Mussolini’s policemen: Behaviour, ideology and institutional culture in representation and practice 9781526129932

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MUSSOLINI’S POLICEMEN

J O N AT H A N

Behaviour, ideology and institutional culture in representation and practice

D U N N A G E

m u s s o l i n i’s p o l i c e m e n

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Mussolini’s policemen Behaviour, ideology and institutional culture in representation and practice

jonathan dunnage

Manchester University Press Manchester

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Copyright © Jonathan Dunnage 2012 The right of Jonathan Dunnage to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Published by Manchester University Press Altrincham Street, Manchester M1 7JA, UK

www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data applied for ISBN

978 0 7190 8139 2 hardback

First published 2012 The publisher has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for any external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Typeset by Carnegie Book Production, Lancaster

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Contents contents

List of figures

contents

page vii

Preface and acknowledgements

ix

Introduction 1 1 ‘Cinderella status’: the liberal police and the lure of fascism

8

2 The ‘fascistisation’ of police culture: representation and practice

37

3 Oppression and consensus-building: policing communities in fascist Italy

78

4 The performance of Mussolini’s policemen: reflections on institutional culture, working conditions and welfare

104

5 Personal profiles

135

6 Facing the demise of fascism

166

7 Conclusion: Mussolini’s policemen and the transition to the Republic

206

Select bibliography

223

Index 229

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List of figures figures

figures

2.1 Procession of armoured vehicles of the Corpo della Polizia Metropolitana during Police Day celebrations, Rome, 18 October 1933. page 40 2.2 Members of Corpo della Polizia Metropolitana with Alsatian dogs in procession during Police Day celebrations, Rome, 18 October 1933.

41

2.3 Photograph marking the inauguration of a cohort of cadets at the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia, Caserta, July 1937.

62

2.4 Cadets of the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia, Caserta, watching an amateur theatrical performance at the school (circa late 1930s). 63 5.1 Ernesto Paglione (third from right), Director of the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia, Caserta (date unknown).

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Preface and acknowledgements Preface and acknowledgements

Preface and acknowledgements

This book is the fruit of a major research project which dates back to the 1990s, but which was predominantly undertaken between 2003 and 2010. The project was inspired by the relatively limited attention which historians of fascist Italy have given to the role of the regular police forces in running the dictatorship. Studies of fascist repression have more often focused on the activities and personnel of Mussolini’s secret police organisations, such as the OVRA (Opera Vigilanza e Repressione dell’Anti-fascismo, tasked with uprooting clandestine anti-facism), or have tended to consider the regime’s police measures from the perspective of the victims. The early phase of the project was, therefore, concerned with examining how the regular forces of the Interior Ministry Police and Carabinieri (military police) controlled and interacted with Italian society during the dictatorship. After a preliminary survey of documentation of the Interior Ministry held at the Central State Archive in Rome, I undertook a detailed case study of the policing of Siena. My choice of the Tuscan town and province was motivated by the fact that, unlike most provincial archives, the Siena State Archive holds a full collection of documents of the Prefecture and Questura (provincial police headquarters) dating back to the fascist period. These sources also revealed a wealth of information relating to the internal hierarchies of the police forces, allowing me to go some way towards reconstructing day-to-day work inside Siena’s police headquarters, as well as the lives and careers of officials and officers who served there. This inspired the second phase of the project, which is the main focus of the present volume. While continuing my work on Siena, I also started to examine the notable quantity of police literature (journals, newspapers, manuals, regulations, etc.) kept at the National Library in Florence. This enabled me to analyse Italian police culture in the context of Mussolini’s ‘fascistisation’ of the Italian state. I then proceeded to embark on a more thorough investigation of the recruitment, training and working lives of members of the Interior

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x

Preface and acknowledgements

Ministry Police during the fascist years. For this purpose, I returned to the Central State Archive. My work in Rome focused on analysing the contents of a sample of personal files of police officials and employees whose careers spanned or overlapped with the period of the dictatorship. I also made use of a wide range of other documents which illustrated how the hierarchy and internal organisation of the Interior Ministry Police were managed during the dictatorship. A large amount of the material in this volume is previously unpublished. Parts of the volume incorporate content from earlier articles and book chapters arising from the project, though these texts have not been directly reproduced. A preliminary survey of Mussolini’s police appeared in ‘Social Control in Fascist Italy: The Role of the Police’, in C. Emsley, E. Johnson and P. Spierenburg (eds), Social Control in Europe. Vol. 2, 1800–2000 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2004), pp. 261–80. I am grateful to Palgrave Macmillan for allowing me to re-use material originally published in an overview of police personnel, ‘Mussolini’s Policemen, 1926–43’, in G. Blaney, Jr (ed.), Policing Interwar Europe. Continuity, Change and Crisis, 1918–40 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), pp. 112–35. Some of the content of the book was briefly summarised in ‘Italian Policemen and Fascist Ideology’, The Italianist, 31:1 (2011), 99–111 (www.maney. co.uk/journals/ita; www.ingentaconnect.com/content/maney/ita). Parts of Chapter 3 regarding the case-study of Siena originate from my article, ‘Surveillance and Denunciation in Fascist Siena, 1927–1943’, European History Quarterly, 38:2 (2008), 244–65 (SAGE Publications Ltd: www.sagepublications.com), and a paper given at the international conference, ‘Gli spazi della polizia. Un’indagine sul definirsi degli oggetti di interesse poliziesco’, held at Messina, in November 2006, which will appear in a forthcoming volume edited by Livio Antonielli (published by Rubbettino, Soveria Mannelli, Italy). The inspections of the fascist police, analysed in Chapter 4, are the subject of a short essay, ‘“A sufficienza, ma senza letizia”: The Performance of the Fascist Police in the Reports of the Public Security Inspectors’, in G. Talbot and P. Williams (eds), Essays in Italian Literature and History in Honour of Doug Thompson (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2002), pp. 125–32. Chapters 3 and 4 also make use of material from an earlier summary of the findings of my research in ‘Des fervents de “L’État totalitaire” aux tenants du “quieto vivere”: le personnel policier dans l’Italie fasciste’, in J.-M. Berlière, C. Denys, D. Kalifa and V. Milliot (eds), Métiers de police. Être policier en Europe, XVIIIe –XXe siècle (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2008), pp. 509–21. Parts of my analysis of the recruitment and careers of fascist policemen originally appeared

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Preface and acknowledgements

xi

in ‘Ideology, Clientelism and the “Fascistisation” of the Italian State: Fascists in the Interior Ministry Police’, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 14:3 (2009), 267–84 (tandfonline.com). Parts of Chapters 6 and 7 were first published in ‘Surviving Fascism; Narrating Fascism; Transferring Fascism: A Preliminary Investigation of the Evolution of Italian Police Culture from the Dictatorship to the Republic’, The Italianist, 29:3 (2009), 464–84 (www.maney.co.uk/journals/ita; www. ingentaconnect.com/content/maney/ita). I am indebted to the British Academy whose two Small Research Grant awards financed several visits to Rome, Siena and Florence during the course of the project. I am grateful to the staff of the Central State Archive in Rome, the Siena State Archive and the National Library in Florence for the assistance they gave me during these visits. I owe a great deal to colleagues and fellow researchers for providing invaluable advice on the original fieldwork and for reading and commenting on drafts of the book. I cannot name them all, but I especially wish to thank Jean-Marc Berlière, Mauro Canali, Nick Carter, Rebecca Clifford, Philip Cooke, Michael Ebner, Clive Emsley, Joanne Klein, Luca Madrignani and Philip Morgan. I am also grateful to Daphne and Andrew for putting me up in their flat in EUR during several of my trips to Rome. My thanks are also due to the staff at Manchester University Press for their support and assistance while I worked on the manuscript and during the production process. Finally, I am indebted to my wife, Adriana, for the encouragement, patience and love she constantly showed me during the many years which the project took up.

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Introduction Introduction

Introduction

In May 1940, a few weeks before Italy entered the Second World War as an ally of Germany, the Questore (provincial police chief) of Turin provided the Director of the Personnel Division of the Interior Ministry Police with a list of complaints about his officials. This provides us with an illuminating picture of the state of Mussolini’s Public Security forces in a major urban and industrial centre, fifteen years into the fascist dictatorship: 1. Commissioner Ianni is of a venerable old age and makes no contribution. 2. The same can be said of Cavalier Petti. 3. Cavalier Numis is a hypochondriac who does little and is in conflict with everyone, and whom I have many times asked to leave Turin and take up a post of his choice so that he does not continue to play the martyr in the face of my insistence on rigour. 4. Cavalier Vecchione could be a capable commissioner, but since his arrival in Turin he has been continually unwell and I do not believe that big sacrifices in the area of active policing can be asked of his physique. 5. Cavalier De Palma continually makes trouble and cannot undertake the direction of important services. 6. Cavalier Rossetti is a diligent official, but his health conditions prevent him from being entrusted with tasks which require physical energy. 7. Cav. Chiocca could be a capable official but his deafness has now reached such a point that his working ability has seriously diminished. 8. Cavalier Tornabene, owing to his age (sixty-five years), cannot be employed in public order services. 9. Cavalier Di Tommaso is an official of modest and limited potential, like Barsotti and several others.

The Questore concluded: ‘There are a few low-ranking officials who have to undertake tiring evening and night shifts in turns. And, with

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Introduction

the exception of the odd heroic spirit, their fatigue manifests itself in forms of discontent (muttering, anonymous notes, etc.). This is the true state of things, without the slightest hint of pessimism.’1 When considering the Questore’s words, allowances should be made for the likelihood that younger-age police officials were being drafted into the military during the period in question. Nevertheless, they are very much in contrast with propagandised images of a modern and powerful institution which had been projected to the Italian public since the early 1930s, suggesting that fascist calls since the birth of the dictatorship for a rejuvenation of police personnel, and their injection with the values of a new ideological era, had been largely ineffectual. This book examines the careers and lives of regular Italian police personnel against the background of Mussolini’s rise to power and his attempted construction of a new fascist civilisation. Based on an examination of official documents (circulars, memos, reports, etc.), unofficial correspondence, journals, regulations and handbooks, it considers how police officers and officials were recruited and trained, the daily tasks they faced and the manner in which they performed them, the punishments meted out to them, and, where possible, their lives outside the force. The book analyses how, and to what extent, the new regime transformed the existing structures and functions of the Italian police, paying special attention to the impact of fascist rule from the internal institutional perspective and from the point of view of individual policemen. In the above context, the book widely explores the cultural environment in which Mussolini’s policeman acted. It examines both his formal training and the rituals and iconography which his institution adopted during the fascist period. It argues that under the leadership of Arturo Bocchini the Italian police were protected from direct interference from the Fascist Party and that any form of ‘fascistisation’ they were subjected to is hardly comparable with the more determined Nazification of Hitler’s police. Yet the presence of ‘first-hour’ fascists (members of the fascist movement before Mussolini came to power) and youngergeneration fascists in the Italian police and the institution’s envelopment in the ‘aestheticisation’ of politics undertaken by the regime deserves more serious consideration. In this regard, the volume aims to assist a process of ‘catching-up’ with the more advanced historiography of Nazi repression. While there is little space for a detailed comparison of the Nazi and fascist police systems, my study aims to contribute to recent scholarship which questions the distance between the two regimes in terms of their capacity to employ coercion and intimidation and which challenges assertions, bolstered by the popular notion that

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Introduction

3

Italians are ‘good-natured’ (Italiani brava gente), that fascism was essentially ‘harmless’. The repressive aspects of fascism have, indeed, been neglected, partly as a consequence of revisionist interpretations underlining the allegedly high levels of consensus enjoyed by Mussolini’s regime.2 Conversely, the recent historiography of Nazi repression has brought into doubt the desire or ability of the Nazi regime to ‘terrorise’ all sectors of German society.3 The evolution of Mussolini’s police is considered against broader issues regarding the ability of the fascist regime to bring about long-awaited modernisation of the administration of the Italian state. Guido Melis underlines, for example, the failure of fascism at the end of the 1920s to bring a ‘culture of efficiency’, characterised by technocratic innovation, into the traditional (ex-liberal) bureaucracy. In what amounted to the co-existence of two administrative cultures, campaigners for modernising reforms among both fascists and civil servants ‘emigrated’ into the growing ‘parallel’ administration of the Corporate State.4 In a study particularly focused on geographical and demographic distinctions delineating these opposed bureaucratic cultures, Mariuccia Salvati suggests that the ‘traditional’ state, mainly staffed by Italians from the poorer South, was, during the course of the ventennio, overlapped by a new, less formalistic, more modern and politically more reliable bureaucracy responsible for economic development, education and the administration of welfare, and made up principally of younger generations of Italians from the North and Centre, many of whom staffed the organs of the Corporate State and the Fascist Party.5 The Public Security institutions were undoubtedly tied to the ‘traditional’ state bureaucracy and culture, employing men mainly from southern Italy, many of whom had joined the police in the absence of ‘better’ career outlets. However, there is evidence of historic pressure from within the police ranks for what many considered overdue institutional reform in the face of professional malaise, poor structures and hierarchies, and an inefficient organisation of tasks. Such needs were manifest in the belief that modernisation and ‘fascistisation’ were synonymous, held by high-ranking police commissioners who had trained in liberal Italy but had later been converted to fascism. Similarly, several first-hour fascists who joined the force during the late 1920s, together with younger-generation fascists recruited during the decade which followed, campaigned for the ‘Revolution’ to penetrate the police more effectively in order to improve the professional qualities of the service. Yet, while the development of the repressive machinery of the

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Introduction

dictatorship saw a partial modernisation of the Italian police, this volume argues that there was some divergence in the quality of performance between specialist policing units and less privileged regular forces. In the scenario of limited availability of funding, modernising incentives for the regular police forces were inhibited by the survival of old-fashioned working practices and recruitment criteria. If ‘bad’ habits inherent in the ‘traditional’ state partly accounted for these failings, they may also be attributed to the fact that those new political forces calling for reform of the bureaucracy embraced the system of clientelistic relationships which had underpinned public office in the ‘old’ Italy. It is no coincidence that among police personnel there were plenty of genuine or self-proclaiming fascists (though often mediocre professionals) supported by the raccomandazioni of Party hacks or members of the Government. The main focus of this study is on the regular forces of the Interior Ministry and the military police (Carabinieri). This reflects my intention to help overcome a notable gap in the historiography of fascist repression, which until now has paid more thorough attention to Mussolini’s secret police.6 By comparison, scholars of Nazism have paid considerably more attention to the evolution and roles of the regular German police forces under the Third Reich. If the fascist regime privileged the activities of the OVRA secret police and the spy networks of the POLPOL (the Divisione Polizia Politica – Political Police Division – of the Interior Ministry Police) over the regular forces of the Carabinieri and the Interior Ministry Police, entrusting the former organisations with the most delicate tasks in the struggle against underground dissent, the latter forces, making up the majority of policemen, played a key role in controlling Italian communities and enforcing fascist policy. It should be stressed that between these two regular forces, the volume gives greater focus to the Interior Ministry Police, especially where individual careers and profiles are concerned. This is explained by the more limited availability of papers relating to the internal workings of the Carabinieri and the absence of readily consultable files for their personnel. Nevertheless, the volume provides a detailed picture of the activities of the Carabinieri as a key organ of the fascist police state and their relations with the communities under their jurisdiction and other law enforcement bodies, as well as offering some insight into the evolution of their internal culture during the dictatorship. My opening chapter examines the relationship between the Italian police forces and fascism during the early–mid 1920s against the background of professional strains widely experienced under the liberal

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Introduction

5

state, which came to a head during large-scale social and political unrest in Italy after the First World War. The chapter illustrates how, in spite of notable levels of support for fascism among policemen, Mussolini’s movement was hesitant in its relations with the police, particularly the institutions of the Interior Ministry. This was also reflected in the early fascist Government’s wavering attitude concerning the role which different police forces should play in the new political order, before Mussolini finally invested the Interior Ministry Police as the leading organ responsible for defending his dictatorship. Chapter 2 analyses how effectively a fascist culture penetrated the police. It contrasts the regime’s official and much propagandised integration of the Public Security forces into the new political order with the ideological and professional shortcomings behind recruitment and training procedures, demonstrating that while processes of ‘fascistisation’ took place, they were highly ambiguous or conducted on an ad hoc basis, rather than being centrally co-ordinated. Turning to an analysis of the daily practices of law enforcement in fascist Italy, Chapter 3 examines the professional tasks entrusted to the regular organs of the Interior Ministry Police and the Carabinieri at the level of the community and the type of relationships with the public which arose out of this. It assesses the ability of the regular Italian police to determine the orientation of fascism at the local level, in view of the extension of their political responsibilities, which now included monitoring the activities of the Fascist Party. Chapter 4 assesses the quality of performance of the regular police and the effectiveness of internal hierarchical structures governing them during the fascist years, before taking a look at issues regarding the welfare and livelihood of personnel and their families. Both Chapters 3 and 4 question how enduring any attraction towards fascism was for regular policemen, given that, beyond new powers and career prospects, the advent of the dictatorship brought greater responsibilities and an intensification of work, which were not always supported by adequate resources. Chapter 5 presents profiles of the careers and lives of a selection of members of the Interior Ministry Police, with a view to consolidating understanding of issues raised in previous chapters. It questions in particular how far successful careers depended on ideological ‘status’ and whether fascist personnel distinguished themselves from colleagues in their professional conduct. It situates the behaviour of a considerable number of fascists in their previous experiences of participation in the fascist movement, or, for younger generations, in the Fascist Party youth organisations. The chapter reveals how many policemen, whatever their ideological persuasion, were egocentric and opportunistic in their

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Introduction

pursuit of career advancement, suggesting that fascism’s endeavours to instil in state personnel selfless dedication to the profession, inspired by love of the fatherland, were largely unsuccessful. Chapter 6 considers how the Italian police forces reacted to the gradual demise of fascism, underlining how their growing dissociation from the regime reflected its failure to engender lasting loyalty among personnel. It starts by analysing their enforcement of anti-Jewish policies (commencing with the 1938 Race Laws), before going on to consider their conduct in the face of growing popular dissent and military defeat arising from Italy’s fateful entry to the Second World War in June 1940. The chapter then examines how police personnel handled the institutional and ideological dilemmas surrounding the Nazi occupation of Italy and the creation of the Italian Social Republic (September 1943 to April 1945). The final part of the chapter analyses the purge procedures which police personnel faced following the Liberation. It illustrates how the great majority of policemen, fascists included, emerged from the defeat of fascism relatively unscathed. Against the background of this failed purge, the final chapter examines the consequences of limited institutional reform in the immediate post-war period for the culture and practice of policing in the Italian Republic. The majority of policemen may have repudiated Italy’s fascist past formally, but their embrace of democracy was highly ambivalent. Although most had not been full-fledged fascists, the experience of fascism reinforced their authoritarian tendencies and their prejudices against particular human ‘types’ or groups. If fascism in any way succeeded in enhancing the self-esteem of the Interior Ministry Police, which before 1922 had considered themselves the ‘Cinderella’ of the Italian state, this only encouraged a high-handed attitude to public order maintenance during the early years of the Republic. Notes 1 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Personale di Pubblica Sicurezza (1890–1973), Fascicoli Personale Fuori Servizio (1890–1966), versamento 1957 (hereafter ACS, FPFS, year), b. 195 bis, f. Santini Andrea, 2266 Questore Torino to Commendatore Schiavi, 22 May 1940. 2 On this, see P. Corner, ‘Italian Fascism: Whatever Happened to Dictatorship?’, Journal of Modern History, 74:2 (2002), 325–51. 3 See, for example, E. Johnson, The Nazi Terror. The Gestapo, Jews and Ordinary Germans (London: John Murray, 2000), pp. 14–15, 484–5. 4 G. Melis, Due modelli di amministrazione tra liberalismo e fascismo (Rome: Ministero per i beni culturali e ambientali, 1988), esp. pp. 233–4.

