Benito Fontcuberta

Benito Fontcuberta y Pardo (4 January 184321 November 1904) was a Spanish journalist, pharmacist and professor who served as a Carlist commander on the Third Carlist War.

Having led the rebel forces of Maestrazgo and Tarragona, after his military retirement Fontcuberta remained an influential figure of Spanish traditionalism through his Integrist newspaper Semanario de Tortosa.

Biography

Youth and military actions Fontcuberta studied Latin, Philosophy and Theology from 1855 to 1867 at Tortosa, and was awarded a baccalaureate with the rank of nemine discrepante. He traveled later to Tarragona to study land surveying and Fine Arts. After obtaining outstanding qualifications he was sent to the Universidad de Barcelona to study Pharmacy on 1868, finishing his career on 1871.

After the dethronement of Isabel II he was commissioned by fellow carlist chiefs to organize the revolutionary forces of the district of Valderrobres and the bordering towns of Gandesa and Alcañiz. Between 1870 and 1872 he was assigned to different military tasks until his formal adherence to the Carlist uprising in September 1873 under Tomás Segarra's command. being expulsed from the Traditionalist Communion after expressing his support for an Integrist newspaper at Pamplona. He kept writing for other newspapers

Using the pen name "Un teólogo de antaño" (a theologian from yesteryear) he published Félix Sardà y Salvany's articles that would be later compiled on the manifesto Liberalism Is a Sin, which had a lasting influence on Spanish politics.

Apart from his journalist career, Fontcuberta worked for 18 years as a mathematics professor at the Seminary of Tortosa and taught various subjects at the San Luis de Gonzaga College for 27 years until his death.

Fontcuberta was also an active member of the Catholic Worker's Circle of Tortosa. He was also a renowned collaborator of the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul and would weekly visit the city's jail and hospital to do charitable works. and the Correo de Tortosa defined him as an "exemplar gentleman and most upright catholic".

He was married to Pilar Fontanet, with whom he had a daughter of her same name. Pilar Fontcuberta would later marry Joaquín Ferrer y Ferrer, jaimist deputy and chief of the Traditionalist Communion of Tortosa, Roquetas and Gandesa.