British in Iberia

Algerciras, early 20^th Century:

The most well-known, if not the most popular character in Algeciras and its’ surroundings is John Morrison, a successful English businessman.  Without a doubt his greatest role is that of General Manager of the train company between Bobadilla and Algeciras and in order to carry out this role, he contracted the employment of two English consultants, an English auditor, an English head of operations and an English management secretary.  This railway line is the only one in the region which terminates in a harbour and this is also the home to the only crane in the region which loads and unloads goods and which the Spanish government uses to transport goods to Ceuta.

The crossing to Gibraltar is made regularly by English steamers under the Spanish flag which belong to Mr. Morrison.  He is also the owner of the “Mister Inglés”, the small steamer which takes the Spanish workers who live in La Roca, to and from Gibraltar.  Travelling across on this ferry from Bobadilla to Algeciras are many Spanish workers and many English passengers, many of whom flock to Andalusia both as tourists and as both owners and engineers in the many British businesses in the area.  In many of such businesses the Spanish only get secondary positions within the companies.

The compartments of the train are decorated with posters extolling the virtues of a new hotel – an English hotel, of course.  Every time the ticket inspector enters each compartment he questioningly makes reference to the wonders of this new English hotel in Algeciras and when the train finally reaches the city, the porters seize upon the luggage and ask convincingly, “I assume you’re going to the Reina Cristina?”

The English would arrive at the Reina Cristina Hotel of Algeciras in small steam launches, without requesting any permission from the maritime authorities or without undergoing any customs inspections.  Those who did not have use of a small dinghy to bring them across the bay could make use of the small dinghy which was of sole use of the hotel, called none-other than the “Cristina”, which was established by the ever-enterprising Mr. Morrison.

In the present day, “Juan Morrison” and “Alexander Henderson” are two streets in Algeciras (Cadiz) whose names have immortalized two British men who, during the 19^th century, provided the city with their extensive services.    With management and design skills developed in the building of railway lines in South America, John Morrison was the British engineer who implemented the Bobadilla – Algeciras rail project and oversaw its early stages.  The second name is that of a well-known millionaire who invested in the former-mentioned South American railways and who promoted the “Great Central Railway”, the British Trade Corporation and the international Henderson Administration.  In 1916, in recognition of the valuable services rendered, the English monarch awarded him the title of Baron Faringdon. 

Alex Henderson was the economic founder for the construction of this railway.  The company which undertook the drafting of the train, “The Algeciras (Gibraltar) Rail-way Company Ltd” was formed following numerous procedures carried out in the UK by Luis Lombard, a merchant seaman from Gibraltar.  The plan of the railway, which eventually pushed aside many others drawn up over the course of the century, was finally approved by the Spanish government in 1888.

In 1889 an article was written and published in the Scientific American Supplement in New York by a Horatio Jones Sprague, American Consul in Gibraltar between 1848 and 1901 and also well known for his involvement in attempting to solve the mystery of the ship, the Mary Celeste.   The article claimed that an English company had successfully started the construction of a railway line between Algeciras, Ronda and Bobadilla, “through the picturesque countryside of such a verdant mountain range”.  At the same time it drew attention to the economic advantages that such a railway line would bring.  The Algeciras (Gibraltar) Rail-way Company completed the design of the railway in three phases:  the first, between Algeciras and Jimena de la Frontera was in operation by the 13^th November, 1890; the second between Bobadilla and Ronda was opened on the 6^th September, 1891; the third and final stretch between Jimena and Ronda saw its first service on the 27^th November, 1892 and therefore was the date when all 22 stations on the line were open for business.  In Bobadilla (Malaga) the train connected both with the Madrid train and with the local services between Seville and Malaga and also with the Cordoba – Malaga trains of the Andalucia Railway Company, which, in 1913 took over the Algeciras – Bobadilla line. 

The Algeciras & Gibraltar Railway Company Limited was built up with an initial capital of 45 million pesetas.  The headquarters of the company were in Algeciras, with John Morrison as its managing director.  However, it was managed by a committee in London, at the head of which was the President of the company, J.W. Todd and the representative in Madrid was Enrique Borell.  The company had two hotels – the Reina Cristina in Algeciras and the Reina Victoria in Ronda.  The wooden jetty in Algeciras was brought into use in 1894 for company’s steam boats which had daily links between Gibraltar and Algeciras.  It was originally built both as a jetty for the passengers and as a coal storage for the company’s locomotive engines.   The line was sold to the Andalucian company in 1913, as was the shipping company whose name then changed to Compañia de Vapores de Sur de España.

