Since a few months ago a group of common people of the Villa of Espinosa de los Monteros, joined by the interest of knowing more about the history of our ancestors and at the same time to announce the same one, we have proposed to investigate and to spread since like it is deserved a historical fact of which this year is fulfilled the bicentenary: the battle happened on the verge of the villa between Spanish and French Armies two cold days of November in 1808.

It is not our intention to interfere in the work of learned historians nor, as it is the opinion among some of our neighbours, to celebrate a lost battle; it is rather to put in value a series of events and vicissitudes that 200 years ago approximately 50.000 poor devils suffered in our land frozen stiff, tired, hungry, in a nature that was appeared them hostile, but though fighting for their ideals, whom we do not want to value; we do not want to do a “movie” of good and bad, of ” patriots and frogs “, but to show the human side of those wars (and possibly of all the wars), where there showed the best and worst feelings and attitudes of human nature.

To get this purpose, we possess a document that seems exceptionally: the story of an exceptional witness who knows everything that happened, Mr. Nicolás Barquín Arana, who later obtained the Abbot’s ecclesiastic position of Pechón, who in those dates, young student of Theology, was involved in the maelstrom of those confused years. He reflected all the experiences lived in an unprecedented manuscript preserved in the Villa thanks to the zeal of her owner, Miss Socorro Samperio Fernández-Alonso, who has put it to our disposition on the occasion of so notable dates.On the basis of the above mentioned book and quantity of compiled documentation in diverse organisms and libraries of the whole Europe, we aim to put in the place that deserves this piece of the History, treated, in our opinion, in a very superficial way in the historiography related to this period, and certainly very unknown on the part of the great public. Among the acts that are expected to realize (if the time and the authorities allow it), there are the following:

• The publication and diffusion of the writing of the Abbot of Pechón, in order to, according to his own author ” they serve to the posterity”.
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• An exhibition - museum to develop from July to November in the Palace of the Fernandez - Villa (which current owner, Mr. Manuel Ogarrio, has yielded very kindly for this purpose), with pieces of the period of time, models, dioramas and informative panels. The last purpose of the exposition will be its medium-term conversion in permanent museum and centre of studies of this event.
• Warning lights and signposting of routes throughout the battlefield, lucky in almost intact conditions from that time, and creation of a net of hiking parallel to the already existing one thanks to the natural values of the zone.
• Accomplishment of gastronomic days in memory of the diverse present nationalities in the battle (Frenchmen, Galicians, Catalans, Asturians, Castilians, Italians, Irish, …)
• Cycle of historical conferences.
• Cycle of cinema related to the period and Napoleonic wars.
• Brotherhood with a French population related directly to a character present in the battle.
• Theatrical representations related to the period.

As colophon to all this activity on the 10^th and 11^th of November there will be carried out a series of institutional acts, as the discovery of the commemorative monument, in honour of the fallen in the battle, High Mass,… As before we expressed, our desire is the permanence of this impulse in the time, and because of it we invite all those who of one or another way could contribute to the deep knowledge of this fact, with documentation or information, to contact us, with what we will be deeply grateful.