Selma Velleman grew up in a liberal Jewish family, and it was not until the war that she was confronted with her being Jewish. Suddenly it became a matter of life or death. When she turned twenty in June 1942, Selma received a call to perform forced labour in Germany. She managed to evade this, however, and decided to join the resistance not much later. She bleached her hair and, thanks to a forged identity card, went on to live as the non-Jewish Margareta ‘Marga’ van der Kuit. Under that false name she distributed illegal newspapers, false identity cards and coupons. After being betrayed and arrested in July 1944, she was imprisoned in Camp Vught and, later, in the German women's camp Ravensbrück — still as the non-Jewish Marga van der Kuit. She knew that if her Jewish identity was discovered, she would be sent to one of the extermination camps. “At night I barely dared to sleep, afraid as I was to say my real name and reveal my real identity.” Only when she was evacuated to Sweden after the liberation of Camp Ravensbrück did Selma dare to say it out loud: “My name is not Margareta van der Kuit. My name is Selma.”She and her older brothers David and Louis survived the war, but her father Barend, mother Femmetje and younger sister Clara were murdered in the extermination camps. In November 1945, Selma moved to London, where her brothers lived and worked. She found a job at the BBC, where she met Hugo van de Perre. The two married in 1955 and had a son in 1957. Selma van de Perre-Velleman still lives in London to this day. She did not talk much about the war for a long time, until she started to put her life story on paper. This resulted in a book with the apt title My name is Selma, which became an instant bestseller after it came out in 2020. About the lasting impact of the war, she wrote in her closing words: “The death of Papa, Mama and Clara is still the most shocking event of my life. Worse than anything I've experienced in the war is knowing how they were killed. Even now, 75 years later, I lie awake at night and say to myself: ‘Selma, go to sleep. You cannot change what happened by thinking about it.’ By participating in commemorations and talking about the Holocaust, I found a way to deal with all of this.”

The Netherlands

Selma van de Perre-Velleman

Rudolph Cleveringa was dean of the Faculty of Law of Leiden University when his Jewish colleague and friend Eduard Meijers, like other Jewish professors, was expelled from the university under pressure from the Nazis. It was the reason for the famous protest speech Rudolph gave on 26 November 1940 in front of a packed lecture hall, in which he expressed his disgust at the anti-Jewish measures and how they went against all the rules of law – his own field of study, after all.It was a speech straight from the heart, but one with major consequences. The same evening, Rudolph, who reportedly already had a packed suitcase in his hallway at home, disappeared and was locked up in the prison of Scheveningen — commonly known as the Oranjehotel (Orange Hotel). Meanwhile, his students eagerly disseminated the speech and went on strike, which led to Leiden University being closed by the occupying forces. After eight months of imprisonment in the Oranjehotel, Rudolph was released, but in 1944 he was imprisoned again, this time as a hostage in Camp Vught. Together with 31 other Leiden residents, he was arrested in retaliation for a failed liquidation of a member of the Dutch National Socialist Party by the city’s resistance. In Camp Vught, he was put to work and had to register the belongings of both new prisoners and those who were released.In July 1944, after more than seven months of imprisonment, he discovered his own name on the list of prisoners who were soon to be released. Having been only just released, Rudolph, at the request of the government in London, joined the College van Vertrouwensmannen (College of Trusted Men), a group of former politicians and representatives of the resistance that had to prevent a power vacuum with the liberation in sight. “A choice that was at least as courageous as the speech of 26 November,” noted his biographer Kees Schuyt. After the war, Rudolph resumed his work at Leiden University until he retired in 1958. He then served in public administration for a number of years. Rudolph died in 1980 at the age of 86. In memory of the professor and his famous protest speech, Leiden University organises lectures all around the world every year on and around 26 November.

Rudolph Cleveringa

Roosje Mozes grew up with her parents and older sister Martha in Tilburg, a city in the south of the Netherlands. In 1941, the Mozes family took in Horst Eichenwald, a Jewish boy from Germany who was sent to the Netherlands by his parents in the hope he would be safe there. However, daily life in the Netherlands changed for both Roosje and Horst. They were no longer allowed to attend their own school, and swimming in the IJzeren Man was forbidden for Jews. In April 1943, the Mozes family had to report to Camp Vught. Father Salomon Mozes, a nurse by profession, was sent to Westerbork, having to leave his wife and children behind. In May 1943, there were almost 1,800 Jewish children at Camp Vught. Many died as a result of sickness and privation, news of which spread outside the camp. The SS decided to take action to put an end to these reports. On 5 June, it was announced that “all children between the ages of 0 and approximately 16 years are required to leave the camp to be accommodated, as we have been informed, in a special children’s camp”. There was great panic. A children’s camp? “No one believes it,” wrote one Jewish woman. On Sunday 6 June 1943, it rained continuously. The youngest children and their mothers were deported. Amongst them were mother Kaatje Mozes, her youngest daughter Roosje as well as Horst.They are followed, on 7 June, by the older children, also accompanied by one or both of their parents. Martha, being 17 years old at the time, remained in Camp Vught. In total 3,014 parents and children were taken away. Upon arrival of these ‘Children’s Transports’ in Sobibor almost everybody was killed in the gas chambers, Kaatje, Roosje and Horst included. Father Salomon was killed a month later, also in Sobibor. Martha survived several concentration camps and was eventually evacuated to Sweden, where she wrote a letter to friends in the Netherlands in which she dreamed about being reunited with her family — still unaware of the fact that she was the only one of her family who had survived the war.

