The Spanish Civil was only a couple of months old when the Irish Times ran a report from its ‘special correspondent’ in Barcelona, L T Fleming. What made it highly unusual was that it was openly sympathetic to the republican side, and showed the popularity of anarchism.
Fleming, however, did not pay much attention to detail. He wrote about “the two Anarchist trades unions (FAI and CNT)”, seemingly unaware that the CNT or National Confederation of Labour was a union but the FAI or Anarchist Federation of Iberia was a political organisation. Any journalist in Barcelona for more than few hours in 1936 should have known the difference.
Fleming went on to say the tramway company, which had been taken over by its staff, “now belongs to the workers – but only to the tramway workers”. Wrong, they did not claim ownership, they couldn’t sell it off. It belonged to society as a whole but its management was vested in the workers. And he follows this by telling readers that “and, apparently, in flat contradiction to the anarchist theory, there goes a tendency to collectivise small industries”. Many small factories were merged into larger units, allowing economies of scale, which gave increased production and shorter working hours. Quite what anarchist theory would oppose this is unstated.
What makes this report particularly interesting is that it appeared in a country where International Brigade volunteers had to secretly make their way to Spain while O’Duffy’s Blueshirts were blessed by the bishops as they sailed beneath the Swastika on the German ship Urundi from Galway to Ferrol.
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LT Fleming reappears in the the Irish Times of December 5th 1936 with a review of Behind the Spanish Barricades, a newly published book about the war and revolution which had broken out the previous July.
In Ireland, the reports of attacks on church buildings had ignited a pro-Franco fervor among many Catholics. The review explained “There was more than one ‘real’ reason why the Church should find itself so fiercely attacked in Spain, and one of them is illustrated in the author’s quotation from the New Catechism: “Question – What sin is committed by those who vote Liberal? Answer – Usually, mortal sin.” Besides taking a close interest in politics, the Church was an enormously wealthy landlord, and, as such, was bound to be attacked in any rising of a land hungry peasantry.”
As for the story of the six anarchists carrying a coffin containing the bones of a saint, drawing their revolvers and threatening to shoot the saint if he got any heavier…
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Thanks to Sam from the excellent Come Here To Me blog for these cuttings.
irishanarchisthistory 
Dec 19, 2017 @ 15:28:24
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