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Remains of Militiamen Cosme Ayala and Manuel Hernáez Returned to Families

The skeletal remains of two militiamen who died in the Civil War have been identified and returned to their families 90 years later.

Traditional Basque architecture, a whitewashed stone farmhouse with dark wood, in a green Cantabrian coast landscape, natural midday light.
IA

Traditional Basque architecture, a whitewashed stone farmhouse with dark wood, in a green Cantabrian coast landscape, natural midday light.

The Basque Government and Gogora have returned the remains of militiamen Cosme Ayala Yoldi and Manuel Hernáez Ruidíaz to their families, following their discovery in a mass grave in Amorebieta.

The remains of militiamen Cosme Ayala Yoldi and Manuel Hernáez Ruidíaz have been returned to their families in an event organized by the Basque Government and Gogora. The remains of the combatants were found in July 2025 in a mass grave at the cemetery in Amorebieta. Today, 90 years after their deaths in the war, their daughters have received the remains of their fathers.
The ceremony took place in Bilbao, attended by the Minister of Justice and Human Rights, Maria Jesus San Jose, the director of the Gogora Institute, Alberto Alonso, and the mayor of Amorebieta, Ainhoa Salterain. Minister San Jose emphasized that "it is necessary to recover the past, to search for the disappeared from the civil war and Francoism, so that they can return to the place they should never have left, which is precisely to make memory".
Militiamen Cosme Ayala Yoldi and Manuel Hernáez Ruidíaz died in April 1937 on the war fronts of Elorrio and Muxika, respectively. Both were declared missing until the scientific society Aranzadi uncovered the mass grave in Amorebieta, enabling the militiamen's daughters to carry out genetic identification.
Ayala was Navarrese by birth and lived in Barakaldo. He was married and the father of two daughters. He fought as a militiaman in the Meabe 1 Largo Caballero battalion, affiliated with the unified socialist youth. He died on April 27, 1937, on the war front in Elorrio. Hernáez, on the other hand, was from La Rioja by birth. He lived in Bilbao, was married, and was the father of one daughter. He fought as a militiaman in the Zabalbide battalion, affiliated with Izquierda Republicana. He died on April 20, 1937, on the front in Muxika.
Although the mass grave in the Amorebieta cemetery has been referred to as if it were the only one, experts state that there were 11 mass graves, containing the remains of 157 people. To date, 8 individuals have been identified among these 157. All of them are combatants who died on various war fronts in Bizkaia between December 1936 and May 1937, after being taken wounded to the military hospital in Amorebieta during that period. Consequently, the Gogora Institute has called on the families of the combatants to undergo DNA testing to identify the remains.

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