Written by Jesús Castro

Translated by Rachael Harrison

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The unusual mixture of Andalucian genius and British patience and perseverance can produce something extraordinary, or in this case a family – the MacPhersons of Cadiz.

At the beginning of the 19th Century Cadiz and its people were scarred by the French invasion and the War of Independence.  The interference of the English in this war set the tone of the commercial maritime relationships in the Atlantic which in turn affected the companies already established in the Spanish ports such as Cadiz. 

Many of the Cadiz traders were of English, Irish and Scottish ancestry and were an educated mixture, with progressive liberal tendencies. They would meet up together in secret societies and Masonic lodges, forming part of the most significant forces within the bourgeois revolution.  Cadiz, therefore was culturally very advanced and without a doubt was the birthplace of Spanish liberalism.

Amongst the wealthiest traders established in Cadiz was the Aguirre family, a Basque family related to the Oruetas from Onate.  These events were the historical beginning of a friendship which developed years later between Domingo Orueta y Aguirre (junior) and Jose Macpherson, and which undoubtedly influenced the geological vocation of the latter.

The Macphersons established themselves in Cadiz in 1820, led by the Scottish immigrant Daniel Macpherson, previously known as Donald MacPherson Grant, and born in Inverness, Scotland.  He moved to Cadiz to take pursue his import and export business in what, at the time, was one of the biggest ports in Spain.  Daniel had changed his name due to religious reasons due to his Catholic marriage with Josepha Hemas Marti, daughter of a Valencian trader and a woman from Cadiz.

With its liberal ideology, the family took part in the Riego rebellion and as a result had to flee to Gibraltar to hide from the bullying of the autocratic Fernando VII after the invasion of the Hundred Thousand Sons of San Luis. Daniel Macpherson’s children therefore began their education in Gibraltar where some of them were born and they returned permanently to Cadiz in 1835.

Donald’s children distanced themselves from the influences of the pleasures of a life a leisure which their family fortune afforded them.  They concentrated all their energies to intellectual and science-related pursuits which each sibling enjoyed and was keen to develop yet further. 

Jose Macpherson never studied a university degree which “contributed greatly to the strengthening of the native independence of his spirit” (Calderon, 1902).  Aided by his economically-fortunate family, he built up a career as he pleased.  Jose Macpherson dedicated his early studies to mathematics, physics and chemistry, vigorously pursuing the latter subject in Paris where he threw himself into the study of mineralogy, spending considerable time with Pisani, Daubree and Stanislas-Meunier.  He concentrated his attention to the study of the geological transformations of the earth.  He made detailed visits to all the mountains and glaciers of Switzerland and carried out microscopic studies on the rocks, personally carrying out and investigating many studies and publishing the results in such extraordinary times.  With regard to his studies of stones, he studied the rocks of Seville (1879), Cadiz (1876), Galicia (1881) and the mountainous region around Ronda (1879).  He investigated the relationships between different types of rocks.  In the field of stratigraphy he produced new data and his study entitled “Molecular movements in rock solids” (1890) was well respected.  His leaning towards geology in this last study was influenced by Domingo Orueta y Aguirre (junior).  The Aguirre family was one of the wealthiest established traders in Cadiz in the 19th Century, of Basque origin and related to the Orueta family from Onate.

Guillermo Macpherson together with Adolfo de Castro created the Academia de Buenas Letras de Adolfo el Sabio in Cadiz in 1854 and also worked simultaneously as a civil servant in the British Consulate in Cadiz and Seville between 1865 and 1877.  In 1878 he was named as Vice-Consul in Madrid and then Consul in 1885.  His earlier interests focused on geology and pre-history and he published various studies.  Between 1873 and 1897 he translated 23 Shakespeare plays with a translation style that was both concise and effective.  According to Alfonso Parr, if they had collaborated on their works, they could have produced the greatest literary criticism of Shakespeare of their time.  The first was Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (Cadiz, 1873).  Between 1879 and 1882 in Madrid seven more were published, amongst them a review of his Hamlet in 1879 and a third in 1882, two editions of Romeo and Juliet  (1880 and 1882), Macbeth (1880), Othelo (1881) and Richard III (1882).

In 1864, the son of Daniel, also called Daniel MacPherson y Hembras was chosen as the Lloyds agent for the province of Cadiz, an illustrious title which his descendants still proudly hold today, representing Lloyds of London in the ports and bays of Cadiz and Algeciras.

