European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

We sneaked behind these two boys, pointed our guns at their neck and got them to raise their hands.

We took away their P38 guns. From then on we felt armed.

We had a meeting in the fields with the Cervi brothers.

They were worried and said that they wanted to go to the mountains.

Their house at the time was a hideaway.

They welcomed a lot of people, maybe too many. They also welcomed fleeing foreign soldiers they didn’t know.

Some of them might have been spies. So they went to the mountains for a while and then came back.

I guess they went on letting too many people in. We all know what happened afterwards.

GAP (Armed Partisan Groups)

GAPs were organized in groups of three.

This meant that each member knew only about two others and nothing else.

We all knew that those who were captured were being tortured in Villa Cucchi.

Just as they did with Paolo Davoli and Tina from Cavriago or Rosellina.

The GAP and Zanti, whose battle name was Maurizio, had decided to take this measure.

We initially had groups of three,

then with time more groups were forming and we met and carryied out joint actions.

GAPs weren't all the same.

They weren’t all communist.

My small group and I were.

Introduction and family; 8th September 1943; escape from captivity