On February 4, 1888, Spanish civil guards fired on a crowd of protesting Rio Tinto Company mineworkers in Zalamea, killing 13 and injuring 35.
[1] In early 1888, Anti-Smoke League agriculturalists and Rio Tinto workers came together to protest the company practice of open-air pyrite calcination in blast furnaces.
[2] It was an unlikely alliance, as the Anti-Smoke League desired an end to calcination, based on what the toxic fumes did to local farmland, but the workers understood its necessity and were willing to accept recompense in exchange for periods when smoke prevented normal work.
[3] The anarchist protest leaders held that they shared more important long-term goals, however, of deposing foreign capitalist interests, and used the issue of fumes to stand a class-based opposition to Rio Tinto.
Beginning in January, the Anti-Smoke League funded the militant anarchist Maximiliano Tornet, formerly of Cuba, to roil the workers to action, resulting in demands for improved pay and conditions.