in Madrid 18 July On 18 July, news of the military rising in Spanish Morocco reached Madrid, and the General Union of Workers and National Confederation of Labor demanded the distribution of arms. However the government initially refused to give weapons to civilians. Nevertheless, a group of young officers led by Lieutenant Colonel Rodrigo Gil Ruiz distributed 5,000 rifles among the workers. The plotters had planned that General García Herrán would seize the army camp at Carabanchel and General Fanjul would occupy the inner city from the Montaña barracks, located on the Príncipe Pío, close to the Plaza de España. Other rebel officers should then have taken over the Cuatro Vientos and Getafe Air Bases, but the plan failed. Furthermore, the commander of the Civil Guard in Madrid, General Sebastián Pozas Perea and the Assault Guard—around 6,000 men—remained loyal to the government. 19 July On 19 July, the new government of Prime Minister José Giral decided to issue weapons to the unions; 65,000 rifles were handed over, but only 5,000 had bolts. The other 60,000 bolts were stored separately at the Montaña barracks. The commander of the barracks, Colonel Moisés Serra, disregarded the order of the Minister of War to hand over this essential equipment, effectively marking the beginning of the uprising in Madrid. On the morning of 19 July, General Fanjul arrived at the Montaña barracks, as did groups of officers from the other Madrid garrisons and a number of falangist and monarchist volunteers. After giving a lecture to his fellow officers on the political goals of the military rising, Fanjul tried to advance into the central city streets with his troops, now numbering approximately 2,000 officers, military cadets and soldiers plus 500 volunteers. A crowd of about 8,000 organized by the National Confederation of Labor and the General Union of Workers, some armed, had gathered around the barracks. Assault Guards were seen taking up firing positions on the roofs of neighboring buildings. Fanjul decided to withdraw into the barracks complex and await help from the other garrisons of the city, rather than attempt to break through the siege. The coup had failed in the other city garrisons. In Carabanchel, General García Herrán had been killed by his own troops while trying to raise them against the government and the artillery barracks there had been secured by loyalist officers. The engineer units at El Pardo had been withdrawn to