European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

You have to realise that at the beginning there were all sorts of people in the mountains,

but the English only wanted experienced men, so 25 partisans were chosen to join them.

Then they had to set up a dispatch-carriers unit,

and I was the only one assigned to Reggio, at the local headquarters.

I was told to go see a group of men I already knew. There was Grandi, a lawyer, Piccinini, an architect, and the Count Calvi.

They were six initially, then Mattia told me that one was killed.

Still, at the beginning there were these six antifascists who were in charge of things in Reggio.

I had to go home to my mother’s and uncles’ house. They were staying in Davoli’s house,

or I should rather say Kiss, the one in charge of the dispatch-riders, who had set up quite a few things.

However I was the only one who would go to Reggio.

They realised I would remember things and take care of everything properly.

I often didn’t write things down, although sometimes I did, in order to remember the names of the Germans for example.

I would have eaten the slips of paper if I was caught.

To give you an example, when they told me to go and inform the others that a mop-up was scheduled, lead by Dolmann or Surmann,

who were in charge of these things, I would write down the most important names and information.

At first they had given me the battle name Libertà (Freedom). Later I was called Giorgio, but at the beginning it was Libertà, or maybe Volontà.

I didn’t even know they had written that name down.

Maybe it was at the time of the wounded man, when they wrote that I had gone back home.

I was given that card in Busana, then they took it away from me in Albinea, and it’s still there.

I don’t have that card now: it was given to me when we had to go to the mountains with the wounded man,