Historians at War: Cold War Influences on Anglo-American Representations of the Spanish Civil War

315 Pages·2018·2.6 MB·English

by  Daryl Anthony Burrowes

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HISTORIANS
AT WAR
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The Cañada Blanch / Sussex Academic
Studies on Contemporary Spain
General Editor: Professor Paul Preston, London School of Economics
A list of all published titles in the series is available on the Press website. More
recently published works are presented below.
Peter Anderson, Friend or Foe?: Occupation, Collaboration and Selective Violence in
the Spanish Civil War.
Richard Barker, Skeletons in the Closet, Skeletons in the Ground: Repression,
Victimization and Humiliation in a Small Andalusian Town – The Human
Consequences of the Spanish Civil War.
Germà Bel, Infrastructure and the Political Economy of Nation Building in Spain,
1720–2010.
Germà Bel,Disdain,Distrust, and Dissolution: The Surge of Support for Independence
in Catalonia.
Carl-Henrik Bjerström, Josep Renau and the Politics of Culture in Republican Spain,
1931–1939: Re-imagining the Nation.
Darryl Burrowes, Historians at War: Cold War Influences on Anglo-American
Representations of the Spanish Civil War.
Andrew Canessa (ed.), Barrier and Bridge: Spanish and Gibraltarian Perspectives
on Their Border.
Kathryn Crameri,‘Goodbye, Spain?’: The Question of Independence for Catalonia.
Pol Dalmau, Press, Politics and National Identities in Catalonia: The Trans-
formation of La Vanguardia, 1881–1931.
Mark Derby, Petals and Bullets: Dorothy Morris – A New Zealand Nurse in the
Spanish Civil War.
Francisco Espinosa-Maestre, Shoot the Messenger?: Spanish Democracy and the
Crimes of Francoism – From the Pact of Silence to the Trial of Baltasar Garzón.
María Jesús González,Raymond Carr: The Curiosity of the Fox.
Helen Graham, The War and its Shadow: Spain’s Civil War in Europe’s Long
Twentieth Century.
Angela Jackson, ‘For us it was Heaven’: The Passion, Grief and Fortitude of Patience
Darton – From the Spanish Civil War to Mao’s China.
Gabriel Jackson,Juan Negrín: Physiologist, Socialist, and Spanish Republican War
Leader.
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Righttt iii
Nathan Jones, The Adoption of a Pro-US Foreign Policy by Spain and the United
Kingdom: José María Aznar and Tony Blair’s Personal Motivations and their Global
Impact.
Xavier Moreno Juliá,The Blue Division: Spanish Blood in Russia, 1941–1945.
David Lethbridge,Norman Bethune in Spain: Commitment, Crisis, and Conspiracy.
Antonio Miguez Macho,The Genocidal Genealogy of Francoism: Violence, Memory
and Impunity.
Carles Manera, The Great Recession: A Subversive View.
Nicholas Manganas,Las dos Españas: Terror and Crisis in Contemporary Spain.
Jorge Marco, Guerrilleros and Neighbours in Arms: Identities and Cultures of
Antifascist Resistance in Spain.
Emily Mason, Democracy, Deeds and Dilemmas: Support for the Spanish Republic
within British Civil Society, 1936–1939.
Soledad Fox Maura, Jorge Semprún: The Spaniard who Survived the Nazis and
Conquered Paris.
Martin Minchom, Spain’s Martyred Cities: From the Battle of Madrid to Picasso’s
Guernica.
Olivia Muñoz-Rojas, Ashes and Granite: Destruction and Reconstruction in the
Spanish Civil War and Its Aftermath.
Linda Palfreeman,Spain Bleeds: The Development of Battlefield Blood Transfusion
during the Civil War.
Fernando Puell de la Villa and David García Hernán (eds.),War and Population
Displacement: Lessons of History.
Rúben Serém, Conspiracy, Coup d'état and Civil War in Seville, 1936–1939:
History and Myth in Francoist Spain.
Gareth Stockey, Gibraltar: “A Dagger in the Spine of Spain?”
Maria Thomas, The Faith and the Fury: Popular Anticlerical Violence and
Iconoclasm in Spain, 1931–1936.
Dacia Viejo-Rose,Reconstructing Spain: Cultural Heritage and Memory after Civil
War.
Antoni Vives, SMART City Barcelona: The Catalan Quest to Improve Future Urban
Living.
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HISTORIANS
AT WAR
Cold War Influences on Anglo-American
Representations of the Spanish Civil War
DARRYL ANTHONY BURROWES
Copyright © Darryl Anthony Burrowes, 2019.
Published in the Sussex Academic e-Library, 2019.
SUSSEX ACADEMIC PRESS
PO Box 139, Eastbourne BN24 9BP, UK
Distributed worldwide by
Independent Publishers Group (IPG)
814 N. Franklin Street
Chicago, IL 60610, USA
ISBN 9781845199456 (Hardcover)
ISBN 9781782845676 (Pdf)
All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of
criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior
permission of the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This e-book text has been prepared for electronic viewing. Some features, including
tables and figures, might not display as in the print version, due to