From the first of the Macpherson clan to the last, this family has never lost contact with its roots in Scotland.  “Twelve years ago we came here to a town called Newtonmore, near Loch Ness to take part in a gathering of all the Macphersons”, says Maria Jose Macpherson Grosso.  Fully kitted out in kilts of the colours of all the lineages, they rediscovered their ancestral links.

Written by Jesús Castro.
Translated by Rachael Harrison.
Sponsored by  www.costaluzlawyers.es

When female pheasants no longer lay eggs, their plumage changes and they start to resemble the male of the species, even growing spurs.  A similar change happens to the widows in Andalucia.  In general, they married men older than themselves, therefore, when the men naturally die before their wives, the role of the female in relation to her children changes fundamentally and, once widowed, she takes on the role of the husband.  Andalucian widows gradually change into males, believes Pitt-Rivers in his short essay on the Andalucian woman.

Drawn by the anarchism of Andalucia, Julian Pitt-Rivers, the great English anthropologist (London 1919 – Fons par Figeac 2001) went to Grazalema, a village chosen after a recent visit to see Ramon Carande in Seville.  This village in the Sierra de Cadiz was chosen as the focal point of his study where he completed his thesis on the people of the Andalucian hills .  Under the tutelage of Meyer Fortes, Evans Pritchard and Peristiany and recommended Evans Pritchard himself, the study was part of his PhD and was the result of applying social anthropology to Mediterranean societies.

After publishing his book, “The People of the Sierra”, he did not receive good reviews from within Britain, with the exception of from his Oxford colleagues.  The opposite happened with his American anthropologist counterparts.  George M. Foster did a magnificent review of Pitt-Rivers’ book and invited him to a meeting of Spanish scholars in 1957 and from this point onwards, Robert Redfiled not only referred to him in his lectures and wrote significant positive reviews on him, but also included his book amongst the 10 best anthropological studies of the post-war period.  He was an avid follower of Simmel and admirer of his work “Sociology” which, whilst in Grazelema, became his bible.   This was the only study at that time which was published in English and he kept in mind the book’s observations on the struggle, the submission, self-condemnation, secrecy, women, and the scope and interweaving of social circles.   Simmel’s book was recommended to him by Julio Caro during his stay in Grazelema in a small house in La Ribera de Gaidovar.  What made the most impression on him from the work of Simmel were his observations on dishonesty.  He discovered that the peasants of Andalucia were the world’s greatest liars, “masters of knowing when to tell the truth and when to hold it back, and experts in deciding to whom and in which situations it was necessary to lie”.

The book on Grazalema is dedicated to Julian Caro, being not only his friend, but also the person who most influenced Pitt-Rivers, instigating the connection between the interpretation of history and anthropology.  “The People of the Sierra” was published in 1954 (London, Weidenfeld and Nicholson) and years later Caro revealed that this dedication was “one of the greatest rewards in my professional career”.  The book (first translated with the title of “The Men of the Sierra”, Grijalbo, 1971 and later “Grazalema, people of the Sierra”, Alianza, 1989) has been used in many universities as an example of an anthropological dissertation and also represents the beginning of modern anthropology in Spain.

In his work, Pitt-Rivers highlights the study of social segregation and the use and value of nicknames and developed anthropological thought on issues such as honour, co-parenting, fictitious relationships, grace, hospitality, marriage through abduction, and the concept of the “people”.

As member of a long-standing and illustrious English family, his great-grandfather, L.F. Pitt-Rivers, together with E.B. Taylor, was the founder of all anthropological study at Oxford.   As an army official, he was named as warden of the young King Faisal of Baghdad.  “The People of the Sierra” was published in 1954 (London, Weidenfeld and Nicholson).  He began his educational career at the University of California at Berkeley and later was invited by Robert Redfield to make up part of the Anthropology Department at the University of Chicago.  From there he participated in and co-directed the Chiapas Project.  He returned to Europe in 1964 and was named as Head of Studies at the ESHE in Paris.  He became friends with Claude Levi-Strauss, Louis Dumont and others during his stay in Paris and at the London School of Economics. 

For 50 years he was a regular visitor to Spain.  In addition to his work in the field in Grazalema he also undertook various studies on anarchism, fiestas, local identity, bull fighting, and the numerous bull-related rituals in the villages throughout Spain.  He is the author of other works for a report for the European Parliament on bulls.  In 1996 the Spanish Government awarded him the Commendation of Isabel the Catholic.

