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Home , Anita Garibaldi, Bersaglieri, Condottiero, Five Days of Milan, Giuseppe Garibaldi, Liborio Romano

between myth and reality

by gianfranco cresciani Castellano Memorial Lecture given at the Dante Alighieri Society, Brisbane, 17 August 2007.

Gianfranco Cresciani emigrated from to Sydney in 1962. He worked for EPT, the Ethnic Affairs Commission and the Ministry for the Arts of the NSW Government on cultural and migration issues. In 1989 and 1994 he was member of the Australian Delegation re-negotiating with the Italian Government the Italo-Australian Cultural Agreement. Master of Arts (First Class Honours) from Sydney University in 1978. Doctor of Letters, honoris causa, from the University of New South Wales in 2005, in recognition of “distinguished eminence in the field of history”. In 2004 the Italian Government awarded him the honour of Cavaliere Ufficiale dell’Ordine al Merito for facilitating cultural exchanges between and Australia. He has produced books, articles, exhibitions and radio and television programs in Australia and Italy on the history of Italian migration to Australia.

beside that of the Madonna, and to speak ill of him, (ha parlato male di Garibaldi), was tantamount to lèse majesté. His admirers eulogised him as the “Hero of the Two Worlds”, the invitto (undefeated leader), the condottiero (soldier of fortune), the apostolo della libertà (the apostle of freedom), and what in the Twentieth Century would be called a personality cult was built around his figure. Indeed he was, throughout the history of the Risorgimento and of Liberal and Fascist Italy, the most popular and revered member of that triad, together with Mazzini and Cavour, that was credited with engineering single-handedly

Fig. 1. Giuseppe Garibaldi. Photo sourced from the unification of Italy, under the paternal Internet. approval of that picaresque character who was King Victor Emmanuel II, the re galantuomo, THIS YEAR MARKS the 200th anniversary of the the gentleman king, better known as the re birth of Giuseppe Garibaldi. Born on 4 July galante, the gallant king – even though the 1807 in , a city then under the adjective “randy” might be more apt in administration of the Kingdom of , consideration of his sexual exploits, worthy of a throughout his life Garibaldi enjoyed Giacomo Casanova, among the peasant unprecedented popularity in Italy and abroad. womenfolk of . Garibaldi’s greatest In 1864 half a million Londoners lined the triumph was the overthrow, in 1860, of the streets to cheer Garibaldi when he paid a visit Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, the event which to that city1 (1) and in Italy his appeal had precipitated . In May of that religious overtones. In many a squalid hovel of year, he landed in with a volunteer force peasant , his portrait hung of 1,070 men, the famous Mille (Thousand). Within two weeks this force had taken , forcing the capitulation of an army of 20,000 1 , Italy. A Modern History, Ann regulars. In August, Garibaldi crossed to the Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1959, p. Italian mainland, routed the Neapolitan army 118.

IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 15 and captured . This feat became one of July 2007, the Region printed ten the great legends of the Nineteenth Century, thousand copies of a History of Lombardy in both because of the skill with which Garibaldi cartoons, which was distributed to state overcame vast military odds and, equally schools, in which the name of Garibaldi was not importantly, because of the potent political even mentioned. Its editor stated that it was symbolism of the event in an age in which the better to speak of the Five Days of in process of the nationalisation of the masses 1848, when its inhabitants fought against the had begun, and people increasingly responded Austrian occupiers, than of Garibaldi.4 Likewise to the clarion call of in a Europe in the South, on 5 July 2007 the mayor of the still in the grip of the Holy Alliance. Sicilian town of Capo d’Orlando changed the Garibaldi’s fame is also alive and well in name of the street bearing the name of contemporary Italy. A survey carried out in Garibaldi, justifying his action by saying that “it July 2007 on a sample of 1002 people by the is a fact that Garibaldi bode ill for Sicily by Istituto di Studi Giuseppe Garibaldi, found out being involved in crime and violence”.5 Even that 46.4 per cent still considered more scurrilous allegations were advanced on Garibaldi by far the most significant national an internet site in , where it was figure, followed by Mussolini (15.5 %) and by claimed that “Garibaldi was not tall, was Silvio Berlusconi (5.4%). The interviewees plagued by rheumatism, was stooped and two admired him for his courage, patriotism, people had to lift him on his horse … people in heroism and tenacity, although 41 per cent the South say that he wore his hair long considered Garibaldi an adventurer and 31 per because a girl, whom he was raping, bit off one cent a megalomaniac. His popularity spread of his ears. This man was not a hero; today we across the entire political spectrum; 31 per would call him a criminal, a terrorist, a cent considered him to be a Republican, 21 per ”.6 cent a Socialist, 11 per cent Communist, 7 per In fact, since Garibaldi’s death, people who, cent Anarchist, 6 per cent a Freemason and inspired by his deeds, carried out guerrilla one per cent a Fascist.2 activities or conspired against the established However, not all contemporary Italians political order, lionised him. On the contrary, share a positive view of Garibaldi. If in the past his detractors continued to defame him and to he was dubbed “thief on land” and “sea pirate” play down his contribution to the history of by clerical diehards, today’s fellow-countrymen Italy. Triestine historian Fabio Cusin, in his are even more scathing. On 4 July 2007, Anti-, reminds us that, “in many during the bicentenary celebrations at the parts of Italy Garibaldi will be considered a Italian Senate, Roberto Calderoli of the hero for the very reason that his reactionary Northern League declared that “we are detractors tried to soil his name by calling him grieving, because Garibaldi’s and the Savoy a brigand”.7 In fact, Southern peasants, Monarchy’s activities have ruined Padania (e.g. oppressed under the Bourbon rule, initially saw Northern Italy) and the South, which in Garibaldi the deliverer of their plight, the previously were very well off as they were” champion of their rights, a Nineteenth Century (stavano benissimo come stavano). The version of an Italian . When their League’s paper, Padania, on the same day was hopes were dashed by Garibaldi, as well as by venomous in its condemnation of Garibaldi, the new Piedmontese rulers, who ruthlessly calling him “a slave-trader, a violent character, declared a state of siege and imposed martial a pirate without scruples, a staunch anti- law, they turned to a form of partisan warfare clerical, manoeuvred by the puppeteers of the that, between 1860 and 1870, saw half of the Risorgimento’s swindle”. Southern , some 86 regiments totalling parliamentarians levelled similar criticism when 211.500 Italian soldiers, employed in counter- they asked the rhetorical question: “Garibaldi a insurgency operations. Twenty three thousand hero? Only a coloniser, a person manoeuvred troops died in combat, while the “brigands”, as by the Savoy dynasty, who started the cynical they were disparagingly called by the project of plunging the South into poverty. Piedmontese, suffered 250,000 killed, executed Until unification, in the vaults of the Bank of or imprisoned. Half a million of those who Sicily and the Bank of Naples there were gold offered resistance were sentenced to jail terms reserves double those in all other Italian states put together. Thereafter, that money was sent 4 3 Corriere della Sera, 6 July 2007. North and Southern emigration began”. Also in 5 La , 5 July 2007. 6www.infinito.it/utenti/s/s.martino.sannita/Brigantag gio/Personaggi/Garibaldi01.htm 2 Corriere della Sera, 16 July 2007. 7 Fabio Cusin, Antistoria d’Italia, Mondadori, Milan 3 Corriere della Sera, 5 July 2007. 1970, p. 74.