Roosje Mozes

Camp Vught’s 21 Dutch female guards were citizens employed by the SS. Most of them came from the province of North Brabant. They were often young women, with the youngest being just sixteen years old. Just like Suze Arts, these Dutch women had all kinds of reasons for taking up the job of camp guard. Some did it for the money, others for love — a number of women were in or started up a relationship with a male guard — and others as a way of rebelling against their parents. Some were also ardent supporters of National Socialism. At the age of two, Arts lost her mother. Not long after her death, a stepmother came into her live with whom she had a troublesome relationship. Arts went to several boarding schools as a child, including one in Germany, where she met Franz Ettlinger. They stayed in touch, and it was Ettlinger who already worked as a guard at Camp Vught when he pointed out the job vacancy to Arts. At the time, Arts was living as a single mother in Amsterdam with her son Hans, a child from an affair with a married GP she had worked for as a nurse. During her time in Camp Vught, Arts got pregnant with Ettlinger’s daughter, even though he was married and had four children at home.Arts was abhorred by the women at Camp Vught. She was described by several prisoners as sadistic, inhuman, brutal and tyrannical, primarily due to her involvement in the infamous ‘bunker tragedy’. For this she was fired and after the war sentenced to 15 years in prison. After her release, Arts found a job using a pseudonym working for the women's magazine Margriet as a coordinator of the letters and puzzle section. Her two children grew up in foster care. After the war she stated: “I had no interest in politics. I simply wanted to put food on the table. Looking back, I sometimes think that it was the humiliation I suffered when I was young that brought me to Vught. There, in my uniform, I mattered.”

Suze Arts

There were several acts of bravery during the breakthrough of the Eastern Gothic Line, in particular during the last days of the Battle of the East, the Nepalese soldier Sher Bahadur Thapa performed an important action that awarded him the Victoria Cross - the British Army's highest honour. The official motivation reads: 'On 18/19 September 1944, a company of the 9th Gurkha Rifles encountered fierce opposition from a well-placed German position. Section commander and rifleman Sher Bahadur Thapa carried out a charge and succeeded in silencing the machine gun. After his section commander was wounded, the Rifleman, who was now alone, headed for the exposed part of a ridge, from where, disregarding the volleys of bullets, he managed to silence other machine guns, covering a retreat and saving two wounded men before being finally killed.'The Gurkha Company was situated in the border territory between the State of San Marino and Italy, namely in the Castle of Faetano, and it was precisely in this territory that the heroic act of Sher Bahadur Thapa took place, which not only saved the lives of several comrades but also enabled an important position to be taken for the continuation of the battle.

Italy

Sher Bahadur Thapa

Don Antonio Marcaccini was a leading player in the war in the Conca Valley. Partly thanks to the presence of the communist Gianni Quandamatteo, he succeeded in building an important anti-fascist presence in the area. The efforts deployed by the resistance in that area were extensive, and in Farneto, Decio Mercanti, an important member of the Rimini Cln also spent time in hiding in the parsonage of Don Marcaccini while escaping from the fascists. The attendance of those places led Mercanti to ask the CUMER (Comando unico militare Emilia Romagna - Single Military Headquarters of Emilia Romagna) representative to make an inspection to check whether a partisan brigade could be set up in lower Romagna. The suggestion was rejected on the grounds that the area was not suitable for holding a large number of partisans. In early July, the priest was involved in the assault on the town of Gemmano in order to break up the population register to avoid the republican draft. During the raid, a number of documents and blank identity cards sent to CUMER in Bologna were also taken. However, the episode for which Don Marcaccini became famous occurred on 6 September 1944, when the Germans were after Gianni Quondamatteo, who escaped from the rectory and sought refuge in a gully in the Ventena stream. As retaliation, the Germans seized six men from neighbouring shelters and threatened them with firing squads for helping Quondamatteo escape. The parish priest, don Antonio Marcaccini, tried to save them by explaining that Quondamatteo was not a partisan and that they were innocent. After fruitless attempts, don Marcaccini volunteered in place of the 6 to be shot; the gesture convinced the German officer to free the hostages and leave the village.

Don Antonio Marcaccini

Eric De Lautour, L/Cpl Reg No. 234312, 2nd New Zealand Division, in 25 Battalion, Company A in North Africa and then assigned in the Italian Campaign to 18 Battalion as a driver and signalman. In life he was a farmer, after fighting he returned to New Zealand, raised a large family and in old age became a well-known senior runner. Of the fighting in Italy he had vivid memories, especially of the civilians he had met, he remembered the poverty and misery of the Italians who showed great dignity and to whom he and his fellow soldiers tried to help. He took part in several ceremonies in Cassino, together with veterans from every nation, showing sincere reconciliation with old enemies. He made friends with the Italians he had fought with in the Liri Valley. He died on 14 April 2020 at the age of 100.

