European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

Then the Germans took away more than a thousand men:

all those who were able to work, and I think also a few women, were sent to Germany.

That time there was a complete disbandment.

After that, the Germans left,

their division withdrew, but the garrisons on road 63 remained until the end of the war.

We slowly recovered, difficultly,

and I remember I stayed home around ten days because of this, helping my father,

Sure, there were moments we were afraid,

but actually, it was more about being irresponsible than afraid.

When I think about it now, I realize that we could have done so much more without that much efforts and dangers.

I’ve been afraid one night because I had never heard this German machine gun shoot,

they called it “raganella” (tree frog): it could shoot so fast, so many bullets.

That was really the only time my heart was pounding.

Later I realized it was quite distant, but at the moment I thought it was there, a few steps away,

this nasty sound in the silence of the night.

I felt fear that night, at least for a short time.

Massacre at Bettola, June 1944

Then there was this episode in La Bettola.

It was a shocking event for our province.