Widnes Examiner. — 1894-01-06 (Widnes, Cheshire, England)

DESPERATE ANARCHIST.  CONFESSION OF THE MURDERS IN A BARCELONA  THEATRE. A LONG CHASE.  The Barcelona Anarchist Salvador Franch, or Santiago Salvador. who has been arrested at Saragossa for alleged complicity in the Liceo Theatre outrage is a labouring man of no education. His wound is said to be serious. He was pursaed by gentlarays for more than a week before his arrest, but continually evaded them by making his way along little-known mountain tracks. Be has made a confession which clears up many points hitherto obscure regarding the dynamite outrage at Barcelona, when bombs were thrown amongst the people in the stalls at the Liceo Opera House, with appalling results.  French, who is in the prison hospital at Saragossa being treated for the wound in his side inflicted by himself at the moment of his arrest, has informed the magistrates that he, and he alone, was the thrower of thehombs. There were two bombs, he explained, of which only one exploded. Per some reason, which he could not understand, the other failed to go off. Possibly there was sonse defect in its construction. He carried them into tho theatre in his sash, in the folds of which the two infernal machines were easily concealed, for they were of small size. Taking his place in the second gallery. Franch waited quietly until the opera was approaching its conclusion and all eyes were on the stage. Then he moved put into the passage, where nobody was likely to observe him, and taking the bombs one in each hand, he hurled them with all his force down into the centre of the closely packed stalls, where the bourgeois were sitting. In the confusion and panic which followed the explosion, Franch, who was alrt-ady clear of the seats, had no difficulty in escaping from ths theatre,but knowing that the police, being cognisant of his Anarchist ideas,would be sure to arrest him,he made at once for a place of concealment in a house near the cemetery. Here he remained for twenty days, and then, deeming that the vigilance of the police would have relaxed, he left Barcelona and set out on foot for his native province of Teruel. For a short time he stayed with his own family at Castelseras, and then made his way to Saragossa to seek the hospitality of a friend living at that city. Franch averred that he ma e this full confession of his own guilt in order to save innocent people now in prison at Barcelona. As to the fabrication of the bombs, Ise had had no assistance at all. He had made them himself according to the prescribed formula. It was a matter of regret to him that so few people I had been killed at the Liceo Theatre-23 persons were killed, and about 40 injured,—because the Anarchists were resolved to exterminate the bourgeois. The prisoner further declared that he had from the first determined te commit suicide after having told the whole truth. He had undoubtedly made preparations for doing away with himself, for on him were a phial, a revolver and an enormous knife. It Is probable, however,that be had made up his mind to sell his life dearly, and that he would have used his weapons on others before turning thew on himself if he had had the chance.