No Pasaran!
The Battle for Madrid

The battle cry for the Republican Army was born on 18 July 1936, when chief propagandist Dolores Ibarruri closed a radio address with the immortal words, "No Pasaran!" (They shall not pass!) And ignited the populous.

A former seamstress, La Pasionaria rose through the ranks of the Basque Communist Party through a self-sacrificing faith in the common man and a profound motherliness. Loved for these maternal qualities, the masses look to "The Passionate One" as a sort of saint who will carry them through the dark days of trial and adversity that lay ahead.

One such devotee is fellow Basque Pilaria Fajardo, 18 An unflailing communist bent on vengeance, the fiery inserecta is a survivor of the Guernica bombings that razed the town and left her orphaned.

Pilaria will do anything to rid Spain of the Germans, and through Ibarruri, aids Elsa and Papa in the mission at hand.

In the course of her "assignment" Elsa witnesses her subject's lethal professionalism and learns of the foreboding offensive against Gibraltar.

The operative must warn the British Consulate, but she and Pilaria are caught in a crossfire between Madrid's citizen militia and Franco's assaulting Nationalist machine.

In the ensuing chaos, the women are separated and our agent takes up arms alongside the city's defenders. Elsa is bloodied in vicious street fighting but the Nationalists are beaten back once again. But the price paid by Madrid's children is high and in this battle of attrition, Elsa wonders if the Capital can hold much longer.

The Anarchist Pablo Garcia

In the aftermath of battle, it is evident that chilling war atrocities occur on both sides of the line. A physician attending to her wounds discovers Elsa's nazi party pin. She is immediately stripped and dragged into the streets as anarchist gunmen, unceremoniously execute wounded and captured Nationals in a macabre spectacle of inhumanity.

On the orders of the anarchist leader Pablo Garcia, Elsa is beaten, groped and tied to a pole. The insidious Garcia nails the party pin to her chest, abhorrently spits in her face and calls forward a firing squad...

Victoria Cross