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hedjet's review
adventurous
dark
reflective
tense
medium-paced
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gun violence, War, and Violence
creechance's review
5.0
This was an excellent war memoir. It is very well written and never drags. It is also refreshing to get a story about the Spanish Civil War from the Nationalist perspective as so much of what I've always heard and read about the war was from the Republican side.
gingerreader99's review
2.0
2.5 stars. This is worth reading if simply for the perspective it gives but the author for no fault of his own produces a painfully biased perspective. Y'know because he's fighting for Fascists. Reading between the lines makes things particular obvious the rose colored glasses Kemp is using while writing this account decades after it happens. Defining men he served alongside during the war as "good hearted" or "good natured" despite them gunning down men who had surrendered to them. Sure Kemp protested some of this but eventually accepts it (to my own disgust). Furthermore Kemp perhaps unknowingly demonizes the Republican side of the war while framing every encounter with people on the Nationalist side as being good and them being grateful for him fighting for their side. It should be noted and expected to be understood that both sides committed atrocities during the civil war. I couldn't help but notice that the majority of people he encountered we're either A) petty aristocrats in some form who very obviously would feel threatened by a communist government or B) peasants and volunteers who were likely serving for the Nationalists because wherever they were from supported that side first.
At the end of the day it's important to remember that Kemp willingly and happily volunteered to serve and fight for a Fascist regime and perhaps ironically would go on later to fight against one. I am glad this is again in print (other reviewers think leftists drove it from print to which I am thoroughly confused and laughed at) if only so that I could get this perspective of the war. I can't say I sympathize for the Nationalists however in any way shape or form and personally I agree with the father at the start of Kemp's story who tried to convince Kemp to not fight at all.
At the end of the day it's important to remember that Kemp willingly and happily volunteered to serve and fight for a Fascist regime and perhaps ironically would go on later to fight against one. I am glad this is again in print (other reviewers think leftists drove it from print to which I am thoroughly confused and laughed at) if only so that I could get this perspective of the war. I can't say I sympathize for the Nationalists however in any way shape or form and personally I agree with the father at the start of Kemp's story who tried to convince Kemp to not fight at all.
scipio_africanus's review
5.0
A moving and interesting memoir of the Spanish Civil War by a young British man who joined up with the nationalists to fight the communist republicans of Spain in the 1930s. A mix of thrilling adventure and horrific brutal fighting. One hell of a read.
capital_letter's review
5.0
Great stuff. A few minor errors in the text but none bad enough to detract from the narrative.
evxstv's review
4.0
Very informative, I’ve rarely read anything from the Nationalist point of view. I do wish Kemp had included some of his reflections regarding his philosophy of war, his ideologies, but maybe I’m just being picky. Overall a pleasant and refreshing read.
komet2020's review against another edition
5.0
It was a little more than 2 weeks ago that I became aware of the book "Mine Were of Trouble." It is Peter Kemp's memoir detailing his experiences as a officer in the Nationalist Army during the Spanish Civil War. Kemp was a recent graduate of Cambridge University, where he had studied law, when the Spanish Civil War broke out in July 1936. It was a war in which the Republican government (a popularly elected leftist government which drew support from workers and the Communist Party) in Madrid was pitted against a coterie of high ranking Spanish Army officers who formed the Nationalist faction, which was dedicated to overthrowing the Republicans and putting Spain back on a more conservative and traditional footing.
Many people throughout the world were deeply moved by the events in Spain. Indeed, many of them flocked to join the Republicans. This led to the development of the International Brigades, who fought bravely in battle for the Republican government. Peter Kemp was among those foreigners who went to Spain to fight on behalf of the Nationalists. Kemp, who been a student member of the Conservative Party while at Cambridge, was a staunch anti-Communist who saw the war in Spain as a crusade against the expansion of Communism in Europe.
Most memoirs about the Spanish Civil War I've come across were written by men and women who sympathized with and supported the Republican government in Madrid. I felt as if I had struck gold when I found Peter Kemp's book because memoirs from foreigners who supported the Nationalists are scarcer than a needle in a haystack! So, my curiosity was deeply aroused and eagerly I read of Kemp's combat experiences with the Requetés militia and later with the Spanish Foreign Legion, an elite unit within the Spanish military.