16 IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 and twelve thousand were deported to the North. However, the “brigands” were not destroyed, they found another form of rebellion: emigration.8 During the Twentieth Century, both the Left and the Right of the Italian political spectrum strumentalizzarono (to use that ugly and much misused Italian verb), took possession of the myth of Garibaldi for their own ends. He became a man for all seasons. During the Spanish Civil War, the Twelfth International Brigade had a Garibaldi Battalion9 and on 12 Fig. 2. The Garibaldi myth down under. This November 1941, a group of Italian political photograph, taken in c.1938, shows refugees in Mexico City, among whom members and sympathisers of the Casa d’Italia club Francesco Frola, a Socialist from , Mario during a May Day rally. The placards on the left, probably painted by Australian artist Noel Counihan, Montagnana, Communist leader and brother- contrast ‘Garibaldi’s Italy’ with ‘Mussolini’s Italy’. © in-law of Palmiro Togliatti, and Vittorio Vidali, C. Canteri & Italian Historical Society, CoAsIt. the legendary commander of the Fifth Regiment in the Spanish Civil War, founded the Alleanza Internazionale Giuseppe Garibaldi.10 Branches of the Alleanza were established in most South American countries, the United States, the , Australia and Egypt.11 In an issue of its bulletin, Informacion Italiana, the Alleanza stated that June was a mes , a holy month for anti-Fascists, because Garibaldi died on 2 June 1882. He was described as “the hero of Italian Risorgimento … a fighter for world freedom … a hero of a thousand battles … not an Italian figure, but a universal one, like Washington, Bolivar, Juárez”.12 In 1954, an anti-Fascist organisation by the name Azione Garibaldi (Garibaldi Action) 13 was also active in Buenos Aires. In Australia, Fig. 3. A close-up of the placard representing the first issue of the anti-Fascist newspaper Il ‘Garibaldi’s Italy’ shown in Fig. 2. © C. Canteri and Risveglio (The Awakening), published in Italian Historical Society, CoAsIt. Sydney in August 1944, displayed on its front 14 page a large portrait of Garibaldi. Also, From the Right, the Fascist Regime carried out between 1943 and 1945, all Communist a similar operation of appropriating the partisan formations fighting the German Army Garibaldi myth. On 4 June 1932, at the and its Fascist collaborators bore the name of inauguration of the monument to Brigades. Garibaldi in , Mussolini stated that “my Black Shirts … are politically on the same ideal wavelength as the Red Shirts and their 15 condottiero”. On 16 March 1927, Mussolini 8http://www.morronedelsannio.com/sud/brigantaggi received Ezio Garibaldi, son of Ricciotti, leading o.htm a group of red shirted garibaldini. On that 9 Anthony Beevor, The Battle for Spain, Phoenix occasion, Garibaldi’s nephew, who in 1929 2006, p. 234. would become a member of the Fascist 10 Gianfranco Cresciani, Fascism, Anti-Fascism and Chamber of Fasces and Corporations, declared Italians in Australia. 1922-1945, Australian National that the Duce was the heir and successor of University Press, Canberra 1980, p. 199. Also, Garibaldi and indeed, that he was a truer and Federica Bertagna, La patria di riserva. bigger leader.16 More importantly, in 1932 the L’emigrazione fascista in , Donzelli, Roma Regime began publishing Garibaldi’s complete 2006, p. 194. 11 Cresciani Archive, Leaflet by the Alleanza works. Its editors took pains to emphasise that Garibaldi, dated April 1945. 12 Cresciani Archive, Informacion Italiana, un-dated. 13 Bertagna, op. cit., p. 240. 15 Luigi Salvatorelli and Giovanni Mira, Storia d’Italia 14 Cresciani Archive, Il Risveglio newspaper, August nel periodo fascista, Einaudi, Turin 1961, p. 500. 1944. 16 Ibid., pp. 386-387.

IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 17 Garibaldi’s ideas acted as forerunners to Garibaldi was well aware of. For instance, at Mussolini’s policy, synthetised in the aphorism the outset of the Expedition of the Mille, Libro e Moschetto (Book and Musket).17 Cavour was decidedly hostile, and denied The representation of Garibaldi, dressed in access to guns and money that Garibaldi could either nationalist or subversive garb, is source in Milan. However, when the reminiscent of an old portrait which has been Piedmontese statesman realised that the touched up or even painted over by people who expedition would go ahead irrespectively, he wanted to impose their own interpretative lent his assistance by putting at Garibaldi’s models for their personal or factional interests. heels a watchdog, Giuseppe La Farina, by In order to restore the work to its original supplying money, weapons and ammunition, form, the alterations and accretions must by by corrupting Bourbon public officials and by necessity be removed. Likewise, the antiseptic granting safe passage to Sicily to the two nationalist iconography portraying Garibaldi as vessels carrying the Mille, escorted by the a pure, naïve and disinterested hero of Italian Sardinian Navy. Cavour’s unscrupulous use of unification wilfully ignores the fundamental Garibaldi’s volunteer army brings to mind political and ideological chasm and the ensuing other, more recent episodes of the Italian acrimonious relationship that separated him State’s covert and questionable operations, like from the two other “apostles”, Cavour and the Gladio stay-behind scheme, the unlawful Mazzini, and must be rejected. Also discarded manipulation of Right-wing extremists by must be the extremist image of a Garibaldi treacherous members of the Italian Secret criminally committed to subvert the established Service, the servizi deviati, or the less known political and social order. Historical reality is plan by Defence Minister Paolo Emilio Taviani more complex and lies, as often is the case, to supply weapons during the to somewhere in the middle. Triestine Nationalist associations in the Far from being the submissive fellow- eventuality of an invasion of the city by traveller of the Savoy dynasty in its ruthless Marshal Tito’s Army.20 However, when quest to expand its rule to Central and Garibaldi’s actions ran against the interests of Southern Italy, as the mythology of the the Kingdom of Piedmont, he was quickly and Risorgimento would lead us to believe, ruthlessly brought to order, as in October Garibaldi, a staunch Republican, was enough of 1860, when he was forced to relinquish control a realist to see that Piedmont’s policy ran of the Kingdon of the Two Sicilies to the counter his plans to establish a Republican Piedmontese Army. Garibaldi’s capitulation dictatorship in the South. The pathetic ended his revolutionary dictatorship. Similarly, utterances “obbedisco” (I obey) at in 1862, Garibaldi’s attempt to “liberate” Rome Aspromonte, and “Sire, I give to you a United from the , who since 1849 was under the Italy” at Teano, put in Garibaldi’s mouth by protection of a French garrison, was crushed by zealous nationalists, were never made. In his the Italian army at Aspromonte, when its Memorie, he unambiguously stated that troops fired on the garibaldini, killing a dozen “Cavour’s Government cast a net of of them and wounding Garibaldi, and entrapments, of miserable opposition which summarily executed those who had deserted beset our expedition to the very end”, and the Army to join the garibaldini. Garibaldi was further, that “the Savoy monarchy, by nature taken prisoner and jailed in a fortress at suspicious, did not act for the common good. Varignano, near . Again in 1867, Badly advised, it tried to consolidate its hold by when the general, in his last attempt to wrestle trampling on people’s rights and causing their Rome from the Pope, was defeated at misery”.18 In order to explain his apparently by a French expeditionary corps, the Italian contradictory behaviour, he declared in his Government did not afford him any assistance, Testamento Politico (Political Will) that, mindful of not further worsening Italo-French “although Italy has the worst government relations. Rather than Garibaldi’s deeds, it was possible, whenever there is no chance to the complex diplomatic game played by the overthrow it, I believe it is better to abide by Savoy Monarchy and the Great Powers that Dante’s great dictum: Make Italy even with the brought about the unification of Italy. British devil”.19 interests in Naples and in Sicily favoured the Cavour deceived Garibaldi and manipulated Expedition of the Thousand. French interests him to serve his own interests, a fact that kept at bay Italy’s eagerness to conquer Rome until 20 September 1870, when Italian 17 Giuseppe Armani’s introduction to Garibaldi’s Memorie, Rizzoli, Milano 1982, p. 18. 18 Garibaldi, Memorie, op. cit., p. 386. 20 Silvio Maranzana, Le armi per Trieste Italiana, 19 Ibid., pp. 246 and 390. Edizioni Italo Svevo, Trieste 2003, pp. 71-148.

