of the Spanish Employers' Federation (FPE) by a number of builders like Francesc Junoy, Feliu Graupera, Joan Miró i Trepat, Jaume Agustí, Tomàs Benet, etc., the plain intention being, yet again, to form a united front against the CNT.

Their first repressive step  was that any worker seeking re-employment had to hand in his CNt membership card and then agree to a new pay-rate negotiated with the employer on a case-by-case basis. This measure, intended by the employers to turn up the pressure, was deeplyn offensive to the workers' sense of dignity. They were disinclined to put up with it so the strike dragged on, even though the Strike Committee had given each sector carte blance to negotiate a return to work. However, there was a significant faction among the employers which did not agree with the had-ball measures adopted by the FPE and so they were willing to negotiate with the workers and again they reckoned that the governor, Montañés, might act as mediator. He put them on to the Roca brothers who, whilst not CNT members, enjoyed a certain standing among the workers. But even then that segment of the employers insisted that they had no wish to enter into negotiations with the CNT. So they sent for Ángel Pestaña who, the indication were, was in Tarragona at that point.

On 2 April, however, Inspector Roldán heard a whisper that Ángel Pestaña was hiding out at 162, Calle Conde del Asalto, with his family and so, at dawn on 3 April, inspectors Grimau and Más arrested him and took him to police headquarters where he would be interrogated by Inspector Doval.

On 6 April the Roca brothers were arrested by General Perales and taken to the Military Government building. On the advice of the civil governor, Inspector Dovalnegotiated with the army to get them to let him interrogate them and so they were moved to police HQ. On their arrival, Doval let them escape so that they could carry on negotiating a return to work with the employers.

By 7 April the strike was on its last legs, with the trams, cars and carts resuming normal services.10 April saw military commanders meeting under the chairmanship Milans del Bosch in the officers' mess; they resolved to expel the civilian authorities from Barcelona. When Romanones got wind of the army's position, he asked the Conde de Figols and deputy Antonio Sala to mediate, act as intermediaries and smooth out anty differences between Milans del Bosch and the civil governor who was at that point very much under the sway of one faction of the Catalan employers.

On 12 April the strike was all but finished, most of the workers having returned to work, althouh many CNT personnel had now been blacklisted and could no longer find work easily.

Although the strike had ended and Romanones's envoys seemed to have ironed out differences of opinion between the civilian and the miitary authorities, they decided to put paid to Montañés and Doval, and so, on 14 April, Montañés had a visit from Martinez Anido and, later, from Civil Guard Colonel Aldir who suggested that he should step down and leave for Madrid. Since he ignored them, it was time for the evening train to leave when the Civilo Guard arrived in his office and escorted him to the railway station, bundling Montañés on board the express bound for Madrid. The same procedure was used to get rid of police inspectors Francisco Martorell and Ramón Carbonell. These incidents triggered a resignation by the Conde de Romanones and Antonio Maura was invited to form a new cabinet that very same day.

In spite of all the obstruction put in its way .. the Lasarte file, betrayals, harassment, arrests, tortures, etc., - remained underground, switching tactics and sparking off smaller scale disputes, but looking art all times to the strike weapon to sort out the problem of poverty wages.

Meanwhile, Bravo Portillo was raising a sort of shadow police force and thus set up an office at No 17, Calle Septembrina, run by a former Security Guard officer by the name of Fernández Terán and relying upon numerous informers, among them Luis Fernández, Jerónimo Botanero, Juan Rodríguez, Ángel Fernández, Antonio Soler, Paco El Rubio', 'Espejito', Epifanio Casas and (one-time CNT members-turned-informers) Bernat Armengol and Eduard Ferrer organised into 10-man teams. Members of the gang earned 15 pesetas a day plus bonuses for their handiwork.

One of their first missions was the murder of Pedro Massoni, the secretary of the CNT Construction Union at the time, for which a bourgeois pay-master was asked for 3,000 pesetas; 23 April 1919 was the day chosen. On that day Antonio Soler aka El Mallorquín, along with Luis Fernández and Octavio Muñoz aka 'El argentino' turned up at Massoni's home posing as police. He was supposed to follow them to the station whilst Epifanio Casas lay in wait en route to carry out the execution. The latter, his nerves on edge, did the job and on seeing Massoni felled did not go over to finish him off. As a result Massoni was very seriously wounded but they were able to save his life at the hospital, albeit that he was in a very bad way. Thereafter, Massoni eked out a living by acting as concierge at the CNT premises in the Calle del Olmo.