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5 M. Salvati, Il regime e gli impiegati. La nazionalizzazione piccoloborghese nel ventennio fascista (Rome-Bari: Laterza, 1992), esp. pp. 219–21. 6 See especially M. Canali, Le spie del regime (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2004); M. Franzinelli, I tentacoli dell’OVRA. Agenti, collaboratori e vittime della polizia politica fascista (Turin: Bollati Boringhieri, 1999).

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1 ‘Cinderella status’: the liberal police and the lure of fascism Mussolini’s policemen

The liberal police and the lure of fascism

In December 1925 an article published in the police journal, Il magistrato dell’ordine, reflected upon the broader implications of a failed attempt on the life of the fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini. The article carried the signature of the Editor-in-Chief, a retired police commissioner, Emilio Saracini. Entitled ‘Long live the Italian police!’, it proclaimed that the ability of the forces of law and order to prevent the outrage and by implication to safeguard the future of the nation had resulted in widespread public praise for their institution. The article referred to a crowd chanting ‘Long live the Italian police!’ in front of the Prefecture in Turin. But it was thanks to the ability of the fascist Government and Mussolini to reform the police, Saracini argued, that the assassination attempt had been foiled.1 We may appreciate why Saracini’s article uses the incident to stress the ‘redemption’ of his institution, if we go back twenty-five years to July 1900, when the assassination of King Umberto I by an anarchist in the Lombard town of Monza confirmed in the public mind the deep-rooted defects of the Italian police. In his volume, I crepuscoli della polizia (The Decline of the Police), published on the eve of Mussolini’s appointment as Prime Minister, Saracini underlines the indignation provoked by the crime, which, it was suggested, could have been prevented if security measures had intensified following an unsuccessful assassination attempt in Rome in April 1897. In line with the general tone of his volume, one senses bitterness in Saracini’s words over the institutional humiliation which the regicide provoked. Such feeling was reinforced by his belief that Italy’s governments time and time again failed to carry out long-awaited reforms to the police.2 Saracini’s open support for the fascist Government lay in his purported belief that fascism would resolve historic deficiencies in the organisation of Public Security which, he argued, had been neglected over decades of liberal rule. Unsurprisingly, much police literature of the fascist period portrayed liberal Italy as having turned

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The liberal police and the lure of fascism

9

its back on the needs of the forces of law and order. This chapter analyses the relationship which developed between the Italian police and fascism, first as a movement, later as a government, against the background of decades of collective professional difficulties which are widely documented in the initial section. Though experienced subjectively on many counts, such difficulties reflected genuine institutional weaknesses. In the scenario of widespread social and political unrest following the end of the First World War police officers and officials were attracted by and often benefited from the blackshirt movement’s violent initiatives against socialism. Police identification with the politics of Mussolini in the longer term would also depend on how able fascism was to address their professional aspirations. Yet, until the establishment of the dictatorship in 1925, the young fascist Government was largely mistrusting of Italy’s Public Security forces and hesitant about the future awaiting them. A miserable fate: being a policeman in liberal Italy The rise of Italian fascism was largely the consequence of a major crisis in public order which followed the First World War. Such a crisis was the culmination of decades of considerable affliction in matters of policing. From the end of the nineteenth century onwards, Italian politicians, social observers and members of the profession had regularly expressed concern about the sad state of their country’s police forces. Outdated structures and methods, poorly qualified and inadequately trained personnel, and limited resources, they argued, made it hard to maintain order and control criminal activity. In his detailed work on the organisation of the Italian police, published in 1898, a high-ranking police commissioner, Giuseppe Alongi, indicated the consequences of such deficiencies in the sad fact that 31% of crimes went unpunished, whilst 37% of individuals arrested for criminal acts were acquitted owing to lack of evidence.3 This state of affairs accounted for the limited prestige enjoyed by the police, which in turn only enhanced the sense of professional malaise among their personnel. From the perspective of individuals like Alongi and Saracini, this situation reflected the low esteem in which governments held the police in comparison with other institutions of the state. Saracini claimed, for example, that pay levels and promotion opportunities in the Interior Ministry Police were disadvantageous in comparison to professions in other sectors of the same Ministry, thus discouraging ideal candidates from applying to join the force. He argued that the highest office of Director General of Public Security (Direttore Generale della

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Mussolini’s policemen

Pubblica Sicurezza) was rarely entrusted to a policeman. This suggested that governments considered practical expertise in law enforcement irrelevant for the task of running the police. In a similar vein, Saracini argued that representatives from the profession were hardly ever allowed to sit on police appointments committees.4 Professional hardships which policemen faced were apparent in their strained and sometimes violent encounters with the public, too. This ensued in part from the development of trade unionism and left-wing political militancy during the latter decades of the nineteenth century. This led to episodes of physical confrontation during strikes and public protests, reaching a point of severe crisis during the late 1890s, which not infrequently witnessed the killing of considerable numbers of demonstrators by the forces of law and order. The risks of casualties increased when the army had to be called to assist police forces which were unsure of their ability to handle large crowds. 5 Coercive government policies to deal with mass protest and social disorder, though reflecting ‘a frightened reaction to social upheaval and the perceived danger of national disintegration’, were further encouraged by awareness of the inadequate resources at the disposal of the police.6 The tenseness of encounters between the Italian police and the public stemmed from the historic lack of trust characterising the relationship between Italian government and society. In this context the particular concept of public order which the liberal rulers of the new state of Italy adopted in 1859 was partly inherited from the earlier absolutist states making up the geographical area of Italy. Periods of civil unrest and opposition to the unification process during the 1860s, marked by brigandage in the South, helped to reinforce the idea of an unruly populace which needed to be handled through ‘preventive’ policing in anticipation of crimes being committed. Consequently, the Italian Public Security Law of 1865 gave the police the power to impose limits on the rights of free speech, association and public assembly granted by the liberal constitution of 1848. Of greater concern to its critics, the law provided the police with powers of cautioning (ammonizione), which authorised the imposition of restrictions on the movements of individuals, and enforced domicile (domicilio coatto), usually in a remote part of the country or on one of Italy’s many islands housing penal colonies. These instruments allowed the police to control the unemployed, vagrants, idlers, habitual or suspected criminals and, increasingly, political ‘offenders’, without the need to go through time-consuming judicial procedures.7 Though they were operationally responsible to their superiors in the Public Security hierarchy, police forces in the provinces ultimately

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depended on the Prefect (Prefetto), the administrative arm of the Government who was also responsible for maintaining public order. Denoting the partisan nature of his office, he often used his powers to dissolve municipal councils holding anti-government majorities. He was also required to help pro-government parties and factions at election time, employing underhand measures for this purpose if necessary.8 In such a scenario, the police, as well as enforcing the law, were easily drawn into politically inspired intrigues. These were reinforced by the politics of trasformismo, through which governments ensured parliamentary majorities by granting favours to their supporters. Blurring the distinctions between state administration and politics, trasformismo strengthened the clientelistic foundations of public life, as ­parliamentary deputies in turn passed down favours to their electors.9 It is not difficult to appreciate why the liberal police forces were largely unpopular and often branded as an instrument of those in power. Policemen who were prepared to be critical of the deficiencies of their own institutions were usually reluctant to question the broader political framework in which they operated. Alongi argued that historic public mistrust of the forces of law and order reflected prejudices which had their origins in the despotic practices of the past. The police had since been reformed into a disciplined and law-abiding institution.10 However, training methods clearly betrayed police prejudices against the peasant and working classes. This is evident in a handbook written in 1875 for members of the military police (Carabinieri). The publication emphasised to each cadet the glorious history of the corps to which he belonged. It presented the Carabinieri as bringing justice and social equality to the people. However, the manual betrays the corps’ underlying mistrust of the people it was entrusted to police. It stressed to the carabiniere how important it was not to become over-familiar with citizens in order to avoid creating a situation in which he would not be able to maintain authority. Equally significant is the manual’s advice to the representative of law and order to be firm, rather than polite, with those uneducated citizens he encountered, on the grounds that such people were governed by instinct rather than by reason.11 If the relationship between the police and the lower social classes was characterised by suspicion and mistrust, the efforts of the former were not always appreciated by the more prosperous classes either. In the years leading up to the First World War, the Bologna city police were on occasion demoralised by criticism from the ‘law-abiding’ public on account of their apparent inability to handle an increase in the number of crimes. From the point of view of the police, such criticism neglected to take into account the growth in the urban population of

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13% between 1901 and 1911. Such growth had not been matched by an increase in the number of policemen, in turn reflecting state budget restrictions.12 The creation of a positive institutional image went some way towards determining both the extent to which the public ‘understood’ the police and the level of self-esteem enjoyed by the police themselves. In this respect, the Carabinieri benefited from the role they had played in the Italian wars of independence. After unification, they ‘became a symbol of the state on the ground, enforcing the state’s laws and regulations, protecting the inhabitants on the state’s behalf, and sometimes even taking the complaints of the disenfranchised to a higher authority’.13 The image in the public mind of the carabiniere as defender of society from brigands, floods and earthquakes was established to a certain degree of success, at least among the propertied classes, with the help of illustrated magazines and newspaper stories. Such publications avoided references to action which could be interpreted as oppressive.14 There is little evidence to suggest that the Interior Ministry Police enjoyed a similar level of national prestige or were as successful in creating an internal culture around their corporate history. However, the mythology created around the Carabinieri did not always correspond to the often harsh realities of policing. Clive Emsley notes that the Carabinieri were probably more feared but also in some ways more respected than the Interior Ministry guards, yet they were still popularly perceived above all as an instrument of repression.15 In an article of 1897 published in the periodical of science, letters and the arts, Nuova antologia, Alongi pointed out the hard lot of those belonging to his profession, ‘present everywhere in order to watch over public and private celebrations without participating in them, to share in public and private tragedies and to face the dangers of the elements, the deception of men, and, worse still, undeserved accusations and insults’.16 Yet how much internal solidarity there existed in the face of public hostility and how able or willing most police commanders were to address the hardships of the men under their command is questionable. Since members of both the Carabinieri and the Interior Ministry Police were prohibited from joining trade unions or forming their own associations, newspaper and journal publications became a useful forum for expressing and discussing professional difficulties, particularly among members of the mid–lower ranks, who often directed the blame for their hardships at their own institutions and superiors. La tutela pubblica, a weekly journal for policemen founded in 1909, regularly featured articles and anonymous letters, several of which had originally appeared in the mainstream press. These

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denounced the inadequate salaries and pensions, excessively long hours of service, and poor living quarters which police personnel had to suffer. They also lamented the regular employment of lower-ranking policemen as orderlies in the households of prefects and high-ranking police officials, as well as widespread corruption which, it was claimed, stifled professional initiative and ensured that career advancement depended on connections rather than merit.17 Beyond issues relating to public status, many of the historic tensions characterising the relationship between the Carabinieri and the Interior Ministry Police may be attributed to hierarchical ambivalence and territorial rivalry. Though dependent on the War Ministry for matters of military policing, discipline, training and their careers, the Carabinieri were answerable to the Interior Ministry Police and the Prefect for matters relating to law and order maintenance, and were expected to provide reinforcements during public order emergencies.18 Inevitably, members of the Carabinieri remained loyal, first and foremost, to superiors within the hierarchy of their corps, allowing the Interior Ministry Police limited control over their activities.19 This was compounded by the fact that, while the latter had headquarters in the cities and towns only, the Carabinieri were present in both urban and rural areas. Rivalry between the Carabinieri and the Interior Ministry Police also revolved around the long-standing question of whether policing should be entrusted to civilian or military forces. At the start of the twentieth century, the Interior Ministry Town Guard (Guardie di Città) became the principle police force in urban areas, denoting an attempt to limit the jurisdiction of the Carabinieri to the countryside and to distinguish the functions of the two corps. 20 If such a measure reflected the consideration that the Carabinieri as a military police force were ill-suited to the investigation of crimes, 21 the military-style hierarchy and procedures characterising the Town Guard were equally cause for concern. Such military attributes were preserved if not enhanced from the turn of the century, if only to increase the prestige and attractiveness of the corps; recruits largely came from the Carabinieri and the army.22 A survey of town guards serving in Bologna between 1880 and 1910 reveals that 60% originated from the regions of southern Italy (21% alone from Sicily), with high percentages having been previously employed in agriculture (29%) and as industrial workers or in artisan professions (36%).23 Recruitment of police officers from among the poorly educated and unemployed of the South was the source of public criticism which was often dosed with cultural prejudices. Southern policemen, it was alleged, were more impulsive and prone

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to violence than colleagues from the North.24 Commanders were certainly concerned about the professional consequences of stationing officers in localities distant from their place of origin. In August 1909 the Questore of Milan noted that the majority of his town guards were from the South; consequently, they found it hard to understand local dialect and customs.25 More generally, reservations concerning the extent of professional autonomy which could be granted to such individuals, undoubtedly inspired by suspicions surrounding their social extraction and lack of adequate qualifications, may have helped to determine the persistence of rigid military-type hierarchies, in spite of criticism that such structures were ill-suited to crime prevention and detection.26 From the start of the twentieth century, the rule of Giovanni Giolitti saw attempts to improve the quality of the police and reduce the level of social conflict which had characterised the 1890s. Yet his policies unintentionally fuelled acceptance of authoritarian solutions to law and order problems. Favouring mediation over force, Giolitti aimed to limit the more brutal aspects of state repression, giving preference to the employment of police units over the army, and of the Interior Ministry Police over the Carabinieri.27 This involved increasing the number of guards and carabinieri and improving pay and career prospects. Such measures were part and parcel of Giolitti’s encouragement of wider participation of the masses in processes of economic and social modernisation which Italy was undergoing. In what was clearly a strategy to isolate political extremism, marked by the Government’s alliance with reformist socialism in 1901, Giolittian rule saw increased mass welfare and education provision, as well as a dramatic rise in the number of citizens entitled to vote.28 Giolitti’s desire for less confrontation at the scene of strikes and demonstrations was largely unfulfilled. As described earlier, attempts to separate the military and civilian functions of the police were unsuccessful. Strikes and demonstrations continued to be characterised by conflict and bloodshed, especially when the army had to be called. Implying the superficiality of the reform measures, policemen continued to refer to the same code of practice that was used in the 1860s. Some of the legislative provisions to improve working conditions remained empty promises: financial bonuses for police commissioners granted in 1907, for example, had still not been paid in 1910.29 The unpopularity of Giolitti’s strategy among policemen is additionally explained by the fact that they were no longer allowed to side automatically with employers affected by strike action. Giolitti urged tolerance in the face of labour disputes, especially if he felt they were justified by

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the unreasonable behaviour of employers. This reflected his belief that minimising the risks of confrontation between the masses and state authorities would reduce the threat of Marxist revolution. Force was no longer considered the best means of resolving work stoppages and political demonstrations, if more conciliatory means could be used. The strategy was of limited success, to some extent because forces on the ground often ignored the new directives, but also because it was tactically tied to narrower political concerns, having been launched in exchange for Socialist Party support of the Government, support which ceased from 1903 onwards, in turn the result of tensions over allegations of continued police abuse. There is some suggestion that under Giolitti the risks of violent and irrational solutions to law and order problems actually increased as members of the police and Carabinieri were disoriented by instructions to avoid the usual employment of fire-arms and, in the case of the Carabinieri, cavalry charges to disperse protesters and strikers. Consequently, ‘vulnerable’ units of guards or carabinieri were prone to panicking and opening fire on ‘threatening’ crowds. 30 Many policemen evidently failed to appreciate the broader social intentions behind Giolitti’s strategy, which they interpreted as impeding their ability to uphold the law. Moreover, the perception that the Government did little to back them up when they faced accusations of abuse embittered them. According to Saracini, the arrest of Police Commissioner Italo Alongi, son of Giuseppe Alongi, following the death of a protester at the scene of a demonstration in Palermo in July 1907, confirmed in the eyes of his colleagues that the police were no longer able to carry out their duty without the risk of a public vendetta, which, moreover, the press and judicial authorities appeared willing to sanction. Alongi, described as a ‘cultured, diligent and sensible official, of mild character and finely educated’, became a symbol of injustice faced by Public Security personnel, since, moreover, he was not even granted a proper defence council. Saracini notes how Alongi, though he was eventually acquitted of the charge of murder by the Assize Court, had been so embittered by the ordeal that he fell ill and subsequently died. 31 Italo Alongi is one of several examples of the election to martyrdom in police memory of colleagues who in the mythology of their institution had fallen ‘victim’ to liberal governments, which appeared to be prepared to sacrifice honest servants of the state in order to appease public opinion

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Policemen and the fascist movement In the light of Giolittian public order policy, it is plausible that members of the police tolerated authoritarian solutions to law and order difficulties which, they believed, simply allowed them to do their job properly. The humiliation of having to ‘tolerate’ working-class militancy and the ‘impositions’ accompanying this, combined with a historic sense of allegiance (or obligation) towards social elites at the community level, may help to explain their acceptance of underhand methods for dealing with ‘disorder’. The years leading up to the First World War occasionally saw the involvement of the public in violent anti-socialist counter-demonstrations during general strikes, as well as episodes of employer vigilantism, notably in the Po Valley, involving the use of private armed guards to handle the demands of peasant unions. Increased militancy among agricultural employers coincided with their growing attraction to the anti-parliamentary politics of the developing nationalist movement.32 In regard to these initiatives, the police were not infrequently accused of turning a blind eye to action which was more provocative and offensive than defensive. These were the early signs of a phenomenon which would characterise the success of the fascist movement from 1920 onwards. Subjectively negative experiences of Giolittian rule contrasted somewhat with achievements in policing during this period. The urgent need to modernise crime-fighting techniques was partly met through a re-ordering of police archives. In 1902 a forensic school (Scuola di Polizia Scientifica) was founded. From 1903 it ran specialist training courses for Public Security officials and town guards. As Giovanna Tosatti argues, during these years international successes in the development of scientific policing theory and methodologies at the school, to which many police commissioners enthusiastically contributed, were considerable.33 Yet it is questionable how widely these new discoveries were put into practice. Towards the end of the decade Giuseppe Alongi lamented that very few policemen had adopted advanced forensic methods for their investigative work.34 While Giolittian policies generally carried negative connotations in police memory, it is ironic perhaps that many of the policing techniques employed by the fascist regime were rooted in experiments which had taken place earlier in the century, with the top posts in the fascist police held by ‘technicians’ originally trained at the school.35 Widespread backing of Mussolini’s fascist movement among policemen reflected a culmination in long-term professional malaise which coincided with the acceleration in social tensions characterising

