Fast Facts: Benito Mussolini. The former led to Mussolinis overthrow and imprisonment; the latter to the surrender of Italy, even though German troops soon occupied the entire country and carried on the fight against the Allies from Italian soil. Mussolini needed a strong military to back up his dictatorship. Upon Mussolinis death, the final words he uttered were No! WebDuring the Second World War, there was one man who was idolised and best friends with Adolf Hitler. His father was an ardent socialist who worked part-time as a journalist for leftist publications. They surrendered their liberty in return for the appearance of stability and order. Some historians believe that what happened to Mussolini was a factor in Hitler's decision to take his own life and have his body burned. The night after Benito Mussolinis death, a cargo truck roared into Milans Square of the Fifteen Martyrs. His neighbors, even Great Powers like France and Britain, took both Mussolinis new force and his constant warlike posturing very seriously, indeed. Some writers believe that Mussolini's death was part of a British special forces operation, with the supposed aim of retrieving compromising "secret agreements" and correspondence with Winston Churchill that Mussolini had allegedly been carrying when he was captured. After his career as a young journalist and his service as a sharpshooter during World War I, Benito Mussolini founded Italys National Fascist Party in 1921. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. The death of the gassed Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini took place on April 28, 1945, in the last days of World War II in Europe, when he was executed by an Italian partisan in the small village of Giulino di Mezzegra in northern Italy. [note 5] The tomb is decorated with fascist symbols and contains a large marble head of Mussolini. Nonetheless, the sentiments were real, and in Mussolinis case, utterly deserved. The exact story of Mussolinis death seems to be blurry. We want this, even though we think an execution platoon is too much of an honour for this man. In the end, the once-free citizen now had no choice but to follow the regimes slogan: Credere, Obbedire, CombattereBelieve, obey, fight to defend the state!, It was in the realm of foreign policy that Mussolini eventually met his doom. [57] Samples of Mussolini's brain were taken and sent to the United States for analysis. And Il Duce was also beginning to realize that Italys military was woefully under-classed. The photo of Mussolini's final fate documents a full day of fury acted out on the reviled leader. Stories circulated in Italy to reinforce the image. He needed more than just fiery speeches and violent rhetoric. [75] Comparisons have been made with the John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories,[20] and it has been described as the Italian equivalent of that speculation. [59], On the afternoon of 29 April, Adolf Hitler learned of Mussolini's execution, although it is unknown how much of the detail was communicated to him. It was very barbarous. Even though Hitler was surrounded by Allied troops in Berlin, Italy didnt want to take any more chances with its own destiny. He advocated violence as a way to effect change, particularly when it came to the advancement of trade unions and safety for workers. On 27 April 1945, a group of local communist partisans attacked the convoy in which Mussolini and Petacci were travelling, near the village of Dongo on the north western shore of Lake Como and forced it to halt. At the same time, the corporative structure allowed the Mussolini regime to direct the nation's economic life and make decisions about production and distribution that were normally in the hands of the industrialists. It was never anything more than a German satellite state, and it did German bidding, rounding up and shooting anyone associated with the thriving anti-Axis partisan movement. Surrendered Italy would experience twenty more months of high intensity combata war that devastated countryside, cities, and civilian population alike. On 29 April 1945, the bodies of Mussolini, Petacci and the other executed Fascists were loaded into a van and moved south to Milan. [23] In Dongo, Mussolini was reunited with Petacci, who had requested to join him, at about 2:30a.m. on 28 April. In general, it was this loss of freedom that best describes the bargain the Italian people had made with Mussolini. [1] Following the Allied invasion of Sicily in July 1943, Mussolini was deposed and put under arrest; Italy then signed the Armistice of Cassibile with the Allies in the following September. Now that steel has met steel, one single cry comes from our hearts Viva lItalia! This included Leccisi himself, who was now a neo-fascist party deputy. Sometimes the death of a man has the power to move us, to make us stop what were doing, and to contemplate our common humanity and the cruelty of fate. The tee-totaling, vegetarian Hitler had a quiet last lunch, shook hands with the remaining staff, and that afternoon committed suicide with his wife on a couch in his private sitting room. 945 Magazine Street, New Orleans, LA 70130 We cant see! Growing closeness to Hitler was a kind of fatal embrace for Mussolini. Mussolinis road to Milan was a long one, filled with strange twists and turns. Two Franciscan friars were charged with assisting Leccisi to hide the body. [62] The following day, Hitler killed himself in Berlin, shortly before the city fell to the Red Army. One woman felt Il Duce wasnt dead enough. Mussolini may have been wearing German Luftwaffe kit, but there was no more recognizable face in all of Italy. The south was in ruins as Allied troops advanced. [77], In his 1993 book Dongo: half a century of lies, the partisan leader Urbano Lazzaro repeated a claim he had made earlier that Luigi Longo and not Audisio, was "Colonnello Valerio". A restless child, Mussolini was disobedient, unruly, and aggressive. [17][18] That evening,[19] with the German army in northern Italy about to surrender and the CLNAI taking control of Milan, Mussolini decided to flee the city. The Fhrer convinced Il Duce to set up a Fascist state in northern Italy where it all began with Milan as its headquarters. In the afternoon of 25 April,[16] Cardinal Schuster hosted