Eric De Lautour

Kurt Rosenberg was born in Wadowice, Poland, on 31 December 1919. Of Jewish religion, he moved to Lviv in August 1939 to avoid Nazi persecution. In the spring of 1940, he was sent, together with his mother and brother Egon, for deportation to Siberia, but escaped from the railway carriage. He began an adventurous escape through Romania and the Balkans, surviving the Bucharest earthquake and the German bombing of Belgrade. He reached Italy in 1941 and was interned for wartime reasons in Villa Santa Maria in Abruzzo. After 8 September 1943, he escaped again and reached Bari, where he enlisted in the British Eighth Army, under the name Kazimierz Go'rsk. He then joined the Polish Second Corps, fighting at Cassino. After the war he chose to stay in Italy. He became an accredited journalist at the Vatican Press Office during the pontificate of John Paul II, his former neighbour in Wadowice. Decorated with the 'Polonia Restituta', he participated in the celebrations for the Battle of Monte Cassino until the very end. He died on 3 December 2009.

Poland

Kurt Rosenberg

The German occupation of Monsummano Terme began in the days immediately following the Armistice of 8 September 1943 and marked the beginning of all-out war in the area. A number of ordinances affected the area, compromising the lives of the local population: a curfew from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m.; the darkening of houses at night; the compulsory submission of straggling soldiers; a ban on aiding Anglo-American soldiers; the forced surrender of all weapons; a ban on listening to hostile radio channels. The situation of displaced persons was especially tragic at that time, as they were crammed into uninhabited facilities or housed in disused buildings, in poor sanitary conditions and often deprived of basic means of subsistence and clothing.One of the most significant events was the arrest and deportation of Jewish citizens. On 5 November 1943 and in the days immediately following, a number of patrols organised by officers from the Montecatini public security police station and carabinieri from the Monsummano station, in collaboration with local German and republican soldiers, led to the imprisonment of people 'belonging to the Jewish race'. After a period of detention, ten Jews were transferred first to Florence, then to the Fossoli transit camp, finally arriving at Auschwitz, where they were murdered in the gas chambers.The German influence in the village was seen through the work of the Todt organisation based in the Grotta Giusti spa; they recruited voluntary or forced civilian personnel to build barracks, concrete forts and tunnels. It was here, from the beginning of June until 14 July 1944, that the headquarters of Albert Kesselring, commander of the Wehrmacht in Italy, was located. He resided in Villa Renatico Martini, in a secluded position protected by the hills.On 23 August 1944, after other massacres of civilians, 174 people were murdered during the Padule di Fucecchio massacre. The massacre was carried out by sections of the German army's 26th Armoured Division and included children, women, and the elderly, many of them farmers or displaced persons. The aim of the operation was to clear the territory was to eliminate any human presence that could help the partisans and hinder their retreat towards the Gothic Line, which ended definitively a few days later. The town was liberated by the partisans on 4 September 1944.Monsummano Terme was decorated with the Silver Medal of Civil Merit.

Total war in Monsummano Terme: the German occupation, the Shoah, the Massacre of the Fucecchio Marshes

Castelnuovo di Garfagnana emerged in the provincial area as the main location for the free internment of foreign Jews in the period 1941-1943. About 70 people, placed in private homes or hotels, without the possibility of leaving the town, going out at night and with the obligation to sign with the local public security authority on predetermined days.After 8 September 1943, the area was occupied by the Germans and fascist authority was restored. The Nazi occupation was characterised by the issuing of a series of ordinances, the transformation of production activities for the purposes of war and the development of voluntary or forced labour under the Todt organisation, which was involved in the building of fortifications, trenches and roads along the Gothic Line. In December 1943, the foreign Jewish families interned here were transferred to the concentration camp in Bagni di Lucca, with few exceptions. From there they were moved first to Florence, then to Milan, and finally deported to Auschwitz. Only Lotte Wallach and Leo Venderber, a young synagogue officiant, were saved from the Shoah.In August 1944, during the German retreat towards the Gothic Line and the advance of the front, the 36th Black Brigade 'Mussolini' stationed in several villages in the Garfagnana, including Castelnuovo at the Capuchin monastery. There they were attacked by a group of partisans from the Garibaldi Lunense Division. A fierce roundup followed on 23 September 1944, resulting in the killing of 7 civilians and 1 partisan at the hands of the fascists. On 6 November 1944, German soldiers shot four more civilians at the cemetery in Castelnuovo Garfagnana.The area from the second half of 1944 was characterised by intense Allied bombardment and violent fighting along the Gothic positions. The first Allied air raid, on 2 July 1944, resulted in the death of six civilians. The population was displaced over the months. The remained people lived in extremely precarious conditions. On 13 February 1945, an Allied fighter-bomber hit a makeshift air raid shelter near the cemetery, killing 30 people. Castelnuovo di Garfagnana was liberated on 20 April 1945 by partisans followed by the immediate arrival of Anglo-American troops. At the end of the war, 70 air raids and the destruction of 80% of the buildings were recorded.Castelnuovo was awarded the Gold Medal of Civil Merit on 13 October 2009, together with 16 municipalities in Garfagnana, for the roundups, reprisals, and bombings suffered near the Gothic Line by the population, which was able to face these events thanks to the solidarity and courage in the ideal of freedom.