Written by Jesús Castro.
Translated by Rachael Harrison.
Sponsored by  www.costaluzlawyers.es

Sir Daniel Macaulay Stevenson was Chancellor of the University of Glasgow and Grand Cross Knight of the Order of Isabel the Catholic, and the first Scot to be given this title (in April,1935).  He was a liberal, a great Hispanophile, founder of the Chair of Spanish Language and Literature at the same University and established exchange scholarships between universities in Spain and Scotland.  But above all he was the pioneer of the Scottish Ambulance which saw action on the frontlines during the Spanish Civil War, from 1st October, 1936 onwards.

The Scottish Ambulance Unit grew out of a strong humanitarian spirit, a large amount of initiative and from the suffering of the Spanish Civil War which was felt by many Scots, ardent fans of the Spanish.  From the beginning of the war onwards, it delivered supplies to the needy and later, brought back the injured and administered assistance.  The ambulances were incredibly well equipped.  So much so that, when the Francoists (ill-named as the Nationalists) took power, they seized an ambulance, released its drivers and, due to the great value of the ambulances, decided and tried to seize all of them.
 
The Scottish Ambulance was present at many of the frontlines during the war, such as Olías, Cabañas, Parla, Getafe etc.   There were 6 ambulances, 12 lorries, a car and bus, all bought and financed by the democratic and working-class people of Scotland.  The human team behind this altruistic movement was made up entirely of Scots, with the exception of one Spaniard, Joaquín Morales.  They were John MacKinnon, Izod A.Joseph Carlin, Thomas Peuman  and Thomas Walters and led by the only female, Miss Fernanda Jacobsen.

Miss  Jacobsen was the driving force of the Scottish Ambulance in Madrid.  She was both dynamic and intelligent and her overwhelming actions on the frontline in Madrid were exemplary.  She carried out her brilliant mission with rigid and unscrupulous discipline and, with her unusual Scottish attire, she became a well-known figure in war-time Madrid.   The people greeted her warmly and regarded her with grateful affection to which she always responded true to character, distributing food with a smile and kind words.

Fernanda Jacobsen’s love for Spain began much earlier, when she would often travel through the country as a child with her mother.   She never felt as though she was travelling in a foreign country and, despite the many differences which existed, she felt so at home there that many times she would think of the pain she would feel when she would finally have to leave the place for good.

However, for Miss Fernanda, as she was affectionately known, this was not her only mission in Spain.   In February, 1938, she personally organized the first visit of a group of Spanish Protestants, fifteen women and seventeen children, to England, as guests of the Committee of Spanish Evangelical Refugee Home.  These evacuees were to stay in the magnificent Moorlands House in Merriott, Somerset, which had been donated to the Committee by an English philanthropist.  The refugees left Madrid for Barcelona in one of the Scottish Ambulance buses where they then met up with other refugees from Granada and Barcelona.  They then left for the French border where representatives from the Refugee Committee met them to drive them to the British Isles.

The Spanish Civil War was a cruel blow for the newly-emerging Spanish evangelists.  Its slow but steady growth was cut short by both the Republican Government and the Francoist rebels and its ranks were reduced through murders and the emigration of many believers.  Day to day functioning ground to a halt and minority faiths were destroyed by a deathly despondency.

Miss Jacobsen always had a great Spanish friend and ally in Tomás Bordallo y Cañizal, the Spanish consul in Liverpool, and from 1936 in Marseille. During his postings as Consul, he played a great part in assisting the student exchange programe and was the first Spaniard to receive an Honorary Doctorate in Law from the University of Glasgow.

Fernanda Jacobsen was decorated with an OBE  for her services to  humanity and for her assistance during the war in Spain. 


Written by Jesús Castro.
Translated by Rachael Harrison.
Sponsored by  www.costaluzlawyers.es

Amongst the villages of Soto de Roma there is one village called Fuente Vaqueros  and another called Asqueroso (now named Valderrubio).    In the former was born Federíco García Lorca on the 5th June, 1898.  Shortly afterwards, Federíco’s family moved to the neighboring village, then called Asqueroso.  Here, in the lands of the Duke of Wellington, the poet lived his childhood and adolescent years.

In an  attempt to try and put into practice the idea of community land ownership, “land for those who work on the land ”, on the 31st July, 2008, around 20 militant trade-unionists made a symbolic gesture of occupying the estate of the Dukes of Wellington in Alomartes (Granada).  In the words of one of the leading unionists, “this is one of the last remaining, blood-stained bastions of medieval privilege in one of the poorest regions of Granada and the Dukes merely use it as a hunting lodge for their wealthy, aristocratic European friends”.

The only incident that occurred was involving the Head of the Estate who warned his workers about hefty fines against the trade union.  Previously, whilst the unionists distributed propaganda in the village, he tore down the radical posters and, mop in hand, desperately tried to clean off the graffiti.