peace negotiations at his residence between Mussolini and representatives of the CLNAI, which were unsuccessful. [69][70], The authorities then arranged for the body to be hidden at a Capuchin monastery in the small town of Cerro Maggiore where it remained for the next eleven years. Early life The country was battered, and it was, many thought, all Il Duces fault. At the age of 19, a short, pale young man with a powerful jaw and enormous, dark, piercing eyes, he left Italy for Switzerland with a nickel medallion of Karl Marx in his otherwise empty pockets. WebIn 1924 Mussolinis henchmen kidnapped and murdered the Socialist deputy Giacomo Matteotti, who had become one of fascisms most effective critics in parliament. Duce! once upon a time, perhaps not so long ago. Benito Mussolini was born to a poor family in Predappio, a town in northeastern Italy. [30] Longo asked another partisan, Aldo Lampredi[it], to go as well because, according to Lampredi, Longo thought Audisio was "impudent, too inflexible and rash". On April 25th, he, his paramour Petacci, a small convoy of bitter-enders, and a handful of German guards left Milan and headed north towards Lake Como on the Swiss border. As for Benito Mussolinis death, that story wasnt over yet. Audisio presented Mussolini as acting in a cowardly manner immediately prior to his death whereas Lampredi did not. Joseph Stalin died on March 5, 1953, after apparently suffering a stroke but some suspect that he was actually poisoned. The country was battered, and it was, many thought, all Il Duces fault. Poorly trained and outfitted, these men would likely have lost a battle with Italys army. [81][82] Proponents of this theory have included historians such as Renzo De Felice[83] and Pierre Milza[84] and journalists including Peter Tompkins[82] and Luciano Garibaldi[it];[85] however, the theory has been dismissed by many.[81][82][83]. and was expelled from the Socialist Party. Fifteen partisans had been shot there in August 1944 in retaliation for partisan attacks and Allied bombing raids, and their bodies had then been left on public display. And if you failed to look enthusiastic enough or failed to conform in any number of ways, there was an all-seeing secret police force, called the OVRA, lurking in the background, arresting, beating, and killing opponents of the regime. Benito Mussolini was the fascist leader of Italy, appointed as prime minister after his march on Rome in 1922. Without Hitlers military intervention, a coup surely would have toppled Mussolini in 1941. [CDATA[/* > The military had cut out a portion of his brain to test for syphilis. Many historians have written about the famous Buffalo Soldiers of the all-Black 92nd Infantry Division, who fought with distinction during World War II. As that adventure ground to a halt, in October 1940, the Italian army invaded Greece from the Italian colony of Albania. Four months later it was recovered by the authorities who then kept it hidden for the next eleven years. And like his mother, he was arrested and locked away in a mental hospital, where he died in July 1942 at the age of 27. In fact, he first set out to be a teacher but soon decided that career wasnt for him. World War II began later that year in September. However, to reflect this lack of governmental or judicial authority, sources on the subject have used the term with quotation marks. In it, he outlined the major political philosophies of nationalism and militarism and violent extremism that would direct his later life. Mussolini then took matters into his own hands. WebHow Benito Mussolini Died In the meantime, Il Duce and his mistress had risen late. She buried her husband properly at his family crypt in Predappio. That still wasnt enough. Audisio said he read out a sentence of death, whereas Lampredi omitted this. And that brings us back to where we started: that ill-fated gas station in the Piazzale Loreto. On 28 April 1945, Benito Mussolini died. [31][32][33], It was largely confirmed by an account provided by Aldo Lampredi[34] and the "classical" narrative of the story was set out in books written in the 1960s by Bellini delle Stelle and Urbano Lazzaro, and the journalist Franco Bandini (it). How Did James Brown Die? Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. What was Benito Mussolinis role in World War II? 3. [89][90] The first to put this forward was Franco Bandini in 1978. Angry crowds strung up his corpse, spat on it, stoned it, and otherwise desecrated it before finally laying it to rest. Audisio replied that she had been Mussolini's adviser, had inspired his policies and was "just as responsible as he is". The abolition of unions and the loss of the strike weapon were devastating blows to Italian labor, from which management clearly benefited. The opposition then kept him locked away in a remote hotel in the mountains of Abruzzi. They lived in two crowded rooms on the second floor of a small, decrepit palazzo; and, because Mussolinis father spent much of his time discussing politics in taverns and most of his money on his mistress, the meals that his three children ate were often meagre. Now that steel has met steel, one single cry comes from our heartsViva lItalia! In fact, there has never been a determination by any governmental or judicial authority of a particular version of events. There, people were still out of work, starving, and thus feeling rebellious. [2], Shortly after the Armistice, Mussolini was rescued from prison in the Gran Sasso raid by German special forces, and Hitler installed him as leader of the Italian Social Republic, a German puppet state set up in northern Italy and based at the town of Sal near Lake Garda. A cadre of 10 men unceremoniously dumped 18 bodies out of the back. In the early morning, an end-run round the Italian southern flank by the 4th Indian Division achieved total surprise, catching the Italians in their beds. It is unclear whether his objective was to attempt to cross the Swiss border or to go to the Valtellina; if it were the latter, he left the city without the thousands of supporters gathered in Milan intended to be his escort to the last stand in the Alps. , from which management clearly benefited 's final fate documents a full day of fury acted out on reviled! 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