Castelnuovo di Garfagnana and its population between internment, Nazi and fascist massacres, bombings, Liberation

The front had stabilised in October 1944 along the Gothic Line and the Allied advance was halted with the arrival of winter. In order to weaken some areas of the front, the German army planned an attack on the Allied troops in Media Valle del Serchio in collaboration with the Republican army, where the 92nd Infantry Division, composed of African Americans and considered one of the weakest and most inexperienced divisions in Italy, was stationed. The Wehrmacht leadership chose the Christmas period to try to surprise the Allies.Operation Wintergewitter (Winter Storm), also known as the Christmas Offensive or Battle of the Garfagnana, caused fierce fighting especially around the village of Sommocolonia, a stone village located in Media Valle del Serchio on the slopes of the Tuscan-Emilian Apennines. On 28 December 1944, the German and Italian units fell back after capturing many prisoners and causing numerous casualties. The Indian brigades recaptured Barga, Fornaci di Barga and Gallicano. US General Harold Alexander ordered the positions to be held until the final offensive in the spring of 1945: the Garfagnana front thus remained unchanged.Signs of the battle are still visible today in Sommocolonia: the walls with bullet holes, the destruction of the parish church of S. Frediano, later rebuilt after the war, the monument with the plaque and memorial stones to partisans and fallen soldiers, the remains of the medieval tower where Lieutenant John Fox had perched. The latter was the heroic figure for which he was awarded the Medal of Honour in 1997, one of the first African Americans to receive it. He voluntarily gave up his life by ordering his comrades to fire on his position surrounded by German army troops in order to annihilate them and not concede the tower.The Peace Museum in Sommocolonia was dedicated to the war events of December 1944. Weapons, equipment and artefacts from the period are on display inside, accompanied by extensive photographic documentation. Via della Liberazione is an itinerary that retraces some of the places linked to WWII in the area. The loop route starts in Barga and reaches Catagnana, Sommocolonia, Rio Villese (La Moma) before returning to Barga.

Operation Wintergewitter

Manrico Ducceschi was born in Capua (CE), the son of Fernando, an aviator from Pistoia, and Matilde Bonaccio, a housewife. He completed his middle and grammar school studies in Pistoia where he attended the Liceo Classico Niccolò Forteguerri. He then graduated from the Liceo Classico Niccolò Machiavelli in Lucca and enrolled in the Faculty of Literature and Philosophy at the University of Florence. With the outbreak of war, he was called up for military service. He was in Tarquinia when the Armistice was announced. He managed to return to Pistoia, then headed to Florence to resume contacts with the Partito d'Azione (Action Party). He was sent to the Pistoia mountains to organise the first Resistance units. First, he assumed the battle name of 'Pontino', then that of 'Pippo' by which he was always remembered, in homage to Giuseppe Mazzini. Initially, his tasks were both organisational in nature, with the collection of weapons and the building of networks of collaborators and informers, and sabotage. He established his headquarters at the Alpe delle Tre Potenze. His formation, divided into sectors, groups and detachments, acted in a large territory of the Gothic Line that stretched from the Val di Lima to Abetone, from the Modena Apennines to Garfagnana and the Serchio valley, from Svizzera Pesciatina to Valdinievole. On 16 March 1944, it took on the official name of 'National Liberation Army - XI Military Zone Patriots'. Ducceschi defended the plurality of political origins of his partisans, around 700, and guaranteed the formation an apolitical character: this caused quite a few contrasts with the Partito d'Azione and the Tuscan National Liberation Committee. He was in constant contact with the US Office of Strategic Services and received a number of airdrops of weapons and ammunition. One of the main operations was the interception of a car carrying Japanese naval rear admiral Tōyō Mitsunobu on his way to Switzerland after holding a conference in Montecatini Terme. He was in Pianosinatico on the Abetone and Brenner Highway 12 when he was attacked and murdered on 8 June 1944. A number of important documents were recovered as part of military operations in the Pacific Ocean. Later, Pippo's formation joined the Allies in their advance towards northern Italy, contributing to the Liberation of some Emilian towns and pushing as far as Milan. Manrico Ducceschi was decorated by the Americans with the Bronze Star Medal of Military Valour. The partisan was found hanged in his home in Lucca on 26 August 1948, having died two days earlier. On 28 August, a solemn funeral was held in Lucca with a picket guard rendering military honours. A street in Pistoia and one in Lucca were named after him.

