Bob Merriman’s task on these days was still organizational.  Not only did he need to train increasingly large numbers of new men who were coming into Villanueva de la Jara, but he had to feed and supply them.  The hub for materiel and people was in Albacete and in between there and Villaneueva was Madrigueras where the British were.  Merriman would find out quickly that the “requisitioning” process included diverting material to your unit when it was intended for another.  He found this out the hard way when his supplies only made it half way.   The Americans were resourceful, however, and one can often find discussions of “organizing” material which was on the move.  His mention of “waylaid Stern” probably falls into this category.  Commissars and Adjutants’ jobs revolved about getting the supplies they needed.

There is a hint of trouble to come in the phrase “hunted for our head man”.  Harris would often go off and be hard to find.  More on this in the weeks to come.   Merriman’s cryptic “Who goes?” suggests they were already planning their move to the front lines, even though the Americans had been in training for less than two weeks.

On the 28th, many new names arise in the diary.  Merriman will mention nearly 300 people over the course of the next year and thus the additional historical value of being able to place people by date.  We have not met General Gal before.  Janos Galicz (General Gal) of Hungary was the military leader of the division commanding the 15th Brigade.¹   Over the summer, he will be mentioned often.  On June 24, 1937, Gal and Copic will meet in Ambite at a meeting of the leaders of the XVth Brigade and their photo is shown here.   Very little has been written about Gal, and Vidal passes over him quickly in his memoir, saying only that the Hungarian Gall {his spelling} was a veteran of the Civil War in the Soviet Union.¹

Platone refers to Felice Platone (thanks to Fraser Ottanelli for this identification).  Platone was a member of the Communist Party in Italy and became Chief of Staff of the International Brigades. Platone will show up in the next few months and then not be seen again in the diary.  Nueman (later to be written Newman) appears frequently in the diary early on, but no American of that name was in Spain at that time.   This is probably the Austrian Doctor Rudolf Neumann who was an early organizer of the International Brigades in Albacete.  Vidal says in his memoir:

Le 20 Octobre {1936}, arrivaient, vacant de Madrid, à Albacete, les camarades André MARTY, VIDAL et BLANCO. …. Du même BLANCO, officier austrichien avait participé à la guerre civile en Union Soviétique; était arrivé en Espagne au début d’Octobre …. Le camarade BLANCO était chargé avec l’instruction militaire …. ¹

Blanco then was one of the three leaders of the Brigade in Albacete in the late fall of 1936 and it is unlikely that two Austrians would be attributed to being “co-founders” of the Brigades.   It is possible that Neumann and Blanco are the same man.  And since Blanco had been in charge of instruction, Merriman would likely have met and reported to him.  By late December 1936, however, Dr. Neumann was organizing the hospitals and there is a memorandum from Vidal to Neumann describing the outfitting of the Auto-Chir (the mobile surgical hospital).¹

Merriman commandeered a truck from Marvin Stern who was the first Commissar of the Lincoln Battalion.  Merriman will become extremely resourceful over the new few months in making sure he has access to transportation.  Peter Carroll says:

Given the importance of the commissars, the first American leaders appeared woefully inadequate.  Phil Bard, appointed by the American Communist Party in New York, lacked any military skills.  When the Lincolns moved to the town of Villaneuva de la Jara for exercises, Bard remained at Albacete to handle battalion affairs; chronic asthma soon forced his return to the United States.  As his replacement, Bard appointed another volunteer named Marvin Stern, a New York seaman, who soon offended the local mayor by demanding to know why he had not yet collectivized the land.   Argumentative and arrogant, Stern nearly came to blows with several of the men.  Angry with his leadership, the Lincolns elected a political committee to bring their grievances to the brigade command.  Commander Vidal’s response was to call them “naughty children.”….²

Stern clashed with Stember as well and resigned as Commissar to return to the ranks.  He disappeared from the Lincolns and was said to have died in Spain in a cloud of innuendo.³

When he got back at Villanueva, Merriman found order disrupted by Ray Steele (Ramond Albert Steele aka as Burns) who had gotten drunk and kicked in a door.  Eby says that he was jailed as “drunk and disorderly”.²  Ray Steele would work as a cook and served in the Lincoln Battalion Machine Gun Company.  He served at Jarama and Brunete, and was killed in the latter action.  He was reported to be one of the best machine gunners in the Battalion.

