A document that can change a life. This is what numerous children and grandchildren of Spanish exiles from the Civil War are looking for to process Spanish nationality within the framework of the new Democratic Memory law, known as the law of grandchildren. A requirement is to have the literal birth certificate of your ancestor issued by the Civil Registry, but sometimes this information is not preserved because it was burned during the war or it is not available on the dates prior to the launch of the registry itself. , in 1871. One door that applicants knock on is the parish archives since in the absence of this document they can use the baptismal certificate, accompanied by a negative certification from the Civil Registry indicating that the birth certificate is not preserved.
Given the growing demand for petitions on this issue, some parish archives have even been strengthened with the help of volunteers. In the case of the Diocesan Archive of Barcelona, ??located in the episcopal palace in the Gòtic neighborhood, the impact of the grandchildren law has been noted. Before this regulation, approved two years ago, they received less than a dozen requests per month to obtain the baptism certificate, while from November 2022 to the end of February 2024 they have responded to 1,280 emails – an average of about 90 per month – asking for this document from their ancestors to benefit from the new legislation. “We try to do what we can. We ask applicants questions so they know where they can look for information and if we can help them. It’s not a yes or no answer. We don’t have everything computerized, it is a kind of artisanal work,” highlights Joana Alarcón, director of the Diocesan Archive of Barcelona.
Regarding nationalities, the majority of the petitioners come from South American countries, especially Argentina, but also from Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil or Mexico. To a lesser extent, there are South Americans residing in the United States and other European countries. According to sources from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as a result of the new regulations, 226,354 applications have been received since 2022, of which 110,540 have already been approved, as of December 31, 2023. Although the deadline to carry out the procedures via of the grandchildren law was initially set to expire this October, the Government has announced that it will extend it for another year.
Until now, the staff of the Diocesan Archive of Barcelona has helped as much as they can and has encountered very diverse cases. For example, some applicants have a copy or baptismal certificate issued by the parish before the Civil War, but with such bad luck that the church archive has been burned so the original papers do not exist. In this situation, the vicar general can restore by decree a baptismal certificate lost during the war. In this sense, the Diocesan Archive of Barcelona houses part of the documentation of some churches saved from burning during the war, such as Mare de Déu de Betlem, Sant Francesc de Paula, Sant Joan de Gràcia, Santa Maria de Gràcia, Sant Pere de les Puel·les, Santa Anna, Sant Just i Pastor or Santa Maria del Mar. In the book El martiri dels temples a la diocesi de Barcelona (1936-1939), written by the priest and diocesan archivist Josep M. Martí i Bonet, it is reported that after the war only 15% of the parish archives were preserved in their entirety.
Another way to find the required information is through marriage records, preserved in the archive since the 16th century. This is what has happened with a request more than 10,000 kilometers away and an ocean in between. Natalia, born in Argentina, learned a little over a year ago that her ancestor was Spanish. “On the Internet, in newspapers and in official bulletins, I managed to find out that she was a native of Barcelona, ??of Gràcia,” she details. Immediately, she sent an email to the Civil Registry to request her birth certificate and to the archbishopric of Barcelona for the baptismal certificate. They did not find the first document although they did have luck with the second. The Diocesan Archive of Barcelona managed to draw the thread from the marriage record of the Santa Maria de Gràcia parish and reach the baptism book, where the baptism certificate of her relative, born in 1895, is registered.
For others, the search continues. Enrique Magnani lives in Guatemala and is one of the grandchildren of the group known as the children of Morelia, a group of 456 minors, including war orphans and children of Republican combatants, who were transferred from Spain to Mexico by ship in 1937. Magnani knows that his grandfather was born in 1926 and in the archive they have located the marriage certificate of his great-grandparents, but he has not found the birth certificate, an essential requirement for the procedure. “The embassy doesn’t know how to support me and I find myself a little detained. “I have requested a hearing with the Barcelona municipal registry from a lawyer, but we have not received a response,” he laments.
Of the cases handled, the file has no record that they have yet been resolved as they are in process. It is not a simple or quick task. “Next year I have a turn to review my documentation and then another year of delay to find out if they accept my citizenship,” says Natalia. A long process for this Argentine that has made her discover her Barcelona roots.
