Nov 23, 2025
Buenaventura Durruti's funeral.
seen from Türkiye
seen from Italy
seen from China
seen from Indonesia
seen from Indonesia
seen from Germany
seen from Indonesia
seen from Indonesia
seen from Poland
seen from Malaysia
seen from Malaysia
seen from Singapore
seen from France
seen from Norway
seen from China
seen from Vietnam
seen from Yemen
seen from Malaysia
seen from Germany
seen from Singapore
Buenaventura Durruti's funeral.
Buenaventura Durruti
There's this cliché that I think a lot of people on the left swallow whole, 'I believe people are good at heart' or something like that. And I think this comes from an uncomfortable cultural impulse to moralise things in a vacuum. I don't believe people are good, at heart or anywhere else; I believe rather that people have the capacity to do good. But I also believe in the capacity people have to do bad. People have to be organised and mobilised to achieve things, and not only are most people not organised or mobilised to do good (even things they themselves consider good), people are, in general, mobilised to do what we all recognise as bad. And, in general, this is not the fault of the people. Most of us rely on systems which are deeply harmful and exploitative just to survive within our own material conditions. It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism, after all. Some clichés are true. So we must be like seeds, and the people the soil; wherever we go we must take root and blossom. For the first step in doing good is to grasp things by the root. So let us sow a good harvest today, that tomorrow we may yield fruit. It is growing this very minute.
July 19, 1936: CNT and UGT called for a general strike against the fascist military coup. This marked the beginning of the Iberian revolution. ¡Viva La Anarquía! ¡Viva la Revolución!
(Esp) Llevamos un mundo nuevo en nuestros corazones, que sea mejor o no, dependerá de nuestras acciones.
(Eng) We carry a new world in our hearts, whether it is better or not will depend on our actions.
⭕ 20 November 1936: Rare video from Buenaventura Durruti's funeral in Barcelona attended by half a million anarchists
➡ Rare newsreel footage from José Buenaventura Durruti Dumange's (14 July 1896 – 20 November 1936) funeral in Barcelona, attended by more than half a million anarchists.
He died on 20 November 1936, at the age of 40, in a makeshift operating theatre set up in what was formerly the Ritz Hotel. The bullet was lodged in the heart; the diagnosis recorded was "death caused by pleural haemorrhage". The doctors wrote a report in which the path of the bullet and the character of the wound was recorded but not the calibre of the bullet, since no autopsy was performed to remove it.
His driver's gave the following testimonial about the events that lead to his death: "We passed a little group of hotels which are at the bottom of this avenue [Avenida de la Reina Victoria] and we turned towards the right. Arriving at the big street, we saw a group of militiamen coming towards us. Durruti thought it was some young men who were leaving the front. This area was completely destroyed by the bullets coming from the Clinical Hospital, which had been taken during these days by the Moors and which dominated all the environs. Durruti had me stop the car which I parked in the angle of one of those little hotels as a precaution. Durruti got out of the auto and went towards the militiamen. He asked them where they were going. As they didn't know what to say, he ordered them to return to the front. The militiamen obeyed and Durruti returned towards the car. The rain of bullets became stronger. From the vast red heap of the clinical hospital, the Moors and the Guardia Civil were shooting furiously. Reaching the door of the machine, Durruti collapsed, a bullet through his chest."
➡ It is we the workers who built these palaces and cities, here in Spain and in America and everywhere. We, the workers. We can build others to take their place. And better ones! We are not in the least afraid of ruins. We are going to inherit the earth. There is not the slightest doubt about that. The bourgeoisie might blast and ruin its own world before it leaves the stage of history. We carry a new world here, in our hearts. That world is growing in this minute.
- Buenaventura Durruti -