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the years immediately following the First World War. During the Biennio Rosso (‘Red Two Years’) of 1919–1920, the police forces had to deal with numerous strikes and land occupations. In a period of severe economic crisis, a succession of short-lived liberal governments, weakened by the dramatic growth in parliamentary dominance of the Socialists and Catholics, managed with great difficulty a surge of labour militancy and mass protest. The willingness of policemen to disobey orders to prevent the fascist backlash which followed reflected a revolt against what they conceived as excessive emphasis placed on mediation for dealing with political ‘extremism’. Professional hardships in the police were exacerbated by staff shortages and post-war inflation.36 Consequently, members of the Town Guard and the Carabinieri staged strikes in early 1919. Illustrating identification among some lower-ranking officers with the class war waged by their traditional enemies, a pamphlet confiscated by the Bologna police authorities addressed to Public Security and prison guards stated: ‘We must not be taken in too much by the proposals of those governing us! If we do not fight for our rights, as our own class does, we will always be forgotten.’37 Luca Madrignani brings to evidence how town guards and Public Security officials made contact with the socialist movement during this period.38 Yet it is unlikely that large numbers of policemen were converted to the socialist cause, their attraction to left-wing unionism being principally motivated by economic and professional concerns. These were partly addressed by measures taken to reform the police in the autumn of 1919. The creation in February 1919 of a Police Federation (Federazione Nazionale del Personale di Pubblica Sicurezza) may also have been intended as an alternative to the lure of the socialist unions. It was presented as an apolitical organisation for the purpose of bringing improvements to the profession and defending the dignity of policemen.39 Far from uniting policemen with the working class, the ‘Red Two Years’ brought historic tensions between the forces of law and order and the labour movement to crisis point. In its issue of 1 May 1920, the Socialist Party daily, Avanti!, published a list of the names of 145 workers killed, together with another 444 seriously injured, allegedly as a result of police repression carried out between April 1919 and April 1920.40 These figures illustrate the high level of civil unrest characterising post-war Italy, driven by the revolutionary intentions of the Socialist Party leadership and the response of the police and armed forces. The conversion in October 1919 of the Town Guard into an enlarged military force, the Royal Guard (Regia Guardia), marked the desire of Prime Minister Francesco Nitti to create an armed police solely

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dependent on the Interior Ministry. While the number of carabinieri was increased from forty-five to sixty thousand, the creation of the Royal Guard signalled the intention of the Government to limit the activities of the former to rural areas.41 The military character of the Royal Guard, made up of a large proportion of demobilised soldiers without professional qualifications,42 heightened the risks of casualties at the scene of strikes, especially when the political instruction they underwent stressed the ‘subversive’ intentions of the working-class movement. A manual for royal guards stated, for example, that union organisations, more than defending the rights of workers, were instruments of rebellion and class war.43 The successful launching of Benito Mussolini’s political movement in the autumn of 1920 provided the police with a means of restoring their authority where they had lost it in the face of prolonged and sometimes uncontrollable socialist militancy.44 It is evident that from very early on the Fascists enjoyed considerable support from representatives of law and order. In many provincial towns and cities of the Po Valley and central Italy policemen started to turn a blind eye to the assaults of armed squads of blackshirts on left-wing and Catholic political and union organisations and their members. They often failed to intervene when the victims of attacks called for help, or carried out selective arrests to the advantage of fascists when they did intervene. If ‘forced’ to arrest fascists, they commonly ensured as much leniency as possible towards them, availing themselves of the co-operation of sympathetic magistrates. Not infrequently policemen ignored orders to prevent squad violence (when their superiors were not themselves complicit towards the movement). Several were more actively involved in the movement, supplying arms to the squads and participating in ‘punitive expeditions’ to enemy strongholds. Camaraderie between officers and fascists who had fought alongside each other in the First World War trenches and the common values arising from that experience facilitated police complicity with Mussolini’s movement. As war veteran and future police commissioner, Brandino Vellucci, wrote of himself and fellow combatants in September 1919: We are the youth […] which knows the great hardships of duty and glory, for which we fought and won, suffered and won, rejoiced and won […] Those who have not experienced the trenches, have not taken part in an assault, and have not suffered the flagellating elements; those who have not been face to face with death without trembling, may believe that we are over-presumptuous, and might judge our outburst as dangerously intrusive. On the contrary, we who represent the gush of healthy and

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vigorous blood of a new life which is advancing are the revelation of the strength of the new Italy in front of the whole world.45

Vellucci went on to support Mussolini’s election campaign the following month, which coincided with his admission to the police. In November 1920, the Questore of Bologna, Luigi Poli, informed the Prefect that many royal guards, carabinieri and Public Security officials had fought in the war. During the conflict, several had enlisted in special units of assault troops (Arditi), which now populated the fascist movement. In a recent incident, royal guards, carabinieri and soldiers had applauded a group of arditi as they left the police headquarters. Moreover, Poli argued that police admiration for the Fascists and Nationalists was also the product of insults, accusations and insinuations against them voiced by the local Socialist Party at political rallies and in its newspapers.46 Poli’s words should be placed in the context of the Left’s adoption during the ‘Red Two Years’ of a hate campaign, which added to the torment of the long hours of overtime required in the face of strikes and land occupations. Revolutionary activists stressed that recruitment to the police amongst the poor of the South was part of a politically motivated strategy for exploiting peasant ignorance to facilitate repression of the northern Italian proletariat. In such statements they treated policemen as artifices rather than victims of the ‘capitalist’ establishment, owing to their ‘betrayal’ of fellow workers.47 In several articles, Avanti! incited shopkeepers to refuse to sell their goods to policemen and their families, and invited readers to treat their women, mothers and daughters as ‘whores’.48 Such attacks played on prejudices against southern Italians, referring to policemen as ‘bandits’ or ‘animals’.49 Owing to their prominent role in the policing of urban protests, the Royal Guard bore the brunt of these attacks, which urged the social ostracism of their members. 50 It is hardly surprising, then, that police commissioners and guards would subsequently be seen in the company of fascists and that little effort would be made to conceal such friendships. In Bologna, guards were reported to have daubed the walls of one of the city’s union headquarters with graffiti threatening the Socialists and Anarchists.51 Beyond identification with the anti-Bolshevism of the Fascists, police espousal of the movement reflected a deeper contempt for what they saw as the failure of political leaders to manage the public order crisis. Although they often applied force to deal with disturbances, government awareness of serious institutional weaknesses, coupled with the need to reach compromises with enlarged mass parties in the

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hope of achieving political stability, not infrequently forced them to urge tolerance in the face of labour militancy and calls from the Left for revolution. On occasion, police commissioners expressed concern at the impositions they faced from the Socialist Party, which government representatives seemed to tolerate. Luigi Poli, Questore of Bologna, suspected of direct involvement in the fascist assault on the city in the autumn of 1920, justified his hard line towards the Left on the grounds that the Prefect was more or less at the disposal of the socialist Mayor, Francesco Zanardi, and the leader of the local socialist union ­confederation, Ercole Bucco. Hence: One day, for example, some subversives burned a national flag in front of the police station. I had them arrested but I had to release them because of the intervention of the Right Honourable Zanardi who threatened a mini-revolution. From then on I decided to act on my own initiative, since I felt that I could not go on in such conditions.

Among the city bourgeoisie, Poli was allegedly applauded for his refusal to tolerate the ‘impositions’ of the socialist council and, thus, for restoring public faith in the law and the state.52 In January 1933, Saracini would commemorate the recently deceased Poli for having followed his patriotic conscience in the face of the Bolognese fascist movement’s heroic battle against Bolshevism.53 This was emblematic of the manner in which pro-fascist policemen were elected to symbolic positions of honour in police literature of the dictatorship. Beside the immediate benefits which fascism offered them, members of the police may well have been attracted to fascist rhetoric which emphasised the need for a more powerful, dynamic and modern state purged of its archaic and parasitic characteristics.54 In order to understand the compliance of policemen towards what was effectively an illegal paramilitary phenomenon, we have to appreciate the social and institutional context in which this happened. Willingness to assist the Fascists partly derived from those backward features of the liberal state which fascism attacked. Political violence had not infrequently been acceptable in the eyes of public opinion and tolerated by the custodians of law and order. Since the unification, the authorities had adopted arbitrary forms of repression and had even been complicit in criminal activities both to deal with ‘disorder’ and to weaken political forces opposed to the governing parties. 55 It follows, therefore, that Giolitti’s inclusion of fascist candidates on the Government’s list at the general election of 1921, intended as a means of taming the movement, constituted an indirect invitation to the provincial authorities to tolerate blackshirt electoral violence. The

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refusal of a succession of governments to treat the fascist movement as a dangerous armed organisation was interpreted on the ground as a tacit instruction to continue to treat the Left as the main threat to the security of the state.56 In liberal Italy, civil servants were accustomed to tolerating or employing illegal forms of violence and coercion. Adrian Lyttelton notes how state officials in positions of command might need to turn to ‘external’ forces in order to ensure that orders received from above were carried out; more frequently, however, subordinates were able to use the same tactics in order to pressurise their superiors and subvert the command systems to which they belonged to their personal advantage.57 In this scenario, ideologically motivated support of fascism among policemen often went hand in hand with career expediency. The lives and careers of several Public Security commissioners who distinguished themselves in assisting the Fascists before Mussolini came to power are examined later in this volume. How widely their actions were premised on long-term hopes for police reform is not always easy to ascertain. What do emerge fairly frequently in their files are the personal advantages (or their belief that they were entitled to these) gained from such allegiances. Behind any image of collective police espousal of fascism, the situation was rather more complex. If individual policemen and fascists established close ties, relations between the movement and the police as an institution were less harmonious. The fact that the Fascists considered the institutions of the liberal state patriotically redundant – owing to their alleged tolerance of left-wing violence – meant in practice that such institutions were subjected to verbal and at times physical attacks. Some police officials were concerned about the unlawful activities of the movement, and such concerns increased when it became clear that fascism threatened the order of the state itself. 58 Those of them who attempted to prevent the movement’s illegal activities risked attacks in the local fascist press for being ‘socialist’ or ‘anti-Italian’ and even ostracism by the communities where they were stationed, if not by their own colleagues.59 The ability of the fascist movement to intimidate representatives of law and order into compliance should not be underestimated. In the above scenario, the police were unlikely to repress illegal fascist activities. Those episodes of repression which have been recorded nevertheless illustrate how the police forces were not always prepared to tolerate squad violence when it threatened their own authority. They raise more general issues surrounding the dynamics of police–fascist relationships. In July 1921 troops and carabinieri killed four fascists

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in defending the town of Sarzana (Liguria) from a punitive expedition. The following September, in Modena (Emilia) royal guards opened fire on a group of fascists demonstrating against the police, killing seven. Fascist reactions to these incidents show how the movement held the Carabinieri in higher esteem than the Interior Ministry Police. While it was recognised, even by Mussolini, that the repression at Sarzana was justified in the face of a full-scale fascist offensive against the town, the action of the Royal Guard at Modena was interpreted as having been premeditated, even though some reports argued that they had fired on the protesters after an assault on two police commissioners.60 If the Royal Guard had been viewed with suspicion and antipathy for some time in fascist and conservative circles, this episode provoked outright hostility towards them.61 It is plausible that the incident at Modena was itself a product of pre-existing tensions between the Royal Guard and the fascist movement, denoting a unidirectional relationship in which the acquiescence of individual guards towards the movement contrasted with the contempt which the Fascists felt for their institution.62 The Royal Guard may have been as exasperated by the Fascists as they had been by the Socialists, a situation exacerbated by criticism from the Carabinieri and military, too. There is evidence that the Fascists applied similar tactics to those used by the Socialists when confronting guards at the scene of demonstrations. This is suggested in the account by the fascist Ras (leader) of Ferrara, Italo Balbo, of the blackshirt occupation of Bologna in May 1922 in protest against the Prefect’s alleged hostility towards the movement. Balbo claims that he exhorted the guards he encountered to consider ‘their present humiliating situation’ and to remember that many of them had been soldiers before becoming ‘slaves of the police’.63 When deciding whether to comply with the demands of the Fascists, policemen had to weigh up how far they could get away with disregarding orders. This usually depended on the attitude of their direct superiors and the level of protection they enjoyed from within the movement. The manner in which the police handled fascist assaults on major towns at the end of October 1922, orchestrated in preparation for the final conquest of power (subsequently known as the March on Rome), implies that, whatever their level of sympathy for fascism, they were more likely to observe unambiguous instructions to prevent illegal action than risk their posts, especially when fascist action was directed against institutions of the state. In several cities, in obeying the Government’s orders to prevent occupations, policemen engaged in conflict with the assailants. In Bologna, carabinieri killed a fascist in

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an attempt to defend their headquarters on the edge of the city from an attack, and in the city centre royal guards and fascists were killed in several armed battles.64 In the event, the refusal of King Victor Emanuel III to sign the decree of martial law prepared by Prime Minister Luigi Facta led the way for Mussolini’s rise to power to be negotiated, without the need for a final show-down with state forces. It is likely that many in the police welcomed Mussolini’s appointment as Prime Minister. Yet transition from liberal to fascist rule was far from smooth for the institutions of public order. Dramatic measures awaiting the forces of the Interior Ministry at the end of 1922 were hardly what promoters of reform like Alongi and Saracini had been hoping for, even though they tackled some of the historic policing issues head-on. Such measures were more a reflection of the ambiguities and tensions which had characterised the relationship between the police and the fascist movement. Police personnel and fascist reforms: the case of Emilio Saracini Police support for the fascist movement was largely a consequence of the institutional crisis faced after the war. How far such support was related to hopes for a longer-term transformation of the police is rarely discernable from the documentation available. Emilio Saracini would subsequently declare that he had experienced Mussolini’s ascendancy as a form of liberation, in the belief that it would fulfil his desires for reform.65 High-ranking commissioners like Saracini may have been confident of the place of the police in a new fascist order. If before coming to power the Fascists had stressed their intention to reduce the state machinery, the police figured among those institutions to be safeguarded, alongside the army and the education system.66 However, there is scarce documentary evidence that the fascist movement discussed future reform measures with representatives of the police before October 1922. There were indications that those institutions it most disputed, such as the Royal Guard, would come under serious scrutiny.67 There is some suggestion too that individuals close to the movement aided police reform campaigns during the post-war years. Significantly, the leading Nationalist and future fascist Interior Minister, Luigi Federzoni, intervened in defence of the Police Federation in the summer of 1920 when its future was threatened.68 Saracini provides a useful example of how a keen advocate of police reform engaged with the early fascist Government. He was bitter about what he saw as the general failure of post-war liberal leaders to

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fulfil promises for radical change. In March 1919 the Government of Vittorio Orlando had set up a special Police Reform Commission, on which Saracini himself sat, with a view to implementing more effective policing. This had led to a re-organisation of departments within the General Directorate of Public Security (Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza) and in the provincial and local police stations, and the appointment of questori in all provincial capitals, as well as the creation of the Royal Guard and a separate plain clothes investigative corps, the Agenti Investigativi.69 Saracini judged these measures as only partially successful. He looked positively upon the separation within the Interior Ministry Police of public order maintenance tasks from those of crime investigation, but he was concerned that the military attributes of the Royal Guard had been exaggerated to the point that the corps had become a second Carabinieri over which the Interior Ministry had limited control.70 The above reform measures can be considered in the broader context of the intentions of post-war governments, notably under Prime Ministers Nitti (June 1919–June 1920) and Giolitti (June 1920–July 1921), to render public administration more efficient and modern but equally to reduce and ‘simplify’ a highly complex bureaucracy which had greatly expanded during the First World War and which the state coffers could no longer afford. Such intentions were hampered by difficulties and contradictions. In a scenario characterised by the survival of the traditional bureaucratic formalism which the reforms aimed to tackle, innovation was costly to introduce and the urgent need for specialisation was inhibited, while ministries, together with employee unions and associations, resisted the reduction of personnel and the introduction of new work practices.71 As regards the police, Saracini lamented that in spite of the intentions of the Reform Commission, the enactment of radical innovative measures had been put to one side or, worse still, reversed. He alleged, for example, that the General Directorate of Public Security continued to function as little more than a bureaucratic organisation. It had been deprived, among other things, of the possibility of employing a team of inspectors to head up inspection zones, originally envisaged by the Commission as a means of ensuring the correct functioning and co-ordination of policing activities throughout the realm.72 Subjective as it may be, Saracini’s account also reflects the feeling that post-war liberal governments had shown little regard for the police, by preventing Public Security representatives from participating in the reform process.73 Corresponding to this was the belief that ‘the government does not want intellectuals in the police. It is

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looking for none other than passive instruments, rigid executors of its orders and those of the prefects.’74 Public Security personnel, Saracini claimed, continued to receive less favourable economic treatment and career opportunities in comparison with colleagues working in other departments of the Interior Ministry.75 Government opposition to the Police Federation, which was forced to cease its activities in November 1920, exacerbated ill-feeling among personnel, especially since those officials who supported it risked disciplinary sanctions.76 Soon after Mussolini’s appointment as Prime Minister, Emilio Saracini paid a visit to the newly appointed fascist Director General of Public Security, Emilio De Bono, presenting him with his recently published volume, I crepuscoli della polizia, of which he left copies to be passed on to Mussolini and other members of the Cabinet.77 Measures taken by the new Government at the end of 1922 only partially corresponded to Saracini’s visions for reform. If dualism in the police had been of historic concern to experts and critics, the creation of a single force in the Carabinieri undoubtedly came as a blow to the Interior Ministry. The abolition of the Royal Guard, and the transfer of some of its personnel, along with the Agenti Investigativi, into the Carabinieri, was motivated by the fact that the corps had strong associations with previous liberal governments. It was reputed, particularly in conservative and military circles, to have been excessively politicised. Moreover, its maintenance would have been interpreted as representing an over-concentration of powers in the hands of the fascist Prime Minister, particularly in view of his creation of a Party Militia (Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale) in January 1923.78 Likewise, any expectations among police personnel that the rise to power of Mussolini would see an increase in their rights were disappointed. In December 1922, for example, De Bono intervened to block the initiative of a group of Public Security officials to create a police union that would adhere to the National Federation of Fascist Unions.79 Furthermore, the abolition of the Royal Guard led to the discharge of a major proportion of its personnel, given that the Carabinieri were limited in the number of guards they could absorb. This provoked protests, some of which were violent.80 As Luca Madrignani argues, reactions to the measure went in a variety of political directions and in some cases betrayed understandable disorientation and confusion: guards attacked the fascist headquarters in Turin and Milan; in other locations, including Rome and Naples, they scuffled with fascists in their support of nationalist protests; in Catania a large number joined the local socialist union. Demobilised guards from the South being

