Today I was struck by the idea of writing a diary
Maria Alemanno was born in Venice in 1900 (and died in 1988) and successfully graduated from senior high school. During the war she was in Florence whilst her fiancé Nando was far away, in a German prisoner of war camp. The typewritten manuscript arrived at the National Diary Archives in Pieve Santo Stefano on August 6 1990.
Saturday 11th September 1943 4pm
As always, when events adopt a certain element of tragedy, we are all extremely shocked, even Ada had to turn her back on the fleeting joy that she felt originally and admit that the cure is worse than the illness. Since yesterday the rumour was already spreading that German convoys were marching towards Florence, we had imagined that when the invasion occurred they would have warned us in order to give us time to take refuge in our homes, but we are always thinking about things that never happen: the Germans entered quietly and uneventfully and took possession of the city without any fuss, maybe it’s better that way!1 Florence was occupied by the German army on September 11 1943.
Even so, it was certainly shocking, here in the centre we didn’t know anything, and about 11 o’clock that morning my sister telephoned, telling me to go home immediately because the Germans had taken control of Piazza San Marco. My heart sank, I don’t deny it, since, having heard about the conflicts that occurred in other cities, I was expecting something similar to happen in Florence. But the Florentines are good people, poor devils, and take things philosophically.
We shut closed very quickly; in order to avoid major drama I got on a tram that took me close to home without passing by Piazza San Marco. For the moment we are scared of them, and maybe these fears are not unfounded.
And him?? That is the nagging, distressing thought that never leaves me. What’s going to happen down there?? I have continued to write these last few days with an infinite hope that something might happen but I know that they are only vain illusions.
During these emotional times I am worried about everything: the house, mother, who is so old and pain stricken that she should have peace and rest, and I try to help where I can.
And him?? Will he come back like so many others? Too far! Too many roads to cover, but in the back of my heart there rests this great hope. What will happen now?
Sunday 12th September 1943 12pm
I saw the Germans for the first time, not as I had seen them until now, but in their vile role as invaders and masters. I understand that we can hate them; nobody really knows whether we have betrayed them or not, because who knows where the truth lies2 On the 8th September 1943, Marshal Pietro Badoglio announced to the Italian nation in a radio broadcast that the government had signed an armistice between Italy and the Allied armed forces. This meant that the Germans were no longer the allies of the Italians but the enemies [TN]. . They are enemies, who have taken possession of our beautiful city.
And here all is calm, while news arrives from other cities of real battles. My patriotic soul believes that they would also have been good for Florence too, but maybe it is better like this. This morning I went to have a look at my workshop. I don’t know what to do with myself if I don’t spend at least an hour here every day3 When she writes her diary Maria Alemanno uses the adverb “here” to indicate the place in which she works, the workshop. . I am worried, not for the work that doesn’t exist, at the moment you just have to keep your chin up, but for all the tragedy in the air.
I have put a padlock on the door, it doesn’t do much, but I am more at ease.
It is a beautiful day, even though whilst going in by foot, so as to avoid the centre of town, I fell over (godforsaken shoes!) and my knee is in ruins, but it’s nothing.
Around town there is a delightful air of consternation: people talk of hunger, of famine, of upcoming war, of war already happening, of looting, theft and worse! And will it really happen? We are trying to take home the little amount of provisions that can be found. What a situation! There are no words to describe it. Every night, or to be more exact, every possible moment, we fiddle with the radio in order to get news: Rome in the hands of one army or another, orders and counter-orders, Milan at war, the Balkans, the point that interests me the most which makes me listen breathless to the limited information that they give. Tirana is resisting... that’s what they’re saying! The Italian garrison is there, the command centre, him... What will he do?? No hope of receiving post: private correspondence is completely forbidden, nothing can be done!
