On 18 July 1936, the military governor of the province, Col., launched the Nationalist "coup" in the city, bombing the civil government and arresting the civil governor, Rodríguez de León; these actions ignited the Spanish Civil War. Following the orders of the putschist General Queipo de Llano, he declared a state of war. The putschists were met by the resistance of the political and social representatives who had gathered in the civil government headquarters, and remained there until the Nationalist rifle fire and the presence of artillery broke their morale. When its defenders began fleeing the building, Rodríguez de León finally decided to surrender and was arrested. In the following weeks, Queipo de Llano and Major Bruno Ibañez carried out a bloody repression in which 2,000 persons were executed. The ensuing Francoist repression in wartime and in the immediate post-war period (1936–1951) is estimated to have led to around 9,579 killings in the province.