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transported home on a train were involved in battles with fascists and the police authorities at several railway stations between Naples and Reggio Calabria. While such reactions are comprehensible, in other cities many guards demonstrated their solidarity with the Fascists at the moment at which their corps was being disbanded and they risked losing their jobs.81 In October 1923, Saracini was retired, having reached sixty-one and completed the statutory maximum period of service in the profession. In a letter to Mussolini, he expressed surprise at being notified of such a measure, at the very moment, he alleged, that his book had been recommended to police authorities throughout the realm. Typical of the manner in which state officials attempted to attract the attentions of the new regime, Saracini took the opportunity to put forward his ideological credentials. I crepuscoli, he claimed, had been written in a spirit of independence, but ‘almost with the presentiment of the new destiny awaiting the Nation’. Although he was not ‘formally’ fascist, and did not wish to join the Party for fear that such a gesture should appear as posturing and opportunistic, ‘if being fascist means loving the Fatherland’, he exclaimed, ‘Oh, by God, he wholeheartedly was, is, and always will be.’82 In spite of his request to stay in employment, Saracini’s retirement went ahead. Articles in Il magistrato dell’ordine, which he launched in March 1924, reflected disappointment with measures taken in the realm of policing since the March on Rome. In the founding issue, Saracini noted that since 1865 no government had managed to reform the police, and asked whether the fascist Government would succeed.83 In a subsequent number, Saracini criticised the creation of a special Carabinieri unit in place of the Agenti Investigativi on the grounds that it did not solve the historic need to unify the police. He argued that whilst the genius of His Excellency Mussolini had realised this, his ideas had not been put into practice by those to whom the Prime Minister had entrusted the task.84 Articles in Il magistrato dell’ordine also backed initiatives to improve the working conditions of Public Security personnel, as, for example, in the summer of 1924 when police clerical staff (impiegati di Pubblica Sicurezza) sent a petition to Luigi Federzoni, now Interior Minister, urging better economic treatment and career opportunities.85 In 1925 the fortunes of the Interior Ministry Police were revived in line with the developing fascist dictatorship. The Public Security Guard was reconstituted in March 1925 and initially staffed by ex-royal guards who had temporarily transferred to the Carabinieri. This was motivated by the fact that Mussolini, though he had earlier

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favoured a unified police in the Carabinieri, increasingly realised that he needed a reliable political instrument, where the Militia had revealed inadequacies.86 The relegation of the Carabinieri to the countryside indicated fascist suspicions that the military corps remained ultimately loyal to the crown.87 From 1926, the Interior Ministry Police saw a broadening of their functions, as they were entrusted with the task of protecting the fascist regime. Crucially, as Tosatti notes, the creation of the dictatorship heralded a period in which for the first time ever police officials who had trained in the Scuola di Polizia Scientifica (renamed Scuola Superiore di Polizia in 191988), were given leadership roles. Such roles had previously been entrusted to individuals who had trained in the main administration of the Interior Ministry. This appeared to mark a priority now given to professional skill over ‘political bureaucracy’, allowing greater emphasis to be placed upon the employment of modern policing techniques in order to extend the regime’s control over society. This included, for example, a major revision and expansion of the centralised card index system for storing information on political ‘offenders’ (Casellario Politico Centrale).89 The major role given to the police forces under the new dictatorship was officially sanctioned by the Public Security Law of 6 November 1926. Forming the basis of the future fascist Public Security Code of 1931, the law endowed the Prefect with wide prerogatives for dealing with public order emergencies, increased police powers of arrest, and made it more difficult for members of the public to prosecute policemen who abused their authority. Many parts of the code represented an extension of instruments at the disposal of the liberal police. Ammonizione and domicilio coatto, the latter now denominated confino, could be applied more widely than previously and there were fewer legal impediments to prevent their application against anyone considered socially or politically dangerous or undesirable. The law was passed amid the general demolition of the institutions and principles of liberal democracy. In this scenario, crimes were punished more severely and the right to legal defence of those accused of committing them was seriously limited. This was inspired by fascist concepts, enshrined in the new Criminal Code of 1930, which put the needs of the state and society before citizens’ individual rights.90 The fortunes of the Interior Ministry Police were reflected in the tone of Saracini’s journal, which, though continuing to take a critical approach, exuded greater faith than previously in the ability of fascism to succeed where liberal governments had failed. Such fortunes were matched by those of Saracini, whom the fascist Government called out of retirement in order to contribute to the drafting of the new Public

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Security Law.91 In professional terms, fascism was now represented from the pages of Il magistrato as heralding the rebirth of the Interior Ministry Police. In this regard, an article dated 1 November 1926 welcomed the fascist Public Security Law as enabling the creation of a new police authority (‘Magistero di polizia’) as a result of which law-abiding citizens would at last feel properly protected and social peace would be guaranteed.92 Moreover, mirroring the creation of a civic religion around fascism, the journal not infrequently hailed Mussolini in messianic terms. In the aftermath of a failed assassination attempt against the fascist leader on 7 April 1926, an article proclaimed that: ‘The life of Benito Mussolini is the life of the Nation. We have to protect, defend and save the Duce even at the cost of death. What do our lives matter as long as he lives and Italy lives?’93 Il magistrato dell’ordine was subsequently endorsed as the official journal of the fascist police. Under the directorship of Saracini, it put forward the vision of a police system in which processes of modernisation and ‘fascistisation’ were in symbiosis. Alongside contributions by police commissioners, notably those working in the Scuola di Polizia Scientifica, and members of the legal profession, the journal hosted articles written by fascist personnel and high-ranking Party members. As illustrated in the following chapter, the journal appeared to push for the establishment of greater ideological control over the police (though outside the direct influence of the Fascist Party) in order to enhance professional qualities. Saracini and his collaborators expressed themselves as converts to fascism. Their conversion may have been premised on the hope that the regime would bring reform to the police. Yet in spite of the constraints of political conformity which the dictatorship placed on publishing, the journal did not merely stress fascist ideas for the purpose of ideological window-dressing; to all appearances fascism was expressed as a creed to be applied to the profession. In spite of their expressions of ideological allegiance, Saracini and co-writers for Il magistrato were not afraid to express dissatisfaction with the progress of reform on several occasions, though recognising the ‘good intentions’ of the Government and of Arturo Bocchini, Chief of Police appointed in September 1926 and principle architect of the fascist police. In an article in the November 1926 issue of the journal, for example, Saracini argued that if the new Public Security Law formed the basis of a new police, Public Security guards continued to be recruited and managed according to traditional criteria. Not enough guards were appointed, while those employed were subjected to an illogical division of tasks. Consequently, the best guards were

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given office work or jobs which had little to do with policing. Saracini warned that increased spending on secret policing which came with the fascist Government risked having a detrimental effect on resources for ordinary policing.94 Conclusion This chapter has outlined the complexities of the relationship between Mussolini’s fascist movement and the Italian police forces. Police support for fascism was often motivated by practical benefits and political passions, but it was not always expressed spontaneously. How widely it formed part of any longer-term political or institutional project is questionable. If the Fascists benefited from assistance in police quarters, they were largely mistrustful of the liberal institutions of law and order, particularly those of the Interior Ministry. As will be demonstrated subsequently, following the March on Rome, several police commissioners were promoted for past services to the movement. However, such measures did not form part of a broader plan for transforming the police. Mussolini’s establishment of a dictatorship may have raised hopes among the higher ranks of the Interior Ministry Police for long-awaited reform. How widely Saracini’s enthusiasm and the ideas he put forward in Il magistrato dell’ordine were shared among police personnel, particularly in less privileged areas of the institution, is debatable.95 It is likely that the appeal of fascism to the Interior Ministry Police grew in some measure from around the mid-1920s onwards, once Mussolini’s Government designated them as the prime defenders of his new order and reconstituted the Agenti di Pubblica Sicurezza. A process of ‘normalisation’ – following the institutional crisis caused by the murder of the socialist parliamentary deputy, Giacomo Matteotti, by fascists in May 1924 – in which the state established a firmer hold over a hitherto violent and undisciplined Fascist Party, may have helped to remove previous dilemmas in the minds of some police officials over how far they could be obedient to a regime which appeared to flourish on unrestrained brutality. Loyalty to fascism was encouraged by the new career opportunities offered to high-ranking members of the Interior Ministry Police. Many questori took on leading roles in the Political Police Division of the Interior Ministry, while inspectors (ispettori di Pubblica Sicurezza) were invited to direct the new fascist secret police, the OVRA.96 However, it is not so clear what fascism represented for lower-ranking police officers, as well as for high-ranking officials who continued their

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careers in the provincial police headquarters. Indeed, if we consider the conduct, mentalities and working lives of police personnel during the fascist period, as undertaken in the chapters that follow, it becomes evident that large numbers were unmoved and relatively unaffected by Saracini’s vision. The Director of Il magistrato dell’ordine projected the development of a new police through a fascist lens. This raises the more general issue of how the regime aimed to reform state administration. Melis illustrates how discussions during the mid-1920s reflected the positions of those who felt that fascism had to conquer and penetrate the bureaucracy in order to purge it of an old mentality and those who argued to the contrary that the state had to modernise itself from within and that this should not be driven by ideologically inspired external forces. Although one of the most extreme exponents of the fascist movement, the intransigent Ras of Cremona, Roberto Farinacci, accused an outdated bureaucracy of being consciously ‘subversive’ and anti-fascist, others within the fascist camp argued that the real crisis in the state bureaucracy lay in poor selection criteria and the need for better incentives in order to attract and keep the best employees.97 As the next chapter shows, these positions featured widely in debates about how a police fit for defending the fascist regime and helping to run a new social order should evolve. Notes 1 E. Saracini, ‘Viva la polizia italiana!’, Il magistrato dell’ordine. Rivista mensile di polizia giudiziaria, amministrativa e sociale, 2:12 (1925), 205–6. 2 E. Saracini, I crepuscoli della polizia. Compendio storico della genesi e delle vicende dell’amministrazione di pubblica sicurezza (Naples: S.I.E.M., 1922), pp. 140–8. 3 G. Alongi, Manuale di polizia scientifica (Milan: Sonzogno, 1898), pp. 64–5. 4 Saracini, I crepuscoli della polizia, esp. pp. 49–50, 104–5, 133–4, 157, 205–7. 5 For detailed analyses of the policing of the late 1890s, see J. Dunnage, The Italian Police and the Rise of Fascism. A Case Study of the Province of Bologna, 1897–1925 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997), pp. 10–12, and Chapter 2; R. B. Jensen, Liberty and Order. The Theory and Practice of Italian Public Security Policy. 1848 to the Crisis of the 1890s (New York: Garland, 1991), Chapters 8 to 11. 6 Jensen, Liberty and Order, p. 180. 7 For more detailed analyses of ammonizione and domicilio coatto,

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see J. A. Davis, Conflict and Control. Law and Order in Nineteenth Century Italy (London: Macmillan, 1988), pp. 217–26; Jensen, Liberty and Order, pp. 32–4. 8 For a detailed analysis, see R. C. Fried, The Italian Prefects. A Study in Administrative Politics (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1963), esp. pp. 42, 67, 122–4, 131–2, 134. 9 For a detailed analysis, see C. Tullio-Altan, La nostra Italia. Arretratezza socioculturale, clientelismo, trasformismo e ribellismo dall’Unità ad oggi (Milan: Feltrinelli, 1986), pp. 57–85. 10 Alongi, Manuale di polizia scientifica, pp. 9–13. 11 G. C. Grossardi, Galateo del Carabiniere (Turin: Tipografia Editrice G. Candeletti, 3rd edn, 1879), pp. 112–16. For a more detailed analysis of the Galateo, see J. Dunnage, ‘Les Carabiniers italiens après 1860. Professionnalisme et auto-représentation’, in J.-N. Luc (ed.), Gendarmerie, État et Société au XIXe Siècle (Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 2002), pp. 411–21. 12 Archivio di Stato di Bologna, Gabinetto Prefettura (1859–1928), Cat. 2, Pratica Generale dell’Amministrazione di Pubblica Sicurezza, 1910–1912. 13 C. Emsley, Gendarmes and the State in Nineteenth-Century Europe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 206. 14 Emsley, Gendarmes and the State, p. 205; G.  Oliva, Storia dei Carabinieri. Immagine e autorappresentazione dell’Arma (1814–1992) (Milan: Leonardo, 1992), pp. 103–9, 121–32. 15 Emsley, Gendarmes and the State, p. 206. 16 G. Alongi, ‘L’organizzazione della polizia in Italia’, Nuova antologia, 153 (May 1897), 249–68 (250). 17 La tutela pubblica. Periodico settimanale politico amministrativo. The majority of examples are cited from articles appearing between May and December 1909. For a more detailed analysis of the professional difficulties which policemen faced and the psychological consequences of this, see J. Dunnage, ‘Sotto la pelle: per un’analisi sociologica e psicologica della vita del poliziotto’, in L. Antonielli (ed.), La polizia in Italia e in Europa: punto sugli studi e prospettive di ricerca (Soveria Mannelli: Rubbettino, 2006), pp. 179–89. 18 ‘Istruzione, 4 April 1867, sottoscritta dal Ministro Ricasoli’, in S. Correa, La sicurezza pubblica nel regno d’Italia, Vol. 2 (Florence: Tipografia Cavour, 1867), pp. 498–505 (p. 501). 19 Alongi, ‘L’organizzazione della polizia in Italia’, 252. 20 L. Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, Storia contemporanea, 8:3 (1977), 441–87 (443). 21 See, for example, Alongi, ‘L’organizzazione della polizia in Italia’, 254; G. Codronchi, ‘Sul riordinamento della P.S. in Italia’, Nuova antologia, 143 (September 1895), 215–22 (219). 22 The intention of emphasising the military attributes of the City Guard for

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recruitment purposes is evident in a law of 31 March 1892, which was reiterated by Giolitti in a circular of 1903. 23 Archivio di Stato di Bologna, Comando delle Guardie di Pubblica Sicurezza di Bologna (1873–1910), Serie III. 24 See government reactions to this type of accusation, in ‘Atti parlamentari. Camera dei Deputati. Tornata 9 giugno 1909. Discussione del bilancio dell’Interno’, Manuale del funzionario di sicurezza pubblica, 47 (1909), 177–85 (181). 25 ‘La pubblica sicurezza a Milano’, La tutela pubblica, 1:17 (5 September 1909), 1 (originally published in Il secolo (Milan), 28 agosto 1909). 26 Issues surrounding the southern origins and limited education of many recruits to the police are discussed in greater detail in Dunnage, ‘Sotto la pelle’. 27 A. D’Orsi, La polizia. Le forze dell’ordine italiane (Milan: Feltrinelli, 1972), p. 22. 28 In 1912 the electorate was increased from three to eight million, as all males over the age of thirty were granted the right to vote. 29 F. Fiorentino, Ordine pubblico nell’età giolittiana (Rome: Carecas, 1978), esp. pp. 67, 117, 121, 124–5. For a critical assessment of the time, see G. Sciacca, ‘Organici e servizi di polizia’, Nuova antologia, 199 (January 1905), 319–31. 30 Fiorentino, Ordine pubblico nell’età giolittiana, p. 26. For a detailed analysis of the policing of politics during this period, see Dunnage, The Italian Police, Chapter 3. 31 Saracini, I crepuscoli della polizia, pp. 193–8. 32 For the relationship between agricultural employers and the nationalist movement, see P.-P. D’Attorre, ‘Gli agrari bolognesi dal liberalismo al fascismo’, in L. Casali (ed.), Bologna 1920. Le origini del fascismo (Bologna: Cappelli, 1982), pp. 115–67 (pp. 121–8). 33 G. Tosatti, ‘La repressione del dissenso politico tra l’età liberale e il fascismo. L’organizzazione della polizia’, Studi storici, 38:1 (1997), 217–55 (227–31). 34 G. Alongi, ‘Per l’incremento della Scuola di Polizia Scientifica’, Manuale del funzionario di sicurezza pubblica, 47 (1909), 145–8. 35 Tosatti, ‘La repressione del dissenso politico’, 247, 249. 36 E. Flores, Eredità di guerra (Naples: Ceccoli, 1925), pp. 175–6; Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 444. 37 Archivio di Stato di Bologna, Gabinetto Prefettura, 1919, Cat. 2, Personale dell’amministrazione di Pubblica Sicurezza, manifesto entitled ‘A tutti i colleghi di PS e Carcerari del Regno’, dated February 1919. For the Carabinieri strike, see Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Affari Generali e Riservati, Categorie annuali (1879–1945), (hereafter ACS, DAGR-CA), 1919, b. 90. 38 L. Madrignani, ‘Dalla psicosi rivoluzionaria alla guerra civile: la Regia

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Guardia per la Pubblica Sicurezza e la gestione dell’ordine pubblico nella crisi dello Stato liberale (1919–1922)’ (Ph.D dissertation, University of Siena, 2011), pp. 23–4, 33–44. 39 This was what Commissioner Giuseppe Candia, who was among those behind the creation of the Federation, claimed in a letter to Mussolini dated 30 December 1926. See ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 145 bis, f. Candia Giuseppe. For the creation and intentions of the Federation, see Saracini, I crepuscoli della polizia, pp. 293–307. 40 D’Orsi, La polizia, p. 25. 41 Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 448–52. See also Dunnage, The Italian Police, pp. 95–6. 42 Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 453–4. 43 Cited in Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 464, note 95. 44 For a detailed case study of police support of the fascist movement between 1920 and 1922, see Dunnage, The Italian Police, Chapters 5 and 6. 45 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 111, f. Vellucci Brandino, article entitled ‘Chi siamo e cosa vogliamo’, La vita. Giornale politico sociale, 25 September 1919. 46 Archivio di Stato di Bologna, Gabinetto Prefettura, 1920, Cat. 2, Pratica generale di Pubblica Sicurezza, 3795 Questore Bologna to Prefetto Bologna, 1 November 1920; 3810 Questore Bologna to Prefetto Bologna, 4 November 1920. 47 For an analysis of the Left’s treatment of the post-war police, especially the newly constituted Royal Guard, see Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 463–7. For an example of writings of the Left on the subject of the police, see A. Leonetti, ‘La Questione Meridionale’, Comunismo (Rivista della terza internazionale), 1:13 (31 March–15 April 1920), 942–9. 48 R. De Felice, Mussolini il fascista, Vol. 1, La conquista del potere, 1921–1925 (Turin: Einaudi, 1968), p. 28. 49 For examples, see ‘La pena di morte’, L’Ordine Nuovo, 1:17 (6 September 1919), 128; ‘Il banditismo di Bra’, L’Ordine Nuovo. Quotidiano Comunista, 22 February 1921, 1. 50 Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 464–5. 51 L. Fabbri, La controrivoluzione preventiva (Pistoia: Vallera, 2nd edn, 1975), p. 31. 52 Dunnage, The Italian Police, pp. 106–7. 53 Saracini, ‘Si è spento in Como il Comm. Luigi Poli’, Il Magistrato dell’Ordine, 10:1 (1933), 12. 54 See, for example, P. Marsich, ‘La posizione teorica e pratica del Fascismo di fronte allo Stato’, in Fasci Italiani di Combattimento. Il pensiero e l’azione dei Fasci, originally published in 1921, reproduced in R. De Felice (ed.), Autobiografia del fascismo (Turin: Einaudi, 2004), pp. 33–45. 55 On this, see A. Lyttelton, ‘Cause e caratteristiche della violenza fascista: fattori costanti e fattori congiunturali’, in Casali (ed.), Bologna 1920, pp. 33–55 (p. 38).

