Children preparing for evacuation from Spain, during the Spanish Civil War. From the estate of Olga Brocca Smith
In Spain, in the 1930s, the Republican government passed a law giving poor farmers the right to become land owners.
In 1936, the Nationalists, led by the fascist General Francisco Franco, began a revolution to topple the government.
The Nationalist's General Yagüe ordered the confinement of all 'prisoners' (most of them civilians) in the town's Bull Ring (Plaza de Toros) and that was where they were tortured and murdered.
Europe has known a number of massacres of civilians.
After the Nationalists had captured the town of Badajoz, around 4,000 civilians and others were rounded up and murdered by the Nationalists.
Serb family massacred by fascist Croatians in 1941
In 1941, in the village of Jedwabne in Poland, "local people, at the instigation of their German occupiers, drove more than 300 of their Jewish neighbours into a barn and set it on fire, killing them all."
In 1941, the Croation government set up the Jasenovac extermination camp.
Up to 800,000 people died in the camp.
The majority of the victims were Serbs.
Gypsies and Jews were also victims.
In the village of Radzilow, as many as a thousand Jews were killed, probably by Poles, in a crime that is still being investigated by Polish prosecutors.
"Terrible things happened there. They cut a girl's head off and played football with it."
There were other similar massacres in Poland.
"Poland had Europe's largest prewar Jewish community - 3m people in 1939 - while now there are only about 20,000."
Massacre haunts Polish history - FT.com
Massacre haunts Polish history - FT.com