18 IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 bersaglieri breached Rome’s walls at Porta Pia would on 1 May 1947 in a similar instance, and entered the Eternal City, finally putting to when it commissioned the men of another an end the Pope’s temporal rule. This not so “hero” of Sicilian brigandage, the bandit daring act was made possible only because Salvatore Giuliano, to fire upon “Communist” twenty days earlier, on 1 September 1870, the peasants demonstrating in support of land Prussian Army had defeated the French Army redistribution at Portella della Ginestra, near at Sedan. Emperor III was made a Palermo. Nine adults and two children were prisoner, thus precipitating the fall of his murdered. Empire and, on 4 September, the proclamation A third aspect of Garibaldi’s political of the Republic in Paris. History would repeat philosophy must be put in a proper historical itself seventy years later when, in June 1940, perspective, that is, his rabid anti-clericalism, another unprincipled Italian Government would which transcended his political opposition to treacherously stab in the back a the Pope as the Head of a State that hindered prostrated by the German blitzkrieg, in order, Italian unification. At the time, opposition at a as Mussolini brutally put it, to throw on the popular level found its expression in negotiating table the weight of a thousand malevolent satire, like Gioacchino Belli’s fallen Italians. sonnets, which are a testimony to the rampant Also Garibaldi’s romanticised libertarianism anti-clericalism being publicly vented even must be reassessed when confronted with his under the Vatican walls. Beside his valiant role actions during the conquest of Sicily in 1860. in the episode of the in 1849, Courageous, riding a white horse, brandishing on three occasions, in 1860, 1862 and 1867, a sword and wearing a red mantle, blond and Garibaldi tried to march on Rome to rid the blue-eyed, eating bread and onions, prone to Eternal City of its clerical government. In doing rhetorical flights, he was the physical antithesis so, he imitated what Italian historian Luciano of those sombre, black-clothed, black-bearded, Canfora in his recent book La prima marcia su lupara-branding (gunshot), silent and sad- Roma21 described as the very first march, looking who were asking for the carried out by Octavian, Caesar’s adoptive son, protection of their homes and feuds, and who in July 43 B.C. was appointed Consul by protection from social revolution. The the Roman Senate after his army threatened to dominated the Sicilian countryside well before enter Rome. Garibaldi was a precursor of the the arrival of the Hero of the Two Worlds. At many marches, studding modern Italian first, Garibaldi sided with the thousands of history, which aimed to overthrow the legally peasants who enthusiastically rallied to fight established Government. Gabriele D’Annunzio for him with their sickles and farming tools, and his legionari in September 1919, Mussolini enticed by his promises of land redistribution and his squadristi in October 1922, Junio and cheaper food; but he soon realised that he Valerio Borghese and his guardie forestali could not govern without the support of the (Forestry Guards) in December 1970 all landlords and the Mafia. When, in August 1860, attempted, the first two successfully, to carry the cafoni (destitute peasants) in the village of out a coup d’état. Even today, this tendency to Bronte occupied the lands granted by the use the threat of violence for political ends is Bourbons to Lord Nelson and his British heirs, criminally appealing to some Italians. On 15 Garibaldi sent and a detachment of June 2007, a member of the Executive of the garibaldini to re-establish “public order”, as Northern League boasted that ten million well as to safeguard British interests. Two people were ready to march on Rome to Royal Navy’s vessels berthed in the harbour of overthrow the Prodi Government,22 and in an , instructed to facilitate Garibaldi’s interview given to Milan’s Corriere della Sera landing and protect British property, like the on 22 July 2007, the leader of Northern Nelson estate and the Ingham family owned League, Umberto Bossi (convicted, like Marsala wine bottling plant. Bixio arrested the Mussolini in his Socialist days, for defaming the ringleaders and ordered the summary Italian flag) declared that “millions of people execution in the village square of five are ready to take to the streets” to bring down “communists” or “” as they were Prime Minister Prodi.23 called, because they were upholding the local Garibaldi’s anti-clericalism had its comune (Council’s) interests. This was the foundations in the fact that he was a price the landowners demanded in exchange Freemason. In 1862 he was bestowed with the for backing the nationalist revolution. Following this episode of wanton repression, support for 21 Luciano Canfora, La prima marcia su Roma, Garibaldi waned among Sicilian peasants. Yet Laterza, Bari 2007. again, the Mafia had flexed its muscles, as it 22 La Repubblica, 17 June 2007. 23 Corriere della Sera, 23 July 2007.

IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 19 title of Primo Massone d’Italia (First Freemason irreproachable, blameless characters. Garibaldi of Italy) and in May-June 1864 he was elected himself, with scant regard for the truth, to the position of Grand Master of the Great described his followers, in his I Mille, Orient of Italy.24 The fact that most Sicilian published in 1874, as “all generally having an politicians of the time were Freemasons, from awful background, mainly as thieves and, with Crispi to his minder La Farina, even to Don few exceptions, with the roots of their , Prime Minister of the Kingdom genealogical tree implanted in the dung heap of the Two Sicilies, made Garibaldi’s conquest of violence and murder”.29 Undoubtedly, of the South easy by means of corruption and Garibaldi’s outburst was motivated in part by connivance. In his addresses to Freemasons of the bitter disillusionment that he felt for the 18 March and 21 June 1867, he unequivocally way Piedmont had managed the annexation of spelt out the link between his Masonic credo the South and by the fact that many of “his” and his political and military action: “With our garibaldini, despite their past as irregulars, had example and our unshakeable, constant, heroic been forgivingly drafted into the Italian Army. practice of the holy principles that Already after Aspromonte he lambasted put into practice across the centuries, despite Piedmont’s policy: “From 1860 to 1863, in less barbaric persecutions, we will forge this Italy of than three years, you have disbanded a ours, with the brotherhood of her peoples, by national army [that is, his garibaldini]. You fastening them in a fascio [bundle of rods have caused brigandage to ravage the containing an axe], under the glorious flag of Southern provinces. You have sold two Italian Freemasonry, anticipating political unity. … I provinces [that is, his native Nice and Savoy]. believe the Freemasons to be the elect part of You have embezzled some billions in order to the Italian people”.25 carry out these nice schemes. Truly, you really Garibaldi could count on the financial are the incarnation of Italian imbecility”.30 support of the Fremasons of Italy, Great Britain In spite of his anti-clericalism, and other countries. La Farina donated eight , Freemasonry, internationalism thousand lire towards the Expedition of the and pacifism, or perhaps because of these Thousand,26 while British Freemasons beliefs, Garibaldi enjoyed widespread contributed with a considerable amount of popularity throughout Europe. His fame Turkish piastres. Most of the 94,000 lire that reached also far-away, colonial Australia. financed the expedition27 were Freemasons’ Perhaps the most famous garibaldino in money. Other funds came from the requisition Australian eyes was , better of five million ducats from the Bank of Sicily known for his earlier role in, and eyewitness and from ransacking all churches found on the account of, the Eureka Stockade revolt in garibaldini’s way. Even a diehard anticlerical 1854. In 1849, he had taken part in Garibaldi’s like King Victor Emmanuel complained to failed enterprise to oust French troops from Cavour about Garibaldi’s cavalier methods of Rome. In 1860 Carboni reached Palermo and, funding his campaign. In his letter, the King allegedly upon recommendation by Garibaldi, claimed that “this man is not so docile and was appointed translator in the office of the honest as he is portrayed … the immense provisional government’s Secretary-General damage that occurred here, for example the and future Italian Prime Minister, Francesco infamous theft of all monies from Treasury, can Crispi. In this capacity, he translated the be wholly ascribed to him. He surrounded correspondence between Crispi and British himself with scoundrels, followed their bad Foreign Secretary Lord John Russell.31 Another advice and plunged this unhappy country in a garibaldino who landed in Australia was Gian horrible situation”.28 Carlo Asselin, a Neapolitan who had taken part King Victor Emmanuel’s scathing in the liberal uprising of 1848 and in Garibaldi’s remarks were no doubt dictated by his Roman Republic in 1849, and who would profound antipathy against the general, become Italian Vice-Consul in Sydney in 1861. although it is true that not all of the Mille were As in many other countries, also Australia witnessed an inflation of Garibaldi-naming of streets, places and shops, as well as a spate of 24 Aldo Alessandro Mola, Storia della Massoneria celebrations honouring the general. In April italiana dall’Unità alla Repubblica, Bompiani 1976, 1864, Austrian painter Eugen Von Guerard pp. 50 and 766. sketched the Garibaldi Claim near Hepburn, 25 Ibid., p. 92. 26 Garibaldi, Memorie, op. cit., p. 247. 27 Giuliano Procacci, History of the Italian People, 29 Aldo Alessandro Mola, op. cit., p. 55. Penguin Books, Ringwood 1968, p. 318. 30 Ibid., p. 57. 28www.infinito.it/utenti/s/s.martino.sannita/Briganta 31 Desmond O’Grady, Raffaello! Raffaello!, Hale & ggio/Personaggi/Garibaldi01.htm Iremonger, Sydney 1985, pp. 52-65 and 226-244.