What was surprising to me is that Kemp arrived in Spain in December 1936 knowing no Spanish. But within the next 3 years, he would acquire fluency in Spanish and become intimately connected with Spain through contacts with fellow soldiers and people who befriended him there, both Spanish and foreign. Indeed, Kemp would become an officer and would sustain grievous wounds in the summer of 1938 while leading a platoon in a major offensive launched by the Nationalists under General Francisco Franco, which - with an overwhelming number of aircraft, artillery, tanks, and troops - would shatter Republican defenses and bring about the cutting of Republican Spain in two. The success of this offensive would help hasten the end of the war, which resulted in a Nationalist victory in March 1939.
"MINE WERE OF TROUBLE" is a book I would highly recommend to anyone who has an interest in the Spanish Civil War, a conflict that was a dress rehearsal for the Second World War that would break out little more than 5 months after Nationalist forces entered Madrid in triumph. Kemp effectively conveys both the tensions and savagery of the war among Spaniards and foreigners alike. One particular tale Kemp related of his unit's having apprehended a deserter from the Republican side - an Irish seaman from Belfast who ended up marooned in Spain after he failed to meet up with his ship before it sailed away and for his pains, was impressed into the Republican Army - who only wanted out of the war and to return home. Well, let me just say that he was given an "out" by the Nationalists, but not what he or Kemp would have wished.
Many people throughout the world were deeply moved by the events in Spain. Indeed, many of them flocked to join the Republicans. This led to the development of the International Brigades, who fought bravely in battle for the Republican government. Peter Kemp was among those foreigners who went to Spain to fight on behalf of the Nationalists. Kemp, who been a student member of the Conservative Party while at Cambridge, was a staunch anti-Communist who saw the war in Spain as a crusade against the expansion of Communism in Europe.
Most memoirs about the Spanish Civil War I've come across were written by men and women who sympathized with and supported the Republican government in Madrid. I felt as if I had struck gold when I found Peter Kemp's book because memoirs from foreigners who supported the Nationalists are scarcer than a needle in a haystack! So, my curiosity was deeply aroused and eagerly I read of Kemp's combat experiences with the Requetés militia and later with the Spanish Foreign Legion, an elite unit within the Spanish military.
What was surprising to me is that Kemp arrived in Spain in December 1936 knowing no Spanish. But within the next 3 years, he would acquire fluency in Spanish and become intimately connected with Spain through contacts with fellow soldiers and people who befriended him there, both Spanish and foreign. Indeed, Kemp would become an officer and would sustain grievous wounds in the summer of 1938 while leading a platoon in a major offensive launched by the Nationalists under General Francisco Franco, which - with an overwhelming number of aircraft, artillery, tanks, and troops - would shatter Republican defenses and bring about the cutting of Republican Spain in two. The success of this offensive would help hasten the end of the war, which resulted in a Nationalist victory in March 1939.
"MINE WERE OF TROUBLE" is a book I would highly recommend to anyone who has an interest in the Spanish Civil War, a conflict that was a dress rehearsal for the Second World War that would break out little more than 5 months after Nationalist forces entered Madrid in triumph. Kemp effectively conveys both the tensions and savagery of the war among Spaniards and foreigners alike. One particular tale Kemp related of his unit's having apprehended a deserter from the Republican side - an Irish seaman from Belfast who ended up marooned in Spain after he failed to meet up with his ship before it sailed away and for his pains, was impressed into the Republican Army - who only wanted out of the war and to return home. Well, let me just say that he was given an "out" by the Nationalists, but not what he or Kemp would have wished.
peterseanesq's review
5.0
Mine Were of Trouble by Peter Kemp
Please give my review a helpful vote - https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R302C4AF5LJ8LJ?ref=pf_ov_at_pdctrvw_srp
This is a most unusual book. It recounts the experiences of Peter Kemp, a young British man who like many went to Spain during the Spanish Civil War to fight for civilization. While there are probably many similar books - George Orwell's "Homage to Catalonia" was one such book - Kemp's book is different in that he decides to fight on the side of the Nationalists, i.e., the "fascists."
This perspective alone is worth the price of the book. The books I've read have all been written from the perspective of the Leftist Republicans where the bestiality and depravity of the Naitonalists has been an assumed fact. Aside from the partisan bias, these books shortchange the Nationalist side. In "The Spanish Civil War: A Very Short Introduction," for example, the author doesn't bother to explain what the "Carlists" were and where they came from.
Kemp's book makes up for this almost immediately by describing the Carlists and the Requetes forces, the history of the Carlist Wars, and other details. More importantly, he humanizes the Nationalists by showing them as human beings with motivations other than hatred and evil.
