This was November 1936. Kemp offers a thumbnail sketch of the first four months of the Civil War, which had passed by the time he arrived. At this point, Francisco Franco had not yet assumed supreme command, nor had he amalgamated the different political factions of the Nationalists under his personal control. As a result, the Nationalist military was organized in a fragmented and ad hoc manner. (The Republican military was too, but the Nationalists were much better as the war progressed at welding together the disparate components of their forces, helped by not being subject to the Moscow-directed purging that bled the Republicans.) The core of the Nationalist fighting forces was the Army of Africa, consisting of most of Spain’s land forces that actually had experience fighting. One part of this was the Spanish Foreign Legion (which meant Spaniards fighting abroad, in Africa; it was not a collective of foreigners, like the French Foreign Legion). The other was native Moroccans, the Regulares. Two political parties also raised separate forces. The first was the Carlists, one branch of the Spanish monarchists (favoring a king other than Alfonso XIII, who had resigned in 1931 to avoid the civil war being fomented by the Left). The Carlists were dominant in the north of Spain, in Navarre and the Basque provinces, and were old-fashioned, happy to die for King and country. The second was the Falange, the small Spanish fascist political party, who had little in common politically with the Carlists (and in fact in later years squabbled violently with the Carlists). Franco, of course, was not a fascist or a member of the Falange; most Nationalist military officers were not political. After the Spanish Civil War, he had some World War II adventures as a member of the British Special Operations Executive. His missions took him to Albania, Poland, and occupied France. He was imprisoned by the Soviets, and went to Asia, where he spent some time running guns for the French in Laos. He was, in other words, an adventurer. I’d like to express the (perhaps) unpopular opinion that Mine Were of Trouble is a better book than Homage to Catalonia. Mainly, because Kemp saw a lot more action than Orwell. On a few occasions, Kemp describes meeting the people in the towns they win from the Reds, who are apparently overjoyed to see Nationalist soldiers taking over the city. This doesn’t fit with the standard good guy vs bad guy story very well, but it may have been true. It’s also possible that non-combatants who were sympathetic with the nationalist side at the time later had decades to change their minds. Or that people will be polite to whoever happens to be marching through their town with a lot of guns. This is a very readable and important book. It is practically the only account we have of the Spanish Civil War told by an Englishman who was fighting on the Nationalist/Fascist rather than the Loyalist/Republican side. It serves as a mirror-image of George Orwell's A HOMAGE TO CATALONIA, and gives a fascinating and curiously even-handed account of the war. There is bias, of course, but the author tries hard to be fair and critical, and succeeds, I think, more than Orwell did in seeing a certain amount of virtue as well as a certain amount of villainy in both sides.

Mine Were of Trouble (Peter Kemp) • The Worthy House Mine Were of Trouble (Peter Kemp) • The Worthy House

One thing worth contemplating is how the Spanish Civil War was also something of an English Civil War. Kemp fought against British members of the International Brigades. In England after the war, he often appeared at meetings with Republicans foreign volunteers, whom he would have been trying to kill in Spain. Within a year or two, of course, Kemp and those same men were fighting fascists for England. Knowing what we now know about the situation of the Soviet Union during those years, this seems very doubtful. It could have been far worse if the Soviets had won.

Open Library

Kemp was around 22 and had recently graduated from university. He had been involved with the Conservative Union at university. Kemp's explanation for joining the Nationalists was (a) he thought he could use the seasoning of military action and (b) there was no way that he would fight for the left. The book does not reveal any interest in fascism or fascist politics on the part of Kemp. Similarly, Kemp is clearly opposed to Communism, but we don't hear vituperative condemnations of Communism from him. This is arguably one of the most interesting, thrilling, and charming books I have ever read, and most certainly is a contender for my favourite of the year. The author, Peter Kemp, has a superb skill for structure, detail, and storytelling that makes it extremely difficult to put this book down. It gives you just enough detail to help you understand the situations he was in without being too heavy-handed and boring. At some moments, 'Mine Were of Trouble' reads almost like an adventure book; not because the events are so unbelievable, but because of the great lengths the author went to describe the acts of heroism and horror he saw in real life. Soft cover. Condition: New. Peter Kemp War Trilogy - VOL. #1 Mine Were of Trouble: A Nationalist Account of the Spanish Civil War; VOL. #2 Alms for Oblivion: Sunset on the Pacific War: VOL. #3 No Colours or Crest: The Secret Struggle for Europe.

Quote by A.E. Housman: “I to my perils Of cheat and charmer

The overwhelming majority of people who have read anything about the Spanish Civil War written by one who participated have read Hemingway or Orwell. Almost nobody reads anything written by anyone who served on the Nationalist side. This excellent memoir is essential reading for anyone with an interest in the conflict who wants to get a view from what was after all the winning side. In the case of the Spanish Civil War the old saying about history being written by the victors is of course stood on its head: almost everything we have, at least in English, is written by the losers. By publishing your document, the content will be optimally indexed by Google via AI and sorted into the right category for over 500 million ePaper readers on YUMPU.In other words, they say that the Civil War actually started before 1936, and it was the left who started it. In describing his motivations for joining the national side, he says that the political motive was of importance only in helping him choose which side to fight on. But then he adds: