68. divize [1938-1939]

History of the division
It was re-formed on April 30, 1938 in Cabeza del Buey. Its purpose was to act as a shock force to reinforce the Levant front in the face of the unstoppable advance of Franco's forces on Castellón. After the training period, the three brigades traveled to the Levant by rail in nine long trains that departed from Cabeza del Buey and Almorchón stations in the first days of June. Once in Levante, the 68th Division set up its headquarters in a farmhouse on the outskirts of the town of Soneja in the province of Castellón .
The Castellón Front
Around 9 June, it occupied fighting positions in the Sierra de Borriol. For several days it resisted intense and continuous artillery bombardment, with more or less success, depending on the units. The 189th and 191st Brigades were severely damaged, although the 189th made a strong counterattack. The various battalions that made them up gradually withdrew to the rear as they were decimated, but one of them, made up mostly of anarchist elements, fortified itself and formed a small wedge about 4 km long and 1 km wide. However, the command decided to withdraw it, given the untenable situation. This withdrawal cost the battalion a large number of casualties. In the meantime, the less battered 190th Brigade was sent to the front line and assigned to the 6th Division. The 189th and 191st Brigades, had not had time to reinforce themselves or hardly get a rest, for they were ordered to move to the Onda sector as soon as the 17th. Brigade, particularly the Anarchist Battalion (which was numbered 756, originally from the 88th BM), made an intense attack on the hill known as Atalaya, north of Onda, succeeded in taking it and capturing a considerable number of weapons and ten prisoners. But this conquest was short-lived. The soldiers, exhausted by the intense march of the previous day (from Borriol to Onda, traversing the rear: 35 km almost without rest), fell asleep for the most part and were unable to prevent the enemy from retaking the hill. During the following hours, there were several attacks and counter-attacks, increasingly less intense, until General García-Valiño's forces took definitive control of the enclave. The aforementioned battalion was noticeably decimated and its commander, Antonio Elías, was killed in the attacks and later posthumously awarded the Medal of Valor. As soon as Onda, heroically defended by the so-called Extremadura Division, came under the control of the Francoist army on the 24th, the troops of the 68th Division took up positions in the Sierra de Espadán, in the vicinity of Onda to the south and south-west. of that locality. The chronicles report that it put up stiff resistance despite fierce attacks by Franco's artillery and aviation, leading to various assaults and counterattacks that made it impossible for the enemy to advance through its sector. The 189th, on the other hand, relieved the Extremadura Division, which continued to defend the front line, to the right of the 191st. The 189th's sector was the most critical defense because it included the area of the highway from Tales to Segorbe, a dangerous route of enemy penetration. On 3 July a strong Frankist attack on the road, coupled with a miscoordination with a battalion from the 205th Mixed Brigade, destroyed the Republican defenses and left the aforementioned road open to enemy tanks. The 68th Division Operations Command, however, through a good knowledge of the terrain, was able to regain control of the situation, locate units scattered during the night, and reestablish lines and contact with headquarters disrupted by the enemy attack. During these days the 190th Mixed Brigade temporarily returned to the control of the 68th Division, but immediately thereafter was placed under the control of the 15th Division. Next, the 189th and 191st Brigades were released to move to the Villamalur sector on the left, where they did not move from their positions until relieved by the 10th Division and withdrawn to the rear by the 9th to rebuild their units. The 68th Division's performance on this front was truly remarkable, and some scholars have even stated that just as the 68th Division's troops were in the front line, the Frankist forces in its touch clearly slowed their advance, or even halted it. The task of this division during those weeks was to hold back the enemy as much as possible in building the XYZ line and trying to buy as much time as possible. But the casualties were enormous. On 9 July 1938 this division was withdrawn from the front to rebuild its battered strength, but the rest period lasted only three days because the 68th Division had to rush to the Manzanera-Alcetas sector near Barracas. The division traveled to the area by rail, where it occupied its positions. But because it was flat terrain, they barely managed to hold off the enemy, and then had to withdraw to the XYZ line, which passed through the towns of Viver and Jérica. In this area they stood their ground well, in the midst of a fierce battle that lasted for several days, with both sides using many resources. The advance of the Frankists was completely halted here, the division being decorated for its outstanding performance, while both towns were completely destroyed after the battle. The 68th Division, already considerably weakened as a result of the losses and desertions of the previous days, and having achieved its objective of halting the enemy, finally withdrew to the rear on 21 July and established its headquarters at Macastre. From this point on the Levant front was generally stabilized.
