Partisan courier
Born in 1926, Luigi Carron joins the partisans at the age of seventeen. At once his agility, reinforced by a burning desire to keep moving, becomes evident and he is therefore assigned the role of courier or, in other words, the person responsible for the delivery of orders and other kinds of information from one place to another. Hearing the words of Luigi means being able to listen to the story of a civil, political and personal formation that took place amidst the numberless and enormous difficulties of those war years.

Virginia Gattegno, an Italian citizen, was fifteen years old, and living in the Jewish Community of Rhodes when the Racial Laws were enacted, and only a few years later, she was deported to Auschwitz. Even though we all know what the Holocaust was, very few of us have probably had the occasion to hear it narrated in such a vivid and "tangible" way. The real substance that Virginia's words give back to us, at a distance of so many years, are not only the look, the ingenuousness and the sour acquisition of awareness by the girl of the time, but also the strength and the invincible spirit of the woman of today: the survivor! 'Perhaps the only form of prayer that I actually expressed was the desire that I didn't want to die in there, covered with mud, darkness and horror, but outside! In fact when the gates were finally thrown open, the first great satisfaction was being able to freely come out and go in again. Do tell me yourselves if I should still go on talking about Auschwitz; because Auschwitz is such an enormous thing that… it is quite impossible to describe…'

Ivo Fantato joined the Italian army at the age of seventeen, and took part in numerous battles during the war, as a bomber pilot. The stories of his raids over North Africa and the Mediterranean Sea are quite adventurous and able to fully convey, not only that sense of danger and vulnerability experienced during those missions, but also the crude reality about the unimaginable violence of dog fighting. "Because it was always risky, be it night or day, and no matter whether one was in the air or on the ground. And very soon nobody felt really bothered by this any more - to put it in a nutshell, it was just ordinary business! What followed was therefore quite obvious: I simply said to my crew members, 'let's go boys!' and, as was usual, they all agreed. So what did I do then; I set course straight towards the target. But no sooner had I done this, than I heard them shouting across to me, 'Watch-out! Here comes a fighter!'… "

Pharmacist
Vittoria Dornig, born in 1920, was a student of Pharmaceutical Sciences during the war years. Having Trieste, Milan, Pavia and Trentino for its setting, her story depicts the very tiresome journeys she had to undertake in order to go to the University, the bombardments, family mishaps, and memories of a student life that was able nourish genuine hope, in spite of the events of the time.
"Then came the fall of the Fascist regime. And, well, I was in Milan when this happened. Then it was quite a sight to see people shedding tears of joy and embracing one another; and even this was something that could never be forgotten. It seemed then that everybody had been born anew: people poured out into the streets, kissed each other… it wasn't any more necessary to know who you were kissing; that is exactly how things went! Everywhere you could see people destroying and pulling down the statues of the Duce, and even that, was quite a day of… happiness, that's what I would say; of liberation - that feeling of having freed one's shoulders from a heavy yoke…"

Veteran of the Russian Campaign and Mussolini's bodyguard at Salò
Erminio Ingaramo was on the Russian Front, and in his narration clearly depicts the episodes, the stalemates, the hunger and the sometimes comical contradictions of that belligerent adventure. On his return to Italy, Erminio was recruited among the personal bodyguards of Mussolini, and did his service at Salò. It was 1943: Italy was divided into two, and everybody, in one way or another, was doing their best to save whatever they could of their own things of everyday life…!
"Apart from the fighting there really wasn't anything left for to do, and so we simply tried to manage as best we could. The same thing applied to the food because mealtimes were not quite regular: the food would arrive in time on one occasion, and very late on another. Consequently, we decided to look into the matter for ourselves, considering that this country was particularly bountiful with snails: we would in fact gather pails of snails, have them cleaned up, and have our fill. And, Oh boy, how many frogs I devoured! Believe me, they were quite a delicacy!"

Air Force radiotelegraph operator
During the years of the second World War Walter Stefani, who comes from Vicenza, was in Rome where he was studying as a radiotelegraph trainee. It was actually due to his being in Rome, that he was in fact able to witness the events of the 25th of July, and to listen to the message of Badoglio announcing the overthrow of "Cavalier Benito Mussolini".
"Another of the episodes I can well recall was the 16th or the 17th of September, when we were assembled in the courtyard - and by this time only a few of us had remained, since many had already deserted; some going away… And then the Colonel, breaking into tears, had communicated to us our orders of temporary exemption. We were also given money; I can still remember that there were five hundred and eighty Lire for each one of us! The Colonel had then concluded saying: 'Those of you who are southbound can be happy because you will be returning home for sure; but instead I can do nothing else than to hope that those going northwards will be able to get there safely - he was in fact aware of all those, let's say… those mopping-up operations that the Germans were then doing. We therefore got ready, prepared our bundles and left. I can remember that by then I was still dressed up in overalls - I mean to say my Air Force flight overalls. What is really curious is that at a certain point everybody started pulling off and throwing away their badges, the stars, that is to say. Well, at first I also did the same thing; however after having taken only three steps I then said to myself, 'but why the hell do I have to throw away my stars?' And so I went back, picked them up, and put them back on…"

Acting Sub-Lieutenant aboard the submarine "Alagi"
At the age of twenty Vicenzo Piovan, a Venetian, started doing active service aboard a submarine belonging to the Italian fleet of the time. His experience of the War is quite a difficult one; but just for once not so dramatic, and which therefore makes listening to him as he narrates his story like having a long adventure. His existence had in fact been caught up in the daily routine of life on board, and an apparently interminable series of immersions, until the 8th of September 1943, and when he was eventually able to cross over to the opposite front. Alongside the British Navy, the submarine he was aboard had then been assigned to an operation area off the coast of Palestine: and this is where he shortly afterwards would have come into contact with the first wave of Jewish immigration.
"From Bastia I took a train that was going to Portovecchio in southern Corsica. For reasons that I couldn't explain, the troop train I had taken kept stopping all along the way - and it was during this journey that I actually had my first experience with the prickly pear. I had noticed, as a result of the insatiable hunger and terrible thirst we were suffering, that the other soldiers would get off the train to gather prickly pears whenever it stopped. And so at the following stop I also jumped down from the train and helped myself to the fruits. But since they pricked so badly, I was then forced to use my handkerchief both to pick them from the plants and rid them of the peel. Well, it happened that after having finished my meal I then decided to use the handkerchief to wipe my mouth clean, and this is how I ended up having my face covered with prickles: it was my first misadventure of the war!"

