Identity card of the (garrotted) Spanish anarchist, Joaquín Delgado (1963)

Identity card of the (garrotted) Spanish anarchist, Joaquín Delgado (1963)

Stuart Christie (2011): 'Grand Orient de France identity card of 29-year-old anarchist cabinet-maker Joaquín Delgado Martínez, garroted (with fellow anarchist Francisco Granado) in Madrid’s Carabanchel Prison at 5.00 a.m. on 17 August 1963, the 24th year of Franco’s ‘victory’. Both were innocent of the actions of which they had been convicted just four days earlier by a drumhead Francoist court-martial. (Those responsible were two other members of ‘Defensa Interior’, the anti-Francoist defence committee of the Libertarian Movement in Exile [CNT, FAI, FIJL] 25-year-old Antonio Martín Bellido and 20-year-old Sergio Hernández, both of whom had returned to France.). The Grand Orient de France (GODF) is the largest Masonic organisation in France and the oldest in Continental Europe. It was formed out of the older Grand Lodge of France in 1773, which allows it to date its foundation to 1728 or 1733. It is generally considered to be the mother lodge of traditional Liberal, or Continental Freemasonry, the defining features of which are complete freedom of religious conscience (although largely anti-Church/anti-clerical) and active involvement in politics which is why it was attractive to many anarchists, libertarians and socialists in France, Spain (Gran Oriente Español) and Italy (Grande Oriente d'Italia)'.