Page Four

PEOPLE’S

ALD VO CATS

June ii, 1937

The VOI

By MICHAEL O'MARA.
Not only with guns and
airplanes are the Spanish
people fighting Fascism,
In the past few months the
potent weapon of propa-
ganda has been used in-
creasingly with telling ef-
fect. Its results are seen
in wholesale desertions to
the Loyalists as the armies
of democratic Spain press
forward

irresistibly, now

on this front and now on
that.

These Italian peasants. They

believed they were on their way
to Ethiopia, there to carve a new
world for themselyes in a land
described by the Italian press 4s
flowing with milk and honey.
They how no means of knowing,
of course, the hardships that
awaited them, but conditions at

home were growing steadily
worse, and, perhaps, in EXithio-
DIAERe e. ce

Instead, they found them-
selyes, gZuns in hand, fighting

other peasants, other workers, in
Spain. They were too bewildered
to understand, at first.

These German workers and
farmers were young men for the
most part. They were conscript-
ed. Reluctant and unwilling, they
had no choice. They, too, found
themselves face to face with the
dreaded “Reds,” against whom
¢he German press, the German
radio, had raged so violently and
jong.

>.<

Night after night as they lay
in the trenches voices speaking
with confidence and conviction
would drift across to them from
Loyalist trenches. Voices speak-
ing their own language, saying
things they had dared not whis-
per scarcely dared to think, at
home. Things they had heard
before Fascism had come to
power. Things they had never
been able to forget.

Sometimes planes would fly
overhead, Loyalist planes, con-
temptuous of the slower Fascist
ships. They would drop, not
bombs, but showers of leaflets.
Jt was fascinating to watch these
leaflets drift down a summer
sky like feather-down, impossible
for frantic, harassed Fascist of-
ficers to prevent the men from
picking them up unobserved and
reading them away from prying
‘eyes.

Doubt began to creep into some
of these minds, poisoned for years
by the unceasing stream of Fasc-
ist propaganda. But here they
could think for themselves. They
could see for themselves. They
could feel for themselves. Doubt
became conviction. Across the
fields, the river, atop the ridge,
were the Loyalist jines—and free-
dom. At the least, it could not
pt worse than here.

At night figures would erawl
away from the Fascist trenches
+o the Loyalist lines. Most of
them carried their rifles with
them, for had they not been told
of the Loyalists’ shortage of rifles
and ammunition.

A thin trickle at first, this
flow of deserters from the Fasc-
ist armies in Spain has now
become a steady stream. This
new weapon of the Loyalists is
one against which the Fascists
have no defence.

x

During the past month 30,000,-
000 bhandbills have been dropped
over Fascist lines by Loyalist
planes in an unprecedented pro-

paganda drive to take adyantage
of the fact that Tranco’s Span-
well-nigh

ish reserves are now

REST FOR

exhausted. Raw young workers
and peasant Jads, 16 to 18 years
of age from territory held by the
Fascists, have been forced into
the Fascist lines and to these
youths has been addressed a
dramatic and effective appeal,
says Robert Minor, war corres-
pondent.

“T have received 40 separate
examples of hand bills being
given distribution, written in
Italian, Arabic, Portuguese and
Spanish,” he says. “They were
addressed to specifie types of sol-
diers and officers within those
languages. Of course, 4 heavy
proportion is devoted to Italian
troops in their own language.

“Qne handbill, in Portuguese,
carries the signature and photo-
graph of a Portuguese soldier
and is addressed to the mem-
bers of Company No. 29, of the
Sth battalion of the Foreign Le-
gion, from which he deserted to
come over to the Republican
army.

“Special and very simple leaf-
lets addressed to Spanish peas-
ants and agricultural laborers
give statistics showing seven and
a half million acres of land con-
fiscated by the People’s govern-

ment from IFascist plantation
owners.”
@ther special leaflets signed

by the General War Commission
are addressed to Spanish officers
on the Fascist side.