20 IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 Victoria, where there also was a Garibaldi name of Garibaldi was unintentionally settlement, and a gold mine was named after implicated in tragic events, as was the case in Garibaldi at Solferino and Lionsville near January 1995, when a food poisoning outbreak Tabulam, in Northern NSW. Gough Whitlam, in that killed one child and made others critically his book My Italian Notebook, comments that ill was traced back to sausages produced by the use of the name of Garibaldi was the Adelaide company Garibaldi Smallgoods Pty widespread in the Victorian goldfields: “In Ltd. For weeks, the media spoke ad nauseam 1860, Garibaldi Gully was opened between of “the Garibaldi effect” and of the “Garibaldi Ballarat and Daylesford and the Garibaldi Lead affair”.36 In Sydney, one of the landmarks was discovered at Fiery Creek near Beaufort. frequented by Italians during the ‘Sixties and Buggins Flat near Wedderburn, where gold had the ‘Seventies was Mario Abbiezzi’s Garibaldi been discovered in 1852, was renamed the Bar, with its huge mural portraying the general Garibaldi Goldfield in 1860. In 1862 a new field on his white horse. During the Resistance, near Woods Point in Gippsland was named Abbiezzi fought with the 52nd Garibaldi Brigade after him and in 1868 a new lead near and was credited to be among those who Beechworth. In Sydney, John Cuneo built the captured Mussolini at Dongo in April 1945.37 Garibaldi Inn in Hunters Hill”.32 Records show that in the 1890s a Garibaldi Township was settled by Chinese tin miners in North Eastern Tasmania, and was abandoned during the First World War.33 On the artistic side, in 1859 the Gawler Institute in South Australia offered a prize for the best musical composition for Caroline Carleton’s verse Song of Australia. Neapolitan migrant and Garibaldi follower Cesare Cutolo submitted a composition bearing the title Garibaldi, to which the judges awarded second place.34 In May 1861 the – for the time – remarkable sum of 358 pounds was collected among Garibaldi’s admirers in Melbourne. A Sword of Honour, purchased with this money and sent to the British Embassy in Turin, was presented to the general in Caprera on 15 August of that Fig. 4. The visit of the Duke of and the year. The accompanying letter rather captain and officers of the Italian ship Garibaldi to bombastically stated that “in you, the the No. 3 ‘Band and Albion Consols G. M. Co's’ gold subscribers of this sword honour qualities mine in Ballarat, 29 April 1873. The Garibaldi was which, while they have enabled you to become probably the first Italian warship to visit Australia the saviour of your country, have entitled you after the Unification of Italy. Image courtesy Ballarat Historical Park Association. to take the rank with Leonidas in valour, and with Washington in virtue”. Garibaldi in reply The arrival in 1873 of the Italian frigate thanked the organising committee for the gift Garibaldi rekindled Australians’ interest in the and, in a thinly veiled reference to the deeds of the general. This interest was Piedmontese government, said that “I am heightened in 1882, at the time of Garibaldi’s enraged by the delay interposed by inept and death. On 17 June 1882, Sicilian Socialist cowardly [government officials] between Francesco Sceusa organised a memorial service affronted Italy and my duty”.35 At times, the at the Garden Palace in Sydney, attended by over ten thousand people. A large papier mâché bust of Garibaldi towered in the hall. 32 Edward Gough Whitlam, My Italian Notebook, The newspaper Illustrated Sydney News Allen& Unwin, Sydney 2002, p. 22. 33http://www.heritageatrisk.org.au/TAS_- highlighted the event in its first page with an _Garibaldi_Township.html artistic impression of the hall. It also reported 34 Desmond O’Connor, No Need to Be Afraid. Italian that “flags and other appropriate emblems Settlers in South Australia between 1839 and the Second World War, Wakefield Press, Adelaide 1996, pp. 34-35. 36http://www.agrifood.info/review/1995/Pointon.htm 35 Cresciani Archive, List of Subscribers to the Sword l. Also, of Honour presented to General Garibaldi by his http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/8.30/helthrpt/hstori Admirers in Australia, Pamphlet printed at the Punch es/hr161002.htm General Printing Office, Melbourne 1861. 37 La Fiamma newspaper, 24 March 1986.

IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 21 were disposed about the building with great dying and wanted to see his sons and effect. In front of the platform there was a grandchildren”. It was Constance who would colossal bust of Garibaldi, admirably executed record from the voice of a dying Garibaldi his by signor Sani in six days, and which occupies family history.42 a prominent place in our engraving. The whole Garibaldi’s death began that long process of of the decorations were designed by Signor evaluation of his political and historical legacy Francesco Sceusa of the Survey Department that is continuing today. On the one hand, it and carried out with artistic completeness”.38 was simpler to manufacture the myth of Yet, the most direct connection between Garibaldi as a hero par excellence of Italian Garibaldi and Australia, the fact that the unification. Nationalist canonization served the general briefly visited this country, was little purpose of sweeping under the carpet all known until the late ‘Seventies, when the Garibaldi’s ideas and actions that were Author mentioned to former Prime Minister incongruent with, or antithetic to the Gough Whitlam that Garibaldi, then in mythology of unification pursued by the command of the vessel Carmen, in December Savoyard Establishment. In some way, what 1852 had landed on Three Hummock Island, Tancredi said in Giuseppe Tomasi di off the coast of Tasmania. Whitlam was very ’s novel , referring to excited by this piece of information, and wrote Sicily’s political situation, that “if we want an article in The Sydney Review. He later things to remain as they are, everything will reported the story in his book My Italian have to change”,43 could be extended to the Notebook.39 In fact, Garibaldi mentioned his whole process of unification, a unification that brief encounter with Australia in his Memorie, was pursued by a small minority. As waxing lyrical on the idyllic environment found of Salina said in The Leopard, “in these last six on that lonely island that, as he put it, months since your Garibaldi set foot in “deliciously excited my imagination when, sick Marsala, too many things have been started of the civilised society so well supplied with without our being consulted”.44 Garibaldi’s priests and police agents, I return in thought to radical, revolutionary zeal, his republicanism that pleasant bay”.40 and internationalism crashed against the A stronger, also hardly known, Australian immovable force of conservatism, of link with Garibaldi was the presence in monarchical and factional interests and of a Melbourne, from 1875 to 1880, of his son powerful social and economic structure. Ricciotti, born to Anita Garibaldi. During the On the other hand, the Left also idealised early 1870s he was living with his father in Garibaldi, without setting in a proper political Caprera but, “unable to settle in that chaotic context his pragmatism, his apparent environment, full of lovers, sons, step-children contradictions, his perceived caving in to the and visitors continuously coming to pay conservative agenda of the Northern homage to the general”,41 Ricciotti fled to bourgeoisie. As Antonio Gramsci shrewdly London, where on 2 July 1874 he married commented, “the masses remained a passive Constance Hopcraft, an aristocratic woman, a spectator, cheered Garibaldi, did not strong Methodist and a close friend of understand Cavour, waited for the king to Nightingale. Seven months later they landed in solve the problems besetting them, that is, Melbourne, where they lived for six years in poverty and economic and feudal dire poverty. Ricciotti found employment as oppression”.45 In his letter ‘Oppressed and fishmonger and baker, and worked for the local Oppressors’, Gramsci again returned on the Council. In Australia, Constance gave birth to issue of the masses being a victim of the five of their thirteen children. Giuseppe, born in Garibaldi myth: “We Italians adore Garibaldi; 1875, died soon after birth, as did Irene since childhood we were taught to admire him, Teresa, while the surviving children, Rosa, Carducci enthused us with his Garibaldi legend Anita Italia and Giuseppe (Peppino) were born … everybody cries ‘Hail Garibaldi’ and nobody in 1876, 1878 and 1879 respectively. In 1880, ‘Hail the King’ without being able to put Ricciotti, Constance and their children returned forward a logical explanation … in Italy the to Caprera, “because Giuseppe Garibaldi was

