Reserves at Risk
In July 1936 the Spanish Civil War began. The Bank of Spain held about 635 tonnes of gold in vaults at Madrid. Street fighting and front lines moved toward the capital through the summer and autumn. Officials in the Republican government concluded that the reserves could not remain in a city under threat.
Discussions covered evacuation routes storage sites and who would take custody. The objective was to prevent capture by Nationalist forces and to preserve a resource that could fund the war effort. The movement of the bullion later became known as the Moscow Gold in Spanish accounts. The name referred specifically to the portion sent abroad rather than to sums held in other Spanish cities.
Orders to Move the Gold
On September 13 1936 the Council of Ministers approved a confidential decree that authorized transfer of the reserves out of Madrid. Juan Negrín as Finance Minister supervised the operation with the Bank of Spain. Crates of coin and bullion were catalogued sealed and sent by rail under guard to Cartagena.
By late October about 510 tonnes had reached the naval base which served as a protected loading point. Contemporary figures described this as about seventy two percent of the holdings kept in Madrid. Smaller quantities that remained in Spain were shifted between Republican strongholds as fronts changed. The Cartagena base continued to handle sensitive cargo through 1937.
Voyage and Storage
In late October four Soviet merchant ships took on the cargo at Cartagena with crews working under supervision of Spanish and Soviet officials. The ships sailed for Odessa on the Black Sea. Records note arrival on November 2 1936. From the port the crates moved by rail under military guard to Moscow.
The gold entered the State Repository for Valuables known as Gokhran where serials and weights were recorded. Spanish officials present in Moscow kept correspondence files and received inventories listing bars and coins by weight. These records formed the basis for later audits and historical reconstructions of the transfers and sales.
Use and Accounting
Once stored in the Soviet Union the gold became a means of payment for purchases requested by the Spanish Republic. Funds were applied to contracts for aircraft tanks artillery ammunition fuel and industrial goods. Transfers took place through accounts managed by Soviet financial institutions that handled sales of bullion on international markets.
By 1938 most of the reserves sent from Spain had been exchanged in this way. After the war ended in 1939 the new authorities in Madrid reported that the gold was no longer recoverable. Debate over valuations commissions and documentation continued among historians and government sources.
As Spain’s Civil War erupted in 1936, guards moved under cover of night.
Hidden in trains and ships was the fortune of a nation, hundreds of tonnes of gold.
Its destination was the Soviet Union. Its fate would haunt Spain for decades…🧵👇 pic.twitter.com/erQgRPQiHK
— Fascinating True Stories (@FascinatingTrue) November 3, 2025