The Extremadura Front
With the Levant front stabilized, the division was ordered to return to Extremadura in the face of Franco's sudden advance through the La Serena area, which bsad the towns of Don Benito, Villanueva de la Serena, and Castuera, among others. The Queipo de Llano troops, who continued to advance, and the surprised Republican troops, very poorly organised, were unable to stop them. Two brigades of the 68th Division left for Extremadura on 31 July in a long convoy of more than a hundred trucks under the command of their chief of operations, while the other commanders did so by car the following day. Once in the vicinity of Cabeza del Buey, they continued to reinforce the sector's defenses, in an utterly chaotic situation. Fighting continued for fifteen long days in the flat areas north of the city, and when these areas could not be defended, they fortified the mountains between Castuera and Cabeza del Buey and the Sierra de Torozo, where they resisted better, but the capture of Cabeza del Buey on 12 August was unavoidable. The towns of Peñalsordo and Zarza-Capilla, after these battles, were left in ruins due to the heavy action of the Frankist artillery. This advance was temporarily halted by the action of the commander of the Republican artillery, Pérez-Salas, but this was short-lived and the Frankist forces occupied the entire mountain range. It was helped by the fact that a battalion of the 191st Composite Division, was attacked by another Republican unit, composed of recently recruited engineers with little or no combat training, and then fled in disorder before the first enemy attack. Toward the end of August, however, there was a brilliant joint Republican attack by the 68th Division, along with two other divisions, which allowed the recovery of almost the entire line in the Sierra de Torozo and most of the plain north of Cabeza del Buey on the outskirts of Castuera and Campanario, including the towns of Peñalsordo and Zarza-Capilla. From then on, the front in this sector was stabilized, practically until the end of the war, with an enemy wedge in Republican territory known as the "Saliente de Cabeza del Buey" because this area was located at the end of this wedge. On the stabilized front, the 68th Division established its headquarters at a farmhouse on the outskirts of Belalcázar, and its units defending the front were located on the right bank of the Zújar River. At that time, the 194th Brigade was incorporated into the 68th Division. With these three brigades (189th, 191st and 194th) the 68th Division went through the war with hardly any changes. The sector was stable, affected only by minor skirmishes. In November 1938, the 68th Division moved to another sector and established its last headquarters in the village of Capilla and near Peñalsordo, deploying its units across the Extremeña plain, from near Campanario and Castuera, to Cabeza del Buey. The terrain was very uncomfortable. The most fortunate 191st Mixed Brigade which was deployed in the Sierra de Torozo, while the 194th Mixed Brigade occupied the westernmost area and the 189th Mixed Brigade was deployed north and northwest of Cabeza del Buey, covered an area of the front flatter and more difficult to defend. Access from the rear to the positions of these last two brigades was extremely precarious, since only one road was available for their resupply and eventual evacuation.
Battle of Valsequillo
In this battle, which began on 5 January, it was assigned the task of supporting the main attack, its deceptive assault on Castuera, which it carried out with its two reserve battalions plus an artillery battery. Faced with this action, the enemy fled their positions in disorder, but torrential rain that morning turned the ravines of the Guadalefra River (which marked the front line in this area) into torrents that the soldiers could not cross, several of whom drowned in the attempt. This fact caused the action to fail, for while the attacking forces waited in vain for several days for the weather to improve, the effect of the surprise attack had already passed and the Frankist troops returned to their positions, aided by the reaction of their artillery. Five days later the attack in this area was abandoned and the battalions returned in a sorry state, due to the intense rain they had endured outside for several days. This event caused severe demoralization in the troops. After this unsuccessful operation, Justo López Mejías was removed from the divisional command. The new commander was José Frías González-Mouvelles, also a communist, who had been in command of the 63rd Division until then. He was forced to leave his post immediately after the coup d'état of Colonel Segismundo Casado following the purges of communist commanders. He was replaced as division commander by Major Leandro Rodríguez Mota of the militia.
The end of the war and extinction.
On 25 March, the division received orders at its headquarters in Capilla to leave the front and move to the town of Siruela (about 30 km), where it would receive further instructions. They arrived in this town after a long night march. The new instructions were to continue the withdrawal to Piedrabuena, where they were to surrender their weapons. Amid great tension and numerous panic scenes (the officers had known for weeks that a surrender was being negotiated, but not the soldiers), the officers managed to get to Piedrabuena with the only three trucks they had, where their weapons and trucks were confiscated. The town was already in the hands of the Frankists, so the officers began to disperse to try to continue their escape or hide. Of the divisional headquarters, only its commander and chief of operations managed to reach Valencia on the 30th with great difficulty, and only the latter managed to board a French ship at Gandía on the way to exile, moments before Franco's army seized the port and has since prevented any more fugitives from boarding.


Source: es.wikipedia.org