The story of this place
In November 1936 Franco's columns reached the western edge of Madrid at the newly built University City, expecting to take the capital in days. Instead they met fierce resistance—militia, International Brigades and the cry 'No pasarán!'—and the front froze here for the rest of the war. Fighting raged room to room through faculty buildings; the Clinical Hospital changed hands amid rumours of bombs hidden in elevators, and combatants used barricades of books. Madrid held out under siege and bombardment until March 1939, one of the longest defences of the war. Bullet-scarred buildings and a triumphal arch Franco later raised still mark the campus.