The whole campaign is close-
ly associated both as to cause
and effect with recent sharp con-

flicts within the Fascist line,
such as heavy firing for mere
than an hour among Fascist

forces at Willa del Rio on May
18, the mutinies at Tetuan, Va-
jJedolid and Granada, and the
fighting between Fascist groups
jn University City.
x
But an interesting new turn is
caused by the rapid increase of
mass desertions, including deser-

_fions of more than 2 thousand

raw recruits, regulars, foreign
legionnaires, Moroccans and
Italians who have come over in
the past two weeks.

Desertions from the Fascist
ranks have increased now to
the average of 200 a day.

It is known that a whole com-
pany came over intact to the
Republican army at Cordova
after shooting its officers.

For this reason a change is be-
ing made in the content of leatf-
jets. The suggestion is now being
given to the dissatisfied members
of Franco’s army that collective
action is better than jsolated in-
dividual acts.

‘They are also being told, that
js in some cases, it is better not
to desert but to remain in Fran-
co's ranks, ruining cannon,
trucks and other Fascist war ma-
terials, before coming over en
masse to the Republican army-

The propaganda campaign vir-
{ually got under way with the
May Day proclamation addressed
to workers and peasants within
territory occupied by the Frasc-
ists, which proclamation was
siened by the UGmT, the Socialist
and Communist parties. How-
ever, the campaign has taken on
the character of mass production
and million-fold distribution with-
in the past three or four weeks
under the influence of the dis-
covery that such work is much
more effective than had been at
first realized.

Newly placed in charge of
this work is one of the ablest
men in Spanish military-politico
service. New importance is at-
tached to propaganda across the
trenches, which is now so thor-
oughly systematized that every

Foot-So-Port

The New Shoe
That Cradles

In summer styles, including
sports patterns jn white and
grey buck—

$5 ro $8

© mournful looxing

shoes for men,

“corn-
are Foot-So-Port
put handsome

dodgers”

TIRED FEET
aN

footwear that can appear in any
company and never petray that
they are built on nature lasts,
have steelarch supportsand solid
leather arch-stay, Metatarsal
cushions and properly wedged
sole. And when you sink your
feet into the moulded insole, foot
troubles will be a thing of the
past! Let us fit you properly

with Foot-So-Ports and let your
feet rejoice!

CE of the PEOPLE

Against This New Weapon the

Fascists Have No Defence

leaflet is closely adapted to a
distant local situation at the
front or to the national char-
acter of soldiers in a particular
section of the enemy trenches
or rear.

The appearance of several hesi-
tant peasant soldiers who came
to the Republican trenches with
hands held high, elutching
erumpled leaflets and asking if
it were true that they would not
be killed, started a revaluation
of this branch of the work.

Nowadays they are increasing

SPRI

By ILYA EHRENBOURG

INGE childhocd, I have
loved to look into
lighted windows in the eve-
ning. The lamp above the
round table, a steaming
bowl of soup, a2 child, the
profile of a woman with a
book in her hand—all this
is full of meaning. Other
people’s lives seem to have
the quality of newness and
attractiveness about them.
In Spain today there are many
houses open to the gaze of the
eurious—the ruins of houses. A
staircase that leads nowhere, fan-
tastic commodes that seem to be
hanging by 2 hair, a wall with a
clock on it pointing the hour of
death. ...

Madrid, Carthagena, Albacete,
Jaen, Guadalajara, Andujar, Po-
zoblanco — women rummaging
every where. Sometimes they Si-
lently gaze at an armchair or the
frame of a mirror. Very likely
they recall that not so long ago
there was still life.

Like every year the hasty,
southern spring descended upon
Spain. Faint and delicate green
can be seen in the hills and yval-
Jeys and in a few weeks the sun
will force the grass through the
earth. In the Sierre flowers are
in bloom now—bright yellow,
mauve, white. The fields of Anda-
lusia are full of poppies.

