Italy’s Sorrow: A Year of War 1944–45. James Holland

Achtung Banditen!

      Despite the cool efficiency with which Germany had occupied much of Italy and the way it had disarmed the Italian armed forces, these actions had begun to cause something of an own goal. By May 1944, German forces in Italy were faced with a major partisan – or ‘bandit’ as they liked to call them – problem. Still comparatively few in number in the big scheme of things, these guerrillas were nonetheless already becoming a serious thorn in Kesselring’s side and greatly loathed by the German soldiers, who felt it was one thing to fight against a uniformed enemy at the front, but quite another to be shot at from behind by men and women who looked like civilians. Unsurprisingly, this threat did much to fuel the already prevailing attitude of most Germans towards Italians – which was one of contempt for their perceived collective cowardice, treachery, and poor fighting qualities. Italy had let them down and so deserved everything that came its way.

      It was a vicious circle because it was largely due to severe German measures that a number of young Italians were now actively engaged in guerrilla warfare. ‘Everything in occupied Italy must be exploited by us for our war effort,’ wrote Ambassador Rahn – and that meant bleeding the country dry. Nearly all Italian gold reserves had been handed over. The Repubblica Sociale Italiana was denied the right to an economic and trade policy of its own. The north’s factories were turned over to Albert Speer, the Armaments Minister. As the Allies advanced, any industry at the front line was shut down, the equipment packed off to Germany and then the factory or plant blown to bits. Food was also siphoned off to Germany, even though there was not enough to go round in Italy. The Italians were also expected to pay for German war-related costs, an expense which proved impossible. Even so, by May 1944, the RSI was handing over a staggering 10 billion lire a month – roughly £2,500,000 in today’s money. ‘I am perfectly conscious of the sentiment of violent aversion nourished by the German soldiers against the Italians,’ Rahn continued, ‘including those Italians who for one reason or another continue to fight at our side.’ Yet, he warned officers of the German Propaganda Section, ‘This negative attitude damages our war effort. It is an emotional impulse which must be better hidden.’63

      It was a bit late for that. Germany’s disdain for those countries it occupied was all too evident to their inhabitants. Of course, very few Italians knew the details of these measures, but their effects were keenly felt. Moreover, for a nation that had briefly thought the war was over the previous autumn, it did not help seeing German troops all over the place, their continuing presence preventing the peace that the majority so strived for; or reading repeated notices warning that infringement of the new laws was punishable by death.

      Moreover, Germany was not only bleeding dry Italy’s wealth and resources, but also its manpower. The Third Reich had become expert at plundering occupied territories for labour, and no one was better at foreign labour recruitment than Fritz Sauckel, the General Plenipotentiary for Labour Mobilisation. By May 1944, there were more than 7.5 million foreign workers in Germany. As soon as Italy surrendered, Sauckel packed off his subordinate, Hermann Kretzschmann, to organise labour recruitment, whether it be voluntary, coerced or compulsory. Most workers were sent to Germany, but a large number were also used by the Organisation Todt, founded by Albert Speer’s predecessor as Armaments Minister, Fritz Todt, as a labour force that was used for the construction of military defences. It had been the Organisation Todt, full of forced Italian labourers, which had made most of the German defences around Cassino and which was now also reinforcing the next major line of defence north of Rome, the Pisa–Rimini Line.

      A number of men were recruited by regular round-ups not dissimilar to the press gangs used by the British Royal Navy of old. Others were creamed off from Mussolini’s conscription drives, much to the Duce’s chagrin. Initial conscription had not been too bad: 50,000 men had responded to their call-up papers by the beginning of 1944. But thereafter numbers fell dramatically. Those who had not reported for duty were given several amnesties: a date in March was declared by which they had to report and then a further date in May. Those who still did not present themselves were threatened with execution and reprisals against their families. The only alternative for many was to go into hiding, within the city or in the mountains, where a large number joined the growing bands of partisans.

      This was precisely what happened to Carlo Venturi, an eighteen-year-old from the tiny village of Fondazza, south-west of Bologna. By May 1944, as one of those born in 1925, Carlo had received his call-up papers. His family, contadini, had never had much interest in politics. ‘They were neither anti-nor pro-Fascist,’ says Carlo. ‘My father didn’t want to get involved.’ Since the armistice, however, Carlo had instinctively felt opposed to the German occupation and the new Fascist government. A factory worker in nearby Casalecchio di Reno, Carlo had, along with a number of other young men, raided a barracks immediately after the surrender and had stolen some arms. They viewed the Germans as the aggressors, and after the end of the Fascist regime the previous July, no longer wanted to live under the authority of a totalitarian state. ‘We loved our country,’ he says, ‘and we wanted to live in freedom.’ Not that they did anything much with the weapons except hide them; Carlo had a number of rifles stashed away in his attic.

      But Carlo soon found himself on the wrong side of the Fascist militia, the GNR. One day he was on his way to Bologna when the tram he was on was stopped. A Fascist had been killed nearby and the GNR were carrying out a search. Carlo and two other men were immediately hauled off, and Carlo was accused of having a hand-grenade in his pocket – in fact, it was simply a bread roll. After being taken to prison, he was beaten up then released a few hours later. ‘From that time,’ says Carlo, ‘I told myself I had to make them pay.’

      In early May, with the deadline for presenting himself for service drawing near, he was brought to the GNR barracks in Casalecchio, and accused of stealing and hoarding weapons. Among his questioners was a Fascist who lived on the same staircase as him. ‘He lived above me,’ says Carlo, ‘and the arms were right beneath his feet! They said, “If we find the weapons, we’ll send you to Poland”’. Somehow, Carlo managed to convince them he was innocent. But he was now beginning to feel seriously in danger, and so tried to join a nearby band of partisans. Unable to find them, however, he then went to look for another group of rebels in the mountains south of Bologna.

      At five in the morning of 16 May, Carlo left his flat and headed first to Sasso Marconi at the confluence of two rivers, the Reno and the Setta, then headed south down the Setta valley to the small town of Vado, lying beneath the Monte Sole massif. He hadn’t told anyone where he was going, not even his parents. It was dark by the time he reached Vado, but he soon spotted four young men sitting outside a house by the side of the road. ‘What are you doing here?’ one of them asked.

      ‘I was looking for you,’ Carlo replied, tentatively.

      ‘And who are we?’

      Carlo felt a wave of panic. What if they were Fascists out of uniform? But to his great relief the men then admitted to being ‘rebels’ and invited him into their house, a short way up the mountain above the eastern banks of the River Setta. There he spent the night, along with them and another man they had picked up that day. Early the next morning, at about half past four, he was woken and they headed out in the early morning gloom back across the river and up into the mountains to the band’s headquarters at a farmhouse called Ca’ Bregade.

      As the sun rose, Carlo saw the ancient mountain landscape of the Monte Sole massif for the first time. Above him, standing sentinel, was the summit of Monte Sole itself. Either side were further peaks, wooded with small oaks and chestnuts, but with sheer escarpments too. There was also a high mountain plain, dotted with tiny farming communities, here a small village and church, elsewhere, as at Ca’ Bregade, just a few barns and buildings. And either side of the massif, the mountains fell away into the two river valleys of the Reno and Setta. Monte Sole was indeed an ideal place to hide a partisan band: plenty of woods and foliage, sandwiched by the two valleys, but with far-reaching views that would warn of any attack from below.

      However, Carlo had not yet been welcomed with open arms. The partisans were deeply suspicious of anyone new: trust had to