SABINO FERNANDEZ CAMPO:SABINO FERNÁNDEZ Campo, the count of Latores, who has died aged 91, was a Spanish army general who, following a successful military career, served in the government of the Spanish dictator Gen Francisco Franco.
But following Franco's death in 1975, he became a faithful servant of King Juan Carlos, Franco's successor as Spanish head of state. In 1981, Campo played a key role helping the king see off an attempted coup by disgruntled Franco loyalists who wished to strangle democracy and return to, as they saw them, the good old days of dictatorship.
Sabino Fernández Campo was born in 1918 in Oviedo, in the province of Asturias in northern Spain. When he was 16, a seminal event took place in Asturias that was to have a major influence on his life. A miners' strike developed into an armed insurrection against the government and was eventually suppressed by troops led by Franco. Some 3,000 miners were killed in the fighting with another 35,000 taken prisoner.
The conflict prompted Campo to join the Falange, the Spanish fascist movement, in 1936, a year before Franco fused it with the Carlist monarchist parties in the middle of the Spanish civil war from which Franco, fighting against the government, emerged victorious.
Campo's military career thrived under Franco and he rose to the rank of general, serving also as a government official.
But it was after Franco's death that events occurred giving rise to Campo's enduring claim to fame. In 1977, he was appointed general secretary of the Zarzuela Palace, the principal residence just outside Madrid of King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia and their family.
At the time, many Spaniards felt a deep distrust towards the monarchy, installed after Franco's death and, crucially, according to his wishes.
Many Spaniards saw Juan Carlos as the dead dictator's puppet and predicted he would not last - some dubbing him Juan Carlos the Short.
But the abortive coup of 1981, by which time Campo was chief of protocol at the palace, changed everything.
On February 23rd, 1981, as members of the Cortes, the Spanish parliament, met to install a new prime minister, a group of serving members of the Guardia Civil, Spain's paramilitary police, stormed the chamber led by 49-year-old Lieut Antonio Tejero Molina.
Mounting the dais and brandishing a pistol, the somewhat comical Tejero told the politicians that the new government was overthrown and would be replaced by one he would lead. But the burgeoning coup was far from comical in reality and involved a number of senior figures in the military.
As the king watched events unfold with Campo at his side, Campo advised him to stand firm and support democracy. Encouraged, the young king made several telephone calls to key units in the army telling them he was not with the plotters and they should not move against the government.
Not all key military figures stood with the king, however. When Campo answered a telephone and was asked whether one of the plotters, Gen Alfonso Armada, had reached the Zarzuela Palace to take control, he replied sniffily "[ He] Neither is, nor is he expected."
The coup collapsed the next day, the plotters were arrested and Spanish democracy was saved. Juan Carlos became a national hero and has never looked back.
In later years, Campo was modest about his role. "No, look, all the credit belongs to the king," he told told El Mundo newspaper. "I just had the luck to be next to him."
In 1992, Juan Carlos created him count of Latores for his "long and brilliant career of outstanding service, the state military and civilian". The following year, he retired - some people believing he was eased out against his will. Asked if he was the victim of a plot, he replied somewhat cryptically: "There are things we should forgive but not forget, because they serve as experience. I forgive slander, slaughter, and am willing to shake hands with everyone: I would not have enemies."
It remains unclear whether Campo was a true democrat or a pragmatist. Asked why Franco's regime, which lasted 36 years, crumbled after his death, he replied: "A dictatorship without a dictator is very difficult to continue."
He was famously discreet about both Franco and the royal family.
"I do not carry any secret [ to the grave] . . . I cannot say I know very serious things. But silence is important, there is much we do not want to say. I have reached a maximum age of prudence, not wanting to offend anyone."
He married twice. First to Teresa Fernández-Vega, with whom he had 10 children.
In 1974, they separated, amicably it is said. In 1977, he married Maria Teresa Alvarez Asturias, a journalist and author more than 30 years his junior.
Sabino Fernández Campo: born March 17th, 1918; died October 26th, 2009