But what sorrow. They all come back disarmed, dejected, exhausted, their hearts weighed down with dismay. Poor boys! It seems that the Badoglio government is taking refuge in Palermo4 On the 25th July 1943, with the fall of Fascism, Field Marshal Pietro Badoglio assumed charge of the government. He guided the successive antifascist governments until the liberation of Rome in June of 1944. The author refers to Badoglio’s “escape”, with the King, the court and the other commanders, at dawn on the 9th September 1943, from Rome towards Brindisi where he found protection from the Allies.. Is it possible that he has thrown us away like that, in such a terribly dishonourable way?? Who knows where the truth lies!
Monday 13th September 1943 6pm
Days increasingly full of dismay and anxiety. On the radio we hear the Fascist hymn again, they reappear, a bit hesitant, to regain power under the shadow of the German protection. German commands, German orders, everything German. We start to look at them slightly fearfully. Entire convoys of troops go past and past again, a deafening and continuous din across the whole city. I am nervous, I find it all disturbing. They have brutally torn something from my heart, letters were everything to me, I always waited for them anxiously, and now there are no more. From time to time I think I see him appear. I am here and I wait for him, and as he enters he would say, “can I come in?” with a voice full of emotion. I feel the impulse with which I would throw myself into his arms and the emotion brings a lump to my throat. Be brave! There is no need to lose heart, maybe he is fighting. May God save him, this is my constant, most ardent prayer.
Tuesday 14th September 1943 4pm
Today on arriving here, emotions were high when they told me that two telegrams had arrived, I would have pushed the elevator myself to get up there quicker! Now I am here, I can’t quite make out the exact date, but one of them has to be from the 1st and the other the 4th of September; few words, but at that point nothing had yet happened: “don’t worry”. No darling, I am not at all worried for myself, despite the devastation around me, but so much for you! When I was able to write to you and tell you everything that came into my head, I felt so happy, and now more than ever I understand what this happiness was. Now I can no longer tell you anything and this suffering is made worse by all these things that are happening. I read and re-read these telegrams. I feel that after these, who knows when the next news will arrive...
What sorrow...
">Wednesday 15th September 1943, 6pm
It is time to close up, I am bored as usual, I don’t have anything else to read, I have already read all of his books.
Tomorrow Ada is coming, I still have some designs to work on, there are people who still have the energy to work. I don’t want to.
They say that the Duce5 When the author writes ‘the Duce’, she is referring to Mussolini [TN]. has been freed from his prison. A feat, a legendary feat by the Germans6 Mussolini, with the fall of the Fascist regime, on orders from King Victor Emmanuel III, was arrested and sent first to the island of Ponza, then to the Campo Imperatore in Abruzzo from where he was released on the 12th September by the German army.. I feel like I am living in an adventure novel. We still don’t know anything precisely, but the day will come when everything becomes clear. They had said so many things about the Duce, that he was dead, that he had gone crazy, that he was here, that he was there... never anything true?! Certainly those Germans know what they are doing and if they have liberated him it’s only to make him dance to their tune.
Now I’m going home. I am sad, ugly and old!!! However today someone looked at me as if I was still worth looking at. I am happy about it only for him, because when he comes back he won’t be too disappointed. Poor old Mary...
Thursday 16th September 1943 7pm
This morning I prayed fervently to my beloved Saint Rita. Every Thursday I take communion. I wish that my ardent desire to have news will be fulfilled. But it is clear that at this point that is not possible. And he has not arrived. Who knows what he will do?! The grief continues. Maybe if he listens to everything that I am listening to, he will think that there are also great troubles in store for me. Have courage, we will see!
Today we worked.
It seems that the Duce has really been freed. Then they will tell us how. I am not in much of a hurry to know things because they will come out eventually. Besides, the Germans are not the devil; we are used to seeing them amongst us, I feel sorry for some of them: callow, kids who can’t even grow a beard yet, sent away from home and country, subjugated by an iron fist. Why does real peace not come sooner that would cancel so many pages of horrors??
Friday 17th September 1943, 7pm
It is time to shut up, it is still daytime and it seems like midsummer, never before this year has the perennially wonderful season been in such direct contrast with so many tragic events.
