Alfonsina Bueno
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2022}}
{{family name hatnote|Bueno|Vela|lang=Spanish}}
{{Infobox military person
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|name = Alfonsina Bueno
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|birth_name = Alfonsina Bueno Vela
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|birth_date = {{birth date|1915|01|26|df=y}}
|birth_place = Moros, Zaragoza, Spain
|death_date = {{death date and age|1979|01|03|1915|01|26|df=y}}
|death_place = Tolosa, Occitania, France
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|allegiance = {{flagicon image|Flag of Free France (1940-1944).svg}} Free France
|branch = {{flagicon image|Flag of Free France (1940-1944).svg}} French Resistance
|branch_label = Service
|serviceyears = 1941–1943
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|unit = {{flagicon image|Bandera_CNT-FAI.svg}} Ponzán group
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|battles = World War II
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|spouse = {{interlanguage link|Josep Ester i Borràs|ca}}
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Alfonsina Bueno Vela (1915–1979) was a Spanish activist who joined the French Resistance in 1941 and became part of the Ponzán group. With her husband {{interlanguage link|Josep Ester i Borràs|ca}} and daughter Angelina she ran a house helping airmen on escape lines. After being arrested by the Gestapo, she was deported to Ravensbrück concentration camp in Germany, under the Nacht und Nebel directive. Nazi doctors performed medical experiments upon her without her consent. Bueno's work in the resistance movement was celebrated by the British, French and US governments.
Early life
Bueno was born on 26 January 1915 in Moros, in Aragon.{{cite news |last1=Izagirre |first1=Iker Gonzalez |title=Elisa Garrido, Alfonsina Bueno, Lise London: tres antifascistas aragonesas que sobrevivieron al infierno nazi |url=https://arainfo.org/elisa-garrido-alfonsina-bueno-lise-london-tres-antifascistas-aragonesas-que-sobrevivieron-al-infierno-nazi/ |access-date=16 December 2022 |work=AraInfo |date=11 September 2021 |language=es}} Her family moved to Berga when she was young. She found employment in a spinning mill where she met her husband {{interlanguage link|Josep Ester Borràs|ca}}, an anarchist from Lleida. Together they had one child.{{cite journal |last1=Celaya |first1=Diego Gaspar |title=Au combat sans armes |journal=Cahiers d'histoire. Revue d'histoire critique |date=2019 |issue=141 |pages=37–55 |doi=10.4000/chrhc.9721 |s2cid=199050191 |url=https://journals.openedition.org/chrhc/9721 |language=fr |issn=1271-6669|doi-access=free }}
Resistance movement
After World War II started, Bueno joined the French Resistance in 1941 and became part of the Ponzán group. With her daughter Angelina, she ran a house in Banyuls-sur-Mer, in France, which hosted maquis and helped airmen flee France and return to England with the help of the Pat O'Leary Line, an escape line. After the house came to the attention of the Sicherheitspolizei, Bueno was arrested by the Gestapo in February 1943. Her husband was also arrested in October 1943.{{cite journal |last1=Balent |first1=Andreu |title=Josep Ester i altres bergadans agents de les xarxes pirinenques d'evasió a la Cerdanya i al Rosselló durant la II Guerra Mundial |journal=L'Erol: Revista cultural del Berguedà |date=2015 |issue=123 |pages=15–18 |url=https://www.raco.cat/index.php/Erol/article/view/295005/387670 |issn=2385-3492}} He was imprisoned in Toulouse and then Paris, where he was tortured. Bueno was first imprisoned in Toulouse then in May 1944 was deported to Ravensbrück concentration camp in Germany, under the Nacht und Nebel directive, which was designed to punish political prisoners. At Ravensbrück, Nazi doctors performed medical experiments upon her without her consent. In an experiment performed under gynecologist Carl Clauberg, she was injected via the vagina with a caustic yellow liquid which burnt her skin as it dripped on her legs. Other women died from the procedure.{{cite journal |last1=Orquín |first1=Amalia Rosado |title=La cosificación de las mujeres como instrumento de una ideología perversa: los cuerpos del fascismo / The Reification of Women as An Instrument of a Perverse Ideology: the Bodies of Fascism |journal=Asparkía. Investigació feminista |date=2018 |issue=33 |pages=185–204 |doi=10.6035/Asparkia.2018.33.11 |url=http://www.e-revistes.uji.es/index.php/asparkia/article/view/3302 |language=es |issn=2340-4795|doi-access=free |hdl=10234/181052 |hdl-access=free }}
The liberation of [[Mauthausen concentration camp in May 1945. The banner reads "Spanish anti-fascists salute the liberating forces" |alt=A US Army tank is surrounded by concentration camp survivors|thumb|right]]
She was moved to Mauthausen concentration camp in March 1945, where she was reunited with her husband and freed in May 1945. The wartime torture meant that Bueno was unable to bear any more children and left her in bad health. She later parted from her husband because he wanted to expose the truth about the experiments and she wanted to forget about them. She died in Toulouse in 1979.
Legacy
Bueno's work in the resistance movement was celebrated by the British, French and US governments.{{cite journal |last1=Celaya |first1=Diego Gaspar |title=Resistencia, Deportación y Políticas de la memoria. Españoles en Francia (1940–1945) [Resistance, deportation and memory policies. Spaniards in France (1940–1945)] |journal=Hispania Nova: Primera Revista de Historia Contemporánea on-line en castellano. Segunda Época |date=2019 |pages=66 |doi=10.20318/hn.2019.4721|s2cid=159166094 |doi-access=free }} The book Noche y niebla en los campos nazis, written by {{interlanguage link|Mónica G. Álvarez|es}}, records the internment experiences of Bueno and ten other women, including Elisa Garrido and Lise London. A mural in Berga commemorates Bueno's life.{{cite news |title=La historia de tres aragonesas que sobrevivieron a los campos nazis |url=https://www.lainformacion.com/asuntos-sociales/historia-tres-aragonesas-sobrevivieron-campos-nazis/2848713/ |access-date=16 December 2022 |work=La Información |date=12 September 2021 |language=es}}