Manrico Ducceschi

Fulvio Zamponi was born in Pescia on 17 February 1901, the son of Gino, a socialist saddler, and Enrichella Vezzani, a housewife. He lived in Monsummano and, between the ages of 15 and 16, joined first the Italian Socialist Party, then founded the Socialist Youth Federation, becoming its secretary. In 1921, he joined the Communist Party of Italy and took part in meetings of the Arditi del Popolo Pesciatini (People's Ardites), taking sides against the squadrist danger. Because of fascist threats, he was forced to go first to Asti, then to Turin (where he collaborated with the Ordine Nuovo), and finally to Milan where he was a member of the National Communist Trade Union Committee. Returning to Monsummano, he emigrated to Marseille in 1922.The Fascist regime registered him in the Casellario Politico Centrale (CPC) as a person kept under special surveillance and 'warned'. In 1923, his wife, Giulia Faldi from Monsummano, was also reported to the CPC as an 'assiduous propagandist [...] among women'. During the years he was abroad, he managed to evade fascist repression, living as a fugitive and constantly moving between Germany, Spain, France and Switzerland, where he continued his political activities. In 1933 he returned to Monsummano for good with his wife and son Bruno. After being arrested and interrogated, he was released, but did not provide any compromising information. He led a secluded existence and maintained diligent behaviour until the German occupation, when he resumed work in the Communist Party.On 9 September 1944, after the liberation of Monsummano, he was appointed Mayor by the local National Liberation Committee of which he was president. At that time, there was considerable conflict with the Allied administration. A few days later, he was imprisoned because of a poster devised by young communists that 'asked women not to behave with the Allies as they did with the Germans', which had been found to be subversive. Zamponi was beaten and imprisoned. He was released by the Allied governor after a fortnight. Later, he held positions in the Lucca and Pistoia federations of the PCI, in some Chambers of Labour and in various Tuscan towns as councillor and alderman. From 1953 to 1958 he was elected to parliament as a PCI deputy.Zamponi died on 18 July 1991. A street and the ANPI section in Monsummano were dedicated to him.

Fulvio Zamponi

Gino Lombardi was born in Querceta di Seravezza in 1920. At the outbreak of WWII was mobilised and sent to Rhodes.Returning to Pisa in 1943 he was assigned to the San Giusto airport. After the 31 August bombing, he evacuated to Ruosina, taking his family and that of his fiancée Margherita Cervelli with him.With his father and his friend Piero Consani he organised the first partisan militia in the area at La Porta, to which he gave the name 'Cacciatori delle Alpi Apuane' (Apuan Alps Hunters).The first actions included the theft of a mimeograph from the Stazzema municipality and the theft of chestnut flour from the Farnocchia heap.On 18 February, fascists from Forte dei Marmi tried to surprise Lombardi at his house in Ruosina, but Gino escaped in adventurous way.On 23 March, the Nazi-Fascists started an extensive roundup with the aim of interrupting the actions of the 'Apuan Hunters'. However, the latter, with the cooperation of the local population, were warned in good time and managed to break free. The fascists then burnt down Lombardi's house in Ruosina and all his family members were arrested and imprisoned.On 17 April 1944, the 'Cacciatori' were again attacked by the fascists on Monte Gabberi. After this clash, Lombardi thought of moving his partisans to the Upper Lunigiana and, with Piero Consani and Ottorino Balestri, headed towards Equi Terme for a survey. Stopped for a tip off in Sarzana, the three engaged in combat and Lombardi was shot dead.In July 1944 the formations operating in the Versilia mountains took on the name X Garibaldi bis 'Gino Lombardi' Brigade.A plaque today commemorates Lombardi in Farnocchia di Stazzema, where a street was also named after him. Another plaque in his and Consani's memory was placed in 2005 in Sarzana. Ruosina features a family tomb and a monument to fallen partisans.

Gino Lombardi

Valoris Poli was born in Pistoia at San Felice on 12 January 1922. His family was of modest origins and his father passed away when he was young. He started working at Officine S. Giorgio (now Hitachi Rail) in Pistoia, one of the most important industrial plants in Tuscany, and demonstrated excellent skills in manual work and technical drawing. He spent his free time composing music and pursuing an interest in photographic art. He developed anti-fascist views thanks to discussions and meetings in both family and work environments.&nbsp;On 8 September 1943, when the Armistice was announced, he was in Bologna as a soldier. He returned home and joined a resistance group formed along the upper Pistoia Ombrone valley. Later, as a draft dodger, he and two companions took refuge in the mountains at Posola, a small village in the town of Sambuca Pistoiese. They were obliged to retreat back to the village due to lack of food supplies but, as they were passing through Piteccio, they were apprehended by the fascist militia, taken to the barracks and interrogated. They were then transferred to the Ville Sbertoli prison. On 29 March, the special republican court sentenced the four young men to death (including Valoris Poli) and three others to various prison sentences for desertion and renunciation of conscription. The sentence was passed at the Santa Barbara Fortress in Pistoia on 31 March 1944. They were machine-gunned at dawn by a firing squad composed of soldiers, Carabinieri and republican soldiers.&nbsp;A Pistoiese partisan formation took the name 'Valoris Poli'. After the war, he was recognised as 'Fallen for the Liberation Struggle.' A street in Pistoia and the Piteccio ANPI were named after him. On 31 March, in the presence of dignitaries, citizens and students, a public commemoration is held in memory of the four people shot at the Fortezza (Alvaro Boccardi, Aldo Calugi, Vinicio Lando Giusfredi, Valoris Poli); a plaque is erected to honour them. On 31 October 2007, President of the Republic Giorgio Napolitano awarded Valoris Poli and the other executed men the Gold Medal of Civil Merit. In 2022, a film dedicated to the 'Four Fortress Boys', entitled 'Four Yellow Narcissus', was made, written and directed by Firenza Guidi.

Valoris Poli

Born in 1924, of Jewish faith, Jacqueline was first evacuated from Paris in 1940 to the region of Aubusson and then to the south of France, to get closer to the Pyrenean border.&nbsp;Via Spain and Portugal, she travelled to the United States, where part of her family already lived. After several months, her new life as a university student was already not enough for her.&nbsp;In October 1943, she chose to join the ranks of Free France in New York, following the example of her elder brother who, after joining the United States, joined De Gaulle’s army in 1942.Embarked aboard the Queen Elisabeth in January 1944, she arrived in Scotland before being directed to London, where she asked to be posted to the Military Mission for Administrative Liaison to become a liaison officer.&nbsp; She thus joined the women’s section of the MMLA, already formed since autumn 1943 and composed. From February 1944, Jacqueline Simon followed a training for three weeks with the women’s branch of the British Army, the ATS, before taking courses as an officer in June 1944. Among the subjects were history, the French Resistance, geography and French administration.After 6 June 1944, Jacqueline was prepared for an imminent landing in France. Around 29 June 1944, 60 women were directed to Camberley, before embarking at Portsmouth.&nbsp;Aboard a ship carrying troops, they made their way to Normandy.&nbsp;On June 30, they set foot in Ver-sur-Mer at a place called Mont-Fleury.&nbsp;Immediately welcomed by Deputy Prefect Raymond Triboulet, they were taken to Bayeux. The liberated city of Bayeux, the first relief centre for the wounded in Normandy, had also become an essential gateway for logistics between Arromanches and Ouistreham.&nbsp;Women volunteers settled in the premises of the minor seminary transformed into a military hospital. &nbsp; The mission of the liaison teams was clear: to help the civilian populations in need, providing social assistance, moral support and medical aid. The task was immense. The civilians gradually returned to their homes at the beginning of June 1944 as the liberation and the advance of the front progressed, but cities and villages were often nothing more than ruins. Jacqueline remained in Normandy until the end of the fighting in the Falaise Pocket.&nbsp; After the liberation of Paris, she was assigned to a new mission within the American 3rd Army in eastern France to take care of civilian populations and the recently released prisoners and deportees.Jacqueline Simon was repatriated to France to be demobilised in October 1945.&nbsp;Jacqueline Simon is now a boarder at Les Invalides in Paris.

France

Jacqueline Simon-Moncorgé

Inigo Campioni was born in Viareggio in 1878.He attended the Livorno Naval Academy between 1893 and 1896, then made a career in the Navy.He fought in the Italo-Turkish War (on the cruiser Amalfi) and then in WWI (during which he commanded the destroyer Ardito).Multi-decorated, he then worked at the embassy in Paris and commanded several units.In the 1930s, he became an admiral, participated in the Ethiopian War and was appointed senator.At the outbreak of World War II, he commanded the 1st Naval Squadron.Criticised for an overly cautious attitude in the battle of Punta Stilo, he was replaced at the end of 1940. He retired on grounds of an age limit, and was appointed governor of the Dodecanese.He was in Rhodes on 8 September, where he organised a defence that ended on 11 September amid threats of air raids.He was arrested by the Germans and taken to Germany. After a period of imprisonment in Schokken, in January 1944 he was handed over to the Italian authorities who imprisoned him in Verona and then subjected him to a mock trial (the so-called Admirals' trial) at the Special State Security Court of Parma.Convicted of high treason, he was Execution by firing squad at dawn on 24 May in the Polygon shooting range of Parma, together with the Counter admiral Luigi Mascherpa, former commander of the garrison of Lero.The two are commemorated in Parma by a monument. A bust in Livorno and a stele in Viareggio are also dedicated to Campioni.Erected in 1994 in the square of the same name along Viale Regina Margherita, it is accompanied by two commemorative plaques. A third one was affixed in 2000 to his birthplace located in Via Regia 11.

Inigo Campioni

He was ordained a priest in 1935 and became parish priest of Fiano, a small, very poor community whose church was still under construction. He was involved in founding the parish kindergarten and strengthening Azione Cattolica (Catholic Action).On 2 August 1944, immediately after celebrating Mass, he was arrested by the Germans during a round-up. He was locked up in the Pia Casa di Lucca, Trial summarily for sheltering the young Jew Adolfo Cremisi (he was part of Monsignor. Artuto Paoli network) and administering communion to partisans (he had set up an altar on Monte Acuto for this); and Capital punishment. In vain was the last-ditch attempt to save him byArchdiocese of Lucca monsignor Antonio Torrini.At 10 p.m. on 4 August 1944he was led by a platoon of SS under the ramparts of the Walls of Lucca near Porta Elisa: he was forced to dig his own tomb and was killed with 28 shots from rifle. Before being shot, as Christ, he wanted to forgive and bless his murderers. And he left a message of hope for his parents.The next morning, having obtained permission from the German Command, the exhumed body was moved to the Barbantini sisters’s facilities in Lucca, Via Elisa.As early as 1945, a marble memorial stone was placed at the execution site.In 1966, a statue was erected in Fiano, where in 1987 his body was interred in the parish church and a small museum was set up in the rectory.The beatification process was also started in 1968.In 1977, the Ministry of Defence and the President of the Republic awarded him the Silver Medal of Military Valour (in memoriam).Capannori also named the local secondary school after him.

Don Aldo Mei

Roberto Bartolozzi was born in La Spezia in 1914. After finishing school, he found work at Teti, the Tyrrhenian Telephone Company, and joined the Communist Party.

