Memorial Mass Grave Cementerio de Torrero

Here liet he remains of 2.500 people executed at the back wall of the cemetery alongside the mausoleum of Joaguín Costa during the Civil War and in the first eight years of the dictatorship under General Franco. They were brought here after they were discovered in two large graves in 1979 under the walkway of block 4 where they had remained hidden for four decades. In the Spain of that time, recently released from the dictatorship, nothing was done to identify them, find their families or give them a decent burial and the remains, with the exception of those killed by the Segunda Bandera de la Legión Sanjurjo, were moved tot his common grave, buried onze again in silence. Ramón Sainz de Varanda, the first democratically elected mayo rafter the death of Franco, wanted to rescue all these forgotten victims and ordered the erection of this monument, unveiled on 1 November 1980, in memory of "those who died for freedom and democracy, 1936-39 and in de post-war period".

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Source

• Text: TracesOfWar
• Photos: Koos Winkelman