European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

She had people who sent her a message to withdraw.

For her it was dangerous now.

So she backed away to the partisans

and thought that everything would be okay if she went.

But she was wrong.

When the Gestapo came

it was dangerous for all of them. They arrested all.

Liberation of Reggio Emilia

We went on the roof to see who was shooting from the Church of Madonna della Ghiara.

We couldn’t see anything from there, so we went back downstairs and headed for the bell-tower.

We found the bell-ringer and asked him how we could climb up.

He showed us the way and told us to proceed slowly.

As we got on the roof there were three men of the Black Brigade with a 37 mm Breda machine gun.

I told them not to move and raise their hands.

They obeyed as they saw the machine gun pointed at them.

They told us not to kill them. They’d show us where the others were. “Alright”, we said, “where are they?”

They told us there was a platoon of around thirty of them hiding in the subterranean vaults of “La Luna”, a spot near Porta Castello.

As we got back down, however, there was a surprise.

A jeep with a big white star printed on the hood was parked by the church. I asked what was going on.

The driver got out of the jeep