 Encompassing 4000 acres of land, bordered by the Sierra Elivra, Soto de Roma, 16km from Granada, was granted to the first Duke of Wellington by the Spanish Government as acknowledgement of the services paid to Spain during the “War against the French” (War of Independence).  

English people touring Granada continue to visit the Spanish estate of the Duke of Wellington, in almost pilgrim-like fashion as a form of hero-worship.

These lands were part of the personal assets of the Catholic Kings and were originally given to Captain Alarcón as a reward at the end of the Reconquest.   Soto de Roma eventually returned into the hands of the Monarchy after periods of ownership by individuals to whom the land was donated for services rendered to the state.   Charles III gave the estate as a gift to his minister Richard Wal, an Irishman, for his services to Spain.  Wal renovated and restored the estate from the state of ruin in which he received it and eventually died in the grounds of the estate.   Charles IV gave it to Godoy.  Joseph I, otherwise known as “Pepe Botella” got his hands on Soto de Roma and then, at the end of the War of Independence, the Spanish crown donated it to Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington.

The origins of the name of Soto de Roma date back to the time of Muslim dominance in Spain, during which time there was a tiny hamlet of Christians in this area, called Roma, and presently called Romilla (also known as Romilla la Vieja, belonging to the municipality of Granda called Chauchina).  The estate was divided into two parts, one clearly named Soto and the other was the so-called meadow of Illora.  The former was made up of irrigated land, lush orchards and large quantities of cattle and wheat crops on the non-irrigated land.  There were also vines which produced thousands of gallons of wine every year.   This is where the village of Fuente Vaqueros can found, the birth-place of Garcia Lorca.  In the middle of this extensive estate there was an area where water collected, occasionally turning it into a swamp due to the waters seeping from the water table from where the village gets its name (fuente meaning fountain or spring).  There were also two farmhouses – the Fuente farmhouse and the Vaqueros farmhouse, which eventually led to the name Fuente Vaqueros.

Until 1940 the municipality of Fuente Vaqueros itself belonged to the Duke of Wellington and the land was rented out to tenant farmers, to whom the Duke gradually sold off the land and it is these settlers who formed the current municipality.  The history of Fuente Vaqueros is linked to Soto de Roma, the extensive estate that, since the Catholic Kings belonged to the Spanish crown, but was then given to Lord Wellington, Duke of Ciuadad Rodrigo by the Courts of Cadiz.  In his Geographic, Statistical and Historic Dictionnary, 1845-1850, Pascual Madoz states, “these very courts, wanting to recognize and repay the important efforts on Spain’s behalf during the War of Independence, made by Lord Wellington, Chief of the British Armed Forces, working as a united front with the Spanish against Napoleon troops, grant to this distinguished soldier and to his successors,  the estate of Soto de Roma in the lowlands of Granada, as per the decree of 22nd July, 1913”.  In the donation was included “the area of Fuente Vaqueros, its annex of La Paz, and the farmhouses named Casa Real and Martinete”, although it was never made clear what the boundaries of Soto de Roma were and therefore has been the source of many lawsuits from owners of nearby estates.

The Illora meadow is 10 kms from Soto de Roma and has extensive olive tree plantations.

In addition to land, the “Protector of Spain” was given a collection of paintings which include a work of art by Correggio, “Prayer in the Garden” and “The Waterseller of Seville” by Velázquez.  These are just three of the hundreds of paintings that Wellington seized from Joseph Bonaparte when he fled after the Battle of Vitoria during the Spanish War of Independence (1808 – 1814).  Bonaparte had begun his move to France, taking with him numerous paintings, relics, jewels and other valuable objects from the royal palaces.  Wellington wanted to return this loot to Spain, but Fernando VII chose to give them to Wellington to show his gratitude.    Thanks to this gesture, Apsley House enjoys three Velázquez originals, “The Waterseller of Seville”, “Portrait of a Young Man” and “Two Young Men at a Table”, an example of the artist’s Sevillian period.

 
Written by Jesús Castro.

Sponsored by 

 www.costaluzlawyers.es

Who are those blond seminarians?  Until mid-twentieth century, visitors to the city of Salamanca stopped to look at them wondering who they were, for Salamanca inhabitants they were a daily scene: tall and  blond young men with a black cassock and a clover-shaped  purple cross on the heart, passed in two rows between the Theological Seminary and the Colegio del Arzobispo Fonseca. The answer: They are the Irish, students of the Royal College of Noble Irish. 

