Josep Lluis Facerias, The "Face" of the Anti-Franco Resistance

Born in 1920, Josep Lluís I Facerias, nicknamed “Face”, was an important part of the resistance against a Francoist Spain. At the beginning of the civil war, Face was already part of National Confederation of Labor (CNT) and to the Iberian Federation of Libertarian Youth (FIJL), both avid anarcho-syndicalist organizations, fighting alongside other Spanish revolutionaries like Buenaventura Durruti. However, toward the end of the battles in Catalonia, Face was taken prisoner. Until his release in 1945, he was moved between multiple concentration camps. Upon his release, he immediately rejoined the CNT and other anarchist groups in his native Barcelona.  In 1946 he became Defense Secretary of the Regional Committee of Catalonia and the Balearic Islands by the FIJL and soon thereafter came under government surveillance. Within four months, he and thirty-eight of his comrades were taken into prison by Spanish police and held for ten months before they were finally released. It was after this that Facerias decided to continue his resistance, then taking up arms against the increasingly tyrannical Francoist regime. He briefly joined the MLR (Libertarian Resistance Movement) before it dissolved in 1948. He continued to organize and build resistance against Francisco Franco for almost another decade. On August 30, 1957, was to meet with several comrades in the Saint Andreu district. But before his arrival, his comrades were all arrested and taken into custody by Spanish authorities. When Facerias arrived at the rendezvous, he was met with authorities and was immediately shot multiple times. Facerias tried to jump down into a trench while pulling a grenade from the pocket of his jacket but was fatally shot a final time before detonating the device. He was 37 years old at the time of his assassination.