Valentin Gonzalez is a legendary killer, bandit and patriot who, under the nickname ''El Campesino" (The Peasant), fought savagely in the Spanish Civil War as a Loyalist division commander. He fled to Russia when Franco won, but his outspoken bluntness was unwelcome in the Soviet Union. He was put to work digging the Moscow subway, was jailed twice and escaped to France in 1948, reporting bitterly that of 6,000 "Spanish comrades'' in Russia, nearly 5,000 had been killed. His disgust with Communism did not diminish his hatred of Franco.
El Campesino set up camp in the Pyrenees, styling...
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