Second
WorId War
The Second World War started in 1939 but it was 1943 before myself and my family
was affected. The Germans occupied Italy at that time. Mussolini surrendered to
the allies. A lot of Germans were in my hometown and they took over the whole
town and used the school to house their ammunition. So that was our education
finished for the time being.
The German soldiers came and went into the houses as they pleased.
They all helped themselves to whatever they wanted. The young girls disguised
themselves as old women as they were feared of being raped. They also searched
the house looking for men so they could work for them. My father and brother were
hiding in the hills. My family and I used to take them dinner every day. In our
village there was war. We had two big tanks near our home and they kept firing
all night and day. We all had to live in the basement with no light on. The Germans
were fighting the allies and they were fighting back. We were in between.
We had a lot of food in the house stored but we could not go
to the mill. So we had to grind all the wheat to make bread with the coffee grinder.
Also the Germans used to go to the stable to get all the mules and donkeys to
use them for transport to carry their ammunition up the hills. The poor animals
were bleeding because of strain. On 23 November 1943 two soldiers
armed with shotguns came to the house. They told us to get out. It was pouring
with rain. My mother was expecting a baby. She was seven months pregnant and her
legs were so swollen that she could not walk.
They put us in an army truck just like we were bags of potatoes.
They took us across the country to the front line by mistake. On the same day
the Germans shot five men. We did not know anything about it. One of them was
my father's brother.
They took us to a place called Ciprano. We were put in the convent where there
were a lot of refugees. They were dirty. The Germans did not give us any food.
We went to pick up anything we could find on the land. We pinched vegetables from
the farms. We didn’t have any cooking facilities so we collected some firewood.
Each group had its own small fire to cook the vegetables we had to cook in empty
food tins. Just when the vegetables were cooked the Germans came to move us on
so we had to rush to eat.
Then they took us in a truck to a place called Fiorentina. There
was a station there. There was a train with cattle trucks waiting there. While
we were waiting to go on the train a woman had a baby on the platform in the pouring
rain. There were no clothes for the baby so it was just wrapped in an old jacket.
We were put on the train with about 80 people to a carriage. There were just floorboards.
We huddled up to my mother in a small space. My mother was crying all of the time.
