European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

Regarding my weight, you hear people say they were thirty-eight or forty kilos, but I never did weigh myself.

I might have weighed around fifty or fifty-five.

I know I was skinny, but I just had to live with that.

I saw some die in anguish, crying:

Then the Americans arrived at my camp.

They left some guards, but we were free to go wherever we wanted.

They began to find calves - I’m not joking! - then slaughtered them

and put the meat in those beer barrels that you can find in Germany.

We had fresh meat after 15 or 20 days,

and every night they would go out to find something,

so we were finally ok concerning food.

Three days without bread

Some of the interpreters, even those who were Italian,

kept telling us there was a chance that Mussolini and Hitler

decided that there had to be no Italian prisoners in this country.

We’re talking about the famous IMIs (Internati Militari Italiani),

Italian interned soldiers who were supposed to wear this acronym on the uniform.

Four or five of us, including two Sardinian sergeants of the Italian financial police (the “Guardia di Finanza”),