On 8 May came the response from the affinity groups when they fired shots at a foreman from the Can Girona firm; it seems, however, that the object was merely to scare him.

On 7 June the CNT's Miguel Villalonga attacked and killed the carpentry employer Felipe Serrano in the calle Valencia where it meets the Calle Calabria. Years later it emerged that Serrano had fallen out with his partner and that the latter had encouraged Villalonga to mount the attack. However, at the time, it seemed plain that trade unionists had been behind Serrano's death.

Bravo Portillo was still taking commissions and his next victim was to be 'El Tero', Pau Sabater, secretyary of the CNT Dyers' Union. He was at home at No 274 bajos in the Calle Dos de Mayo in the early morning of 17 July when Portillo's goons arrived, posing as police. 'El Tero'was taken away in cars that made for the Camp de l'Arpa quarter which in those days was sparsely occupied. There, near a riera (?) they put six bullets into him. The names of two of Portillo's gunmen, Luis Fernández and Joan Serra (a businessman's son) are linked with this murder.

That very day Portillo's goons were in action again in a barber shop in Sans, killing the CNT's José Castillo; this was the work of Epifanio Casas who had two colleagues in tow.

In view of these attacks, the CNT and the affinity groups were outraged and of course they stepped up their security, but even then, coordination between them left a lot to be desired.

Then again, Seguí, fearing the worst, had fled top an apartment in the Calle Perot lo LLadre from where a number of get-togethers were organised at which Seguí strove to calm his comrades, lest they walk straight into the bosses' trap.

A new cabinet was formed in Madrid at around this point; it was led by Joaquín Sánchez Toca and the Christian Democrat Manuel de Burgos y Mazo was minister of home affairs. Seguí thought of making contact with them and so turned to Francesc Layret to get him to act as go-between. Seguí's intentions were to head off the obvious provocation from the employers and their hired guns.

Meanwhile, the CNT sent out delegates to a number of countries, seeking trade union alliances with other workers around Europe. Evelio Boal paid a visit to Portuugal, and Pere Foix to Russia, after first attending the International Trade Union Congress in Amsterdam.

On 20 August a new governor, Julio Amado, arrived in Barcelona.

Portillo's hired gun, luis Fernández was to be arrested on 24 August by the Mozos de Escuadra along with judge Alberto Parera and lawyers Jesús Ulled and Guerra del Río. After a number of sessions of questioning, Fernándezacknowledged that he was a confidante of Bravo Poortillo and he also implicated police colonel Alvarez Caparrós in the murder of 'El Tero', his car having been used to mount that operation.

Due to the many strikes and lock-outs in Barcelona, the incoming civil governor Julio Amado tried to get negotiations going betweenworkers and employers so as to end the difficult situation in Barcelona, but at that point the CNT had 15,000 personnel on the run, in jail and its union premises had been shit down, so negotiations were problematical. So, on 21 September the 'state of war' conditions under which Barcelona had been living were lifted, although a request had gone out to Madrid from the (Interior ministry that same day for Civil Guard and under-cover police operatives reinforcements.

However, Luis Fernández was the only member of the Bravo Poortillo gang behind bars and Portillo carried on blithely orchestrating his henchmen, which irked the CNT and its anarchist affinity groups. For instance, the known gunman, 'el argentino, Octavio Muñoz, was bodyguard to the Spanish Employers' Federation chairman, Feliu Graupera.

So the Ródenas brothers' group decided that Portillo had to be targeted. They sought out two comrades and throughout 5 September these waited for the erstwhile comisario, seeking an opportune moment to tackle him. It came in the Avenida de la Diagonal at the junction with the Calle Santa Tecla when Portillo was on his way to the home of one of his paramours. Even though rushed by taxi to the Clinical Hospital, he was to die a short time later.

That night Portillo's goons decided to kill Ángel Pestaña, regarding him as having been the instigator of the killing. They also had had word from a plant within the CNT called Manuel, naming the actual killers. The informant laid an ambush for the CNT members in a bar in the Ronda de San Pablo at the junction with the Calle Aldana; they arrived as agreed whilst the bosses' hired guns kept watch from cover, but the CNT personnel managed to escape from the trap and vanish into the night. The informer had doubtless blown his cover for he turned up dead a few days later.

With the death of Bravo Portillo, the gang now passed under the control of the Baron de Koening, real name Rudolf Stallmann, a sinister individual who had been a German spy during the First World War.