I don't feel like doing anything. I am working by force of habit. The growing and increasingly horrific war approaches and I have heard nothing from him! Salerno has not yet fallen but it seems it will not be for long; they are advancing from the other side. And what is happening where he is? Will he still be there? What will happen to him? Question upon question torments me, no one can answer me yet. And the torment continues more acutely, more bleakly every day.
The Duce has made his voice heard. A tired voice, and not that demanding one which spoke to the mobs, possessed by madness. Poor man. His brain must be full of chaos too!
Saturday 18th September 1943, 7pm
I am getting increasingly anxious for him! There is an order from the Duce declaring that all the officers are no longer under the allegiance to the King. Who knows what my officer will do, he might at least have time to come back home.
This evening Miss Aurelia7 The cousin of the boyfriend, employed in a Milanese firm, evacuated to Florence because of the war. (Author’s Note) gave me a lovely book, she didn’t know how to thank me for a little hat that I made her8 It seems that the author worked as a milliner in a small workshop in central Florence. Trade became increasingly scarce as the occupation went on since people could no longer afford to buy hats [TN]. . The path among the stones 9 Original title “ Il sentiero fra le pietre” [TN]. must be a good book and I am pleased with it. We spoke a lot about him and what he must be doing, my poor darling! At least nothing bad has happened to him.
Around us there is a false and disheartening atmosphere. These boys that are coming home have something tragic about them and they are very worried about their fate! There is a spectre of misery in the air!
The Duce is once again at the head of the government: new Fascist Republican Government, but it all seems false to me, useless, unfounded10 After the liberation of the Emporer’s Camp on the 12th September 1943, Benito Mussolini reconstructed the Fascist party and the voluntary Militia for National security; liberated officers and soldiers under allegiance to the King, and created the government of the Repubblica Sociale Italiana (Italian Social Republic) based at Salò.. Who knows who will be able to save this poor Italy from the ruin that she has fallen into. They are constantly accusing Badoglio and the King of high treason, but who knows what the truth is??
We wait and may God help us...
Sunday 19thSeptember 1943,8pm
When I begin to write my little daily page, I feel like I am starting to write a letter to him, and for a while I can hardly stop myself from writing the usual phrase “My dear Nando”. In reality, now that they have prevented me from writing and that I am no longer receiving anything, these are almost letters that I send to him and write for him.
Sad Sundays, an air of melancholy. I am increasingly eager to see him appear, I lean out of the window if I am at home and live here in a state of constant expectation. I wait for something, a word, a line, whatever sort of event that will bring news of him, but my wait is consistently fruitless. Now they are talking about a war that will overcome us soon. This thought is terrible, and the fear of alerts air raid warnings? and bombardments becomes even more terrible than before. The alerts are already very frequent and during these, different formations of aeroplanes are buzzing around over our heads. I still remember the one last Thursday that surprised me in piazza Savonarola while I was going to Maggini’s house. My heart skipped a beat because my mother was all alone at the house, I ran directly home without stopping, which is quite a way, with aeroplanes whirring dangerously above my head. Emotions are always running higher in these times of war.
Today I went to the cinema to pass the time. A nonsense film: “Woman is fickle”11 Original title “La donna è mobile”, 1942 film by Mario Mattoli.. When I am at the cinema who knows where my head is, when I am constantly turning around to see if he will arrive!
What a nightmare and a torment! Who knows if or how I will be relieved of these sorrows?
Monday 20th September 1943, 4pm
Work is coming to an end, dear Ada, you have to go back home. The ridiculous thing is that all these orders are still here and no-one wants to come and take them. Time, material and effort wasted.
18 thJanuary 1944
For the last few days, the nightmare of the bombing has started up again. Tuscany is a battle camp and since Saturday we can hear the detonations nearby.
It is so scary not to feel safe in your own home. To know that death is two steps away at each wail of the sirens.
Today another postcard arrived from him, I have been waiting for it for a while. My poor darling, he receives nothing from me. I wish he knew how much I am thinking about him and how anxious I am as the days go by.
