Teruel, war-torn region

survival strategies, death, and community reconstruction in the post-war period, 1938-1953

Abstract

The south-western half of Teruel province is an exceptional space for understanding the particularities of postwars in territories devastated by modern wars. The tools provided by social and cultural history of war allow us to understand how the population both in the capital and its hinterland faced a major humanitarian crisis during the decade after the Battle of Teruel. This critical situation was directly related to the effects of war itself and was exacerbated by the broader state-building process of the Francoist regime and its policies. The article analyses documentation generated by provincial courts and the correspondence between the provincial governor and various state agencies, combining it with testimonies of contemporary witnesses. This highlights how the process of community reconstruction took place and which kind of strategies were implemented by ordinary people in order to survive. All of this places us before the socioeconomic consequences of war in Teruel: soil pollution, cluster bomb accidents, child labor, extreme poverty, burglaries and thefts, lack of public safety, abuses of authority and disobedience, social exclusion, suicides, and mental illnesses.