Two urban children, evacuees in the countryside during the war
"Because the Americans, as I can remember, then began using plate bombs which were inflammable. They hurled them down right in the middle of wheat fields and burnt up all the wheat, right! This was their way of carrying out sabotage. Then there were those well known bombs in the form of fountain pens, and many other gadgets that children… the dolls that were extremely dangerous, and so it was prohibited for children… they always said, 'Don't ever touch anything, avoid picking up things, and don't just pick up anything that you might see.' And it was… how do you say… quite curious for a child to see all these things - a friend of mine, among other things, lost one arm, and yet another lost a hand. And so there were these toys, these things, and it was… yes, it was always aimed at sabotage or else for doing… in my opinion it was actually something much closer to barbarism than to mere acts of sabotage, but as it were, this doesn't really matter: after all they very knew enough that it would have been children, and not grown-ups, going out to pick up this stuff."
"Then on another occasion we happened to be right in the middle of the town, a hoard of us young people, when an aeroplane swooped down on us form the direction of Piumazzo, perhaps mistaking us for a group of soldiers or a public rally… well, it simply started raining shots and shells at us! A friend of mine and I managed to survive by diving for cover behind the built up edge of a well which was one and a half metres high from the ground. We hid behind this, but you should have seen the iron sheet with which the well was covered… it had holes this big all over it! Well, this is but just one of those episodes."

Partisan - alias Outlaw "Ten"
Angelo Marson joined the Partisans at the age of twenty-one, following the events that took place on 25th July 1943 - the battlename "Ten" was successively assumed after having heard this word for the first time from the lips of an English interpreter! Marson's story is a tale made up of drammatic actions and numberless moments of hardship, and therefore allows us to have a close encounter with the complex hibstorical vicissitude of the Resistance.
"...Well, we were also literally terrorized by the fact they could have come and picked us up from house to house, because it was actually true that they had a the list of all the young people who would have had to go back to the Republic… what is it that we could have done about it? Under the cover of the night, in the evening once it was dark, one would therefore go out carrying a blanket with him, and spend the night wherever there were families… families that until then hadn't had boys who had been conscripted; and amongst whom, therefore, it was still more secure. More so, in the area, after the 25th of July, they had started setting free the Anti-Fascists who were in prison abroad or in border areas, and these were immediately more experienced and prepared in politics; for what was to become their future! They started contacting us, the youth who used to hold gatherings in the stables by ourselves…"

Partisan courier
Pompeo Meneghin's exciting story tells us about the Resistance. Having been brought up in an anti-Fascist family, Pompeo, who actually is still a child, finds himself right in the middle of the partisan activities of the Alto Vicentino territory. The dramatic event connected with "The Four Martyrs of Marostica", is one episode that Pompeo very well recalls. But, nevertheless, he also remembers many others, such as the mopping-up operations, the numberless arrests, the violence committed by the "Black Brigades"…, and right up to that unmistakable sense of disappointment, that was felt by many a partisan after the end of the War, as a result of the many promises of renewal that were left unfulfilled.
"Well, after having firmly planted this pole in the ground, they led the four partisans under the portico, and sent for a priest so that he could confess them… The firing squad then lined-up in front of the portico, and once the men had been confessed, the public executions began. As a matter of fact, the event of simply having to stand and watch while these men were being shot to death was by itself more than a tragedy to the town (…) The four were in fact shot one at a time, and at an interval of precisely fifteen minutes from one another: and in this way, what otherwise would have been considered as a single execution was instead made to last for one endless hour! Now, can you just try to imagine how it must have felt to hear that burst every quarter of an hour knowing very well that it was killing someone?

Catholic partisan of the 76th Garibaldi Brigade
During the war Father Giulio Cittadini, who was born in 1924, joined the Resistance and took part is such military campaigns as the liberation of Ivrea. His is actually the perspective of a young Catholic who, only a couple of years from then, will have celebrated his priestly ordination.
" This here is the beret which I wore from a certain point onwards, and is therefore almost sixty years - almost… No… let's say, fifty… 1945… that is, more than fifty-five years of existence, in short, right?… That's it…! Fifty-five! Alongside this medal on which… you can see there is… there is an inscription, "FSP" - that stands for, "Fede Senza Patria" ("Faith Beyond Every Frontier"), Association of Italian… Catholic University students, that is what! And there also was this little "Tri-colour" which, I repeat, took the place of the… there was… there was supposed to be a star, and not a red one… but white, red and green! Ours was a relatively tolerant brigade, and so I was allowed to… For me it was something of very great value, for it wasn't only a visible sign of the choice I had made, but also the demonstration that I was actually fighting in the name of that Christian choice (…). What you see here instead is the rank: "Detachment Deputy War Commissioner"! Well, this isn't really where they would have to go since they are normally meant to be worn on the jacket; but unfortunately I threw mine away, and therefore decided to simply remove the rank and place it here! And this one here is the "Distinguished Service Cross", obtained by merit… A Military Cross for war merits, and which was actually awarded to all partisans."