Roberto Bartolozzi

Bogardo Buricchi was born on 23 October 1920 in Carmignano di Prato, part of a religious family, although of poor financial condition. At the age of thirteen he entered the seminary in Pistoia, but left four years later without graduating and with a deep aversion to Church, although he remained a believer. After the death of his mother, thanks to the help of a parish priest, he obtained a secondary high school diploma in pedagogy and became an instructor at a boarding school in Florence. Naturally curious, he came into contact with the liveliest cultural environment: that of Carmignano. He wrote articles, poems and kept diaries. With Italy's entry into the war, he developed a strong aversion to fascism. After 8 September 1943, he went into hiding, organised a patriotic action squad (PAS), of which his brother was also a member, and began sabotaging communications. He never espoused any political ideology, but remained an independent, albeit fascinated by Marxism. In mid-February 1944, he called a strike by the Carmignano peasants, gathering around three hundred of them in the square to protest against the provision which increased the quota of wheat that each family had to put into storage. After the Podestà escape, the Florentine authorities sent the infamous Banda Carità to enforce the order and Buricchi's team, in order to avoid retaliation, set fire to and destroyed the municipal office of agricultural assessments with explosives on 2 March. He helped produce and distribute leaflets for the 4 March strike against the regime, which was followed by repression by the authorities with the arrest and deportation of 133 men to Germany. On the night of 30 April, the team hoisted the red flag on the tower of the Campano di Carmignano, which waved throughout 1 May. On 11 June 1944, a train loaded with explosives from the town's Nobel factory was stopped on a dead railway track at Poggio alla Malva station. Although he had no approval for the action: the area partisan commissar was absent, Bogardo decided to act anyway. On the night of 10-11 June, the Sappists placed a time bomb on a wagon, but it exploded before its time. Some partisans died, including Bogardo. The explosion uncovered some roofs in the area and was felt as far as Prato, Florence and Pistoia. After his death, Prato's most important partisan brigade was named after him, although he was not awarded the silver medal until 1972.

Bogardo Buricchi

Colin Eglin was born on 14 April 1925 in Sea Point, Cape Town. His father died when he was nine years old and he had to move to live with his aunt in the Eastern Free State of South Africa, where he attended school; he was the only English-speaking student. In the mid-1930s, the political tensions between the two leaders of the South African United National Party spilled over into the very life of his aunt's family, such that Colin, disagreeing with her ideas, moved to the college in Villiersdorp, where he graduated in 1939. The following year he enrolled at the University of Cape Town, taking a course in Quantity Surveying. In 1943, at the age of 18, he interrupted his studies to join the army as a volunteer. He first became an instructor in the Cape Town anti-aircraft unit, then was transferred to Egypt where he joined the 6th South African Armoured Division, where he served in the First City/Cape Town Highlanders regiment until the end of the war.In 1946, he returned to South Africa, where he completed his studies and graduated with a degree in Quantity Surveying. In 1949, he married Joyce Mabel, and together they had three daughters. In 1951, he became president of the Pinelands Civic Association and was elected to the town's municipal council. In 1954, he became a provincial councillor for the United Party and remained so until 1958. Later, in 1959, he became one of the founders of the new Progressive Party (PP). In 1971 he became president of the National Executive Branch of the PP. From 1971 to 1994 Eglin led the Democratic Alliance, a multi-racial party that achieved small but significant victories, such as being allowed to visit Steve Biko in prison before the activist was killed by police beatings in 1977.&nbsp;Eglin's party was the first to send a delegation of whites to the so-called 'Southern Homelands', where blacks were relegated, to begin a dialogue on the future of South Africa. The Progressive Reform Party he led became an authoritative mediator between the 10 million whites, the 37 million blacks and their respective political representatives.Colin Eglin died on 29 November 2013. Nelson Mandela described him as one of the architects of democracy in South Africa.

Colin Wells Eglin

The son of two wealthy American artists, Tompkins knew Italy from a young age. When the war broke out he worked as a correspondent and in 1942 enlisted in the OSS, requesting action in Italy. The OSS had both espionage and sabotage tasks and functions to support partisan forces by sending money and weapons and identifying enemy targets for destruction. Arriving in Italy after Sept. 8, Tompkins made an agreement with Raimondo Craveri, the son-in-law of Benedetto Croce, to set up the Italian Resistance Organization (ORI), an intelligence body under American command.Leaving Capri, Tompkins reached Corsica, thence the Lazio coast and arrived in Rome on January 21, 1944, just hours before Operation Shingle (code name for the Anzio landing) was triggered. Despite objective difficulties, Tompkins managed to forge relationships with Roman resistance leaders, meeting several times with communist Giorgio Amendola, socialist Giuliano Vassalli and shareholder Riccardo Bauer. He carried out his activities mainly with the cooperation of the socialist partisan military organization, making use of the future ambassador Francesco Malfatti di Montetretto, thanks to whom it was possible to set up a secret information-gathering network, consisting of about sixty men who, around the clock, monitored the movements of German troops in and out of Rome on the consular routes. This enabled Tompkins, with the cooperation of Lieutenant Giglio and "Radio Vittoria" operators, to keep the Anglo-American contingent at the Anzio beachhead informed at all times with reliable news.Unfortunately, Giglio, as a result of a denunciation, was captured by agents of the Koch Gang and then slaughtered at the Fosse Ardeatine, along with 14 other Tompkins collaborators. For most of his mission, Tompkins hid in a secret room inside the ancient Palazzo Lovatelli in Rome's eponymous square. He assumed fictitious names and identities, in part to deceive the fascist services.On June 4, 1944, as American columns were about to make their entry into Rome, Tompkins drafted and signed "the official order to assume control of public order." After the war, he devoted himself mainly to his work as a columnist, working with the CBS and the "New Yorker."