This School was founded by Father Thomas White, SJ, a native of Clonmel, with the approval of Philip II in 1592. The King of Spain provided generous funding and the direction of the school was entrusted by him to to the Jesuits, so that  Irish Catholics coming to take refuge in Spain could study there. Close commercial relations came out of this and many families of these students get the Spanish nationality and made a great impact in the destiny of Spain.

Wellington himself, who was Irish, at his arrival to Spain saw that the President of the Irish College of Nobles was a member of a family friend of his. This President, using Wellington´s influence got a house (Colegio del Arzobispo Fonseca) to replace that one the French had burned during the War of Independence.  Irish returned to Salamanca after the war and since 1838 they occupied the Fonseca College until 1951.

In Spain,  Irish colleges were established in Salamanca, Sevilla, Alcala, Santiago de Compostela and Madrid  so that Irish could study in a Catholic University. Many of the most distinguished Irish bishops and priests during the seventeenth century were men who had graduated in  Salamanca. Schools had this standard " To receive Irish students , perfect grammarists, of well-known skills, sense and virtue; of clean and pure blood, of Catholic parents and ancestors," as evidenced by a statement of 1720. They were tested in Ireland before coming to Spain, by the Superior of the Company, "without whose report and patent could not be admitted into this seminar" .They studied Philosophy and Theology.

In the period between 1594 and 1644,  Salamanca prepared almost four hundred students, including a Primate of All Ireland, archbishops, bishops, directors of religious orders, martyrs, priests, distinguished writers and Doctors of  Divinity.
 
Until 1951 around thirty students studied in this College. They entered the College at age of 18 or 19 years old, having previously passed in Ireland the equivalent to  High School Spanish and passed an entrance examination. Instruction was all given  in Latin. They all came from aristocratic families, mainly, because they alone could cover the vast expenses of studying abroad, most spent the duration of six years of their studies before returning to their land. But...yes,  they spent their summers in a farm next to the beach that the College had in Asturias. Each and every one of the priests who left the Irish College in Salamanca, returned very oftenly due to the good memories that kept of those times.

Salamanca is a university town since the Middle Ages, for this reason it has assumed constant contacts with other countries and cultures, always attracting a very important  number of foreign students. Irish have always had there a constant and considerable influence. The College is now used as a residence for postgraduates from around the world in which almost always an Irish researcher is housed. 

Algeciras, fifteen of January 2010. 

Jesus Castro. 

Sponsored by 

www.costaluzlawyers.es

"Many venerable institutions and many famous regimes, praised by men, perished in the storm, but the Boy Scout movement survived. Not only survived the Great War but the bungling of the post war times. While many elements of life and spirit of nations seemed to be mired in stupor, that one flourished and grew intensely. Its motto takes on new national significance as the years pass on our island. Bring to every heart its message of honor and duty: be ready to defend Law and Truth, whatever the whipping winds are”

(Great Contemporaries, Winston Churchill, 1937.)

The history of the Scouts in Spain began in 1912 and went through underground 1940 until the restoration of democracy. At present, it is in our country a voluntary education movement for more than sixty thousand children and young associates, which encourages commitment, freedom, awareness of social issues and helping others, with adapted, continuous an suggestive schemes of activities in areas such as health education, social equality, environmental culture, education for peace and development and promoting quality of life of children and adolescents.

 The institution of the Scouts in Spain has gone through all the stages that the Spanish character goes printing along the time on any person or work. It creates it, animates it, rises it up, sinks it or forgets it. A day in Madrid, drumbeats and trumpets blowing crossed the streets by small boys wearing an uniform symmetrically formed. The year of 1912 in Spain saw the Scouts to take presence, under the initiative of its initiator Sir Robert Baden Powell and Don Arturo Cuyás.

Robert Baden, in view of the vicissitudes and hardships of the campaign against the Boers,  understood the need and usefulness of educating youth in a positive and fundamental way by making them robust, enhancing their love of their country, preparing future citizens in all virtues and directing them to banish all evil. He thought that forming a strong, moral and educated youth. He would transform his country making it  strong, free and independent. And effectively, England responded and still responds to these dictates. That was strong and rich was clear due to his army, the most efficient in the world, and its colonies, forming a grand empire. Freedom was and still is absolute, as citizenship rights are fully guaranteed. For all these reasons Scouts of Spain were a hope for our country, we just simply need to see the objects for which they were made and for which they were organized.

