Romanian voluntary units in Spanish Civil War

Are you from Spain Jivana?

Partially, I lived a long time there, Imperialist.

Greetings

Jivana

Do you people know in which of the "International Brigades" were this Romanian units included? AFAIK it was the Abraham Lincoln

Dragos can tell us for sure. He just have to check in "Istoria artileriei romane" - there are some informations about romanian artilery units who fought in Spain.

Hola Jivana,

This is a bit off-topic. Could you please indicate the work of Ernest Hemingway where he mentions Roman? The book that comes to mind, in what regards the SCW, is, of course, "For whom the bell tolls". There's nothing on it about Romanians fighting in Spain.

The most up-to-date and historically balanced acount of the International Brigades in Spain in César Vidal's work, "Las Brigadas Internacionales", originally published by Espasa Calpe (Madrid, 1999). The book marked a progress in the study of the subject, since it is impervious to the pro-Communist clichés common in many books published abroad and, on the other hand, to the former Spanish regime propaganda.
Of course, a maze of articles and monographic books on this issue have appeared over the last years, the vast majority of whose in Spain.

As for Emilio Kleber (or Kléber, as the name is spelt sometimes in Spanish publications), he already had quite a "career" under this belt when the SCW broke out.
His real name was Manfred Stern. He was born in 1896, in Czernowitz/Cernăuţi. The confusion regarding his place of birth and nationality is understandable; back then, it was a Austro-Hungarian town. Stern volunteered to serve in the k.u.k. army in 1914, having fought afterwards in Galicia. He was captured by the Russians and spent several months as a POW in Siberia. After the revolution, he managed to escape from captivity to fight in the Civil War, with the Reds. Later he went through the Military Academy, in Moscow.
In Spain, he played an important role in the defence of Madrid. However, he disagreed with Gen. Miaja views and was sent to Valencia. After the death of another foreign advisor (ethnic Hungarian Lukács), he was reinstated as commander of the 45th Division.
He returned to Moscow before the Republican defeat and disappeared (in 1939) in the Stalist purges then sweeping the Soviet Union.

Ruy

Hola Ruy, ¿qué tal?

Thank you very much for all these very informative additional informations and details about Emilio Kléber and Walter Roman, which confirm, explain and amplify some aspects I found in the net.

Sorry, at the moment I cannot answer your question, even if I was looking for the site during almost 2 hours.

When I wrote my post about the Spanish Civil War on this thread I had just finished reading many different Spanish sites about the topic. After (unfortunatelly "after") I had read them I had the idea that it could be interesting for this forum to write down the things I remembered. Therefore I could not give the exact references. My contribution to this subject was just a hint for the interested, but I´ll try to find it out the next days.

Un saludo cordial

Hola, Jivana.

Muy bien, gracias. Y tú, ¿qué tal?
Intentaré colaborar con mi granito de arena...
You are welcome. Please don't worry about my question. I was just a bit puzzled about Hemingway's mention about Romanian volunteers, but of course this is linked to my own perception of his famous novel "For whom the bell tolls", which is perhaps the most well known of his works. Besides, and also as a sort of side effect, produced when the name of the North American writer is referred jointly with the Spanish Civil War, the first thing that jumps to my mind is that book... even if he wrote several other novels and stories whose action is set in Spain, both before and after "For whom..."
In the meantime, I was told by a friend that a recent, deeply researched book on the post-Civil war Spanish POW camps contains some lists, ordered by nationality. Romanians do pop up here and there in very small numbers, in the midst of a staggering array of different nationalities. I will ask him to loan me the book.
Bibliographic data is as follows:

Javier Rodrigo - "Cautivos: campos de concentración en la España franquista 1936-1947", Crítica, Barcelona, 2005. ISBN:84-8432-632-2

Some foreign volunteers retained their pseudonyms even after capture, but in many cases the new Franquist military authorities managed to figure out the real ID of some prisoneers, especially those not fluent in Spanish. However, some Eastern European volunteers posed as French or Francophone nationals on some occasions, especially when fluent in French.
Un saludo y hasta pronto,

Ruy

This post has been edited by Ruy Aballe on November 23, 2005 02:28 pm

Rare stamps with the portraits of Iron Guard members Mota & Marin, KIA:


[Photo: Hoffmann]

Gen. Dénes

Romanian volunteers fought for both sides in the Spanish civil war.
Mota and Marin, plus the old general Zizi Cantacuzino (WW1 veteran, commander of a border guard regiment) and other guys, including engineer Clime (future second-in-command of Corneliu Zelea Codreanu), fought alongside Franco's forces.
Valter Roman and a lot more like him fought alonside the Communists. Hemingway was very impressed by them.
However, I wonder if there were any Romanians alongside the ANARCHISTS (probably few know that the Anarchists's leaders were executed by NKVD commisars sent by Stalin to weaken the Republican side). In his turn, George Orwell preferred the Anarchists. The guy who wrote the "Animal Farm", the famous Communist fairy tale.

I doubt Valter Roman can be called Rumanian.

Gen. Dénes

Is it Valter Roman actually Valter Neulander?

He was born Ernő Neuländer, in Nagyvárad/Oradea [Mare] in 1913, son of a rabbi.

Gen. Dénes

More info on Valter Roman, Romanian artillery unit, etc. on wikipedia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valter_Roman

This is the link to an interesting site on Jewish volunteers in this war, including Valter Roman. Quite a difference between Poland's and USA's participation, against Soviet Union. And nothing on Romania, except Valter Roman.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Volunt...anish_Civil_War

Then why don't you expand the topic? Wikipedia is accessible to everyone...

Gen. Dénes