The tiny mountain streams
have become swollen and over-
flow their banks. Alongside the
batteries carefree birds are sing-
ing—this is the time for their
brief love.

I saw an infant nursed by its
mother. It was born amidst the
roar of armored cars and the
shrill, piercing shrieks of sirens.
He was happily kicking his litile
legs. THere is a lot of sunshine
in this country, ruddy-cheeked
little girls with blue eyes, many
oranges, pasture Jands and heavy
Jassitude at midday. Now death
hovers over this land. In the
ever-blue sky (mornings one
doesn’t have to wonder what the
weather will be like today) bomb-
ing planes appear.

The tanks are hidden amons
the olive trees. Pepe or Pako who
sang the beautiful, sustained
song of the flamingo under the
windows now stand at the ma-
chine-guns_

T saw silent women. I
ask them why the Italian air-
planes killed and maimed 500
people in Jaen in five minutes.
There was a man who was kept
from going near the ruins. His
wife and eight children perished
there. “Let me through,” he mut-
tered, ‘‘there is nothing left for
me.”

Eyery morning in Madrid I saw
the wounded. They were being
earried into the operating rooms.
One of them said to the nurse:
“They re not really going to am-
putate. . = He was being
operated on under a local
anaesthetic. Hearing a squeak he
asked: “‘Can it really be.”

“Oh, that’s the street car,” the
nurse quickly answered. He said:

didn’t

“Byen the street cars are difi-
erent now. -. -”

T have seen parts of little
bodies dragged from the debris

- had

the use of loudspeakers.

‘We consider this mass propa-
ganda as the new artillery,” an
official In the new propaganda
department has stated. “But it
might be called a kind of artillery
that humanizes war, a5 it is now
the fashion to say.

‘Te use loudspeakers for talk-
ing to the fascist armies, cap-
able of throwing the voice as far
as three kilometers. We rig them
up on sound trucks that approach
close to the front line.

“But when we get on a moun-
tain the Iascists cannot stay in

-..an hour previously the chil-
dren were playing in the little
square. Their mothers were
standing near them.

In Jaen a mother found her
little girl’s hand. Demented, she
placed it where it belonged on the
body and began to hunt for the
head.

What else is there to Soy = = =
that people are afraid to spend
the night in the towus, that they
go out into the fields at night,
that people have been doomed to
live the life of animals, that in
the caves of Carthagenia eight
women decided to put an end to
it all, that old men hide in water-
mains. ... Death stalks through
the land.

When a plane is seen over the
city, the dogs hide in terror. Near
Jarrama there are gaping holes
in the grounds. . - the bright
yellow flowers will not bloom
there for a long time. .

In the evening people roam
around distractedly. The sereech
of the sirens is unbearable; they
sound like human voices. Women
stand in long queues, docile, wait-
ing for their bread rations.

When the inhabitants of Ma-
Jaga fled to Almeria, airplanes
eireled over them. A woman
sereamed “‘Where’s my baby?”

Somebody handed her a child.

It wasn’t her baby. She didn t
have any children; terror had
driven her insane. The baby

smiled. Its mother had not been
found; she died somewhere
among the piles of stones.

An old woman lives im this
pink house, Her son was killed
near Pozoblanco. Someone had
chalked on the house: “Tt is bet-
ter to die standing up than to
live on your knees.” This phrase
is on everybody’s lips:

YT remember seeing the corpse
of an Italian—the blue cheeks,
the coagulated blood. In his ad-
dress book, between the addzesses
of houses of prostitution and
praise of I] Duce, was written:
“War is a jolly business*”

We had been brought up in a
world where people are taught
plunder, violence and destruc-
tion. In a self-satisfied way he
called himself “The little
wolf-cub of the Roman she-wolf.”

He had come to Spain to have
some fun. Like a wolf he had
killed and plundered and now he
lay with his head pressed to the
soft green down of the earth.