38 Gianfranco Cresciani, Migrants or Mates. Italian Life in Australia, Knockmore Enterprises, Sydney 42 Ibid. 1988, pp. 26-7. 43 Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, Il Gattopardo, 39 Edward Gough Whitlam, op. cit., pp. 18-19. Feltrinelli, Milan 1962, p. 42. 40 Giuseppe Garibaldi, Memorie, op. cit., p. 200. 44 Ibid., p. 209. 41http://digilander.libero.it/fiammecremisi/carneade/ 45 Antonio Gramsci, L’Ordine Nuovo. 1919-1920, znipoti.htm Einaudi, Turin 1970, p. 329.

22 IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 Reds, the Greens, the Yellows idolise Garibaldi husband of Anita, during his life he collected without truly appreciating his noble ideas”.46 three wives, eight children and dozens of The fame of Garibaldi, misunderstood hero lovers. In 1859, he was involved at the same of Italian unification, a “difficult hero”, as time in four torrid affairs. The following year, Enrico Iachello and Antonio Di Grado qualified on 24 January, aged 53, he married Giuseppina him in their lecture at the Casa d’Italia in Raimondi, the eighteen year-old daughter of a Sydney on 7 July 2007, endures even today. garibaldino Marquis. The marriage lasted less Throughout his life, marked by ambiguities and than day, as Garibaldi came to know after the contradictions, he swam against the current of ceremony that Giuseppina had an affair with Great Power politics, well after the the young garibaldino Luigi Caroli. In 1864, he revolutionary, the “heroic” era had ended. The began a relationship with a Piedmontese period that followed was characterised by a peasant, Francesca Armosino, who gave him complex and duplicitous process of Savoyard three children, Manlio, Clelia and Rosa. His territorial expansion, which took advantage of bigamist relationship was legalised in 1879, the opportunities offered by a favourable when his marriage to Giuseppina Raimondi was international situation. In this scenario, annulled, and in 1880 Garibaldi was able to Garibaldi was a distraction, an embarrassment, marry Francesca.48 a temporary hindrance to Cavour’s scheming, Despite his proclaimed love for freedom, to be strumentalizzato, relegated to Caprera or having conquered the Kingdom of the Two even shot at when his interventionism did not Sicilies, Garibaldi proclaimed himself a fit the strategic vision of expansionist Dictator. It was an interesting revival of this Piedmont. No doubt, Garibaldi, like George word on European soil, perhaps a transfer from Bush Junior, sincerely believed in the spread of Latin America. Having no patience with the freedom by force of arms, yet his idealism was delays of parliamentary democracy, tempered by the realisation that his almost dictatorship was the natural form of religious faith in republicanism, government he had chosen for Southern Italy internationalism, the abolition of privileges, the in 1860. At times, even his notorious anti- disbandment of a permanent army and the clericalism gave way to braggadocio. Denis elimination of war, ran counter to the Mack Smith recalls the episode in 1860, when of the time and all that Cavour, the Garibaldi “presided from the royal throne king and even Mazzini stood for. His during pontifical high mass in the Cathedral of understanding of Italian peasantry was utopian Palermo, claiming the royal rights of apostolic and naïve. What the Southern cafoni really legateship, clad in red shirt and with sword meant when they were clamouring for liberty unsheathed as the Gospel was read”.49 was that they wanted bread, land and fewer Controversy, confrontation and conflict taxes. In a way, their misconception of what accompanied Garibaldi throughout his life. One Garibaldi was offering is reminiscent of that would either love him dispassionately or manifested by the Russian kulaks who, during nurture a deep, abiding hatred for his person the December 1825 Decembrist uprising, cried and actions. There was no middle ground, no out outside St Petersburg’s Winter Palace for compromise. Today, on the occasion of the the Constitution, believing it was the Tsar’s 200th anniversary of his birth, a lot of Italians wife. Garibaldi admitted to the devastating still pass judgement on his legacy. On 10 consequences of his campaign in the South August 2007, a symbolic trial of Garibaldi was when in 1868 he wrote to Adelaide Cairoli, that held at San Mauro Pascoli, a small village in “today I would not take again the road to , famous for having posthumously Southern Italy, fearing of being pelted with called to the bar Mussolini and Mazzini. The stones, as we brought there only misery and prosecution was represented by historian stirred up only hatred” (non rifarei oggi la via Angela Pellicciari, author of the book I panni dell’Italia meridionale, temendo di essere preso sporchi dei Mille (The Thousand’s Dirty Linen), a sassate, essendosi cagionato colà solo published by Liberal Libri, while the defence squallore e suscitato solo odio).47 council was led by London-based historian Lucy The Romantic myth built around Garibaldi is Riall, who recently published the volume in stark contrast with the prosaic reality of his Garibaldi. The Invention of a Hero, edited by life and actions. Far from being the faithful Yale University Press. Pellicciari maintained that Garibaldi was a brigand, the leader of a 46 Antonio Gramsci, 2000 pagine di Gramsci. Lettere edite e inedite. 1912-1937, Il Saggiatore, Milan 48http://www.italia.it/wps/portal/en_channels?WCM_ 1964, p. 14. GLOBAL_CONTEXT=/Tourism+Portal/EN+Speciali/E 47http://www.andriaroberto.com/garibaldi_il_proces N+Speciali+2LV/Love+and+War so.htm 49 Denis Mack Smith, op. cit., p. 16.

