IMPORTANT PASS

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 32, 6 August 1936, Page 9

IMPORTANT PASS

REPORTED CAPTURE

GOVERNMENT CLAIM

DAY OF FIERCE FIGHTING

(Received August 6, 10 a.m.) LONDON, August 5. 1 The latest claims by the Spanish Government are that it has captured the important pass of San Rafael, in the Guadarrama Mountains, where its forces bombed and destroyed 40 lorries, and that aeroplanes destroyed an insurgent battery at Palma. Reports from Madrid state that Government troops' forced the rebels from the San Rafael pass after a day of fierce fighting. The famous sanatorium was blown to pieces and the town littered with corpses. The police at Madrid rounded up Monarchists and Fascists and arrested 619 persons, including Senor Melquiades Alvarez, former President of the Cortes. COMPLAINT AGAINST CRWSEK. It is reported from Tangier that the German cargo steamer Sevilla complained by wireless to the cruiser Deutschland that the Spanish destroyer Almirante Valdes deliberately fired at her while unloading at Larache, several shells falling close by. A Gibraltar message reports that broadcasts from Lisbon and rebel stations state that Saragossa was heavily bombed by Government aeroplanes. The cathedral was damaged. The Spanish liner Cristobal Colon, which, when en route from New York to Vigo, was diverted to Southampton, passengers .being told that a rebel warship was searching for the vessel, received a radiogram from the Madrid Government instructing it to proceed to Havre and await further orders. The message expressed confidence in the captain. ■ , . ~ ROYALISTS TO FIGHT AS PRIVATES. A Lisbon message states that Prince Juan, youngest son of ex-King Alfonso, accompanied by Prince Joseph of Bavaria, is reported to have entered Spain through Navarra. Both were dressed in overalls and red caps, and

were en route for Burgos, the rebel headquarters. They lunched with aristocrats and entrained for Somosierra to fight as privates. General Mola, on learning of their arrival, sent a message of thanks..

Mr. C. Campbell Black, the English airman, left Burgos by car for Paris. It is understood that an aeroplane in which he flew to Lisbon was sold there.

The 34-year-old - former Austrian Archduchess Assunta' escaped from Barcelona in a man's clothes. She had cloistered herself as a nun in the Convent of Sainte Therese and when Red militia threatened to burn the building she and others managed to escape and got out of the country. After great trials she" reached Vienna.

The Archduchess Assunta is the seventh child of the Archduke Leopold Salvador. She was born in 1902.