19th January 1944
I received a letter from his mother which made me cry with joy: she addressed me as “tu”12 In Italian there are two ways of saying you (singular). The ‘lei’ form is formal and used to address strangers, acquaintances, older people or people in authority and the ‘tu’ form is more informal and used between family members, children and close friends. The author is pleased because her boyfriend’s mother used the ‘tu’ form, demonstrating the intimacy between them [TN]. and spoke to me as a daughter.
Florence has been bombed again, not badly but at night time, and it was pretty frightening. They say that the whole city was lit up as if it was daytime. Will he know about it?
26th January 1944
The recent state of the war is scaring and dismaying me: I am only thinking selfishly though, I think that if they arrive in Florence, I will be separated from him and from his mother again without even the prospect of these postcards that give me strength and hope.
They are near to Rome and they will take it, then it will be our turn and I pray to God that he protects us and at least saves our skins. Now I have to go home, there is a beautiful sky and I am scared of the alerts.
24th July 1944
After six months break I am picking this diary up again. One day it will remind me of the struggles, the sadness, the emotions of this period. Why haven't I written in here? Because I didn’t feel the need, given the improved correspondence with Milan and with him that was enough to fill the emptiness in my life.
Today, since I have been cut off from Milan again, and above all from him, with war at the gates of Florence, I need to write something, one never knows, perhaps I will not survive the events and so he will be able to find my undying love, my memories here. It is not a premonition, I don't have those, but one never knows. Firstly I will briefly sum up life at the moment and the most important events of the past six months. The days have been so similar that it is enough to describe one of them in order to describe them all. First of all, the obsession with the alerts; one of the most splendid springs we have ever had in Florence was tormented by the nightmare of bombings. The worst memories: 11th March, 23rd March, 1st and 2nd May. Because of these four days I will have a din ringing in my ears for the rest of my life. The 11th March the districts of S. Jacopino and the Romito, areas very close to the house, were destroyed. That morning, I was at home because my sister had to go and cash a cheque. At the first alarm, around 11 ‘o clock, we went down into the shelter, we could hear the aeroplanes. Around twenty minutes of silence passed, then we heard the roar of the engines like the noise of a hundred lorries in the house. They fell on us in an instant and made an infernal racket three times, each for a period of 5 or 6 minutes, which seemed like centuries of distress and during which I waited to see the walls of our little refuge shattered at any minute. I held my mother in my arms and prayed to the Madonna to save us. We were saved, but what a massacre!
On the 23rd March, the Campo di Marte district was particularly badly hit, a massacre there too. This time the first blows caught me whilst I was still in my little bedroom, the window were flung open and the walls, the floors, the stairs trembled as if they were under huge pressure.
Also that day the bombing was long and distressing especially with the worry for my parents, not knowing what their fate would be. The ones on the 1st and 2nd of May were just as violent.
The one on the 1st happened in the morning while I was shopping at the market (how many times I have been round that market!), at the first shots I took refuge in the shelter of an inn with a bad reputation, the first that I came across. What difference can it make? At that moment it wasn’t worth making distinctions. That day it was the area from Porta to Prato that was particularly affected, and the same the day after. It was then 3pm and I made my way along Via Roma towards the workshop, with the alarms already blaring. In an instant, planes above my head and bombs which made a hellish din. A lot of people impulsively threw themselves on the ground, me I desperately ran hell for leather to my door. There, amongst faces livid with fear, I listened to this new succession of bombing that was one of the worst. Since then, there has been nothing as violent as that, however, we have had continuous alerts from 7 ‘o clock in the morning until 7 ‘o clock at night, even 7 or 8 a day, like that every day until the end of June. We always take refuge in this little room, we felt safest here, but it is an enormous strain for my mother, who is so weak and in need of calm and rest.
Now we have got sort of used to the sound of gunshot, which sometimes thunders on throughout the entire night, and to the mines exploding, certainly all of that doesn’t incite as much terror as the aeroplanes which fly above our heads and which can bury us in an instant under the ruins of our house.