United States

Peter Tompkins

Giorgio Marincola was born in 1923 in Italian Somalia, the son of Giuseppe, a senior infantry marshal, and Askhiro Hassan, a Somali from the Abgal Kabyle. Contrary to the customs of the time, his father recognized both children as mestizos (in addition to Giorgio, Isabella, born in 1925) and brought them to Italy. Giorgio grew up in Pizzo Calabro with his uncles and moved to his father's house in Rome in 1933. Here he attended the royal Umberto I high school and had as a professor of History and Philosophy the militant actionist Pilo Albertelli, later killed at the Fosse Ardeatine. In 1941 he enrolled in medical school, intending to specialize in tropical diseases, and then returned to work in his home country. In the fall of 1943 he joined a partisan group linked to the Partito d'Azione and operated in Rome in the third zone of the PdA, Salario sector. Following the arrest of a comrade he decided to move to Corchiano, in the province of Viterbo, where he participated in sabotage actions and armed clashes. After the liberation of Rome, in June 1944 he enlisted in the Special Operations Executive and left for the province of Brindisi, where he received Allied military training. At San Vito dei Normanni airport, he was attached to the Bamon mission and parachuted near Zimone in the province of Biella. On January 17, 1945, he was imprisoned by an SS unit in the Biella prison and from there transferred to Villa Schneider, at the German military police headquarters. There they forced him to speak during a Radio Baita broadcast, during which he chose to extol the Resistance, lashing out against the fascist regime. The broadcast was interrupted, "with atrocious sounds of beatings." In March 1945 he was transferred to the Bolzano Transit Camp. When the camp was decommissioned by the Germanic authorities on April 30, 1945, Marincola instead of repairing to Switzerland decided instead to reach Val di Fiemme, where partisans were still fighting the retreating Nazi army. The Germans killed him on May 4, 1945, at a checkpoint near the village of Stramentizzo, the site of one of the last Nazi massacres in Italy

Giorgio Marincola

In 1943, General Mark Clark became commanding general of the 5th Army in Italy and in 1944 he assumed command of the 15th Army Group, consisting of all Allied forces in Italy. He led the military operation called Avalanche. In this operation, the assault corps consisted of two corps: the US VI Corps, commanded by Maj-Gen. Ernest Dawley, and the British 10th Corps, commanded by Lt. Col. Gen. Richard McCreery. D-day was set for 9 September and the immediate objectives of the assault forces were to take Salerno and the airfield at Monte Corvino, to take the port city of Salerno and the port city of Naples and the surrounding airfields. Operation Avalanche was conceived by the Anglo-Americans amid much discontent and perplexity. The least convinced were the Americans who would have preferred to devote themselves to preparing the landing in Northern France, the real second European front. Although with a few exceptions, the British were pushing in a very different direction, privileging a peripheral, Mediterranean war of attrition, without frontal attacks on the strongest links in the Axis defence chain.The compromise between these two contrasting visions was reached in May in Washington D.C. (Trident Conference), when a hypothetical date for the cross-Channel attack was finally given: 1 May 1944. On the same occasion, it was decided that once Sicily had been conquered, Eisenhower was authorised to take all necessary measures to push the Kingdom of Italy out of the war and force the Germans to commit as many forces as possible to the defence of the Axis soft underbelly.For these reasons, the planning of Avalanche was overshadowed by cutbacks and uncertainties, and decidedly inappropriate resources, beginning with the leadership chosen for the operation.The shortcomings of the men and means Clark had at his disposal also added up to some errors in approach. The Gulf of Salerno was in fact considered by the Germans to be an almost taken-for-granted target, because it represented the point of maximum extension of air protection that Allied fighters could guarantee from the available airfields. Yet Clark gave up the fleet's pre-emptive cannonade of the coast in the futile hope of catching the enemy by surprise. Furthermore, it divided the forces by placing the 6th US Army Corps south of the Sele river (the 36th Infantry Division, with the 45th in reserve on ships) and the British X Army Corps (the 46th and 56th Divisions) north of the same river.Furthermore, in 1945, General Clark was head of the US occupation forces in Austria and US High Commissioner for Austria. As deputy to the US Secretary of State, he negotiated a treaty for Austria with the Council of Foreign Ministers. As commander-in-chief of the UN Command, General Clark signed a military armistice between the UN Command, the North Korean army and the Chinese People's Volunteers in Korea in 1953. In 1953, General Clark accepted the presidency of The Citadel, where he served for twelve years. After retirement, he was appointed President Emeritus of the college. General Clark died in 1984 and he is buried on The Citadel campus next to Mark Clark Hall.

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