War in Val d'Orcia

by Iris Origo

  I accordingly reluctantly agree to stay on in Florence for a few days—and send a report of the circumstances to Antonio, who is waiting in Siena.

  MAY 4TH

  Here everyone is much shaken by the bombing of yesterday and the day before, which has been far more serious than any preceding attack, and has caused much destruction in the Campo di Marte area, and by the Porta al Prato, where there was a repair-shop for engines—the only one in this part of Italy. On the first day the bombs missed it—hitting instead the Teatro Comunale (where a rehearsal of Cosi fan tutte was in progress) and destroying many villini in the district.

  MAY 5TH

  The murder of Gentile was followed by the arrest of four university professors (anti-Fascist, but wholly unconnected with the event)—but since then the matter has been dropped so completely by the authorities, that it is rumoured that it is the Fascist extremists themselves who are responsible for the crime. Certainly it is true that Gentile had not concealed his opinion of the weaknesses of the Republican Government, and it is said that he had prepared a report for Mussolini—which he did not live to deliver. Since then, a few days ago, there has been an attempt to murder a colonel of the Fascist militia, and a reward has been offered of half a million lire to anyone who will give any information on the subject. But it does not, alas, need so large a reward for the Tuscan to turn traitor. Nothing has been uglier, in the story of these tragic last months, than the avalanche of denunciations which have been showered upon both the Italian and the German officials. Professional rivalry, personal jealousy, the smallest ancient spite—all these now find vent in reports to the Fascist police, and cause the suspected person to be handed over to prison, to questioning by torture, or to a firing-squad. No one feels safe—for who can be quite certain that no one has a grudge against him?

  In contrast with these, there are remarkable stories of individual steadfastness and courage. Thus in Florence last week, O.C., a boy of nineteen, sentenced to death for failing to report for military service, spent the harrowing night before the execution (during which the news of a reprieve, at midnight, was cancelled three hours later) in prayer in his cell, supporting his two comrades—a peasant boy and a Neapolitan lieutenant—and enduring with equal fortitude the terrible alternatives of hope and fear. He then faced the firing squad, unbound, with unflinching serenity, reciting ‘Our Father’. On the following Sunday the Prior of San Miniato, in his sermon, mentioned the death of these three young men as a remarkable instance of Christian faith and courage, and was promptly arrested himself. To the reproaches of those who had arrested him (he is an old man of nearly eighty) he firmly replied that he would take nothing back that he had said—since it was his duty, as a priest, to point out examples of a Christian death, wherever they may occur—and eventually was released.

  MAY 8TH

  There have been some more arrests of anti-Fascists, following a German mopping-up at night in the poorer quarters of the town. The papers are full of articles urging the ‘rebels’ to report themselves before midnight on May 24th, when the amnesty comes to an end. It is, the articles say, the ‘rebels’’ last chance to return to their families and become respectable members of society. After that date any of them who are captured will be shot without mercy.

  All Red Cross nurses are also now obliged to take a vow of allegiance to the Republican Government—with the result that practically all of them are resigning. Their places will be taken by paid Republican nurses—very insufficiently trained—and the whole character of the Red Cross work will (temporarily) be altered. Fortunately the hospitals—except for German wounded—are mostly empty.

  MAY 9TH

  Hear from Pippo Cavazza, who has just returned from Arezzo, the story of his family’s imprisonment there. It has already lasted twenty-nine days, on a score of trumped-up charges. The first (that of having listened to Radio Londra) was merely a pretext for the arrest, not only of his sister-in-law, Bianca Cavazza, and her husband, but of her two daughters, her son-in-law, a cousin who was staying in their house, and an unfortunate neighbour who had merely come to dinner. The latter was kept in prison for six days, and the rest of the family for twenty-nine days, until at last Pippo Cavazza succeeded in obtaining their release; but the Contessa herself and her husband are still under lock and key. For the first forty-eight hours after their arrest, none of the party were allowed any food or drink, not even a glass of water; and, during the whole time all of them (including the daughters and guests, against whom there was no charge whatever, and who were merely held as witnesses) slept upon lice-infested straw, were never allowed to change their linen, and ate nothing but prison fare. Moreover, during two severe air-raids which took place during this time, and in the course of which the house next to the prison was completely destroyed, they were left locked up in their cells, while the gaolers all ran away to a shelter. The questioning was conducted with rudeness and threats, especially the women’s, but not with actual physical violence—but when the Contessa, after a heart-attack, asked to be allowed a camphor injection, she was brutally told that they were not interested in giving medical care to prisoners who would soon be shot. After a fortnight, her illness was so severe (she suffers from heart and kidney trouble) that she was moved to the infirmary, where she still lies, at the point of death. The charges against her are of ‘favouring the rebels’ and of having ordered arms for them from an arms factory in northern Italy.

