ABSTRACT
On July 3, the American battalions were making a long hike across the burnt plains north of Madrid. On the American national holiday they rested, were fed an extra large dinner, and received a double ration of chocolates and, for a change, American cigarettes. In the Washington Battalion, Harold Smith led the first squad of the first company across the stubbly Brunete plain. The American Internationals scooped hollows out of the hard ground, pressed themselves flat against the earth, and waited for the enemy to come. Once rebel infantry did charge down the slope in a counterattack, but Loyalist fire stopped them. In one sense the offensive was working too well, for Franco had shifted the German Condor Legion from the northern front to Brunete, and by now the Luftwaffe pilots had chased the Loyalist aircraft from the sky and were free to pound government infantry at will.