The life of Spain scouts was a school of class equality much more complete than the actual school where students used to be distinguished between those who attended the school for free and those who paid a fee to the teacher.  Common and outdoor life matches from the first years of life the different social conditions. It's a little-known historical episode, as it's incredible, but Franco in 1940 banned the institution in Spain.  In the late fifties, the regime opened the doors slightly to the scout movement but it was always under control and assigning the direction of the movement to the Church.

Sir Robert BAden visitó a los Exploradores de España en Madrid, en Octubre de 1918, en 1929 visitó Cádiz, Palma de Mallorca y Tenerife, en 1934 Gibraltar y al años siguiente volvió a Tenerife. Los Exploradores de España  en esos años obsequiaron a su Majestad el Rey de Inglaterra con un sillón de nogal tallado y de cuero repujado de estilo  Renacimiento Español.

When Franco blocks the life of to the most famous form of nubile socialization that had been established in Europe in the early twentieth century, he does because he perceives in this organization the seed of Freemasonry. Not even the sympathy of Baden-Powell to fascist European thoughts in the 30s in Europe, free him from judging the movement under the anti-Masonic personal phobia which devoured him.

In return for the disappearance of the young "masons" scouts Franco created the Youth Front, a kind of daughter of Falange. Over the time, the Youth Front became the OJE: Spanish Youth Organization. They changed some aesthetics of the scouts such as the salute with his left hand which was replaced by the much more vigorous Roman salute

Sir Robert Baden Scouts visited Spain, Madrid in October 1918, then Cadiz in 1929, Palma de Mallorca, Tenerife and Gibraltar in 1934, returning to Tenerife in 1935. Spanish Scouts in those days made a gift to His Majesty the King of England of a carved walnut armchair with embossed leather of the Spanish Renaissance style.

Algeciras, the fourteenth of January 2010.

By Jesús Castro.

Sponsored by 

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When the ambassador of Spain in France, the Marquis de Dos Rius Castell, informed the Duke of Anjou, later King Philip V, grandson of Louis XIV, who inherited the crown of Spain upon the death of King Charles II, said, " There are no Pyrenees anymore!  They have been sunk into the ground and we are no more than a nation now! " Eighteen years later, when Spain and France entered into war, the phrase" There is no Pyrenees” became popular and was spreaded in a humoristic way; today, the phrase is used to name goods, works or situations of very short life.

According to historian Thomas Macaulay " the conduct of Spanish people during the War of Succession was extremely characteristic” Counted the few advantages of  number and situation, they were ignominiously defeated; all the  European lands owned by  Spain were lost, Catalonia, Aragon and Valencia owed allegiance to the archduke;  Gibraltar was surprised under the power of England, a few troopers had made themselves masters of Barcelona, the invaders, penetrating to the center of the peninsula, had their headquarters in Madrid and Toledo.

Juan Miguel Saura and Morell raised the menorquines to the Austrias and against Felipe V. It was on 19 September 1708, when an Anglo-Netherlands army commanded by Sir John Leake accompanied by Gen. James Stanhope took the island in less than nine days, being the Menorca Navy caught in a pitiful state.

The Peace of Utrecht awarded the domination of Minorca to England, which was later taken away to France by Admiral Galissoniere and General  Duc de Richelieu, Admiral John Byng who was executed on the deck of his ship by his own countrymen, a very strange event apart from times of revolution or civil war. Bynd was defeated in 1756 and was returned to England under arrest. It was submitted to court-martial in which he could not be accused of cowardice but, of not doing enough and was condemned to death.  Prime Minister Pitt made all in his hands for Bynd to be pardoned by King George but he refused. The Island returned to Britain with the peace in 1763 and was lost again in 1781, returning to British hands in 1798 until the Peace of Amiens, when this was incorporated into the Crown of Spain.

The British presence on the island lasted less than 70 years but still they left numerous influences and perennial features; emblematic interesting documents, mayonnaise types of that time drawn by Chiesa, colonial painter of those days. Paintings where British influence is seen in the dresses of women even when these were wearing the typical dress of the island. The map and printed sheets of Armstrong in his historical work "The History of the island of Minorca" (1752) report and stage the character of British, always respectful of the traditions and customs of the islanders. We need to remark too that the British presence was not always understood by all or estimated as shown in the engravings, lithographs and satirizing drawings of the customs of British in Minorca at that time.

The English governor who left the deepest imprint on Minorca was Sir Richard Kane, who made great works of sewerage in the  strip of Es Vergers to prevent epidemics of malaria: he also improved the roads and fortifications (Camí d'en Kane).  He also intervened on the economic adjustment of prices of products of the island, regulated imports and deforestation practices and introduced new weights and measures, ie English traces in public works, agriculture, livestock and also in language with different Anglicisms. Kane ended his government of Minorca island by death in December 1736. He has conquered the appreciation of the inhabitants and the gratitude of their King.

