European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

Toni starts antifascist activities

Fascist propaganda was telling us the communists in Spain

had raped and stabbed to death some nuns, so I really didn’t like communism much.

Then what happened?

It was 1943, the war was starting,

people were talking about our retreats in Russia and in Northern Africa, the bombings, etc.

In spring 1943, strikes began at the Reggiane plant.

Not in my department or in the tooling department, where some of my friends were arrested.

From then on I started some soul-searching: what was I really doing?

I was working day and night to boost production for the war,

while war killed people.

I was shocked.

From that moment on I tried

to get in contact with the antifascists, but it was impossible.

It was already the summer of ’43 when I went to Sassuolo to visit a friend.

I knew him as an antifascist, hoping he could help me to become part of the movement.

He told me he couldn’t, since he was indeed an antifascist but he wasn’t organized.

There was another comrade in my department

who I was friend with, his name was Armando Grassi from Gattaglio.

I told him I wanted to be involved and I finally convinced him.