Then I don’t remember much about other supposedly important events, always the mundane things, our life, the same old thoughts, very little work, extremely tough living, sometimes an empty stomach because of insufficient food, sky-high prices and these few coins that they disappear, they disappear at a frightening rate. After the fall of Rome, on the 4th June13 On the 4th June 1944 the Allied army entered Rome., the fear of the approaching war started, and the obsession with filling the house with provisions, especially flour, then potatoes, which we couldn’t find, dried vegetables, biscuits, jam. All things that I was never able to send to him because I was not able to find them, and now we have been forced to buy them at ridiculously high prices, making big sacrifices, because danger is at the door, and it is our duty not to think too much of ourselves but of our mother. But how I sigh however, not to be able to buy much for lack of money and to look with a pained heart at the small amount of food which will only just last a month and cost a fortune: my sweat and tears. Be brave, the work will pick up again, he will come back and we will work together. Then little by little as the danger approaches, so do new sorrows: no more post from him, the last letter was on the 30th April, then a postcard to Mori rather than to me, because it was full of requests to take care of me.
From now on I will talk to you as if you were going to read these words soon and I feel in my heart a sweet sense of hope: to talk to you like that! On day if I am no longer here, when you find this book, you will read these pages written badly, as they come out, but true and spontaneous since they come from my heart, and maybe you will understand exactly what you have meant to me! When you read, you will think of those days I spent while we were so far from each other, divided by everything.
Who knows if you know that at the moment they are fighting in the south of Florence, that the war is here and that we are already hearing the roar of bombing. Do you know what is happening here? Of you, I only know that they have decided to make the prisoners work in Germany, does that mean you as well as the others? How I would like to know! And I know, a frail thread that keeps me hoping, that perhaps this horror might finish very soon! And you, what do you know? Maybe something about what is going on here, and the rest you imagine is so much worse than it is in reality. Here not that many terrifying things happen, Florence is an open city, maybe it will be respected and, although it seems like a dead town, there is nothing scary about it, for now. The boom of the mines, that, yes, everything explodes, but not in the city. The antiaircraft artillery hits and the aeroplanes swoop down to machine-gun nearby, but always in the outskirts. But from far away to hear of Florence spoken about as a war zone must be worrying. I have in my heart the dear words of your mother, now that I am in danger she is afraid for me, she considers me as a daughter and hopes and believes to be able, on your return, that I will properly be a daughter to her. At this moment, I receive, as if by a miracle, a letter from Aurelia, they transferred her to Milan a month ago, and this letter arrives by way of the Metallurgica14 This refers to the Società Metallurgica Italiana (SMI) (Italian Metallurgical Society), founded in Florence in 1886., and so we communicate while it is possible.
She tells me that the happiest day of her life will be when she is able to toast us at our wedding lunch. Her too!! And all of these allusions leave a hollow pain in my heart. I know that you don’t want to marry me and I know that there will only be tears for me. How am I supposed to stand the humiliation of being thought of only as your girlfriend, in front of your parents, especially your mother! ! But you will have to understand yourself because I will never talk to you about this suffering of mine; if only you had understood before this disaster, today I would not be forced to work like mad to earn so little, I would be living with your parents, I would still work but in a different way. I reproach you for this, you deserve it, but for this reason I don’t love you any less, only that I have always suffered so many humiliations and joy, even during your brief leave, has always been full of this venom: hotel rooms, porters who look at me like a harlot and ask you: “Still the same girl?”, like what happened during your last leave and you never understood. Because of this I have resentment in my heart and it will remain if you do not want to understand me.
28th August 1944
I feel like I am dreaming, still here after all this suffering, so many events, still here at my worktable, in this little room in the workshop that for so long I thought would be destroyed15 When the city was under siege the author was unable to get to her workshop so she did not know whether it had been destroyed in the bombing [TN]. .
