\l‘x.,take precautions from saboteurs. Fragments of rolling stock lay
along the railway, mute evidence of air attacks‘. Several Internae

 

 

t'onals coming through ahead of us had been poisoned.

‘L To avoid any incidents we were formed into groups of
t elve with military and political leaders to each group. There
w re seven political commissars inour car. I was elected chair»
ma. We placed‘ guards at each door so as to intercept any
fasclist agents who might try to board the train. Train" men comr
inglon duty had to be “O.K.d” by us. We stopped a Portuguese
soldier from joining us until we were satisfied that his papers
were in order. He had deserted from the Portuguese Army; to
]O1I1 us.

g No Training

We picked up another group of Canadians and Americans
in Valencia. Together we constituted more than half the strength
of the first North American combat unit. Our bunch was at
the base about two days before our marching orders arrived‘.

We were supposed to go to some camp for training but it
seemed that the fascist army was not waiting for us
to receive t r ai n i n g. They were hitting the Valencia«
Madrid road with everything they had in a desperate attempt to
cut this main artery to the Spanish capital. Our battalion, made
up of workers, ‘professionals, artists, who had never worked to»
gether as a unit, were given the task of filling in a gap on the
Jarama Sector.

February 15th was a bad day. The fascists attacked and we
had not built our trenches yet. Fierce fighting took place on
open ground. Not only did we hold our positions but we push’
ed them back in many places and began to builda system of
zigrzag trenches. This was how we got our training. During

the lull our commander ordered us to fire at a soft embankment

at -a two hundred metre range. This was to get the feel of our
rifles. MachinerGun Company Commander Seacord asked me

.__7_._