take precautions from saboteurs. Fragments of rolling stock lay 
along the railway, mute evidence of air attacks. Several Interna-
tionals coming through ahead of us had been poisoned.

To avoid any incidents we were formed into groups of 
twelve with military and political leaders to each group. There 
were seven political commissars in our car. I was elected chair-
man. We placed guards at each door so as to intercept any 
fascist agents who might try to board the train. Train men com-
ing on 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 
join us.

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 had to take precautions from air raids and we had to 
prepared camp but it seemed that the fascist army was not wait-
ing for us to receive training. 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 sectors and began to build a system of 
zig-zag 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. Machine-Gun Company Commander Seacord asked me

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