Mariano Cruellas Maraña

Spanish anarchist, anarcho-syndicalist and anti-fascist fighter. Born into a family of small landowners in Fraga, Huesca who were part of the anarchist movement. One of the founders of the Jeunesses Libertaires (FIJL) in Fraga, during the war he was a Milicien in the Roja y Negra column, fighting on the Huesca front where, after a failed attack and a confrontation with the Stalinists, his unit was dissolved and he left the front. Exiled in France with his wife Salvadora Serveto (born circa 1917 in Fraga, who died in November 1992 in Perpignan), he first fought in the Résistance in Perpignan and eventually emigrated to Venezuela, where he participate at the core of the CNT in Caracas. After having started a small buisiness with a number of employees, the CNT decided in the 1960s to excluded from the organisation. Told of the decision, Mariano Cruelas said that the union could remove his membership but they would never remove the CNT, which he had been a member of since 15 years old, from his heart. died in Caracas