A Civil War (157 page)

37
See Spinelli,
Io, Ulisse
, pp. 159–60, with reference to Viterbo prison.

38
Transcript of 20 October 1944, in IG,
BG
01519. Immediately after Liberation, such objections manifested themselves, and with their own specific tone, in the area around Gradisca, on the Yugoslav border. A document of the local ‘Communist Committee' firmly argued that ‘they must be considered Party members' and not sympathisers, generic anti-Fascists or members of the youth federation. With a characteristic leap into universal judgements, the document concluded: ‘He is a member of the Party, he who is active and gives his whole self for the future development of humanity – independently of his political maturity' (document from the Osoppo archive, a copy of which Galliano Fogar gave to the IRSFVG).

39
‘Estratto di una lettera del Comando unificato (Divisione Sesia – Divisione Ossola), ufficio del commissario politico', from the commissar of the Volante Loss Brigade, undated but from winter 1944–45 (IG,
BG
, 06560).

40
Pesce,
Senza tregua
, p. 166.

41
Ibid., p. 163.

42
Letter from Riccardo to the Lombardy Delegation, n.d. (IG,
BG
, 01775).

43
‘Rinnovarsi per progredire', in the 25 January 1944 northern edition. On top of this consideration, there was also the ‘division between the recreational and political fields', much greater among the Communists than the Socialists, which has been discussed by Victoria De Grazia (De Grazia and Passerini,
Alle origini della cultura di massa
, p. 25).

44
‘Rapporto al centro del Partito' by Banfi, Emilia, 16 December 1943 (IG,
Archivio PCI
).

45
Testimony of Arnaldo Lippi (Portelli,
Biografia di una città
, p. 26); testimony of Maria Francesca Accossato, widow of Sandrone, in Guidetti Serra,
Compagne
, vol. I, p. 31. On the lasting difficult relation between friendship and ‘the cement of politics' among Communist trade union leaders after Liberation, see S. Tatò's interview of Emilio Guglielmino (
A voi cari compagni
, pp. 25–45). An analogy could be drawn between the Communist trade unionist among the workers and the Party militant among partisans.

46
Testimony of Teresa Cirio, in Bruzzone and Farina,
La Resistenza taciuta
, p. 74.

47
See
Unità e Libertà
, Domodossola, 28 September 1944.

48
‘Informazioni da Milano', 15 December 1944 (Secchia,
Il PCI e la guerra di liberazione
, p. 708).

49
Testimony of Giovanni Serbandini, in G. Bocca,
Storia dell'Italia partigiana
, Bari: Laterza, 1966, p. 99.

50
Lazagna,
Ponte rotto
, p. 40.

51
Among the many firm statements to this effect, see the letter from the ‘comrades responsible' for the Piedmont Delegation sent to those responsible for the Val di Susa brigades on 12 July 1944, and the ‘Direttive organizzative e di lavoro', dated 28 January 1945, drawn up by the directorate of the Party Committee for the Friuli Division (
Le Brigate Garibaldi
, vol. II, pp. 116–20, and vol. III, pp. 299–302).

52
See IG,
BG
, 01519.

53
Such was Al's response to the comrades unwilling to accept his reproaches: transcript of the ‘Riunione dei rappresentanti di Partito', the meeting of Party representatives from several Padua factories on 18 March 1945 (IG,
Archivio PCI
).

54
A circular addressed to ‘all Party activists' arriving in Turin on 4 November 1943 lamented the lack of these qualities among ‘inexpert, muddling and confusing … leaders and chiefs' who had emerged from the shadows after 26 July (ibid.).

55
Spinelli,
Io, Ulisse
, p. 101, which speaks of how the Communist Party had through twenty years been able to arouse an ‘inexhaustible capacity for
martyrion
' in the ‘humble classes' for the first time in the history of Italy.

56
‘La Disciplina', in
L'Unità
, Rome edition, 7 December 1943.

57
‘Passare all' offensiva' (in the regular ‘Vita di Partito' section),
L'Unità
, Northern edition, 21 June 1944.

58
For example, the letter from the ‘comrades responsible' to the political commissar of the 5
^th
Zone in the Cuneo area, Pietro, 28 December 1944 (
Le Brigate Garibaldi
, vol. III, pp. 149–53).