To retell the days gone past is an arduous task, long days of terror and anxiety and even longer nights during which it seemed impossible to see the dawn again. I will report the most noteworthy days. 3rd August: 1st day of emergency16 On the 3rd August 1944 the city was declared as in a state of emergency, violent explosions reduced the bridges, roads and buildings around the Ponte Vecchio to rubble.. After having already heard nearby the first violent battles for the liberation of Florence, now on the afternoon of the 3rd at 3pm emergency was declared. I remember how my heart was beating as I went to get water for fear of not being able to get out, whilst the mournful sound of the gunfire was coming closer and freezing my blood with terror. The state of emergency lasted 15 long days, during which it is impossible to describe how much we suffered from fear and also hunger from lack of any food supplies. The nights, nightmare without name, all passed the same way, without even being able to lie down, overpowered by the thunder of the battle and by the whistle of the missiles that passed like rockets over our roofs. The worst night was when our house was hit by rounds of machine gun fire. And then also the violent trembling like an earthquake, the explosion of the bridges on the Arno, and the even more violent ones when they blew up the bridges on the Mugnone, and so many hours of terror that I remember and I don’t know how to describe, but which will never be erased from my memory. When, on the morning of the 18th, they said that the last Germans had gone, we thought we would be able to relax, but after the end of the emergency the situation didn’t improve and still remains dangerous and nerve-racking. Even now the guns are firing nonstop and the noise thumps in my head. I want to remember the awful night between the 18th and the 19th. At no other moment of the war have I felt such fear. We were awoken from a weary sleep around 11.30pm by a terrible roar, gunshot again and again uninterruptedly, the deafening sound of breaking glass and tiles raining down from all over the place. I don’t know how we found the strength to go down half-naked and trembling into the shelter, my legs were shaking as I climbed down the stairs, I don’t know where I found the strength. Our building was hit in two places, at the front and on one side, fortunately no victims. I am writing succinctly facts which would need pages and pages, but in rereading these few lines even in twenty years time I will remember what happened. And it is still not finished.
On the morning of the 19th, as we were getting ready to leave the house – we had to take my poor mother out of the house to put her somewhere more secure - there appeared in front of us, like a vision, my brother-in-law, dear Corrado, of who we had not had any news for a good 13 months. To relate our emotions and especially those of my sister would be impossible. With him we felt instantly more secure and we went to the Collegio fiorentino17 One of the most highly-rated schools in Florence, of which Corrado Corradini, a relation of Senator Enrico Corradini, was co-owner with his brothers [Author’s Note]. in piazza della Victoria. But even there the security was relative, even there we had a terrible, indescribable fright on the morning of Sunday the 20th. Rounds of mortar fire continued to beat down on the city for a good three consecutive hours: near the Collegio and in the garden at least 15 of them fell. It was for this reason that the morning of the 22nd we decided to come into the centre, although even here the bombs fell without apology. At the moment we are living in our aunt’s house. Lives full of sacrifice and misery, in other people’s houses, sleeping fully clothed, queuing for long hours for a cabbage or a kilo of pears as hard as wood, lifting up with difficulty the water needed for daily chores, eating little and badly, feeling emptiness in your stomach, cold in your heart and desolation and ruins all around. And it is still not finished, the gunfire is so strong and close that I jump every time I hear it, my brain is empty, I don’t know how to pray anymore, I don’t know what to think anymore, I want the guns to stop and that is all18 Florence was liberated on the 11th August 1944.. I leaned out of the window, Florence was unusually lively, half of the shops open and half closed, the piazzas crowded with Allied army vehicles, the streets full of soldiers climbing up the ruins of Por Santa Maria19 Street in the centre of Florence with ancient buildings mined by the German army and razed to the ground.. How my heart leaped when I saw it for the first time and how I ached for this little room, but Jesus had saved me. Who knows if we will survive until the end, who knows if I will see my dear one again, who knows what he knows about Italy, who knows what he is thinking. My thoughts search for him constantly and now more than ever I wish he was here.
18th September 1944
The guns have been silent for about ten days, and on the 13th we finally went back home after an absence of around 20 days. At this precise moment the electricity came back! Praise the Lord! Something has started to work again amongst the ruins of our precious, blessed amenities. I have started to work again but I don’t like it, who knows how it will go! I am not satisfied with it.