Merriman also had trouble with Andrew Royce (aka Royce Alvin).  These linked biographies are prepared by Chris Brooks for the Abraham Lincoln Brigades Archives and I owe a debt to Chris for his suggestions on the names of Americans as they come up.  He probably has the best handle on the names of the Lincolns of anyone researching the Brigades at this point.

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¹ Gayman, Vital (Vidal), The Base of the International Brigades in Albacete 1936-1937, ibid., pp 7-9.

² Carroll, Odyssey of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, ibid., p 96-97.

³ Eby, Comrades and Commissars, ibid.

Settling in at Villaneuva de la Jara included building a new firing range at the edge of town.  Alan Warren sent us a photo of the cupola of the church described by Merriman and says that you still can see bullet holes in the painting inside.

Ironically, there is now a supermercado (supermarket) in the building and it has a familiar acronym.

The names of the colleagues with Merriman on January 25 were Harris, Stember, Daduk, Kelly, Parker and what looks like “Tenbetti”.   After some discussion, it was concluded by Chris Brooks that Parker must have been John William Parks.  We will see that in less than a month, Mr. Parks will be dead in one of the more unfortunate mistakes at the Battle of Jarama.   Harris is James Harris who was to command the Lincolns with Merriman.  James Harris was Polish in nationality and Harris is a nom-de-guerre.   Lincoln veteran Robert Gladnick (in an unpublished memoir found at the Hoover Institution’s Archives) says that Harris travelled to Spain on the Normandie with the first group and used his actual name on the manifest.   To this point, all the names on the sail manifest are identified as Lincolns and a Polish name is not on the list.

Stember and Daduk have been discussed before.  Kelly cannot be any of the Kelly’s listed in the ALBA archives.  The closest match is Thomas Kelly who arrived in Spain on February 7, 1937, but that is too late for this diary entry.   Sandor Voros’ list (private communication from Chris Brooks) of the Lincolns at Jarama lists Kelly as a section leader in section 2 of Company 1 of the Lincolns.  Kelly is likely to be an Irish comrade.   Barry McLoughlin’s list⁴ of the Irish in Spain lists Michael Kelly who was  a platoon leader in the Lincoln Battalion.   Kevin Buyer’s excellent site on the International Brigades has the photograph of Michael Kelly of Galway on the right.

Brooks also suggests that Tenbetti may actually be Juan/John Landetta.  Landetta shows up on the list of Lincolns used by Adolph Ross to identify photographs after the war.  John or Juan Landetta was a Cuban American student from New York City who arrived in Spain on January 14, 1937.²  Art Landis says of the Cubans³:

“In the winning of the villager’s goodwill {in Villaneuva}, credit must also be given to a young Cuban named Rodolfo de Armas and his equally young commissar, Landetta.  De Armas and Landetta were in command of a Cuban section of approximately 60 men that had been assigned to the Lincoln Battalion.  They called themselves the Antonio Guiterras Centuria after a revolutionary student, a victim of the Machado terror.  De Armas and Landetta had also fought against the early Machado dictatorship of Cuba….”

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¹ John Tisa, Recalling the Good Fight, Bergin & Garvey Publishers, Inc., 1985

² Cadre List, Abraham Lincoln Brigade.

³ Art Landis, The Abraham Lincoln Brigade, ibid. p.31

⁴ Barry McLoughlin, Fighting for Republican Spain, Lulu.com, ISBN 9781291968392