  MAY 10TH

  Antonio arrives from Siena, and tells me of his interview with the Prefect, which ended in his receiving from this official fervent protestations of esteem and trust. The Prefect went so far as to state that he had not seen the number of the paper containing the article against me, and to insinuate that the source of our troubles is the German Command in Chianciano—which we are inclined to doubt. In fact, the whole interview, while satisfactory on the surface, does not leave us wholly reassured—especially in view of the fact that Bianca Cavazza received equally eloquent protestations from the Prefect of her province—exactly forty-eight hours before she was arrested! Moreover, our local situation is still very unsettled. Two nights ago, the partisans marched into Montepulciano, disarmed and undressed three militiamen, and hung their shirts on the doors of the Casa del Fascio—fired off their guns under the windows of the Fascio secretary—and then returned to the shelter of La Foce woods! It is all childish and purposeless—and, in view of the penalties that may fall upon the civilian population in consequence, extremely foolish. Antonio persuades me to stay in Florence a little longer, until he has been able to see the head of the Fascist militia of Siena. All police measures are in his hands, and it is on his attitude that our future will depend.

  MAY 15TH

  Met Heydenreich, the German archaeological expert, who is responsible for the preservation of Tuscan art treasures—a gentle, cultivated, human being. He said that when the Piero della Francesca ‘Resurrection’ was removed from San Sepolcro, the lorry which carried it stopped for half an hour at Arezzo; the town was bombed, and a bomb fell within twenty yards of the lorry—by a miracle, without exploding. Now he is engaged in moving back to Florence, from the tunnel near Incisa where originally they had been placed for safety, the great bronze doors of the Baptistry, a truly Herculean task. In the general destruction of Arezzo the Piero della Francesca frescoes in San Francesco have escaped and now (owing to Heydenreich’s efforts) are being protected by an elaborate framework, at the expense of the German Government. It is his plan, too, which has made Siena into a ‘hospital city’, into which no traffic can now enter—and he is full of hope, he says, of reaching a ‘gentleman’s agreement’ with the Allies about Florence, too. He speaks with respect and liking of his opposite members of the Allied Commission, Kenneth Clarke and Woolley, and with much nostalgia of the year he spent at Windsor, studying the Leonardo da Vinci drawings. A queer, comforting conversation, a reminder of eternal values, which may outlast the present madness.

  MAY 16TH

  At
last the car comes to fetch me, and I arrive home to find the children well, and the situation much quieter. The partisans have now scattered, and only one small group of fifteen or twenty remains in our woods. Moreover, Antonio has had a fairly satisfactory interview with the colonel of the Fascist militia of Siena. It started badly, the colonel producing a dossier of the accusations against us (including that of our having a deposit of arms and ammunition concealed in the Castelluccio), but there is no doubt that Antonio’s policy of counter-attack is the most effective, and he does not think that any active measures will be taken against us, at any rate for the present. At the moment the Republican policy is one of leniency towards the partisans, and no effort is being spared to get them to report before the 25th.

  MAY 18TH

  Meanwhile events, at last, are moving. The attack on the Cassino front has begun.

  MAY 19TH

  Cassino has fallen.

  MAY 20TH

  The Gustav line has broken, and the Allies are advancing towards the Adolf Hitler line—which is said, however, to be very strong.

  The local situation is becoming more stormy again. Partisans have broken into the barracks of San Casciano, disarming the Carabinieri; they have also taken prisoner one of the monks (an ardent Fascist) in the Montefollonico Monastery. He was subsequently sent back to his monastery, completely naked. Other partisans have disarmed two German soldiers at Contignano; with the consequence that this morning two lorries of German soldiers went to the village and took nine men away with them as hostages. On their way back, at seven a.m., they stopped here, and sent up a message to Antonio to come down immediately.

  Thinking it was some routine matter, Antonio dressed and shaved in a leisurely manner, until the officer, a captain, sent up an irate message to say that, if he didn’t at once appear, he would come up himself and fetch him. When at last Antonio came downstairs the captain abused him for keeping him waiting, and then stated that he had come to search the house for rebels. His soldiers had already searched the surrounding houses and farms, but here they only entered the kitchen and servants’ rooms, abstracting such small objects as caught their fancy. In the farm every room was examined, and everyone had to show their papers, and the captain then told Antonio to translate a little speech, in which he warned us all that any further help to the rebels would be given at the risk of our skins. He also asked Antonio to give him exact information as to the partisans’ whereabouts, to which Antonio replied that they are to be found everywhere on the chain of hills running from Cetona to Monticchiello—about fifty miles—and are seldom more than twenty-four hours in any one place! The Germans then went off again.

  MAY 21ST

  Leaflets have been dropped this morning by German planes in the Val d’Orcia, saying: ‘Whoever knows the place where a band of rebels is in hiding, and does not immediately inform the German Army, will be shot. Whoever gives food or shelter to a band or to individual rebels, will be shot. Every house in which rebels are found, or in which a rebel has stayed, will be blown up. So will every house from which anyone has fired on the German forces. In all such cases, all stores of food, wheat, and straw will be burned, the cattle will be taken away, and the inhabitants will be shot.’ The leaflet finishes with the reminder that ‘the German Army will proceed with justice, but with inflexible hardness’.