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56 For a detailed analysis, see De Felice, Mussolini il fascista, Vol. 1, pp. 35–9, 204–5, 211; G. Neppi Modona, Sciopero, potere politico e magistratura (Bari: De Donato, 1969), pp. 249–61; Dunnage, The Italian Police, pp. 125–30. 57 Lyttelton, ‘Cause e caratteristiche della violenza fascista’, p. 37. 58 According to Danilo Veneruso, by the summer of 1922 most police officials realised that fascism was a subversive phenomenon, but they were hesitant to take action in the face of the non-intervention of the Government. La vigilia del fascismo. Il primo ministero Facta nella crisi dello stato liberale in Italia (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1968), pp. 319–25. 59 See Dunnage, The Italian Police, pp. 140–2. 60 Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 468–70; P. Alberghi, Il fascismo in Emilia 428–33. For the Sarzana Romagna (Modena: Mucchi, 1989), pp.  killings, see C. Costantini, ‘I fatti di Sarzana nelle relazioni della polizia’, Movimento operaio e socialista, 8 (1962), 61–100. 61 Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 40. 62 The unidirectional nature of this relationship is mentioned by Madrignani, ‘Dalla psicosi rivoluzionaria alla guerra civile’, p. 198. 63 I. Balbo, Diario 1922 (Milan: Mondadori, 1932), pp. 78–9. 64 For a detailed analysis, see A. Lyttelton, The Seizure of Power. Fascism in Italy, 1919–1929 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1973), pp. 87–90; Alberghi, Il fascismo in Emilia Romagna, pp. 618–19, 624; Dunnage, The Italian Police, pp. 136–8. 65 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 18 bis, f. Saracini Emilio, Saracini to Mussolini, 23 October 1923. 66 See, for example, Benito Mussolini, ‘Discorso pronunciato a Udine il 20 settembre 1922’, in De Felice (ed.), Autobiografia del fascismo, pp. 117–25 (p. 124). 67 Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 470–2. 68 Saracini, I crepuscoli della polizia, pp. 300–7. 69 P. Carucci, ‘L’organizzazione dei servizi di polizia dopo l’approvazione del testo unico delle leggi di pubblica sicurezza nel 1926’, Rassegna degli archivi di stato, 26:1 (1976), 82–114 (89, note 1). Until 1919, questori were only appointed in towns with over 100,000 inhabitants. 70 Saracini, I crepuscoli della polizia, pp. 281–6. The objectives and concerns of police officials regarding reform measures and working conditions were also voiced in a new monthly journal, La difesa sociale, founded in May 1919. 71 Discussed in detail in Melis, Due modelli di amministrazione, Chapters 1 and 2. 72 Saracini, I crepuscoli della polizia, pp. 264–5. 73 Ibid., p. 270. 74 Ibid., p. 291. 75 Ibid., pp. 312–15. 76 Ibid., pp. 293–307.

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77 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 18 bis, f. Saracini Emilio, Saracini to Mussolini, 23 October 1923. 78 For a detailed analysis, see Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 468–87. As suggested in Donati’s article, fascist hostility towards the Royal Guard, particularly after the killings at Modena in September 1921, was also behind the decision to abolish it. 79 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Personale di Pubblica Sicurezza, Affari generali (1876–1952), versamento 1963 (hereafter ACS, DP-AG, year), b. 199, f. Leggi, 9071–5 De Bono to Prefetti del Regno, 12 December 1922. 80 Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 441, 480–4. 81 Madrignani, ‘Dalla psicosi rivoluzionaria alla guerra civile’, pp. 119–28. Donati (‘La Guardia regia’, 484) notes that in Rome the guards naively believed that they could find a common cause with the Nationalists whose ‘Sempre pronti’ squads had recently been disbanded by the fascist Government. 82 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 18 bis, f. Saracini Emilio, Saracini to Mussolini, 23 October 1923. 83 E. Saracini, ‘La nostra impresa’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 1:1 (1924), 1. 84 E. Saracini, ‘Il Magistrato dell’Ordine e la Riforma del’Amministrazione di PS’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 1:4 (1924), 49–52. 85 E. Saracini, ‘De minimis’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 1:9 (1924), 145–6. 86 Donati, ‘La Guardia regia’, 487. According to Carucci, ‘L’organizzazione dei servizi di polizia’, 98, note 1, in January 1926 the Guard was defined as being ‘militarily organised’. Following Decree-law 2380 of 11 December 1927, however, control of the Interior Ministry Police over the Guard was enhanced by the abolition of ranks of Public Security officers within the corps, bearing in mind the hierarchical ambiguity which this had previously caused, particularly in the Guardie Regie. The law did not apply to the Special Police Division for Rome. 87 R. Collin, ‘Police and Internal Security’, in Philip Cannistraro (ed.), Historical Dictionary of Fascist Italy (Westport: Greenwood, 1982), pp. 428–32 (p. 430). 88 Carucci, ‘L’organizzazione dei servizi di polizia’, 89, note 1. 89 Tosatti, ‘La repressione del dissenso politico’, 247–9; G.  Tosatti, ‘L’anagrafe dei sovversivi italiani: origini e storia del Casellario politico centrale’, Le carte e la storia, 3:2 (1997), 133–50 (140–3). 90 For a detailed analysis, see J. Dunnage, ‘Social Control in Fascist Italy: The Role of the Police’, in C. Emsley, E. Johnson and P. Spierenburg (eds), Social Control in Europe, Vol. 2, 1800–2000 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2004), pp. 261–80 (pp. 263–4); Tosatti, ‘La repressione del dissenso politico’; P. Barile (ed.), La pubblica sicurezza (Milan: Neri Pozza, 1967); C. Schwarzenberg, Diritto e giustizia nell’Italia fascista (Milan: Mursia, 1977). 91 Tosatti, ‘La repressione del dissenso politico’, 248, note 117.

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E. Saracini, ‘Riassumiamo’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 3:12 (1926), 238–9. ‘A Noi!’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 3:5 (1926), 81. Saracini, ‘Riassumiamo’, 238–9. This is evident from a reading of Saracini’s 1932 article ‘Per le sorti della rivista’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 9:1 (1932), 1–2, which lamented the low subscription numbers for his journal. 96 Tosatti, ‘La repressione del dissenso politico’, 247–8, 255. 97 Melis, Due modelli di amministrazione, pp. 146–54.

92 93 94 95

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2 The ‘fascistisation’ of police culture: representation and practice Mussolini’s policemen

The ‘fascistisation’ of police culture

In the mid-1920s, members of the Italian police forces became guardians of an authoritarian state and fascist civilisation in the making. Corresponding to the broadened scope of their activities and the intensification of their powers, questions were inevitably posed around the ability and willingness of police personnel to fulfil the requirements of the new regime. Fascist reforms were facilitated by the fact that the liberal police system had been founded on the concept of a state police, which was anti-Marxist in character and had not infrequently resorted to oppressive methods of law enforcement. Moreover, as illustrated in the previous chapter, a considerable number of policemen had supported the fascist movement. Yet, in spite of this, the Fascists associated the police organs, particularly those of the Interior Ministry, with weak forms of government distinguishing the period of the Biennio Rosso. In the fascist concept of things, they had failed to maintain order and uphold the national interest. Following Mussolini’s rise to power, a number of policemen were removed from the Interior Ministry forces. Besides the abolition of the Regie Guardie and Agenti Investigativi at the end of 1922, during the mid to late 1920s numerous police officers and officials lost their jobs or were retired on the grounds of professional incompetence or political unreliability. In 1924 the Chief of Police, De Bono, forced forty commissioners and three hundred deputy commissioners to retire.1 In 1927, there were further sackings and forced retirements in the wake of new legislation making it difficult for policemen who were politically or professionally ‘undesirable’ to keep their jobs. In Mauro Canali’s view, this demonstrates that a significant number of policemen were not committed to the new regime.2 The case of Deputy Commissioner Carmelo Camilleri, stationed at the Questura in Milan, who resigned ‘voluntarily’ in October 1928 following pressure from his bosses, exemplifies how policemen could lose their jobs on account of ideological unreliability. Camilleri’s

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ousting from the police was officially motivated by his alleged work-shy attitude and improper conduct, as also emphasised following an inspection of the Questura of Milan in July 1928. He was accused, among other things, of having attempted to silence a creditor by threatening him with arrest.3 Evidence gathered by historian Mimmo Franzinelli suggests that in reality Camilleri was expelled from the police for the manner in which he conducted the investigation into the explosion of a bomb on 12 April 1928 in the vicinity of the Milan Trade Fair, killing eighteen people. While several communists were arrested for the crime, Camilleri believed that the attack had been the work of fascists, inspired by the Federal Secretary of the Fascist Party in Milan, Mario Giampaoli. In May 1931, Camilleri was sentenced to five years’ confino for having had contacts with anti-fascists. Realising that there was a political design to frame innocent people, he had provided the defence lawyers of those arrested with documentation which indicated their extraneousness to the atrocity.4 It is unlikely that Camilleri was acting out of anything but desire to bring to justice the real perpetrators of a horrific crime; during a previous posting at Siena he had been commended for uncovering an underground communist organisation.5 Though the precise manner in which Camilleri was removed from office is unclear, the case reminds us of the fact that compliance with the dictatorship inevitably meant having to cover up fascist crimes and, where necessary, ‘sacrifice’ those who were not prepared to be complicit in this. While the regime presented professional reform and fascist ideology as inseparable, in practice there were wide divergences of opinion and tensions over how much political control the police should be subjected to. This chapter assesses how far fascist ideas entered the policing profession. Focusing in particular on recruitment and training, it contrasts the formal ideological integration of the police into the regime, as evident in the manner in which the forces of the Carabinieri and Interior Ministry were internally and publicly represented, with a more complex reality, characterised by conflict and compromise. In spite of the fact that many policemen identified with the aims of the fascist state, a thorough ‘fascistisation’ of the police was not achieved, beyond superficial or piecemeal measures. This reflected the institution’s capacity to protect itself from excessive political impositions, as well as the ability of the surviving culture of the liberal state to contrast and inhibit fascist attempts to bring professional renewal to the police.

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At one with fascism? Images, rituals and iconography of the police A major locus for public representation of the Interior Ministry Police during the fascist period was Police Day (Festa della Polizia), a national celebration introduced in 1928 and held annually on 18 October. The celebrations marked the anniversary of Mussolini’s re-constitution of the Public Security Guard in 1925. Emilio Saracini’s journal, Il magistrato dell’ordine, hailed the institution of Police Day as an example of the national profile which the force enjoyed under the fascist regime.6 While the occasion was marked in the provincial capitals, the main celebrations took place in Rome, attended by Mussolini, Party leaders, high-ranking police commissioners, foreign police delegations and local dignitaries. Featuring processions, athletics displays and medalawarding ceremonies, these events were transmitted to the wider public via cinema newsreels, projecting to the nation the image of a modern, well-trained and powerful force at one with fascism. Original footage of the 1932 celebrations shows Mussolini, his right arm raised in the Roman salute, observing companies of the special police corps of Rome (Corpo della Polizia Metropolitana) pass before him in procession.7 From the mid-1930s, cinematic images of Police Day were accompanied by a brief oral commentary. Stressing the power, technical advancement and international prestige which the police had acquired under Mussolini, commentary to footage of the 1937 celebration read: ‘The Duce presents the magnificent military review of the Public Security Guard on the occasion of the twelfth anniversary of the founding of their corps. The German, Austrian, Hungarian, Portuguese, Yugoslav and Albanian police delegations watch the superb spectacle and the procession of six thousand men carrying the most advanced arms and equipment.’8 The Police Day celebrations were, naturally, given positive coverage in the mainstream press, too. An article published in the Roman daily, Il messaggero, dated 19 October 1933 gave a detailed account of the ceremony which had taken place in the capital the previous day. It referred to the perfect discipline, and technical and physical skills of the Public Security Guard, as illustrated by impeccable processions and feats performed for the occasion; such skills, the article claimed, equipped the Guard to carry out a multiplicity of important and highly delicate tasks. The article described in detail the ceremony at which Mussolini decorated ten guards and a Public Security official for acts of bravery. It hailed the huge turn-out for the celebrations at the Villa Glori hippodrome as proof of public recognition for the police service, and the continuous

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2.1  Procession of armoured vehicles of the Corpo della Polizia Metropolitana during Police Day celebrations, Rome, 18 October 1933. Source: ‘La festa della polizia’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 10:11 (1933). By permission of the Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali. Authorised by the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Florence.

cheers of the crowds as a demonstration of the ability of the police to conquer the public.9 Beyond the creation of a public image, Police Day celebrations and other rituals were intended to instil in police personnel themselves the notion of their integration in the fascist state. This discourse was clearly connected to the thorny issue of the historical relationship between the police and the public. In an article published in Il magistrato dell’ordine in October 1933, emphasis was placed on how the celebrations reflected the fortunes of the police under Mussolini, to which there corresponded a rise in their popularity. Saracini’s journal described the ‘Cinderella’ status which the Interior Ministry Police had suffered under the liberal state; an institution which did its job under difficult circumstances without public recognition; an organisation merely concerned with punishment and repression. Thanks to fascism, the police had been born again as an organisation no longer associated merely with hand-cuffs, having adopted a wider social role which involved both ensuring that citizens slept peacefully in their beds at night as well as helping the weak and vulnerable, including those who had fallen but who wished to be rehabilitated. The article concluded: Before the Regime, the police counted for nothing, and this was the worst injustice … Thanks to the Regime and, to be fascistly sincere, especially

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after the choice of His Excellency Bocchini as its Chief, the Police have been revealed in their true light, their true colours. The Official and the Guard represent the mind and body of an Army which at every moment of the life of the Nation is precious. It has an altar: the Fatherland; it has a flag for which many died; and, lastly, it sees in the Duce and in the Regime, the National ideal conquered through martyrdom and indestructible glories.10

The printed word was matched by the tenor of speeches made during these ceremonies, which presented the police in a new spiritual dimension, reflecting the creation around fascism of a lay religion. This was evident in the wording of an address by a police commissioner to the Public Security Guard at Savona (Liguria) on the occasion of the 1932 Police Day celebrations, which coincided with the tenth anniversary of the March on Rome. The speech claimed that the sacrifice of the martyrs of the fascist ‘Revolution’ had allowed Italy and the police to be born again.11 In Florence, Police Day celebrations followed a regular programme which culminated in a procession to the fascist sacrarium in the church of Santa Croce, where policemen

2.2  Members of Corpo della Polizia Metropolitana with Alsatian dogs in procession during Police Day celebrations, Rome, 18 October 1933. Source: ‘La festa della polizia’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 10:11 (1933). By permission of the Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali. Authorised by the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Florence.

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wearing black shirts formed a guard of honour.12 The role played by the police themselves in the fascist ‘regeneration’ of Italy was marked by special commemorations of their own ‘martyrs’. On Police Day in 1936, a memorial chapel was opened at the police headquarters at La Spezia (Liguria) to honour two Public Security guards, Nunzio Calabresi and Carlo Rocchieri, who had been killed in 1921 in an armed conflict with ‘subversives’. This was followed by a ceremony at the cemetery, where the two guards’ remains were buried, together with those of a fascist, in a common niche.13 Police Day celebrations should be considered in the broader context of what Gianni Oliva stresses as Mussolini’s use of the armed forces to maintain a climate of continuous mobilisation and patriotic exaltation. This revolved around the image, bolstered by rhetoric of the First World War, of a heroic and combative nation.14 If representations and rituals underlined the newly achieved power and prestige which fascism had bestowed upon the Interior Ministry Police, those involving the Carabinieri continued to stress the traditional image of the corps as defender of the national order and friend of the people, though they were partly adapted to the ideological demands of the regime. A national Carabinieri museum (Museo Storico dei Carabinieri) was inaugurated in Rome in 1925. In October 1933, in the presence of the King, the Carabinieri Commander in Chief, General Di San Marzano, and representatives of the fascist Government and Party, the ‘Monument to the Carabiniere’, a statue financed by contributions paid by local councils throughout Italy, was unveiled in Turin.15 Similar to the Interior Ministry Police, rituals suggesting the alignment of the Carabinieri to the fascist regime are evident, for example, in the laying of a wreath before the tomb of fascist ‘martyrs’ at the Casa Littoria (fascist headquarters and recreation centre), alongside those who had fallen in the First World War, as part of the Police Day celebrations in Turin of October 1933.16 Where fascists and carabinieri had fallen together during the ‘Revolution’, they were the object of joint commemorations, as evident in the ceremony which took place in February 1937, in Piazza Antinori, Florence, to honour the ‘sacrifice’ of carabiniere Antonio Petucci and the fascist, Carlo Menabuoni, who on 27 February 1921 had been killed by a communist bomb.17 Yet, if the Interior Ministry Police celebrated fascism for having given them a new national profile, the Carabinieri appear to have been celebrated and to have celebrated themselves as a historic symbol of heroism and patriotism which had pre-dated fascism. Carabinieri literature referred reverently and enthusiastically to the role of Mussolini and fascism in revitalising the nation, expressed solidarity towards the Party Militia,

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and made much of Mussolini’s proclamation of their corps as a bulwark of the regime,18 emphasising, however, that: ‘The Carabinieri were one of the few hallmarks of Italy before fascism … Fascism could not fail to recognise and develop to its full potential such a worthy institution as the Carabinieri.’19 As illustrated above, fascist iconography and rituals were incorporated into the police environment. For the Interior Ministry Police, these included the Roman salute, addressed towards superiors throughout civilian organs of the state from 1925 onwards.20 Police personnel (including Public Security guards) obligatorily wore the Party black shirt on formal occasions such as Police Day.21 Non-uniformed policemen were obliged to wear the Party badge on their jackets alongside the service badge identifying rank; those failing to do so were threatened with ‘serious disciplinary measures’. 22 In March 1938, the Roman step (passo romano) was adopted for military parades, 23 including those undertaken by the Public Security Guard and the Carabinieri. From that year, fascist symbols were displayed on a new military-style uniform introduced for all civilian state personnel, 24 with different ranks and ministries or departments identified by particular colours and by variations in the design of braids and epaulets. Police officials’ regular uniform included a black woollen tunic and coat, both bearing the fascio littorio (fascist symbol of rods and axe) on the collar, and with gold buttons with engravings of the Roman eagle (symbolising the empire), 25 the crown (symbolising the monarchy) and the fascio. Epaulets on the tunic likewise displayed these symbols; at the centre of the corresponding black woollen cap a crowned gold eagle perched on the fascio littorio was embroidered.26 The co-existence of royal and fascist symbols may have identified underlying ambivalence surrounding institutional loyalties. Nevertheless, in her study of the ‘aestheticisation’ of politics in Mussolini’s Italy Simonetta Falasca-Zamponi argues that fascist uniforms allowed each group and association in Italian society to occupy ‘a place in the whole’, while ‘the sense of discipline and order emanating from their uniforms produced an aesthetic effect that reflected fascist inner qualities and expressed spiritual attributes … Uniforms came to epitomise change and differentiated fascist spirit from bourgeois values.’27 With reference to the institution of uniforms for the civilian state administration, Mussolini is reported to have stated: ‘The employees’ uniform is the reform of the bureaucracy. Remember: The cowl does make the monk.’28 Yet, it is not easy to ascertain how far envelopment in the regime’s political iconography and spectacles turned police personnel into loyal fascist servants. Undoubtedly, the new public prestige bestowed upon