electronic conversion limitations and/or copyright strictures.
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Contents
The Cañada Blanch Centre for Contemporary Spanish Studies ix
Series Editor’s Preface xi
Author’s Acknowledgements xvii
The Cover Illustrations xviii
List of Abbreviations xix
Introduction 1
Terminology, Parameters, and Aims 1
Historiography 3
Approach and Methodology 13
Structure 18
CHAPTERONE
George Orwell’s Spanish Civil War: Homage to Catalonia 23
Issues of Mythologization 25
Orwell in Spain: Involvement and Disillusionment 26
Homage to Catalonia: Representations of the PCE and USSR 33
in the Spanish Civil War
Appropriation 42
Summary 51
CHAPTERTWO
Gerald Brenan: From The Spanish Labyrinthto South 53
From Granada
The 1950s: ‘The Winds of Change’ 56
The Spanish Labyrinth: Genesis and Significance 58
Historiography: Issues of Misrepresentation and Romanticisation 59
Brenan in Spain 63
Brenan Politicized 68
The Spanish Labyrinth: Researching, Writing, Reception 70
Brenan’sChange of Heart and Cold War Pragmatism 74
Summary 83
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viii Contents
CHAPTERTHREE
Burnett Bolloten: Dedicated Scholar Unravelling a ‘Grand 87
Camouflage’ or Obsessed Cold War Warrior?
Setting the Scene: Background to the Historiographic War 90
Bolloten – The Historian: Trials and Tribulations 93
Early Life and Influences – 1909 to 1935 95
War Correspondent and Communist Engagement – 1936 97
The Move to Mexico – 1937 100
Writing the Villalba Episode 101
Mexican Years: Communist Disengagement – 1937 to 1940 103
California Bound: The Gladys Factor, Health and Wealth Issues – 109
1946 to 1949
Getting Published: Continued Money Problems 114
George Weller to the Rescue: The Value of Networking 116
From Stoush to History War: Taking Sides and Cold War Issues 122
The Politics of Publication 132
‘Birds of a Feather Flock Together’: The Paul Seabury Eulogy 134
Summary 136
CHAPTERFOUR
Herbert Rutledge Southworth: Defender of the Spanish 139
Republic from Cold War Revisionism
Catching the Spanish Bug: In the Service of the Republic 147
World War II: Getting Down to Business 149
The Historian Takes Shape 152
The Southworth Corpus 155
The Southworth Reputation: Reality and Myth 158
Cold War Political Pressure 165
Southworth: Historian at Work 166
Summary 171
Conclusion 173
Notes 181
Bibliography 263
Index 286
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The Cañada Blanch Centre for
Contemporary Spanish Studies
In the 1960s, the most important initiative in the cultural and academic rela-
tions between Spain and the United Kingdom was launched by a Valencian
fruit importer in London. The creation by Vicente Cañada Blanch of the
Anglo-Spanish Cultural Foundation has subsequently benefited large numbers
of Spanish and British scholars at various levels. Thanks to the generosity of
Vicente Cañada Blanch, thousands of Spanish schoolchildren have been
educated at the secondary school in West London that bears his name. At the
same time, many British and Spanish university students have benefited from
the exchange scholarships which fostered cultural and scientific exchanges
between the two countries. Some of the most important historical, artistic and
literary work on Spanish topics to be produced in Great Britain was initially
made possible by Cañada Blanch scholarships.
Vicente Cañada Blanch was, by inclination, a conservative. When his
Foundation was created, the Franco regime was still in the plenitude of its
power. Nevertheless, the keynote of the Foundation’s activities was always a
complete open-mindedness on political issues. This was reflected in the diver-
sity of research projects supported by the Foundation, many of which, in
Francoist Spain, would have been regarded as subversive. When the Dictator
died, Don Vicente was in his seventy-fifth year. In the two decades following
the death of the Dictator, although apparently indestructible, Don Vicente
was obliged to husband his energies. Increasingly, the work of the Foundation
was carried forward by Miguel Dols whose tireless and imaginative work in
London was matched in Spain by that of José María Coll Comín. They were
united in the Foundation’s spirit of open-minded commitment to fostering
research of high quality in pursuit of better Anglo-Spanish cultural relations.
Throughout the 1990s, thanks to them, the role of the Foundation grew
considerably.
In 1994, in collaboration with the London School of Economics, the
Foundation established the Príncipe de Asturias Chair of Contemporary
Spanish History and the Cañada Blanch Centre for Contemporary Spanish
Studies. It is the particular task of the Cañada Blanch Centre for Contemporary
Spanish Studies to promote the understanding of twentieth-century Spain
through research and teaching of contemporary Spanish history, politics,