59
As the inspector-general Pietro (Antonio Roasio) put it, towards the end of 1943, in a communication probably addressed to the PCI leadership (
Le Brigate Garibaldi
, vol. I, p. 202).

60
Bruzzone and Farina,
La Resistenza taciuta
, p. 99.

61
‘Ancora sulla cospirazione',
L'Unità
, Rome edition, 1 December 1943.

62
Command of the Milan SAP Brigade to commands under its aegis, 1 January 1945 (
Le Brigate Garibaldi
, vol. III, p. 183).

63
Ibid., pp. 569–71.

64
There are, moreover, testimonies of Communists who requested grace, in the letters of Resistance fighters across Europe condemned to death: see
LRE
, p. 347 (a Frenchman), p. 424 (a German), and pp. 515–17 (an Italian).

65
Letter from Luigi Ciol to his family, 14 March 1945 (
LRE
, p. 548).

66
‘La vraie saison des juges',
Les Cahiers politiques
, November 1943. Bloch concluded with the statement that ‘the renewed France will be an energetic, solid France'. Bloch was one of Secchia's favourite writers (from a conversation with the present author).

67
See ‘Intervista con Ernesto Rossi', ed. L. Calogero La Malfa, in
Quaderni dell'Istituto romano per la storia d'Italia dal fascismo alla Resistenza
1 (1969), p. 109.

68
Letter from the Upper Italy Secretariat to the provincial and regional committees, n.d. but between late 1944 and early 1945 (INSMLI,
CLNAI
, envelope 8, folder 12).

69
Editorial ‘Per un'Italia nuova' in youth paper
Giovani
, Rome, 27 May 1944.

70
‘Circolare n. 2 riservata ai comitati regionali', written during Badoglio's ‘45 days' (ISRT,
Carte Enzo Enriques Agnoletti
, envelope 1, folder 2, subfolder Documenti che riguardano l'ideologia e la storia del PdA).

71
Pamphlet
Parole chiare ai comunisti
, signed by ‘Eleandro', who described himself as a professor from a liberal-socialist background.

72
In Carocci,
La Resistenza italiana
, p. 187.

73
‘Il Partito d'Azione è un partito socialista', in
La Libertà
(Tuscany), 27 October 1943.

74
La guerra di liberazione
, pamphlet dated 1943, pp. 3–6.

75
‘Norme per gli ispettori', 25 December 1944. All of these norms were imbued with a strong pedagogical spirit (published under the title ‘La guerra in città', in
Formazioni GL
, pp. 257–63).

76
Letter to Umberto Calosso, sent from New York to London, 22 November 1943 (CSPG,
Fondo Calosso
, envelope 13).

77
Inverni (V. Foa),
I partiti
, p. 56.

78
See Bocca,
La Repubblica di Mussolini
, p. 198.

79
Valiani,
Azionisti
, pp. 80–1.

80
G. Agosti and L. Bianco,
Un' amicizia partigiana. Lettere 1943–1945
, introduced and edited by G. De Luna, Turin: Albert Meynier, 1990.

81
See Bianchi,
I cattolici
, p. 159.

82
On Olivelli's ambiguity, here, see Webster,
The Cross and the Fasces
, p. 210.

83
‘Orizzonti economici e Principi' in
Rinascita
, 25 March 1944.

84
‘Noi e i cattolici' in
L'Azione
, 10 November 1943, and ‘Scuola sociale cristiana', in
Rinascita
, 25 March 1944. On the Social Christians, see A. Parisella, ed.,
Gerardo Bruni e i cristiano sociali
, Rome: Edizioni del Lavoro, 1984.

85
See, for example, ‘Parole chiare al cattolico medio', in
Voce Operaia
, 15 January 1944.

86
‘Parole chiare',
Voce Operaia
, 26 October 1943.

87
Note the several sharp observations in A. Del Noce, ‘Genesi e significato della prima sinistra cattolica italiana postfascista', in
Storia contemporanea
II (1971), pp. 1035–124.

88
‘Religione e comunismo', in
Voce Operaia
, 5 January 1944, in which Machiavelli, Galilei, Vico, the men of the Enlightenment, Kant, the romantics, the French revolutionaries, Hegel, and – albeit in different hues – Marx were termed ‘angelic sinners'.

