Clandestine letters from a man condemned to death

Thursday, May 28, 2026

Nouvelle activité de mémoire qui invite à écouter et partager des récits et des expériences contribuant à restituer la dignité des personnes réprimées et à renforcer les valeurs de vérité, de justice et de réparation.

Last week, the forensic archaeologist from Girona, René Pacheco, spoke about how a mass grave is opened, invited by the Association for the Recovery of Historical Memory of Llagostera. Since 2008, Pacheco has worked on the research and exhumation of graves from the Spanish Civil War and the dictatorship across the country, as well as on the identification of people who disappeared during Franco's regime. He is currently working on the exhumation of two hundred sets of human remains claimed from the Valley of Cuelgamuros (formerly Valle de los Caídos).

The graves of the Civil War and Francoist repression are the central theme of the 8th Local Historical Memory Conference: Graves, Memory, Justice and Reparation, organized by the Museum of the Mediterranean in Torroella de Montgrí. And precisely for this reason, and within the framework of the activity series "Memory of a War in Girona" organized by the Girona History Museum, a new session of the itinerary "Clandestine Letters from a Man Condemned to Death" with Josep Casadellà Turon has been scheduled for this Saturday, May 30.

The route is based on the 35 writings that his grandfather, Josep Turon Mir, managed to send to his friend Josep Alsina during his 291 days of captivity in the "icebox" section of Girona prison, from February 25 to November 14, 1940. Alsina was also imprisoned there.Although both men were aware that they were risking their lives if the messages were intercepted, these valuable writings recount daily life in captivity and coexistence with fellow inmates.

The families of those executed probably never had the chance to know these experiences because of the censorship imposed on official correspondence. It is a moving testimony to the military tribunals and the harshness of imprisonment while awaiting execution under a death sentence.

The activity highlights how, following the entry of Franco's army, a vast apparatus of repression was put into motion through purges, political responsibility tribunals, confiscations, and summary military trials. This was the case, among many others, of Josep Turon Mir, local leader of the agricultural union Unió de Rabassaires in 1934 and mayor of Santa Coloma de Farners from September 9 to October 21, 1937, who was tried before a Military Tribunal in an Emergency Summary Proceeding, with the prosecution requesting the death penalty.