Kemp was around 22 and had recently graduated from university. He had been involved with the Conservative Union at university. Kemp's explanation for joining the Nationalists was (a) he thought he could use the seasoning of military action and (b) there was no way that he would fight for the left. The book does not reveal any interest in fascism or fascist politics on the part of Kemp. Similarly, Kemp is clearly opposed to Communism, but we don't hear vituperative condemnations of Communism from him.
Kemp entered Spain under the guise of a journalist. Once there he joined the Carlist Requetes as a soldier and was subsequently commissioned. Then, after discerning that he would get more experience as a Spanish Legionary, he transferred to the Spanish Legion. He describes the military actions he was involved in, and these descriptions make for some tense and fascinating reading.
Kemp comes across as a likable and dependable person. His narrative recounts how he was assisted in his various movements by people he met. He gives thumbnail sketches of the various soldiers he met and towns he visited along the way and the positive way he describes those people and places creates a picture in our own mind of Kemp being a positive and enthusiastic person.
We also get an inside look at the realities of the Spanish Civil War. The sense we get is that the Nationalists had substantial popular support among peasants and villages. This undoubtedly reflects that Kemp was on the winning Nationalist side and the villages captured by the Nationalists would hardly have indicated support for the Republic. However, Kemp's description of the starving and cowed village people suggests that the Republicans were not winning the hearts and minds of the Catholic peasants.
Kemp honestly admits to war crimes among the Nationalists. Captured International Brigade soldiers were shot out of hand by the Nationalists. These forces were particularly hated on the grounds that their intervention extended the destructive war to the injury of Spain. Kemp was ordered to execute a captured British Intenational Brigade member, which he does. Kemp's narrative speaks to his own emotional turmoil. On the other hand, Kemp notes that Republican forces were far more likely to kill Nationalist prisoners:
//Certainly the execution of prisoners was one of the ugliest aspects of the Civil War, and both sides were guilty of it in the early months. There were two main reasons for this: first, the belief, firmly held by each side, that the others were traitors to their country and enemies of humanity who fully deserved death; secondly, the fear of each side that unless they exterminated their adversaries these would rise again and destroy them. But it is a fact, observed by me personally, that as the war developed the Nationalists tended more and more to spare their prisoners, except those of the International Brigades: so that when, in 1938, the Non-Intervention Commission began to arrange exchanges of prisoners of war, they found large numbers of Republicans held by the Nationalists, but scarcely any Nationalist soldiers in Republican prison camps.//
Kemp fought with Italian and German forces. While, apparently, there is a myth that Russia only provided "humanitarian aid," Kemp notes:
//The Russians did for the Republicans roughly what the Germans did for the Nationalists—they supplied technicians and war material of all kinds. In return they exacted a far greater measure of control over Republican policy and strategy than the Germans were able to obtain from Franco; the price of Russian co-operation was Russian direction of the war and the complete domination by the Communist Party of all Republican political and military organizations.//
One interesting bit of social history is how small the world seemed in 1938. Amazingly, Kemp would run into people he knew from college or who knew his friends. One of the most tantalizing bits is found in this passage:
//The New Year opened sadly for me. On January 31st a Press car containing four friends of mine—Dick Sheepshanks, Kim Philby, and two American correspondents, Eddie Neil and Bradish Johnson—was passing through the village of Caude, eight miles north-west of Teruel, during an enemy artillery bombardment, when a 12.40 cm. shell burst beside it. Sheepshanks and Johnson were killed outright. Neil died a few days later; Philby escaped with a wound in the head.//
So, Peter Kemp knew Kim Philby and Kim Philby was almost killed in the Spanish Civil War?!??!?!
Small world.
Kemp finishes his service for Spain was a meeting with Francisco Franco.
One thing worth contemplating is how the Spanish Civil War was also something of an English Civil War. Kemp fought against British members of the International Brigades. In England after the war, he often appeared at meetings with Republicans foreign volunteers, whom he would have been trying to kill in Spain. Within a year or two, of course, Kemp and those same men were fighting fascists for England.
This is a fascinating story told from a different viewpoint.
Please give my review a helpful vote - https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R302C4AF5LJ8LJ?ref=pf_ov_at_pdctrvw_srp
This is a most unusual book. It recounts the experiences of Peter Kemp, a young British man who like many went to Spain during the Spanish Civil War to fight for civilization. While there are probably many similar books - George Orwell's "Homage to Catalonia" was one such book - Kemp's book is different in that he decides to fight on the side of the Nationalists, i.e., the "fascists."