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the Interior Ministry Police, and their comparative rise in status in relation to the Carabinieri, must have been professionally uplifting for many and may have determined their identification with fascism in some measure. However, the images displayed on Police Day did not always correspond to the daily realities of working life. Significantly, in contrast to the parades of the uniformed special police for Rome, Public Security guards were mostly employed for plainclothes duties. Moreover, beyond the rituals, symbols and uniforms, the ability of the fascist regime to transform the institution ideologically was limited in the context in which direct Party control over the police was precluded. Fascist expectations of the police During the period of conception of Mussolini’s police state, opposed factions within fascism disputed whether primacy in the creation of the new civilisation should be awarded to the state or the Party. Indicating the extent of influence of the culture of squadrismo on the dictatorship in its first months, under the leadership of Roberto Farinacci (February 1925 to March 1926) the Fascist Party attempted to assert its autonomy from the Government and increase its power to the disadvantage of the state. 29 This was opposed by Mussolini, who with the support of moderate fascists, ‘flankers’ (individuals who supported the fascist Government and state without being committed fascists) and nationalists (who had merged into the Party in 1923), firmly believed that the Party should be subordinate to the state. 30 It is significant that during the mid-1920s two ex-nationalist ministers in the fascist Government played an important role in determining the direction in which Mussolini’s repressive apparatus developed. Luigi Federzoni, occupying the office of Interior Minister between June 1924 and November 1926, and originator of the 1926 Public Security Law, moved to ensure that political oppression remained firmly in the hands of the state. He strongly opposed Farinacci’s reconstitution of armed squads in the summer and autumn of 1925 on such grounds, and in March 1926 Mussolini intervened in the dispute in Federzoni’s favour and fired the Party Secretary.31 Alexander De Grand notes that it was above all Alfredo Rocco, Minister of Justice from January 1925 to July 1932, who ‘transferred the Nationalist conception of the state as the primary engine of political and social action into the institutional structure of fascism’.32 In 1925 and 1926, Rocco took legislative measures to empower the state to the disadvantage of the Party. His law regulating associations, for example, was inspired principally by the need to solve the problem of

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freemasonry, but allowed all associations to be placed under the control of the state. It entrusted their regulation to the Prefects rather than to local Party representatives.33 Following several assassination attempts against Mussolini, Rocco’s Law for Defence of the State (November 1926) created a special tribunal (Tribunale Speciale per la Difesa dello Stato) to deal with the most serious crimes against the state, restored the death penalty (for the punishment of attempts on the lives of sovereign, regent, royal heir and head of state, and of other serious crimes against the security of the state) and prescribed harsh prison sentences for the reconstitution of outlawed parties and associations. This marked the beginning of juridical reforms which would underline the new police state.34 In spite of the formal establishment of the primacy of the Italian state over the Party, tensions surrounding the level of ‘fascistisation’ which the organs of the state should undergo remained. Following Farinacci’s dismissal in March 1926, the Party, under its new secretary, Augusto Turati, set itself the tasks of educating the masses and the youngest generations in obedience to the Duce and of ‘fascistising’ the state.35 In a speech to fascist leaders on 13 February 1927, Turati voiced his concerns about the lack of genuine fascists both in the state and among Party members; but, he argued, a ‘fascistisation’ of the bureaucracy, allowing the occupation of every command post by a blackshirt bearing the spirit of the ‘Revolution’, could not be achieved through the employment of ‘first-hour’ militants, since they lacked the necessary skills; moreover, acting in this manner would have led to conflict between them and ‘flankers’ (fiancheggiatori) already in post. Nor could the situation be resolved by giving everyone the Party card. Turati believed that the Party should convert existing state personnel into genuine fascists.36 Turati’s intentions were not easily fulfilled as regards the police. For one thing, any such plans were precluded by the lack of direct Party control over the Interior Ministry and armed forces. In November 1925, signalling his desire to avoid conflicts of interest among police personnel, Federzoni had prohibited Public Security officials and guards from taking up or continuing membership of the Fascist Party, a ban which was only lifted from 1932. Likewise, because of their status as ‘militari’, low-ranking carabinieri were barred from Party membership until retirement. More crucially, Law 563 regulating unions, introduced in April 1926, prevented police personnel and members of armed forces from joining the Fascist Association for State Employees, AGFPI (Associazione Generale Fascista del Pubblico Impiego).37

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There is evidence that the Party attempted to apply back-door strategies to penetrate the police when it was precluded from direct means to achieve this. It is believed that Turati tried to manipulate the police through his close ally, Ernesto Gulì, appointed as Chief of the new Political Police Division (POLPOL), which Bocchini had constituted following his appointment as Police Chief. Gulì allegedly took note of anyone who visited Bocchini, referring this to Turati at the end of each day, and was able to determine appointments to the advantage of Party hacks.38 Furthermore, Federzoni claimed in his diary entry for 3 March 1927 that Bocchini was exasperated by a war that most of the Party leadership waged against him.39 In the course of my research little documentation confirming these claims has come to light. In practice, Bocchini had been closely acquainted with both Gulì and Turati before he was appointed Chief of Police. According to Dante Germino, Turati had personally selected Gulì;40 Canali argues, however, that Bocchini went to great lengths to appoint him, on account of his admiration for a person who had previously worked under him at the Prefecture of Brescia.41 Bocchini in his previous role as Prefect of Brescia (1923) had been close to Turati when the latter was leader of the fascist movement in the province. Bocchini partly owed his appointment as Chief of Police in September 1926 to his relationship with Turati, who had since become Party Secretary.42 As Salvatore Lupo suggests, alliances between representatives of the Party and the state were partly motivated by reciprocal desire for personal advancement.43 Turati would have supported Bocchini because he saw him as politically reliable as well as personally useful; in an environment characterised by patronage and factionalism, ideological designs were strategically achieved through highly personalised alliances. How far the original Bocchini–Turati alliance was a guarantee of perennial co-operation between the two is questionable, and this might explain their alleged conflict over how much influence the latter could wield over the police. If it were true that Turati later instructed Gulì to spy on Bocchini, this may have reflected the Party Secretary’s realisation that the Chief of Police was not as malleable as he had assumed he would be. At this juncture a brief introduction to Arturo Bocchini is called for, bearing in mind that his office as Chief of Police spanned most of the dictatorship, and was only ended by his sudden death in November 1940. In his detailed analysis of Bocchini, Italo Savella stresses how this relatively unknown and unstudied figure quickly became one of the fascist regime’s most powerful men, even though he was more a ‘flanker’ than a fascist. During the dictatorship, many

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considered him Mussolini’s second-in-command until he was eclipsed in the 1930s by the rise of the Duce’s son-in-law, Galeazzo Ciano, and the Undersecretary of the Interior, Guido Buffarini Guidi.44 Born in 1880 into a well-off landowning family in a small community in the Neapolitan hinterland, Bocchini’s early career was typical of that undertaken by young men of the South in their search for future stability in public office. After being awarded a degree in law at Naples University in 1902, he entered the civilian bureaucracy of the Interior Ministry, reaching the rank of Prefect shortly after Mussolini’s rise to power.45 Savella underlines the importance of two assignments Bocchini received after the First World War: he was put in charge of security for the police delegation which accompanied the Prime Minister, Vittorio Orlando, to the peace conference in Paris; then he joined the personnel administration of the Interior Ministry, becoming its director in June 1921. Savella argues: ‘These two assignments allowed him to build ties with key political figures, learn the mechanism and shortcomings of the police apparatus, get to know the men, and pick the most suitable ones for various jobs.’46 Although Turati’s supporting recommendation may have helped to secure Bocchini’s appointment as Chief of Police, this was directly tied to his abilities as Prefect in a period when the direction and future of fascism was uncertain. During his first posting, to the northern province of Brescia, he took firm measures to limit conflict between rival Catholic and fascist peasant leagues, but he used the pretext of maintaining order to disempower opponents of the Government. This included dissolving socialist municipal councils and employing militiamen to intimidate government opponents in communities where there was a limited police presence. Yet Bocchini also urged tact to prevent the political enemies of fascism from capitalising on underhand methods employed by the Government in the mass lay-off of workers of a local metal-working plant.47 Bocchini applied similar tactics during his subsequent office in Bologna. In early 1924 he supported the new pro-Government Ras (and future Undersecretary of the Interior), Leandro Arpinati, and assisted him in cleaning up local Party dissidence. Indicating his awareness of the risks of excessive ties with local fascism, Bocchini was not afraid to be firm with Arpinati later, during the summer of 1925, when the latter turned against the Government. This provoked an attempt to invade the Prefecture by squadristi.48 In Bologna, Bocchini acquired fame as a manipulator of elections, which rather exceeded the traditional role entrusted to prefects. There are suspicions that he found a way to control how people voted and that this led to successes for the Government,

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in traditionally socialist territory, during the general election of 1924 and the local elections of the following year.49 In the midst of the crisis surrounding the murder of the socialist parliamentary deputy, Giacomo Matteotti, during the summer of 1924, Bocchini managed to combine hard-line policing with more tactful measures to deal with the resurgent political opposition in the Emilian city. His police forces harshly repressed anti-Government demonstrations, but Bocchini was also concerned that workers were deserting the fascist unions because employers would not grant concessions to them.50 Though he was not opposed to the employment of illegal or semi-legal methods to help the fascist Government crush its political opponents, Bocchini was concerned to limit the excesses of local fascism and the advantage which employers took of squad protection, when the reputation of the Government was threatened as a result. Savella notes how once appointed as Prefect of Genoa, in the autumn of 1925, Bocchini, in no doubt about the secure future of fascism, systematically enforced anti-subversive measures, particularly against members of the underground Communist Party, which had become the norm since Mussolini had declared a crackdown against political dissent in January 1925. Bocchini would subsequently perfect and extend these measures throughout Italy, though he maintained his characteristic tactfulness. Savella argues that: ‘Avoiding the creation of martyrs was always one of the principal features of Bocchini’s modus operandi.’51 Moreover, Bocchini’s skilful handling of security measures during the visit of the King to Bologna in June 1925 and more importantly that of Mussolini to Genoa in May 1926 helped to secure his appointment as Chief of Police. Such operations foreshadowed Bocchini’s later organisation of the Duce’s protection on a wider scale.52 In regard to the fascist leader’s visit to Genoa, Savella notes how the ‘formidable and extremely detailed’ security arrangements for each itinerary created ‘a display of professional virtuosity’ which was ‘bound to make points with Mussolini’.53 In spite of his early links with provincial Ras, Bocchini is reputed during the fourteen years in which he was Chief of Police to have shielded the police from excessive Party interference and to have been only opportunistically loyal to fascism.54 In contrast to the Nazi and Soviet regimes, the fascist secret police, the OVRA, was not the creation of the ruling Party, but of Bocchini, who succeeded in removing himself from the hierarchical control of the Interior Minister, placing himself directly at the orders of Mussolini. 55 Renzo De Felice argues that although Bocchini zealously and efficiently served Mussolini and the fascist regime, he did not display the fanaticism and

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cruelty of such personalities as the head of the Nazi police, Heinrich Himmler, or Reinhardt Heydrich, the Commander in Chief of the Nazi ­Sicherheitspolizei, or of certain leaders of the Soviet secret police.56 Regarding Bocchini’s personality, Savella describes a man known for his jocular manner and, in contrast to Himmler, his enjoyment of earthly pleasures, including amorous liaisons which on occasion threatened his career.57 Bocchini’s sense of humour, sometimes flavoured with a fair dose of cynicism, is evident in comments he pencilled over personal requests from police commissioners which landed on his desk. In April 1927, for example, he wrote at the bottom of a letter in support of the promotion of an unrealistically ambitious police commissioner: ‘… the decree promoting him to commissioner has yet to be registered … and he would already like to be promoted to chief commissioner!!!’58 Anti-fascists of the time, and subsequently historians of Italian fascism, usually agreed that to the benefit of the regime he refrained from inflicting ‘unnecessary’ suffering on the enemies of fascism and was measured in the manner in which he punished them. Yet several of them noted his lack of scruples.59 If Bocchini was reputed to have avoided the creation of martyrs, driven by the imperative to uproot underground dissent, he certainly tolerated violent methods of interrogation committed against individuals who fell into the hands of his men; how rigorously he was prepared to intervene when they committed excesses is questionable, too. This may partly reflect the far lower risks which such excesses now posed for the public reputation of the fascist Government, which had established firm control over the media. Though there is little evidence that Bocchini behaved tyrannically towards those under his command, there are suggestions that he was vindictive towards those few unfortunates who were imprudent enough to challenge him. Bocchini’s attitude towards fascism largely mirrored that of many of his dependents, characterised by a combination of political sympathies and career opportunism. Bocchini did not want the Party to dictate to the police; yet he imposed a formal but nevertheless exacting alignment of the institution with the regime, as illustrated by its adoption of fascist rituals and iconography. Moreover, although he did not enforce an integral ‘fascistisation’ of training procedures, he tolerated the presence of fascist positions, as long as they were matched by professional competence. Bocchini’s attitudes can be ascribed to a myriad of factors which may have varied according to the particular occasion and circumstance: these included his desire to maintain his privileged relationship with Mussolini, the need to protect the professional autonomy of the police, perhaps by giving way here and there, and a

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genuine sympathy for certain aspects of fascism, as well as clientelistic obligations. Bocchini was tolerant of a measure of contact and discussion between the police and the Party, even when this threatened to bring into doubt the institution which he had played a key role in developing. During the early 1930s, for example, the quality of state personnel continued to preoccupy the Party, preoccupations which were evidently felt by Saracini, too, and which prompted an exchange of ideas involving his journal and the AGFPI journal, Il pubblico impiego. In an article dated 1 July 1930, Saracini stressed how the organs of the police still had to modernise their structures and incorporate the spirit of the ‘Revolution’. If the new Public Security Law had ‘fascistised’ the functions of the police, he argued, the institution rested on the ruins of an ancient order that had undergone only a superficial process of renewal.60 Il pubblico impiego published an article in response to this. It advocated an urgent rejuvenation of state administration in order to fulfil the totalitarian aims of fascism. This would involve an integral purge of those elements who lacked the best political qualities, tougher recruitment criteria, the application of the requisites of ‘intelligence, practical ability and fascist spirit (as opposed to Party membership or fascist uniforms)’ for promotions, a clearer definition of responsibilities according to rank, and the provision of a fascist working environment for fascist employees.61 The above issues were difficult to resolve when fascist affiliation was destined to become a mass phenomenon. From October 1932 onwards, the ban on Party membership for Interior Ministry Police personnel was lifted.62 Joining the Party now became obligatory, as it did for other categories of state employees; or, to be more precise, membership of the Party or its affiliated youth organisations was essential for obtaining a post in the state, while employees already in service needed to join the Party if they hoped to be promoted.63 How far obligatory Party membership determined the political orientation and loyalty of state employees is questionable, especially when possibilities for employment and career advancement depended upon it. ‘First-hour’ fascists were formally awarded a measure of priority over others in competitions for posts and promotions in public administration, as explained below. Yet the question remains whether this facilitated a ‘fascistisation’ of the culture of the state in the scenario of mass Party membership. Most importantly, at least from the perspective of the Fascist Party, those working for the Interior Ministry were still not permitted to join the employee associations, which had been incorporated into the Party in 1931.64 This led to the objection that those officials excluded from

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regimentation in the associations were precisely those who, in order to accomplish the requirements of the fascist state and carry out its laws, needed more than anyone else to develop a fascist conscience.65 Only in 1937 did joining the associations become obligatory for all Party members,66 with the consequence that in January 1938 Bocchini informed the Prefects that membership was to be considered mandatory for police personnel, with the exception of members of the Public Security Guard, given their status as members of an armed force.67 Each provincial police headquarters had to nominate a representative for the police section of the Association, preferably from among personnel with sound ‘fascist’ requisites.68 Beyond their collection of monthly dues, how much control these representatives exercised over colleagues is not easy to ascertain, though we do have some clues, as will be shown in Chapter 5. Despite his enforcement of a formal integration of the police in the new regime and his tolerance of radical fascist views about how the police should be reformed, Bocchini avoided situations where participation in political activities took up police working hours and, though not explicitly stated, might lead to undue influence from the Party, or, at least, to conflicts of interest. In this regard, he was forced to address the question of membership of the fascist Militia during the mid-1930s.69 Public Security clerical staff (impiegati) had always been allowed to belong to the Fascist Party Militia (Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale – MVSN) and participate in training exercises, as long as this could be reconciled with the requirements of their jobs.70 The issue of Militia membership for other ranks of the police came to the fore in May 1936 when the Party announced that all its members could join the Militia. In reaction to this, doubtlessly representing an expedient show of ideological alignment, the questori in the provinces asked permission from Rome for their staff to be allowed to join, or, in some cases, communicated that their entire staff had applied directly to the nearest Militia Legion.71 In response, Bocchini sent a telegram, dated 3 June 1936, to the Prefects, stating that, on the orders of Mussolini, Public Security officials and guards could not take up membership of the MVSN on the grounds that they belonged to an armed force of the state.72 During the same period, the issue of participation of police personnel in the sabato fascista was also addressed. Established in June 1935, the sabato fascista refers to the compulsory recreational activities organised for Party members every Saturday afternoon, with the consequence that public offices had to close at one o’clock so that civilian employees of the state could take part. While personnel of the

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questure were not formally excluded, they were often prevented from leaving work on Saturday afternoons. This appears to have angered lower-ranking office staff, who protested, by means of anonymous letters addressed to Mussolini, at their exclusion from participation in sport and cultural initiatives provided by the regime. The question was resolved, to the advantage of the employers, in February 1936 when the Undersecretary of the Interior, Buffarini Guidi, decreed that personnel of the Interior Ministry and municipal administration were no longer obliged to observe the sabato fascista.73 The expectation that policemen should serve the fascist state over and above all other allegiances was written into their induction formula. In liberal Italy, state employees had upon taking office sworn an oath of allegiance to the King and to the constitution and laws of the state. In 1925 the wording of a revised oath for new public appointees reflected fascist concepts of the state and of the importance surrounding the tasks facing those serving it. Public employees were now required not only to swear to faithfully observe the constitution and the laws of the realm and to faithfully tend to their duties. More specifically, in line with the fascist view that public office constituted being part of a ‘militia’, they had to make a commitment to diligently and zealously attend to their daily tasks in the interests of the administration and to behave in a manner appropriate to their office at all times.74 The specification in the 1925 oath that public servants did not and would not belong to any party or association whose activities were incompatible with their duties to the state formally ironed out any contradiction with the oath of allegiance sworn to the Duce at the moment of joining the Fascist Party. In practice, however, commitment to the Party among the most ideologically observant employees could clash with commitment to public office, as the example of the sabato fascista illustrates. On the question of the oath sworn by civil servants to the Party, Germino suggests that this created a high level of moral anguish among those who were not sincere fascists. He quotes Hannah Arendt’s observation that ‘people who joined the party for essentially economic reasons and without any convictions whatsoever’, because they were ‘guilty of their “opportunism” … became gleichgeschaltet [were brought into line] in true earnest. There are very few people who have the strength of character to remain “cynical” enough to keep their personalities intact.’75 Without intending to dismiss this observation, what becomes apparent in the course of this study is, I would argue, a rather more relaxed and less guilt-ridden attitude to Party membership among police officials who in any case, if not fascist, usually identified with the regime’s policies of repression to a notable degree. Although