Spain doesn’t want to live on
its knees. She is fighting to live

a life of full stature, a fine life.
Here, side by side with death,
one feels this very keenly. But

it will be a still Hner life, worthy
of human beings, hfe which will
pecome a reality, Life which is
so dear that for its sake one
eeases to value one’s own life.

A shepherd descended from
the mountains near Cragat- He
had walked three days: Up there
he had heard that people are
fizhting for the truth. He asked
simply in a matter-of-fact tone:
“Where shall I go now?’

T have seen old men, youns
boys and girls in the People’s
Army. They were filled with pas-

sion and tenderness and they
were silent. Silently they took
Aim at the enemy-

German professors, French

metal workers, Croation students,
farmers from Ohio, Poles, Mexi-

the valley ahead of us, but to
avoid our fire from above they
so back to the next mountain.
Therefore sound trucks are not
much good unless they
three kilometres.

“These broadcasting campaigns
are having wonderful results.””

“Tast Thursday 224 ‘regulars,
legionnaires and requettes came
over to us in one day and some
of them will take the wmicro-
phone tomorrow to tell their
comrades in the Fascist trenches
how well they are received by
the Republican army.

PAIN

cans, Swedes came to help their
Spanish brothers. Among the
ruins of Pozoblanco a soldier
came up to me. “I have met you
in Bratislav,’? he said. He is one
of the heroes of Flordsford who
with arms in his hand managed
to reach the Czechoslovakian
border. His life had been spared
in Vienna: he is now ready to
give it for faraway Andalusia.

carry

Andre Malraux became a flier.
We bombed the airdrome of Tala-
vera, Ludwig Renn marched in
front of his battalion. I knew
Ralph Fox, the writer, in Lon-
don.

He was a gay and cheerful per-
son, One night in a small bar
he told me some funny stories.
He loved life a great deal and
that is why he died at Jarrama.

I don't know why I am speak-
ing about writers. I could just
as well talk about engineers,
ynasons, musicians, they all came
here to defend human brother-
hood. Wwesterday in the moun-
tains of Andalusia Berlin work-
ers sang: “‘No,- we have not lost
eur fatherland, Madrid is now
our fatherland. . . .’”” The shep-
herds and wine growers of Spain
didn’t understand the words but

their eyes shone with deep
emotion,

J never thought that there
were so many heroes in the

world. They lived alongside of
me, went to work, laughed at the
movies, Suffered because they
were unfortunate in love. Now
they are marching under ma-
chine-gun fire, destroy tanks with
hand-grenades, and, severely
wounded, their blood flowing
freely, they go into no man’s
jand to pick up their fallen
comrades.

A soldier is waving a little red
flag. It's for the first of May.
Perhaps in a few days this little
flag attached to a bayonet will
move forward towards victory.
Heavy artillery will salute the
day which in Republican Spain
is marked on the calendar as the
“festival of labor.’ This is truer
than ever. In Bilbao or near
Penarroya people are now dying
for their right to labor.

In Pozoblaneco there was 4
woollen mill. Fascist shells
crashed through its walls; bombs
destroyed the roof. By some
miracle the machinery remained
untouched. After the victory ot
the Republicans the workers re-
turned to the deserted city. They
were not afraid of the Pascist
planes. They took their former
places at the looms.

Above them, the blue sky,
through the holes in the walls
the ruined city can be seen. They
look neither at the stars nor the
stones—they work from morn-
ing till night weaving army
blankets. - - They are alone,
the front surrounds them, im the
city there is neither shelter nor
bread but they continue to work.
This is an outpost of labor in a
world of death.

I shall never forget the youns
pomber. Before the war he work-
ed in a garage in Madrid. He had
been decorated—he had put three
enemy tanks out of commission.
Thoughttully he said with a
smile: “When we win the war
Tl go back to the garage to Te-

pair cars.

(Left) —An Italian anti-Fascist who deserted with his machine-
gun to the Loyalists as soon as his regiment arrived at the

front.

“training.”

