Paul Preston - The Destruction of Guernica

Nevertheless, the horror undergone by those in Guernica on that market day can be gathered from the eyewitness account of Father Alberto Onaindía.

It was Monday and market day. We were passing near the railroad station when we heard a bomb explosion; it was followed immediately by two others. An airplane which was flying very low dropped its load and left, all in a few seconds. It was Guernica’s first war experience. The panic of the first moments shocked the inhabitants and the peasants come in to market. We observed a considerable excitement. We got out of the automobile and tried to find out what was happening and to calm the many women who were growing more nervous and excited. Minutes later other bombs fell near the Convent of the Madres Mercedarias and the people began to leave the streets and to hide in cellars and under shelters. There very soon appeared, as if coming from the sea, some eight heavy planes which dropped many bombs and behind them followed a veritable rain of incendiary bombs. For more than three hours there followed waves of bombers, of aeroplanes with incendiary bombs and of solitary machines which came down to two hundred metres to machine-gun the poor people who fled in fright. I did not know the mark of the aeroplanes, because I do not understand about such things.

For a long time we were at the exit of the town towards Munitibar and Marquina. The explosion of the bombs, the fires which were beginning to break out and the harassment of the machine-gunning planes forced us to take cover under trees, under house entrances, dropping to the ground in the field when we saw a plane approaching. There was no anti-aircraft defence, no defence of any kind, we were encircled and corralled by diabolic forces in pursuit of defenseless inhabitants. Through the streets wandered the animals brought to market, donkeys, pigs, chickens. In the midst of that conflagration we saw people who fled screaming, praying, or gesticulating against the attackers. We finally left the burning town, but when we saw approaching aeroplanes which would pass over us, we left the automobile and ran to hide under some trees. We sought the protection of a small stone bridge over a nearby stream, while a few metres away three bombs exploded raising a cloud of blinding dust. Someone left the highway and climbed into the wood. When calm returned, we found a woman dead, machine-gunned, and a young gudari

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