89
‘Le fatiche totali di Voce Operaia',
Il Segno
, 18 May 1944. The utterly fundamentalist
Il Segno
– which held that ‘the ultimate goal' of Christian Democracy should be the Catholicisation of the state – took a position towards that party which we would today call
collateralismo
(outside sponsorship by an organization that is not itself expressly political). See the editorial ‘Posizioni', signed ‘Signifer', from the first issue, 1 March 1944.

90
‘A proposito di politica e morale', signed ‘g',
La Punta
, 2 February 1944 (the first issue). The paper, whose motto was ‘I cut and drive forth', was headed by Giulio Andreotti, Giorgio Tupini and Cesare Dall'Oglio (see Gorrieri,
La Repubblica di Montefiorino
, p. 134).

91
‘Ai giovani',
La Punta
2 February 1944 editorial, signed ‘Grint'.

92
Gorrieri,
La Repubblica di Montefiorino
, pp. 542–3.

93
Letter to the Ravenna Christian Democracy, 15 March 1945 (my italics):
Le Brigate Garibaldi
, vol. III, p. 487.

94
Letter to Pippo, 6 July 1944 (IG,
BG
, 06162).

95
Transcript of a meeting of commissars and Party organisers attached to the 3
^rd
Lombardy Division, 20 October 1944 (ibid., 01519).

96
Letter from Andrea Lima to the ‘Communist directorate' and to the Command of the Friuli battalion, undated (IZDG, envelope 534, folder III/1). Curious evidence of what the Communists would have wished the Christian Democrats to have been like is given by the article ‘Comunismo e democrazia cristiana', in the 5 September 1944
L'Unità
(Liguria edition), which is presented as having been submitted by a group of Christian Democrats. The article is so made-to-measure as to give every impression of having been written by a Communist who is not ashamed to say that the greatest contribution to the liberation struggle came from the Communists and Christian Democracy.

97
See the short piece devoted to the freedom of religion which Stalin had guaranteed Italy on the basis of the third point of the Moscow Declaration (in the 14 November 1943 Rome edition).

98
The pamphlet, edited by the diocese's secretariat for social activism, was printed by the Antoniana printworks in Padua, its imprimatur dated 7 November 1944. See also the
Catechismo sul comunismo
(Catechism on communism) that the archbishop of Milan, Cardinal Schuster, had published in August 1943 and February 1944, and which Miccoli defines as ‘rozzo centone' (‘crude travesty') as well as an obviously political agenda, in
Problemi di ricerca
, p. 249.

99
Letter of February 1945, in ibid., p. 261.

100
Fogar,
Le brigate Osoppo-Friuli
, p. 292.

101
Libro storico degli avvenimenti più notevoli avvenuti in questa Parrocchia di Rivalpo (Arta)
, dated 19 June 1945 (cited in Miccoli,
Problemi di ricerca
, p. 258).

102
Libro storico della parrocchia di San Pietro al Natisone
, dated 30 December 1946 (cited in ibid., pp. 258–9).

103
Cited in Tramontin,
Contadini e movimento partigiano
, p. 308.

104
Reports by the parish priests of Longarone and San Gregorio nelle Alpi, cited in ibid., pp. 292, 300. On the migration of a large group of Bologna partisans to the Veneto, see E. Antonioni, ‘La Resistenza veneta nel contributo dei garibaldini bolognesi', in
La Resistenza in Emilia-Romagna
, Bologna 1970, pp. 126–48, and L. Bergonzini, ‘I bolognesi nel Veneto, nel Modenese e nelle Valli', in L. Bergonzini and L. Arbizzani,
La Resistenza a Bologna
, Bologna: Istituto per la storia di Bologna III (1970), pp. 169–265.

105
Tramontin,
Contadini e movimento partigiano
, p. 292.

106
Ibid., p. 291.

107
Ibid., p. 290.

108
See the sermon given by the Alpago parish priest on Sunday 6 May 1945 (ibid., p. 318).

109
See
Clero bresciano
, May 1944 (cited in Bianchi,
I cattolici
, p. 181).

110
‘L' educazione nazionale problema del domani',
Il Regime fascista
, 19 August 1944, cited in Mazzatosta,
Educazione e scuola nella RSI
, p. 71. Japan's ambassador to the RSI was, nonetheless, critical of Italian women, ‘especially those from the bourgeois and uppermost classes', because of their lack of dedication to caring for their families (‘Rapporto al Mikado' in Ragionieri,
Italia giudicata
, p. 802).