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Concept
La Nueve
Summary
The 9th Company of the Régiment de marche du Tchad, part of the French 2nd Armored Division (also known as Division Leclerc) was nicknamed La Nueve (Spanish for "the nine"). The company consisted of 160 men under French command, 146 of whom were Spanish republicans including many anarchists, and French soldiers. All had fought during the liberation of French North Africa, and later participated in the Liberation of France.
The 9th Company's most notable military accomplishment was its important role in the Liberation of Paris. Men of La Nueve were the first to enter the French capital on the evening of 24 August 1944, with half-tracks bearing the names of the Spanish Civil War battles of Teruel and Guadalajara, and accompanied by engineering personnel and three tanks, Montmirail, Champaubert and Romilly, from the 501e Régiment de chars de combat.
After the victory of the Nationalist faction of General Francisco Franco in the Spanish Civil War, many thousands of refugees, many of whom were exiled Spanish Republicans had fled from Spain to Metropolitan France or French North Africa.
On the eve of the Second World War, France compelled male foreigners between 20 and 48 years old and entitled to the right of asylum—including Spanish republican exiles—to serve in the French Army, or to work in agriculture or industry, or on French defensive works. The military options included enrolling in the French Foreign Legion or the Marching Regiments of Foreign Volunteers; as the Foreign Legion was associated with the Francoist Spanish Legion, most opted for the Foreign Volunteers. Returning to Spain was not a safe option.
On 22 June 1940, Nazi Germany imposed an armistice on France; part remained under control of the French Vichy government until Germany took over the whole country in November 1942.
Following Operation Torch, the Allied invasion of North Africa, on 8 November 1942, the Free French authorities based in Algeria created the Corps Francs d'Afrique.
Official source
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