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consideration has to be given to the fact that the sample of cases I have examined is relatively small, a more proactive attitude denoting desires to milk the Party system for personal gain often comes to the fore. The picture which has emerged so far is of an authoritarian police system which was formally integrated into Mussolini’s regime, against a broader scenario of contention over how much ideological control it should be subjected to. Seeing modernisation and ‘fascistisation’ as one and the same, many fascists would have looked upon those transformations which did take place in the police with scepticism. The section which follows analyses procedures for recruitment and training of police personnel in the context described above. Besides questioning how far such procedures were determined by fascist ideas, it considers the extent to which they responded to calls for a more general reform of the law and order apparatus. Though mainly focusing on the forces of the Interior Ministry, comparative references are made to the Carabinieri where data is available. Recruitment and training Amongst documents in one of the three files of Public Security Guard Commander Ernesto Paglione, is a single issue, dated September 1928, of a newspaper. The publication commemorates the completion of training of the third cohort of cadets of the Guard at the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia (police training school) at Caserta, which Paglione re-organised and directed between 1928 and 1939.76 Written by the cadets, the paper takes the reader through the events making up the day in which they qualify as police officers: on Sunday 16 September, following celebration of Mass under the arcades of the school building, in an atmosphere of intimacy befitting future guardians of the national order, the cadets are sworn in by the Director in the presence of their teachers and two representatives from the Interior Ministry; the visitors from Rome, accompanied by Paglione, make a tour of the school, during which they inaugurate the Guard’s mess and a library. The evening celebrations, featuring gymnastics and wrestling displays, are attended by representatives of the local authorities. The ‘Prayer to the Duce’ and the anthem ‘To Rome! To Rome!’ are sung to the accompaniment of the school band. The climax of the evening is a light display in which cadets armed with pocket torches and accompanied by the band position themselves in such a manner as to form the luminous words of ‘RE’ (King) and ‘DUCE’, words which are shouted in unison by cadets, as the images of the King and of Mussolini are projected onto a large screen behind them. This is followed by the

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entrance of a cart adorned with flowers preceded by the cadets on foot or astride donkeys, waving Venetian lamps, strumming mandolins and clicking castanets, at which point the jubilation reaches its climax. The party concludes with a banquet offered to the cadets under the arcades of the school, while in the officers’ mess, female guests are entertained with dancing. The account of the day’s events concludes that: ‘The celebration has worthily exalted the monarchic and fascist sentiment which animates the leaders and guards of the School. It has cemented bonds of fraternity which unites men at the service of the same faith, soldiers who have in common the same mission.’77 Taken at face value, the document provides the researcher with an insight into the type of professional and ideological training which cadets at the school at Caserta underwent. This is particularly evident in paragraphs written by the cadet Roberto Diana. Employing the mythical language of fascism, the profession which future policemen are about to take on is presented as a fulfilment of fascist ideals as the cadets, following the example of the vestal virgins of ‘eternal’ Rome, are ‘elected’ to maintain the ‘sacred fire of world dominion’, taking inspiration from the ‘magnanimous sacrifice’ of martyrs in the profession. By entering the police, the ‘elected’ have sacrificed their youth not out of vanity or personal ambition but inspired by a sense of duty and mission.78 Diana continues by explaining the symbolic value of the oath ritual in a new era in which the police are no longer the ‘old whore who parades in dark corners of the barracks out of the way of the populous cities or becomes consumptive in the shadow of dusty archives’. They are now represented by the ‘loyal ranks of an efficient and far-sighted militia which is in perfect synchrony with the new mood of the life of the nation’. While acknowledging the formal wording of the oath, sworn before God to the King and to all those in whose hands the destiny of the fatherland has been entrusted, Diana proposes an unofficial and unambiguously fascist version of the oath, to be sworn in the name of the King, the Duce, the dead of Vittorio Veneto,79 and the martyrs of the fascist cause, and in which each cadet prostrates himself before the power of the nation, invoking the revenge of God should he fail to maintain his promise. In the words of Roberto Diana, a cohort of youngsters trained and educated both as police professionals and fascists were about to embark upon a mission in the service of a new social order. Yet the document we are concerned with presents a number of interpretative issues. How representative was it of the type of ideological training which police cadets underwent and of daily rituals performed at the school? How far was the sense of mission, to which the document refers, shared

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among teachers and cadets? How representative and sincere were the words of Diana? Were they his words, or were they suggested to him? In short, how reliable is this type of research material, as a means for understanding the development of institutional cultures during the dictatorship? The fact that Paglione was fascist might have determined training procedures at the school he directed. Yet the nature of the environment in which cadets like Diana were trained is put into a different perspective by a revelation and subsequent inquiry over a decade later. In 1939, an anonymous letter prompted an investigation of the manner in which Paglione had directed the school since 1928.80 He was suspended on suspicion of having abused his position for personal gain, often at the material expense of the cadets. Among a significant number of accusations, Paglione had allegedly pressurised the cadets on a regular basis into making financial contributions to the school when such contributions should have been voluntary. This included the purchase of books ‘of questionable utility’ published by instructors at the school. In many instances, the Director was suspected of having pocketed the proceeds of these contributions for his personal benefit. Paglione was also accused of openly criticising the organisation of the Italian police and their high-ranking personnel, and of commenting negatively about the regime’s policies. In one particular incident, it was claimed, he had made fun of instructors entrusted with teaching cadets the Roman step, on the grounds that it was not suited to the Italian race and would be the ruin of fascism.81 In 1940, following a disciplinary proceeding, Paglione was dismissed from the police in disgrace. Though Paglione insisted on his innocence, and would spend the next fifteen years vainly attempting to be professionally rehabilitated,82 there is evidence of a more general phenomenon of corruption in fascist Italy’s police schools. A month after Paglione’s suspension, an inspection of the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia at Rome revealed that most of the instructors were inadequately qualified and that several of the staff, including the Director, Armando Giglio, were suspected of having lined their pockets by privately making use of the school’s facilities and selling its supplies, while allowing the cadets to put up with poor living conditions. It is notable that on receiving the inspection report, Bocchini scribbled over it: ‘Clear out the school at Rome from the Director to the guards.’83 Suggesting the police leadership’s fear that it had lost control over its training centres, the inspections at Rome and Caserta coincided with the creation of a Public Security Guard Training Schools Inspectorate, allowing more direct supervision of management and teaching activities. The Inspectorate

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also had the authority to intervene in recruitment and end-of-training examination procedures.84 Effectively, research conducted on the internal culture of the fascist police reveals, not unexpectedly, a contrast between the projected image of a powerful, efficient and technologically advanced organism made up of individuals who were dedicated to the fascist cause, and the reality of an institution which often found it difficult to match this in practice. Legislation passed in 1923 aimed to reinforce hierarchical controls over all state employees,85 and from 1927 police personnel could be sacked more easily. Yet there is little evidence that the quality of personnel improved during the dictatorship. Moreover, if many exponents of the regime saw ‘fascistisation’ and modernisation of the Italian police as one and the same, recruitment, promotion and training procedures bring to light the constraints and contradictions surrounding efforts to create an ideologically loyal institution. While membership of the Party did not become a requisite in state competitions until the end of 1932, it is likely that during the mid to late 1920s a number of appointments and promotions were politically motivated, though this was never a formal procedure. In a few cases, fascists who had never previously been employed in state administration were placed in positions of leadership. Significant here is the appointment of a fascist lawyer, Pietro Bruno, to whom I will refer on other occasions, as Questore in August 1927.86 The competition for police officials announced in January 1927 has been associated with the phenomenon of ventottismo, a term which identifies the influx of fascists to the state administration, particularly in the Foreign and Interior Ministries, between 1926 and 1928.87 This competition allowed recruitment the following year of police officials from among individuals without the standard law degree.88 Party membership, together with the qualifications of ‘first-hour’ fascist, squadrista, or legionario fiumano (veteran of Gabriele D’Annunzio’s 1919 expedition to liberate Fiume), though not mandatory, may have been advantageous for candidates. There is also evidence to suggest that a number of police officials were promoted during this period on account of their fascist credentials. This included individuals who had previously distinguished themselves by supporting the fascist movement and assisting its ascendancy to power. In spite of earlier-cited allegations concerning Turati’s attempts to personally interfere in policing matters, it is not easy to confirm how far the Party vetted these appointments. It is known that Turati sat on the appointments committee for two special state competitions held for the Foreign Ministry during this period,89 but information on the

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composition of Interior Ministry appointments committees is not easy to obtain. Even if Bocchini was pressurised into accepting political appointments, the ideological consequences are questionable. Turati’s reservations about the possibility of achieving a proper ‘fascistisation’ of the state in the short term were to some extent borne out by the fact that the individuals concerned were often reported as performing poorly in their jobs. For all his claims to want to clean up the Party, and to put an end to the practices of raccomandazioni (claims, moreover, which he personally failed to live up to),90 the possibility of career advancement of fascist personnel in the police was more often determined by the extent of their ability to make use of protectors in the Fascist Party or Government, not by professional or even political qualities. What is crucial here is that formal resistance against external ideological control over the police characterising the years of the dictatorship concealed an informal but contorted ‘fascistisation’ process, which exploited the pre-fascist system of patronage and which, on occasion, sacrificed professional criteria, inhibiting a much-desired modernisation of the police. In the above scenario, alongside ‘first-hour’ fascists, many other officials were able to gain in their careers by enlisting the support of fascist protectors. Some went to notable lengths to convince the regime of their fascist qualities in the hope of achieving promotions. In April 1925 Deputy Commissioner Ermindo Roselli requested that recognition be given of his role in bringing to justice two hundred ‘subversives’, considered responsible for a massacre of sailors and Carabinieri. Roselli claimed that as a result of the operation, which had taken place in the province of Empoli in 1921, he had dealt a blow to the revolutionary organisations in the most militant area of Tuscany, allowing its subsequent conquest by fascism.91 The fact that Roselli was promoted to Commissioner in January 1927, a period which saw the career advancement of several fascist officials, suggests that his political merits might have been recognised. If the establishment from October 1932 of compulsory Party membership for state appointments watered down the ideological value of the Party card, from the mid-1930s ‘first-hour’ fascists were for the first time given formal recognition of their political status in public employment. They were awarded a measure of priority, equal to that already enjoyed by war veterans, with Mussolini allowing up to half of available posts in the state bureaucracy to be reserved for them, as long as they had passed the entrance competitions. For such individuals, the maximum age limit for applying rose from thirty-five to thirtynine.92 New recruits and individuals already in the police who qualified

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as ‘first-hour’ fascists were awarded an extension of the period of recognised service (referred to as ‘anzianità fascista’, ‘vantaggi fascisti’ or ‘meriti fascisti’), calculated on the basis of the number of days from the date they had joined the Fascio di combattimento (local Party headquarters) up to the March on Rome (28 October 1922), which was advantageous for salary and pension calculations, and in promotion competitions.93 In July 1934 candidates for state jobs who had been injured or disabled fighting the ‘fascist cause’ (or whose fathers had been killed or injured), had taken part in the March on Rome, or had been members of the Party before the March on Rome, were added to the list of those (including war veterans and those injured in combat) already enjoying priority in entrance tests.94 How seriously the possession of fascist qualifications determined advantage over other candidates for recruitment and promotions to the police is questionable, given the additional categories of applicants enjoying preferential treatment. Aspiring Public Security guards who had been ‘first-hour’ fascists, beyond benefiting from ‘vantaggi fascisti’, saw the maximum age for applying rise from twenty-eight to thirtytwo,95 while those applicants who had been members of the Party Militia, the Carabinieri, the Customs and Excise Police (Guardia di Finanza) or prison guards, or were war veterans, benefited even more, with the age limit being increased to thirty-three.96 Nevertheless, career advantages for ‘first-hour’ fascists, particularly from the late 1930s, were often considerable. From February 1939, for example, they only needed to have completed half the prescribed minimum period of service as Public Security guards for entitlement to train as a vice-brigadiers.97 Theoretically, too, many individuals joining the police from the mid-1930s onwards would have undergone a fascist education whether at school and university or through membership of the regime’s youth organisations. University graduates joining the force at the deputy commissioner rank during the 1930s had commonly been members of the Party-controlled university students’ organisation, the Gruppi Universitari Fascisti (GUF), or had been active in other Party organs. To cite one case, Luigi Fiorentini, who started his career at the end of 1938, had previously been president of the fascist after-work organisation and leader (fiduciario) of one of the Party district sections (gruppi rionali) in his home town of Chievo (Verona).98 During the late 1930s, several demobilised blackshirt volunteers from the Ethiopian war joined the police too.99 By all appearances, the Interior Ministry Police leadership was not opposed to the influx of fascists, as long as the need for good

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professional qualities was not put in second place; the problem arose when the institutional loyalties of such individuals were in doubt. As illustrated in this volume, fascist personnel, particularly among the younger generations, often pushed for a more intensive politicisation of procedures. In reality, neither the system of ‘meriti fascisti’ introduced by the regime nor the recruitment of new cohorts of young fascists seriously threatened the ideological autonomy of the police. More importantly, perhaps, some fascists saw their status as granting them an automatic right to career privileges in spite of mediocre professional qualities. As in all realms of employment, requisites for admission to the police saw greater emphasis than previously on the political suitability of candidates. Moreover, for the first time a minimum academic qualification was expected. In liberal Italy, aspiring members of the Town Guard, and later the Royal Guard, had merely to ‘be able to read and write’. An examination of the files of aspiring Public Security guards in the Siena province dating back to the fascist years reveals the formal requirement that applicants had completed primary schooling, and were aged between twenty and twenty-eight, physically fit, unmarried and morally and politically suitable.100 As had always been customary in Italy, on receipt of a job application, the police requested the authority in the community where the applicant was resident (usually the Carabinieri or, where he resided in another province, the Questura) to supply them with information about him and an opinion regarding his suitability for employment in the force. Marking the introduction of more penetrative political vetting, inspired by racial considerations, during the fascist years the police requested data regarding not only the moral conduct and criminal record of applicants, but also their ideological orientation and mental health. In the case of applications to the Public Security Guard that I have studied, other than ascertaining whether candidates or relatives had militated in left-wing parties, those vetting the applications wished to know whether they were keen gamblers, drinkers or womanisers, and whether they, or members of their family, were suffering or had suffered from epilepsy or other illnesses ‘affecting mental faculties’.101 From the end of 1932 onwards, reports on applicants had to specify whether or not they were members of the Party or its youth organisations. From the autumn of 1938, following the passing of anti-Jewish legislation, confirmation that applicants belonged to the ‘Italian race’ was requested too. Though the documentation available does not always provide an indication of how frequently the recommendations provided were followed, it does give us an insight into the criteria applied when

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selecting Public Security guards. In the case of F. B., who applied in 1934, enrolment was discouraged on the grounds that the moral conduct of the applicant’s mother was questionable. She was allegedly involved in a relationship with (and had had a child by) a man married to another woman. Moreover, the applicant’s uncle had been sentenced to five years’ prison for fraud.102 In the case of Memo Cingottini, who applied the same year, the Carabinieri of Siena noted the applicant’s membership of the fascio giovanile (Party youth organisation) since April 1933 and the fact that he posed no problem in relation to alcohol and women. However, their report claimed that he was of a superficial character, and that he had a reputation for being work-shy, as a result of which he was unemployed – though this did not stop him from spending (and occasionally gambling) well beyond his family’s means. Moreover, his father, though a member of the Fascist Party, had been a ‘subversive’ during the ‘red period’, and had only joined out of expediency.103 Guido Gonnelli, a member of the Party since May 1934, received a glowing report from the Carabinieri of Montepulciano, who besides recommending his nomination, noted that he was a war orphan; but he did not pass the compulsory medical examination on account of being under the minimum prescribed height (1.65m).104 In December 1936, the Commander of the local Public Security Guard recommended against the enrolment of Alvaro Poggiolesi, on the grounds that, though of good political and moral standing, his father and uncle were both registered as anarchists.105 In the case of Leopoldo Chiavai, a member of the fascio giovanile, the Carabinieri of Montepulciano made a positive recommendation – on condition, however, that the competent authorities be prepared to overlook the ‘mental state’ of his aunt.106 It is evident that as part of the preliminary selection process, aspiring Public Security guards had to take a writing test at their local police headquarters. In February 1936 at the Questura at Siena, Carlo Cini was instructed to compose an imaginary letter explaining why he wished to join the force. His letter, partially reproduced below, if not necessarily reflecting his true motives, gives us a picture of the type of ideological protocol which dominated the fascist years: Dearest brother I have applied to enrol in the Public Security Guard. You cannot imagine my joy at the thought of being able to be part of the Public Security. I got through the medical check, and I have submitted all my certificates. As you know, I continue to study in order to improve my knowledge and I hope that all is successful and that I can serve the Fatherland as I have always desired … Please tell the Commander of the Young Fascists of

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my joy and tell him that as soon as possible I will also write to him and thank him for all he has done to educate me. Please speak to the [primary school] teacher at Sovicille, Mr Angelini, as well, and assure him that I will follow and take full account of his advice.107

If fascist affiliation was never a formal requisite for joining the police before 1932, from the moment that Party membership subsequently became compulsory, this alone did not guarantee recruitment. As some of the above examples suggest, equally, if not more, important were the moral standing and state of health of the applicant and his family and relatives. ‘Subversive’ relatives also undoubtedly posed problems for applicants. Those applicants to the Public Security Guard who passed the initial selection stage, including aptitude tests held in the capital, attended a six-month training course run by the police schools at Rome and Caserta. In line with demand for specialisation of police competencies which came with the dictatorship, the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia at Rome additionally ran courses allowing cadets to qualify as mechanics and telegraphists.108 There was nothing specifically fascist about training procedures, at least on paper. Any minor differences from earlier training programmes possibly reflected the desire to provide better quality training for the higher quality recruits anticipated. According to Article 22 of the Public Security Guard Regulations of 1936, the course offered cadets instruction in the Italian language; arithmetic; the Criminal Code and Public Security Code (and their execution); policing techniques; the internal regulations of the corps; codes of behaviour (in public and in private); hygiene and first aid; physical education, fencing and wrestling; and military instruction.109 At face value the course appears more or less identical to those offered during the liberal era, though with the additional training in hygiene and first aid, and wrestling, and with less emphasis placed on the need to teach cadets to write and read correctly.110 Performance in the course was assessed by the customary oral and written examinations. Cadets were then placed on a classification list according to the mark achieved. When two or more candidates were awarded the same mark, priority was given to those in possession of one or more of a wide range of ‘qualifications’. These included war veterans, those injured in combat, ex-members of other police corps, and, from 1934 onwards, ‘first-hour’ fascists, those injured fighting the fascist cause and the orphans of fallen fascist combatants. Implying the limited fascist penetration of police culture, the subjects on which candidates for posts as Public Security officials or employees were examined in state competitions remained primarily of a technical

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or juridical nature, though themes of more specific relevance to the new regime now featured alongside them. Candidates for posts or promotion at commissioner level, for example, might be expected to write or comment on aspects of the new social order of direct concern to the police profession, such as the fascist Public Security Law or legislation governing the Corporate State; candidates in competitions for clerical positions at the bottom of the police hierarchy were expected to show a knowledge of recent events of Italian history and of institutions of the new regime, such as the Fascist Grand Council. An examination of manuals and reference books gives us a picture of the professional and political culture disseminated through the ranks of the police during the fascist period. Indicating an ad hoc, if not confused, approach to the issue of how far to enforce fascist notions, training manuals and other police publications varied in the extent and intensity of references to the new social order. Some engaged directly with fascist ideology, treating the policing profession as inseparable from the new political order. Just as many merely featured the odd laudatory phrase or sentence, while others still were more or less devoid of direct references to fascism. This would confirm the limited control which the

2.3  Photograph marking the inauguration of a cohort of cadets at the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia, Caserta, July 1937. Source: Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Personale di Pubblica Sicurezza (1890–1973), Fascicoli Personale Fuori Servizio (1890–1966), versamento 1973, b. 158 bis, f. 2. By permission of the Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali. Authorised by the Archivio Centrale dello Stato, 2011, n. 961/2011.