IHSJ ITALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 16 NO 1 – JANUARY / JUNE 2008 23 troublesome minority of so-called “patriots”, the myth of Garibaldi and mythologised the dictatorial, wilfully excluding from power the role of Communist garibaldini formations in the peasant and Catholic masses, occupying, Resistance, in order to gain political and moral rather than liberating the South by proxy for legitimacy in their quest to radically change Freemasonry’s and British interests, a divisive Italian society, contributed to the creation of and disruptive national force because of his an unrelenting rift between the warring parties. anti-clericalism. On the other hand, Italian conservative, clerical , on the other hand, compared and capitalist interests indefatigably opposed Garibaldi to Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, the the Left’s political agenda and, as at the time Roman who was made twice dictator in the fifth of the Prince of Salina, also in Republican Italy Century B.C. and on each occasion resigned his everything changed to remain the same as dictatorship to return to his farm. Garibaldi, before. The Right did not and, to date, as Riall pointed out, was an extraordinary man of amply demonstrated by the Berlusconi action, a generous and legendary hero. He also government, does not want to subscribe to a withdrew to Caprera after his military exploits. shared vision of past Italian political events and He was politically “ductile”, working with the is not in the slightest interested in healing the Monarchy in spite of his republicanism, and wounds inflicted to a fractured society by therefore not so “ingenuous” as the opposite ideologies. historiography of the Left would want us to In the final analysis, Garibaldi continues to believe. He was a courageous leader, a brilliant be worshipped as a super hero, as a demiurge military strategist, disinterested, incorruptible, of the Risorgimento and, conversely, to be a true hero.50 demonised and made responsible for the The Jury, formed by regional journalists, on questione meridionale, for the problem of the the same evening issued its verdict: not guilty. South, that successive Italian governments The motivation read as follows: “Although have been historically unable or unwilling to recognising the excesses committed during the tackle and resolve. To this effect, Giuseppe garibaldini campaigns, the jury decided not to Garibaldi was and remains a complex, issue a guilty verdict for lack of evidence. charismatic, contradictory, controversial and Therefore Garibaldi is a hero”.51 A similar bewildering personality in contemporary Italian verdict was reached on 13 April 2002 by the history. Jury of another symbolic trial held in Naples at the Liceo Garibaldi, where Garibaldi was declared not guilty, in the absence of creditable proof, of having caused “considerable moral, civic and economic damage to the people of the South”, but was declared guilty of having invaded a legitimate kingdom without a proper declaration of war.52 These verdicts are hotly contested by those Italians who still believe that Garibaldi’s deeds, after one hundred and fifty years, continue to have a negative impact on their lives, that the unresolved national problems and the social, economic and developmental disparity between North and South were caused by his pivotal role in precipitating Italy’s unification. Another reason why the figure of Garibaldi looms large over contemporary Italian politics is that Italians have never metabolised Fascism’s legacy or the tragic events of the civil war that raged in the country between 1943 and 1945. The fact that the Left held a hegemony over

50 Corriere della Sera, 25 July 2007. Also, http://www.romagnaoggi.it/showarticle.php?articleI D=236492§ion=news/ 51http://www.romagnaoggi.it/showarticle.php?article ID=238695&storico=giorno§ion=news/Cesena 52http://www.andriaroberto.com/garibaldi_il_proces so.htm

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