The Legendary Commander Robert Merriman

In April 1938, at the end of the retreat from Aragon, American commander Robert Merriman of the International Brigades disappeared without a trace near Corbera d’Ebre (Tarragona) while attempting to cross enemy lines at the head of his men from the Lincoln Battalion. A few weeks earlier, in Alcorisa (Teruel), he had been forced to abandon his suitcase, which contained personal letters, photographs and important documents. Now, almost ninety years later, the discovery of this material has enabled the authors to reconstruct a story that seemed lost forever.

The young professor Robert Merriman was the original inspiration for Robert Jordan, the protagonist of For Whom the Bell Tolls, the celebrated novel by Ernest Hemingway. The Nobel Prize-winning author met him while working as a war correspondent in Spain and, together with John Dos Passos, another of America's great writers, developed a close relationship with Merriman that led them to collaborate on a radio programme broadcast from Madrid to the United States.

Fernando and Javier Pérez Gómez reveal the truth behind one of the most enigmatic figures of the Spanish Civil War. Born in California, Merriman was not only a volunteer in the International Brigades, but also a multifaceted man: an idealist, a leader and a figure marked by contradictions. A man who embodied the complexities of the turbulent era in which he lived.