By CHAS. MARRIOTT

ORONTO one hundred
years ago was plenti-
fully supplied with inns,
hostelries which played
quite a role in the political
lite of the times. The inn in
which the followers of Mac-
kenzie most frequently
foregathered for political
discussions was the Red
Lion, which stood just
north of the Bloor street
toll-gate, then considerably
out of town.

This inn was the scene of bal-
loting to elect a member to the
legislative assembly after Mac-
kenzie had been arbitrarily oust-
ed from that body, as happened
repeatedly and usually was fol-
lowed by the re-election of the
ousted member.

Forty carriages rode out from
York on January 2, 1832, and two
thousand country people collected
about the inn. Two hours later
Mackenzie was re-elected. His op-
ponent drew only one vote.

Qn the northwest corner of
Yonge and Queen, where  Wool-
worth’s now stands, was an inn
ealled The Sun. There opponents
of the Family Compact gathered.
After traveling past the g0ov-
ernor’s house and the parliament
buildings (parliament was then
temporarily in the old courthouse
at King and Church) the proces-
sion ended at the Sun where Mac-
kkenzie addressed the crowd from
an upper window.

Five years later the Declara-
tion of Independence of Upper
Canada, a basic document of the
rebellion, was drawn up at the
Sun.

If you enter the tall office
puilding at the northwest corner
of Bay and Adelaide you will
notice on the wall of the entrance
a picture of John Doel’s brewery.
John Doel was one of Macken-
gie’'s adherents and his brewery

(Right)—Nazi militarists have delu
into believing that war is noble. Rich landowners exploit
them at the expense of farm labor when they are given

<= 3

ded these German youths

William Lyon Mackenzie

Made History In These

Canadian Inns

stood just beside his house in a
clearing on that corner. Here
Mackenzie and his principal fol-
lowers held their secret meetings.

In Doel’s brewery Mackenzie
and his lieutenants made their
decision to organize the rebellion
of 1837 and left immediately to
mobilize their forces throughout
the countryside. After the march
of Mackenzie's followers on To-
ronte had commenced, Doctor
Rolph, after being sent by Sir
Francis Bond Head to parley
with the insurrectionists came to
Doel’s brewery to a mecting
where the question of rallying
armed support for Mackenzie
among the Toronto people was
discussed.

Bay and Adelaide is now an im-
portant corner but in 1837 it was
yalued at less than four dollars
a foot. As late as the 1840's a lot
at the corner of King and Yonge
street, now valued at more than
a million dollars, was exchanged
for a load of hay.

*

The inns which were the
meeting places of the plebian
fighters for democracy have dis-
appeared, but one pbuilding, 2
favorite resort of members of the
Tory- family compact, still re-
mains. It is the Grange, which
now adjoins the Ontario gallery.
The Grange is one of Toronto’s
oldest buildings, built im 1817 by
D'Arcy Boulton, the first man
called to the bar in Upper Can-
ada.

The building then stood well
off in the forest, far away from
the town. It is reported that once
curious ~ Indians invaded the
house and had a look around.

Boulton was granted many
aeres of land surrounding the
house he built. The principal
members of the Family Compact
all presented themselves with
Jarge tracts of the public domain
and Boulton was no exception. In
his house, later occupied by
Goldwin Smith, the family com-
pacters held many 2 conference.

)

\

i

4

AWN

Above is shown Vancouver's tirst labor temple, reproduced from
“Builders of British Golumbia,” Bill Bennett's stirring history of the

labor movement in this province
Orginally 2 Methodist Church. this
ters in 1899. For many years a lan

covering fiity years of struggle.

building became Labor’s headquar-

dmark at the corner of Dunsmuir

and Homer, it was torn down in 1910 and a new labor temple, now
occupied by the Workmen’s Compensation Board, erected on its site.

When labor occupied this pbuilding

BC which was second only to Ontario jn union strength. Dedication
ceremony was perfurmed by Eugene V. Debs on his second visit to the

eity in 1899-

ea
—
ene RT a NAAT ST