One of the tasks of the now former prime minister the Conde de Romanones was to encourage Mixed Commissions as bargaining tools. However, neither side would agree to them and it was only after a lot of pressure from both sides that they were accepted as a resource in labour disputes.

This was seen first on 8 September when the Mixed Commission met in the Civil Government building; it was chaired by the entrepreneur Pere Roselló and by the employers' lawyer Tomás Benet.

On 16 September it looked as if the two sides had reached agreement and the actual drafting and signing of that agreement was postponed until the following day. However, the more radical factions on both sides, for one reason or another, were determined that the agreement would not be signed. That night a former CNT leader, Eduard Ferrer, who had been blackmailed by Bravo Portillo into turning informer, was killed in the Calle Montalegre while on his way home. And the son of businesman Agustí Sabater was also murdered in Pueblo Nuevo.

Next day, 17 September, te document was drawn up and waiting to be signed by both sides. Governor Julio Amado launched into a brief preamble. Then he was interrupted by employers' counsel Tomás Benet who informed him that the employers were pulling out of the negotiations and could not negotiate with those behind the murder of Agustí Sabater. Salvador Seguí promptly retorted that they were in agreement with the arrangement and that the workers had had nothing to do with the events of the previous day. Governor Julio Amado, outraged, answered the employers' representatives, warning them not to mess with him and ordering them to present themselves the next day to sign up to the agreement; otherwise, they would be arrested. However, the following day the employers failed to show up and Amado backed down from his threat to have them arrested.

21 October saw the inauguration of the Spanish Employers' Federation's 2nd Congress at the Catalana Music Hall under the chairmanship of Barcelona mayor Antonio Martínez Domingo (in office since May). Feliu Grapera was elected chairman for the coming term and Francesc Junoy appointed FPE agent in Madrid. The congress closed on 26 October and among its resolutions was the decision recognising the lock-out as the employers; most powerful weapon and to start laying the groundwork immediately.

On 23 October, even as the FPE's 2nd congress was in progress, the employers imposed a complete shut-down of the cafes, bars and restaurants in Barcelona.

On 3 November the FPE imposed a lock-out that would last for 14 days and affect some 45,000 workers.

However, there was a large number of businessmen who were not interested in enforcing a lock-out and they had a special interest in the Mixed Commission which met in Barcelona city hall on 6 November under the chairmanship of the mayor and with lawyers Josep Roig i Bergada and Felp Rodés as consultants. The talks dagged on for several days and since the workers on thestreets could not be sure what was being discussed at meetings and since there were hints in the press of hitherto unprecedented friendly exchanges, they began to suspect treachery. One day, as Salvador Seguí was en route to one sitting of the Commission he had a gun drawn on him by one worker [12] who warned him of the consequences of possible treachery. Yet the Mixed Commission negotiated on and after a lot of toing and froing, it signed an accord on 11 November whereny all strikes and lock-outs were to end and a case-by-case approach adopted. Another accord was that in any negotiations where 50% of demands by workers were won, the resultant agreement should be taken as a precedent.

Yet as might have been foreseen, the employers failed to hoour all of the accords and in some plants such as the Eloy Detouche plant (even though it had been one of the signatories to the agreement) a number of leading CNT members were denied entry, whereupon they protested strenuously to the Coty Hall where Seguí, Piera, Duch and company were still working through the separate agreements. When Seguí heard what had happened he threatened to walk off the Commission, although it seems he was merely intending to travel up to Madrid.

Meanwhile, Feliu Graupera, the FPE chairman, did travel to Madrid for talks with government representatives and to lobby them to take a different tack with the workers, but what Graupera failed to realise was that the very same train was carrying a CNT commission  headed by Seguí, its plan being to see the Interior Minister in order to rebut the arguments from the FPE chairman and to attend the forthcoming CNT congress.

But the key to the murky developments in Barcelona at that point was Baron de Koenning, whose lans were along the same lines as Graupera's.

The Baron set the wheels in motion, his aim being clearly to destabilise things and to effect a change in the stance of the military governor Milans del Bosch and that of the Madrid government. To that end he instructed the gunman 'El Mallorquím' to plant a bomb at the Captaincy building, no doubt to create the impression that this was some act of provocation by  CNT affinity groups. The bob went off on 24 November, injuring two soldiers and blowing out a window. An indignant Milans del Bosch seized control of public order in the city.