This perspective alone is worth the price of the book. The books I've read have all been written from the perspective of the Leftist Republicans where the bestiality and depravity of the Naitonalists has been an assumed fact. Aside from the partisan bias, these books shortchange the Nationalist side. In "The Spanish Civil War: A Very Short Introduction," for example, the author doesn't bother to explain what the "Carlists" were and where they came from.
Kemp's book makes up for this almost immediately by describing the Carlists and the Requetes forces, the history of the Carlist Wars, and other details. More importantly, he humanizes the Nationalists by showing them as human beings with motivations other than hatred and evil.
Kemp was around 22 and had recently graduated from university. He had been involved with the Conservative Union at university. Kemp's explanation for joining the Nationalists was (a) he thought he could use the seasoning of military action and (b) there was no way that he would fight for the left. The book does not reveal any interest in fascism or fascist politics on the part of Kemp. Similarly, Kemp is clearly opposed to Communism, but we don't hear vituperative condemnations of Communism from him.
Kemp entered Spain under the guise of a journalist. Once there he joined the Carlist Requetes as a soldier and was subsequently commissioned. Then, after discerning that he would get more experience as a Spanish Legionary, he transferred to the Spanish Legion. He describes the military actions he was involved in, and these descriptions make for some tense and fascinating reading.
Kemp comes across as a likable and dependable person. His narrative recounts how he was assisted in his various movements by people he met. He gives thumbnail sketches of the various soldiers he met and towns he visited along the way and the positive way he describes those people and places creates a picture in our own mind of Kemp being a positive and enthusiastic person.
We also get an inside look at the realities of the Spanish Civil War. The sense we get is that the Nationalists had substantial popular support among peasants and villages. This undoubtedly reflects that Kemp was on the winning Nationalist side and the villages captured by the Nationalists would hardly have indicated support for the Republic. However, Kemp's description of the starving and cowed village people suggests that the Republicans were not winning the hearts and minds of the Catholic peasants.
Kemp honestly admits to war crimes among the Nationalists. Captured International Brigade soldiers were shot out of hand by the Nationalists. These forces were particularly hated on the grounds that their intervention extended the destructive war to the injury of Spain. Kemp was ordered to execute a captured British Intenational Brigade member, which he does. Kemp's narrative speaks to his own emotional turmoil. On the other hand, Kemp notes that Republican forces were far more likely to kill Nationalist prisoners:
//Certainly the execution of prisoners was one of the ugliest aspects of the Civil War, and both sides were guilty of it in the early months. There were two main reasons for this: first, the belief, firmly held by each side, that the others were traitors to their country and enemies of humanity who fully deserved death; secondly, the fear of each side that unless they exterminated their adversaries these would rise again and destroy them. But it is a fact, observed by me personally, that as the war developed the Nationalists tended more and more to spare their prisoners, except those of the International Brigades: so that when, in 1938, the Non-Intervention Commission began to arrange exchanges of prisoners of war, they found large numbers of Republicans held by the Nationalists, but scarcely any Nationalist soldiers in Republican prison camps.//
Kemp fought with Italian and German forces. While, apparently, there is a myth that Russia only provided "humanitarian aid," Kemp notes:
//The Russians did for the Republicans roughly what the Germans did for the Nationalists—they supplied technicians and war material of all kinds. In return they exacted a far greater measure of control over Republican policy and strategy than the Germans were able to obtain from Franco; the price of Russian co-operation was Russian direction of the war and the complete domination by the Communist Party of all Republican political and military organizations.//
One interesting bit of social history is how small the world seemed in 1938. Amazingly, Kemp would run into people he knew from college or who knew his friends. One of the most tantalizing bits is found in this passage:
//The New Year opened sadly for me. On January 31st a Press car containing four friends of mine—Dick Sheepshanks, Kim Philby, and two American correspondents, Eddie Neil and Bradish Johnson—was passing through the village of Caude, eight miles north-west of Teruel, during an enemy artillery bombardment, when a 12.40 cm. shell burst beside it. Sheepshanks and Johnson were killed outright. Neil died a few days later; Philby escaped with a wound in the head.//
So, Peter Kemp knew Kim Philby and Kim Philby was almost killed in the Spanish Civil War?!??!?!
Small world.
Kemp finishes his service for Spain was a meeting with Francisco Franco.
One thing worth contemplating is how the Spanish Civil War was also something of an English Civil War. Kemp fought against British members of the International Brigades. In England after the war, he often appeared at meetings with Republicans foreign volunteers, whom he would have been trying to kill in Spain. Within a year or two, of course, Kemp and those same men were fighting fascists for England.
This is a fascinating story told from a different viewpoint.
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