  Other leaflets scattered by Allied planes give precisely opposite instructions: ‘At all costs refrain from reporting yourselves to the Army. Commit acts of sabotage on the communication lines. Enter into contact with the foreigners in the German Army. Go on organising groups. The moment for decisive action is near at hand.’

  The peasants read these leaflets with bewildered anxiety as to their own fate, and complete indifference (in most cases) to the main issue. Che sarà di noi? (What will become of us?) All that they want is peace—to get back to their land—and to save their sons.

  All day a succession of young men come up, asking for advice, including the Sicilian and Calabrian soldiers who are working on the place. In the evening, too, we have a visit from some of the women from Contignano, whose husbands and brothers have been taken as hostages by the Germans. They have been to take food to them at Chianciano, where they are at present shut up. Antonio promises to try to help, but we believe that probably these men are merely being detained as a warning.

  MAY 22ND

  We were mistaken. This afternoon, the Bishop of Pienza arrived, and informed us that seven out of the nine hostages from Contignano are to be shot. He has succeeded in obtaining forty-eight hours’ reprieve, but if, within that period, the arms which the rebels took away from the Germans are not returned, the execution will take place.

  The Allied troops are advancing on Terracina.

  Every day now, whenever I go out of the house, I find a little group of famished people sitting in the farm courtyard; haggard women, with babies in their arms and other children waiting for them at home; thin, ragged schoolboys or old men, carrying sacks or suitcases—all begging for food to take back to Rome. We give them all that we can, but Antonio begs me to remember that we must also go on providing food for our own population and for the two hundred partisans in the woods.

  None of our young men are going to report for military service. They will all leave home and hide in the woods—and they are trusting to luck, and to the Allied advance, to save their families from reprisals. But Antonio has already, this evening, received a note from the Fascio of Pienza, warning him that in a few days German troops will arrive there, to remain ‘until the mopping-up is finished’. Our personal crisis is just beginning.

  MAY 25TH

  Visit from the Maresciallo of Pienza. This is the last day of the amnesty, but it has been prolonged for a week, for this district at least, before the mopping-up is to begin. The little village of Castiglioncello, at the top of the hill, was surrounded this morning by German troops, who have found there the man responsible for disarming the Germans at Contignano. The seven hostages from Contignano have consequently been released, but two men from Castiglioncello have been shot.

  The only recruit to join the Fascist Army is a boy with pleurisy who consequently believes that he will be sent home at once.

  The Fifth Army, after occupying Terracina, joins up with the Eighth on the Anzio beach-head.

  MAY 26TH

  Anti-aircraft guns, stationed at Spedaletto, bring down five Allied planes out of an unusually large bomber formation, which is attacking German columns on the road. Some of the airmen save themselves by parachute. From our terrace we can hear the firing, and see the little silver balloons opening and drifting down from the sky. One plane, laden with bombs, explodes as it hits the ground. We see the great column of black smoke soaring up, and long to hurry to the scene to bring first aid; but the Germans will be there before us.

  The Allied Armies, still advancing, have broken through the Hitler line.

  MAY 28TH

  A young partisan comes to the clinic and asks the nurse to go up with him to a farm, where one of his comrades has been severely wounded—not as the result of an encounter with the Germans or Fascists, but shot in the stomach by one of his own friends! The nurse goes up the hill, and on her return reports that the wounded man is none other than the Fascist from Chianciano, whom the partisans had after all not executed as a spy. The bullet is still in his abdomen, and the nurse says that an immediate operation is necessary to save his life. Then follows a council of war. It is clearly dangerous to send the young man, whom we certainly have no reason to believe trustworthy, to the Montepulciano hospital, where the Fascist officials will question him. If he should talk (either under the anaesthetic or deliberately) he is in a position to betray not only us, but all his companions, many of whose families are still living at Chianciano or Montepulciano. Yet one can hardly let him die without help. The partisans accordingly decide, most humanely, to risk it, and at dusk the little procession, carrying a stretcher, winds down the hill. We put the wounded man in our car and,
accompanied by the nurse, take him off to the hospital. There, a word in the surgeon’s ear ensures that no one is present at the operation except one elderly and deaf nun, and our own nurse. And when the Segretario del Fascio turns up the next day, the young man declares that he was just about to report for military service, when he was shot by an unknown person, in La Foce woods! So far, so good. But the partisans, who do not trust him too far, propose to break into the hospital on the first day that he is fit to stand, and take him off with them again!

  MAY 31ST

  Quite suddenly one of our refugee children, Nucci, aged eleven, completely loses her speech. She looks terrified, and cannot answer us, but writes down that when she was ‘little’ the same thing happened before, after a fright, and the doctor said ‘it might perhaps be meningitis’! It seems necessary to take her to the hospital, but not convenient, owing to the machine-gunning of cars on the road. However, we decide to risk it at dusk, and take her to the doctor at Montepulciano, who clearly has not the faintest notion of what is the matter with her.