But there were also clashes between British and menorquines especially when the English needed men for their squads and ordered forced conscriptions. As there were also times of bad government and provocation with the Church.

 
Of the Anglicisms, still remain around 60 words in the language of Menorca as manifested by Vincent and Xavier Campos in his book "Els anglicisme of Menorca". In this context, the most comprehensive study is that produced by Professors Ortell and Campos. Some examples of these menorquine Anglicisms are: Correr de Berecs (barracks), bricbarca, berguin (bargain), boi (boy), Jan (Johm), Miledy (my lady), piquels (pilchard), pudin (pudding), grog, sutimbor (setting board), tiquitil (tea kettle), xaques (shake hands), mervles (marbles).

Algeciras, Thirteen of January 2010.
Jesus Castro.

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Drake lived until 1908, not the brave pirate but the venerable and peaceful turtle Drake, which was a giant turtle of those species with Latin-scientific names living in the London zoo, and that in those days of the early twentieth century was  about four hundred years old and was one of the oldest inhabitants of the planet.

The turtle was caught in the Galapagos Islands in the late eighteenth century, when captured, it was observed that in its shell, there was, dotted with a knife, a data, whose figures were almost undone, being readable just the first two, which were 16 ... Because of this, it was concluded that it had  been caught in the seventeenth century. The author of the dotting was a corsair, once of the many who in those days, threatened Spanish galleons lurking between America and the Philippines, currently hit the Galapagos Islands. So they called it Drake.

Reading the book "The voyage of Lionel Wafer” (1680) evoking the exploits of the English buccaneers, the French filibusters and Brethren of the Coast that sheltered in Santo Domingo and the Turtle, plaguing the seas of the Antilles, you can see how Wafer,  buccaneer by fondness and curiosity about such an adventurous life , dedicated his book to the Duke of Marlborough, giving to him a head-up call for England to occupy the space of Darien (Panama),  as it was highly advisable that this territory passed from Spanish to English hands.

 If we ask ourselves about the origin of the proverb " War against every nation, peace with England”, I would humbly say what follows:

In 1588,  after the conquest of Portugal, Philip II  had  in his mind his old and ambitious project,  that one he had always cherished and which was to take revenge against England motivated both by the personal slights inflicted by Queen Elizabeth and the fact she consented that the English corsair Drake persecuted and arrested many ships from America, heavy galleons stuffed of American wealth: gold, silver: Treasures of the West Indies, ripped at the expense of blood and burnt by men of the peninsula,  falling without much trouble into the hands of daring islanders.

The above, within the more critical frame of the Religion war: the English Protestants threatened to lead a relentless fight against the Spanish Catholics, made Philip II to organize such a tremendous squad that was named Invencible, consisting on 150 ships and 20,000 men. The first admiral of the fleet, was the Marques de Santa Cruz, this was succeeded by the Duque de Medina Sidonia, as the former succumbed at the leaving of Lisbon waters.

A temporal when rounding Finisterre Cape and the admiral's inexperience led to the loss of eight ships.  The survivors, taking refuge in the port of La Coruna and insisted on the mission, once they have almost recovered the squad,  continued its course toward the channel of La Mancha, being overwhelmed by Drake, who was appointed vice admiral of a fleet to fight against La  Armada Invencible. . Drake, favored by the fury of the storm, made the Spanish lose 90 ships and 10,000 men. King Philip II trying to store some cold-blood, uttered then: "I have not sent my ships to fight the elements." The aftermaths of this failure were appalling for Spain; the British fleet attacked the Spanish possessions and laid siege to La Coruna. Since then, England was the Queen of the Seas.

Drake was born in the hold of a ship, being orphaned since soon after this, the Captain of a boat picked him up and close to him, he entered into the life of the Seas.  John Hawkins taught him the theory and practice of the art of navigation. In 1567, commanding the expedition Judith in a Mexican coast expedition, the fleet his ship was part of was destroyed by the Spanish in a naval battle, Drake escaped but vowed revenge on the Spanish and gave his entire life to the realization of this plan. His maxim, "No peace beyond the line" was famous becoming the scourge of Spanish resources.

Drake is one of the favorite heroes of the English people, with good motivation, as he was one of the most attended nationals to raise the maritime preponderance of their land.

The first English fleet that sailed around the world was that of Drake.

By Jesús Castro

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