26th October 1944
As I had presumed my work has gone badly. It is a shame because it was a source of income that suited me at the moment. I have been forced to sell the camera. It pains me, but it was the only object that could yield a nice little sum, essential to enable us to do the shopping during this period of insanity. It feels like we are in a world of craziness, everything is worth thousand-lire notes. A shoe repair costs 400 lire, you can’t find stockings for less than 400 lire, pitiful fabrics at 500 lire by the metre. Then it is a miracle if you can face buying food. We are talking about corn flour at 80 lire per kilo, oil at 2,300 for a flask. Coal, which is essential at the moment, they have the nerve to sell at up to 35 lire per kilo. Money is going, work is finished, the clients won’t pay.
I am trying not to think too much about him so as not to go crazy. I pray to Saint Rita. This morning, I wasn’t able to take Communion because I was standing in line for two and a quarter hours to buy a kilogram of potatoes. It’s unbelievable! And this loneliness weighs me down more than ever.
- 1. Florence was occupied by the German army on September 11 1943.
- 2. On the 8th September 1943, Marshal Pietro Badoglio announced to the Italian nation in a radio broadcast that the government had signed an armistice between Italy and the Allied armed forces. This meant that the Germans were no longer the allies of the Italians but the enemies [TN].
- 3. When she writes her diary Maria Alemanno uses the adverb “here” to indicate the place in which she works, the workshop.
- 4. On the 25th July 1943, with the fall of Fascism, Field Marshal Pietro Badoglio assumed charge of the government. He guided the successive antifascist governments until the liberation of Rome in June of 1944. The author refers to Badoglio’s “escape”, with the King, the court and the other commanders, at dawn on the 9th September 1943, from Rome towards Brindisi where he found protection from the Allies.
- 5. When the author writes ‘the Duce’, she is referring to Mussolini [TN].
- 6. Mussolini, with the fall of the Fascist regime, on orders from King Victor Emmanuel III, was arrested and sent first to the island of Ponza, then to the Campo Imperatore in Abruzzo from where he was released on the 12th September by the German army.
- 7. The cousin of the boyfriend, employed in a Milanese firm, evacuated to Florence because of the war. (Author’s Note)
- 8. It seems that the author worked as a milliner in a small workshop in central Florence. Trade became increasingly scarce as the occupation went on since people could no longer afford to buy hats [TN].
- 9. Original title “ Il sentiero fra le pietre” [TN].
- 10. After the liberation of the Emporer’s Camp on the 12th September 1943, Benito Mussolini reconstructed the Fascist party and the voluntary Militia for National security; liberated officers and soldiers under allegiance to the King, and created the government of the Repubblica Sociale Italiana (Italian Social Republic) based at Salò.
- 11. Original title “La donna è mobile”, 1942 film by Mario Mattoli.
- 12. In Italian there are two ways of saying you (singular). The ‘lei’ form is formal and used to address strangers, acquaintances, older people or people in authority and the ‘tu’ form is more informal and used between family members, children and close friends. The author is pleased because her boyfriend’s mother used the ‘tu’ form, demonstrating the intimacy between them [TN].
- 13. On the 4th June 1944 the Allied army entered Rome.
- 14. This refers to the Società Metallurgica Italiana (SMI) (Italian Metallurgical Society), founded in Florence in 1886.
- 15. When the city was under siege the author was unable to get to her workshop so she did not know whether it had been destroyed in the bombing [TN].
- 16. On the 3rd August 1944 the city was declared as in a state of emergency, violent explosions reduced the bridges, roads and buildings around the Ponte Vecchio to rubble.
- 17. One of the most highly-rated schools in Florence, of which Corrado Corradini, a relation of Senator Enrico Corradini, was co-owner with his brothers [Author’s Note].
- 18. Florence was liberated on the 11th August 1944.
- 19. Street in the centre of Florence with ancient buildings mined by the German army and razed to the ground.
- Numéro: XX003
- Lieu: Archivio Diaristico Nazionale di Pieve Santo Stefano, Arezzo, Toscane