Graupera, back from Madrid and seething because Burgos y Mazo had cold-shouldered him, called a meeting for 30 November on the premises of the Spanisj Employers' Federation in the Rambla Cataluña. That meeting agreed upon a lock-out (a general strike on the part of employers) as a gauntlet thrown down, not just to the Catalan workers, but also to the national government. Only small concerns would continue to operate, lest the bourgeoisie be left short or inconvenienced. The CNT promptly got wind of this and gathered its committees together in the premises in the Calle del Olmo where they were discreetly guarded by the affinity groups against potential provocation, whether from the police or  from the Somatén. At that stormy gathering the CNT personnel drafted a note asking CNT militants and anarchists to offer passive resistance lest they play into the hands of the bosses' provocation for the latter were brazenly seeking confrontation. That note would be published the following day in Solidaridad Obrera which at that tme was based in the Calle de la Tapias under director Salvador Quemades.

The lock-out in Barcelona began on 1 December 1919, affecting upwards of 150,000 workers and their families. Yet again its aim was clear, to break the labour and CNT movements in the city and to get them to obey the absolute lords and masters of the public good.

In Sant Martí de Provensals the workers holding out against the lock-out stormed the "Hijos de José Salva" plant and worked on as normal until the Civil Guard drove them off the premises. Similar developments were repeated around the Barcelona area, with the same outcomes each time.

On 7 December the CNt member José Álvarez Arnoldo was arrested in the vicinity of the Estación de Francia for distributing anti-lockout leaflets.

On 10 December the CNT's 2nd congress opened in Madrid. It was to go down in the record as the La Comedia congress, being held in a theatre of that name. [The congress had previously been planned on the q.t. on the premises of the Ateneo Sindicalista at No 13, Calle Pizarro, Madrid and its architects were Manuel Buenacasa, Ángel Pestaña, Eusebio Carbó and Hilario Arlandis.

Even as the congress was under way in Madrid, in Barcelona the workers rendered jobless by the decision of the FPE had to survive by their wits. People's canteens resurfaced and there were long queues at the alms houses in search of something to put on the plates of working class families.

Also on 10 December, Ramón Sales, a Carlist from the "Crit de Patria" political group met with other members of that group at No 32 Calle Tapineria, the premises of  the (Carlist) Ateneo Obrero Legitimista and after protracted talks they launched the Corporación General de Trabajadores - Unión de Sindicatos Libres de España, Sales being elected its very first secretary. {Hereafter this new union will be referred to simply as the Sindicato Libre or Libre].

The following day a workerist-style manifesto was issued announcing the formation of the new union grouping and lashing out at the CNT.

Not that the CNT's answer was long in coming. On 12 December a group of CNT activists burst into the Café Fornos in the Calle Tallers where a number of individuals from the Libre were gathered; these were taken at gunpoint to premises in the Calle del Olmo where they were warned off the dangerous notion of setting up a new trade union grouping.

On 14 December the 'Acción' affinity group attacked a gang of strike-breakers who were busy unloading foodstuffs in the docks. The injured included a member of the 'Acción' group itself, the young Francesc Glascar.

On 15 December the Baron's gunmen picked up the CNT's Francisco Enrich; Enrich was to be tortured by the Baron de Koenning in person.

At the time, the affinity groups could count on precious cooperation from a number of physicians with private consulting rooms: one was the physician R. Pla i Armengol, an ex-socialist, who, in March 1919, expressed sympathy with the general strike mounted by the CNT. And there was also Doctor Tussó's consulting room in the Calle Tallers.

On 19 December, an attempt was made on the life of businessman Arturo Elizalde in the Paseo de San Joan where it meets the Calle Roselló; according to the police, the assailants were Pedro Matheu and Ramón Casanellas who worked at the industrialist's factory. The supposed motive was that it was believed that Elizalde had been the financial backer behind the killing of 'El Tero'. Elizalde emerged from the attack unscathed, but his driver, Florentí Prats lost his life.

On the same day Julio Amado was dismissed as governor of Barcelona by the incoming prime minister in Madrid, Manuel Allendesalazar, who was of like mind with the Catalan employers' organisation. The replacement civil governor would be Francisco Maestre Laborde.

Meanwhile, Bertrán i Musitu, the man in charge of the Barcelona Somatén acted as go-between between the Baron de Koenning and military governor Milans del Bosch, to whom they were passing information from the Lasarte dossier.

Miguel Arlegui, the chief of police in Barcelona, who was at that point unaware of the figure of the Baron, was able to gauge from dealings with the military governor that the latter was better briefed on the situation in Barcelona than the police handling the matter.