Spain’s search for Franco-era victims revives painful memories and hope for closure

Monday 10 November 2025 - 13:50

By: Dakir Madiha

Spain’s search for Franco-era victims revives painful memories and hope for closure

Across Spain, the few remaining children of those executed under Francisco Franco’s dictatorship are in a race against time. With more than 3,300 mass graves still scattered across the country, they hope to recover and identify the remains of their parents through DNA testing before their generation fades away.

At 88, María Jesús Ezquerra still dreams of burying her father beside her mother. Her father, Jesús Ezquerra, a 38-year-old laborer and Socialist councillor, was arrested and executed in Aragón shortly after the 1936 nationalist coup that plunged Spain into civil war. Two days later, he was buried in a mass grave in Ejea de los Caballeros alongside about 150 others.

Nearly nine decades later, exhumations have begun at the Ejea cemetery. María Jesús is one of the few surviving children of victims whose DNA may help identify the remains of her father.

A nation still haunted by its past

When General Francisco Franco seized power in 1939, his forces had crushed the Republican side, leaving Spain devastated. The regime honored its own dead while abandoning its opponents in unmarked graves. Fifty years after Franco’s death, on November 20, 1975, these graves remain an open wound in Spain’s collective memory.

The government led by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez estimates that more than 140,000 people remain missing from the Spanish Civil War, their bodies hidden in over 3,300 mass graves. The largest of these sites lies at the Valley of the Fallen near Madrid, a monumental complex where 33,000 victims from both sides were buried many without their families’ consent.

Franco himself was buried there until 2019, when his remains were exhumed and moved to a private family vault as part of a broader national reckoning with the dictatorship’s legacy.

The long path to identification

Although a 2022 law made the Spanish state responsible for exhumations, much of the work remains in the hands of local associations. One of them, the Asociación Memoria Histórica Batallón Cinco Villas, leads the project in Ejea de los Caballeros.

“We expect the work to last around two years. DNA testing takes time and significant resources,” said the group’s secretary, Javier Sumelzo.

Archaeologist Javier Ruiz, who heads the excavation, noted that Spain still lacks a unified national genetic database to identify victims. “Opening a grave and being unable to identify almost anyone is heartbreaking. Every year that passes makes it harder,” he said.

Government figures show that of the 9,000 bodies exhumed in the past five years, fewer than one percent have been identified and returned to their families.

Science and memory

Forensic archaeologists such as Cristina Sánchez work closely with relatives to collect any detail that might aid identification photos, medical traits, or personal memories. “Sometimes families tell us their loved one walked with a limp or wore glasses,” she explained. “But DNA testing is vital. Otherwise, you risk false hope.”

In Pinsoro, María Jesús’ daughter, Conchita García, believes these exhumations offer closure rather than reopening old wounds. “Recovering their remains allows us to say goodbye properly,” she said.

Nearby, cousins Ramon, Marivi, and Paquita recently reburied their grandfather, Eusebio Fenolle Miguel, killed in 1936. His remains were identified through DNA testing and placed beside his wife’s, covered with their wedding photo.

“It’s a relief,” Ramon said quietly. “You find someone you never met, but always loved.”