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2.4  Cadets of the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia, Caserta, watching an amateur theatrical performance at the school (circa late 1930s). Source: Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Personale di Pubblica Sicurezza (1890–1973), Fascicoli Personale Fuori Servizio (1890–1966), versamento 1973, b. 158 bis, f. 2. By permission of the Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali. Authorised by the Archivio Centrale dello Stato, 2011, n. 961/2011.

fascist regime, and particularly the Party, was able to maintain over the internal culture of the police. What most publications had in common, however, was their focus on the new penal culture of the fascist state. They explained and justified the imposition of restrictions on individual liberties, as enshrined in the Criminal Code (1930) and Public Security Law (1926). Some publications were characterised by an elaboration of fascist ideas and their application to the policing profession. In Emilio Saracini’s Nuova pratica di polizia amministrativa, published in 1929, for example, the enhancement of police powers under fascism was directly linked to the failings of liberal democracy and Mussolini’s successful creation of an authoritarian state.111 Such levels of analysis were evident in some Carabinieri manuals as well. In the section outlining the corps’ institutional history, the Manuale d’Istruzione per il Carabiniere (1942) referred to its role in fighting communism alongside the fascist movement after the First World War. It mentioned that forty-two fallen carabinieri and another 460 injuries were a tangible testimony to the contribution of the corps to the fascist

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cause.112 The section went on to stress displays of heroism in the Ethiopian campaign and ‘the present [Second World] war, caused by the greed of the demo-plutocratic powers’.113 Subsequent parts of the manual were mainly of a technical and regulatory nature. However, the section on the ‘Constitutional Order of the State’ embarked upon an explanation of the ‘totalitarian’ and ‘ethical’ states underpinning the fascist regime, as well as the roles of the Fascist Party, the fascist Government, and the Fascist Grand Council.114 Other manuals emphasised the important social and moral functions of the regime’s organisations, which assisted the police in their task of preventing crime. This emerges in Luigi Salerno’s Enciclopedia di polizia, a reference book for Interior Ministry Police officials, Public Security guards and carabinieri published in 1938. The entry for ‘Partito Nazionale Fascista’ explained how the Party educated society in the values of the family, religion and the fatherland.115 The manual also applauded the role of the Balilla youth organisation in bringing up youngsters as fascists.116 How far these publications were imbued with fascist ideas probably depended less on the constraints of political conformism and more on the personal beliefs of their authors. The level to which training procedures were ‘fascistised’ was also more likely to have depended on the outlook of individual instructors. Though chosen primarily for their professional skills, several were ‘first-hour’ fascists. It is difficult to ascertain what specific criteria were applied in their selection. Those entrusted with the training of Public Security guards had a military background and in some cases had previously occupied command roles in the corps itself. Several had been decorated during the First World War. Ernesto Paglione, Director of the Caserta School, had a fascist background, having occupied the rank of Centurione of the Party Militia shortly after its creation. During his appointment, he remained proactive in the Party Federation at Naples.117 Bocchini may subsequently have regretted the choice of a fascist whose alleged open criticism of the Interior Ministry Police possibly derived from a sense of ideological superiority. By contrast, Paglione’s counterpart at the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia at Rome, Armando Giglio, a decorated war veteran, though distinguishing himself in service to the OVRA secret police before his appointment, does not appear to have been a Party figure. Although he had joined the Party in 1926, during the period in which membership had been banned, this was in all probability in order to obtain a promotion.118 Mimmo Franzinelli argues that Giglio’s appointment to the school indicates the OVRA’s influence in the training of police personnel in anti-fascist repression.119 The documentation considered in this chapter suggests how a number

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of weaknesses and contradictions come to the fore, in spite of calls at the time for more effective recruitment, training and promotions procedures in order to meet the requirements of a reinvigorated police at the service of the new social and political order. Selection methods did not mark a radical departure from the liberal period, though stricter vetting according to political and moral criteria may have had some impact. There is little evidence that better quality personnel were recruited during the fascist years. Quality was also inhibited by the dictates of political conformity and the politics of patronage when it came to recruitment and promotions, while professionalism and ‘fascistness’ were often erroneously seen as being one and the same. If training procedures reflected new forms of specialisation in policing, the researcher is left with the impression that instructors were left to their own devices when it came to determining the cultural and political outlook of future policemen under their care. Limited modifications to recruitment and training procedures in the regular police forces, as outlined above, hardly responded to the major overhaul of state employment which fascist reformers had envisaged. This was not purely an issue of how much ideological control could be exercised over the police, but more generally regarded the type of candidate and instruction required for the creation of an efficient bureaucracy to meet the demands of the new Corporate State. A government Committee for the Reform of Working Methods, set up in October 1928 and chaired by the Finance Minister, Alberto De Stefani, had proposed that selections in all realms of the state should be decided through a single competition, thus removing the direct influence of individual ministries over appointments, with candidates being directed to specific sectors of administration according to the particular abilities they demonstrated. On other issues relating to state administration, the Committee had proposed greater autonomy and responsibility for heads of sections in order to avoid a fractioning of tasks, the replacement of written forms of communication between offices with telephones, and the use of shorthand and typewriters when written correspondence was indispensible.120 Rejection of the Committee’s final report by the Personnel Office of the Interior Ministry reflected in all probability the latter’s need to jealously preserve its traditional functions and hierarchical structure.121 This is partly an illustration of how modernising impulses were resisted during the fascist years. There was a clear contradiction between the increase in external scrutiny and greater individual responsibility proposed by the Committee and the reinforcement of the principle of strict hierarchical control which fascism had brought to the state

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administration in 1923.122 Nevertheless, as Melis notes, it was above all the organs of the police which remained sensitive to issues relating to the rationalisation of work practices, when a general reform of the traditional institutions of the state failed.123 Bocchini’s re-organisation in 1927 of the General Directorate of Public Security was a clear response to the need for rationalisation in the face of extended responsibilities which came with the dictatorship. This saw, for example, the creation of a new Political Division (POLPOL), an Armed Police Forces Division, a Contract and Provisions Management Division employing technical staff and a Frontier and Transport Division.124 If, as will be demonstrated in subsequent chapters, performance in the regular police organs did not always live up to the modernising expectations of the regime and promoters of reform, there are signs of greater success in more specialist areas of policing. Fascist support of scientific policing experiments at the Scuola Superiore di Polizia provides an example of the close association between the regime’s ideological programme and desires for professional advancement from within the police. Since the turn of the century, under the directorship of the school’s founder, Salvatore Ottolenghi (a disciple of the criminologist, Cesare Lombroso), courses had instructed on how to apply anthropological, physiological and psychological theories to the identification and treatment of delinquents.125 Advocates of reform, like Giuseppe Alongi, had since the end of the previous century urged more widespread application of such techniques to reduce crime. Scientific policing appealed to the Fascists in view of its supposed contribution to the moral renewal of Italian society and the invigoration of the Italian race. The modern, progressive and technocratic image of scientific policing fitted with their view of the ‘Revolution’.126 The benefits which scientific policing gained from the support of an authoritarian regime are manifest in the enforcement of more systematic use than previously of the cartella biografica del pregiudicato, a dossier for the recording of detailed information on the physical, mental and social characteristics of criminals.127 Ottolenghi’s strong sympathies for the regime gave the courses at the school a fascist hallmark. Hence he told course participants in 1928: When science is applied with the greatest conviction it becomes faith, it identifies itself with discipline. Faith and discipline are the symbols of Fascism, Fascism which, you youngsters should remember, is no longer a party but personifies the State and Regime which, you should remember, you have to worthily represent in every task you execute.128

Yet a reading of publications produced by the school suggests that

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it is unlikely that fascist ideology seriously diverted the direction of scientific policing. The school certainly served some of the more sinister aspects of fascism. Notable in this respect was the promotion of the cartella biografica del pregiudicato for racial purposes in the colonies by one of the younger instructors, Pietro Bianconi.129 However, such developments can hardly be separated from Lombrosian theories on which the school was founded. As Mary Gibson points out: The theory of scientific policing changed little with the advent of fascism … Ottolenghi and his colleagues served all governments with equal fervor, taking advantage of the authoritarian power offered them by Mussolini to strengthen the position of the school within the PS [Interior Ministry Police] bureaucracy. They welcomed a regime that accepted their premise that biology was the key to human behavior and cooperated in using the tools of scientific policing to identify ‘inferior’ racial groups, like blacks and Jews, as socially dangerous.130

Underpinning the dubiousness of any correlation between a specifically fascist outlook and scientific policing, the level of commitment to fascism of instructors at the school varied, with many collaborating with fascism more out of professional opportunism than ideological commitment.131 Although the school would distinguish itself during the fascist period as a major institution of advanced policing techniques, one of the main arguments in this study, developed in the chapters that follow, is that such facets of modernisation were less easily applied to the daily work of the regular police forces, particularly in the provinces. In a similar vein, if high-ranking police personnel enjoyed greater autonomy and responsibilities than previously, their energies and careers were often channelled into those new organisations (the POLPOL and the OVRA) considered indispensible for safeguarding the fascist regime.132 Conclusion This chapter has demonstrated how, beyond a formal integration with the fascist regime, the level of ideological engagement exercised within the Interior Ministry Police was not governed by a coherent policy, when it came to such issues as recruitment, training and professional practice. The entry of fascists to the police, though somewhat facilitated in comparison to other candidates, hardly corresponded to desires to transform the force, often being determined by personal raccomandazioni. While the leadership protected the police from excessive interference by the Party, the amount of direct control it exercised over

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how instructors and commanders engaged with fascist ideas is dubious. Bocchini accepted, or was forced to tolerate, the voicing of radical fascist positions within the police, or even discussion which potentially brought into question the political credentials of his institution, in the belief that this would in practice carry little weight. Illustrating Bocchini’s toleration of radical positions, a number of articles appearing in Il magistrato dell’ordine during the mid to late 1930s, published by ‘first-hour’ fascists and younger generations of fascist recruits, called for a more thorough process of ‘fascistisation’ of the police. Their pronouncements, which are examined in detail in Chapter 5, may be considered in the context of efforts, undertaken particularly by the Party, to complete construction of the totalitarian state and ‘fascistisation’ of Italian society.133 Whatever the official enthusiasm of these fascists, one often perceives in their writings a sense of frustration regarding the slow pace of change. As addressed in Chapter 4 of this volume, their criticism was partly borne out by the reality of practical difficulties and technical deficiencies which the regular forces of the Interior Ministry Police faced, as well as by frequent examples of unprofessional behaviour and petty corruption in police circles which hardly reflected the fascist ideal of dedication to Duce and fatherland. Even so, such behaviour can hardly be attributed to limited Party influence or incomplete ‘fascistisation’, being a more general reflection of the nature of fascist society as a whole. Unravelling the issue of how far the Carabinieri were ‘fascistised’ is not facilitated by lack of accessible documentation. While there is evidence of ‘first-hour’ fascists joining the Carabinieri, institutional policy regarding recruitment is unclear. The literature of the corps, as exemplified by manuals, journals and newspapers, reveals a high level of identification with the regime and engagement with fascist ideology, also exemplified by participation in fascist rituals, though this should be interpreted with caution. Journals and newspapers of the Carabinieri did not appear to engage seriously with the issue of ‘fascistisation’ of their personnel. This would denote the confidence, if not aloofness, of an organisation with a deep-rooted esprit de corps, as well as its historic loyalty to the crown.134 At this point in my study, a brief comparison with the Nazi police is warranted. In the first place, indicating a number of parallels with the Italian situation, from the late 1920s onwards a combination of political sympathy, hostility towards the Left, professional difficulties and ambiguous government policy accounted for notable levels of support from within the Weimar police for Hitler’s Nazi movement.135 After Hitler came to power in January 1933, in spite of the removal

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of officers and commissioners known for their loyalty to the Weimar Republic, there was a high level of carry-over of personnel.136 This was not dissimilar to what happened in Italy following the March on Rome. Yet the scenario described in this chapter contrasts with the Nazi programme for transformation of the German police. Although Hitler’s law and order system relied on the expertise of police professionals, there was a more determined process of ‘Nazification’ of personnel, as Heinrich Himmler, Reich SS Leader and Chief of Police within the Reich Ministry of Interior, centralised the police forces and fused them into the Third Reich’s elite formations of SS (Schutzstaffeln). This process, though only initially achieved at the top, and pursued at different levels of intensity according to the police forces concerned, was gradually consolidated through the awarding of SS membership to police personnel, and through the infiltration of Nazis into the police.137 By 1941, 30% of all officers of the ‘regular’ uniformed police belonged to the SS; 66% were members of the Nazi Party, with 20% of these being alte Kämpfer (NSDAP members before Hitler came to power).138 If the incorporation of police personnel into the SS did not always indicate genuine conversion to Nazism,139 the impact of the infiltration of Nazis into the police can hardly be understated, especially since ‘the control of key areas of the state police, especially in the Security Police, was fully in the hands of fanatical SS leaders’.140 Moreover, all German policemen were regularly instructed in Nazi ideology, and by the mid-1930s a branch of the SS was entrusted with this task.141 According to Edward Westermann, from 1937 training directors selected for indoctrination of the police had to hold SS-leadership ranks, while the lecturers had to be recruited principally from the ranks of the SS. Ideological training, which initially included weekly meetings and a monthly propaganda lecture, was from June 1940 intensified to several indoctrination sessions per week.142 Thus, in contrast to fascist Italy, the German police were subjected to more exacting political control, whether through their centralisation and structuring under the umbrella of the SS, regular indoctrination, or the use of political personnel to ensure compliance in the enforcement of Nazi policy. As later chapters illustrate, in the context in which the Fascist Party was barred from directly influencing the police forces, fascists in Mussolini’s police did not enjoy the same status or importance as their Nazi counterparts. If they occupied high-profile positions, this was more often coincidental and hardly determined by any ideological design. Yet, in spite of such shortfalls, the extent to which Italian police personnel were influenced by fascist theories should not be understated either. The following two chapters focus on the daily professional activities

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of Public Security personnel and the Carabinieri in the community. The behaviour and attitudes of policemen were determined not only by the level of hierarchical and ideological supervision they were subjected to. Their conduct and loyalties equally depended on the particular nature of the tasks they were entrusted with, the environment in which they performed their duties, the availability of supporting resources, the quality of their lives and the welfare of their families, as well as the cultural baggage they carried over from the liberal regime. Notes 1 Canali, Le spie del regime, p. 33. 2 Canali, Le spie del regime, p. 60 and note 125. According to Canali, 7 questori, 4 vice questori, and 31 commissioners and deputy commissioners were retired as a consequence of Decree-law 33 of 9 January 1927. Another 52 officials were subsequently retired. 3 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 38, f. Camilleri Carmelo. 4 Franzinelli, I tentacoli dell’OVRA, pp. 77–81. 5 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 38, f. Camilleri Carmelo, 016972 Capo Polizia to Prefetto Siena, 2 August 1927. 6 ‘XVIII Ottobre 1928’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 5:11 (1928), 173–4. 7 Giornale LUCE B0157, 28 October 1932. Footage of police ceremonies, conserved at the Archivio Storico LUCE, Rome, may be viewed online: www.archivioluce.com/. 8 Giornale LUCE B1184, 20 October 1937. 9 Il Messaggero, 19 October 1933, reproduced in ‘La festa della polizia’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 10:11 (1933), 165–7. 10 ‘La festa della polizia’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 10:11 (1933), 165–8 (168). 11 ‘La festa della polizia’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 9:11 (1932), 171–3. 12 H. Reiter, ‘I progetti degli alleati per una riforma della polizia in Italia (1943–1947)’, Passato e presente, 15:42 (1997), 37–64 (41). 13 E. Saracini, ‘La festa della polizia’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 13:11 (1936), 133–4. 14 Oliva, Storia dei Carabinieri, p. 187. 15 Ibid., pp. 187–9. See also ‘Il Monumento al Carabiniere’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 10:11 (1933), 168–9; M. Murat, Il Carabiniere (Piacenza: Apuana, 1935), pp. 202–3, 205–6. 16 Murat, Il Carabiniere, pp. 216–18. 17 ‘Nel Palazzo di Parte Guelfa a Firenze’, L’Arma fedelissima, 4:4 (1 February 1937), 1–2. 18 See, for example, Murat, Il Carabiniere, p. 9; Legione Territoriale Carabinieri Reali – Bari. Ufficio Comando, Manuale d’Istruzione per il Carabiniere (Bari: Laterza, 1942), p. 3. 19 A. Nastri, ‘I Sacerdoti dello Stato’, Arma e dovere, 28 June 1932, 3.

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20 ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 16, f. Obbligo del Saluto. As members of an armed force, Public Security guards were instructed only to use the Roman salute when addressing officials wearing the state uniform. 21 See, for example, Bocchini’s order that questori should attend Police Day celebrations in the capital wearing the black shirt, in Archivio di Stato di Siena, Gabinetto Prefettura (1865–1945), (hereafter ASS, GP), b. 31 (1934), Cat. 7 Personale di PS, 333/9018, Divisione Personale Pubblica Sicurezza (hereafter DP), Sezione 1a (pel Ministro Arturo Bocchini) to Prefetti Regno/Alto Commissario, Napoli, 2 September 1934. 22 ASS, Questura (1930–1952), (hereafter ASS, Q), filza 161 (1935), Cat. E.3 Varie, f. Distintivi di grado, di servizio e di categoria. See also Circolare 800-9820-K 3, 7 March 1939 Ministero Interno (Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Forze Armate di Polizia), reproduced in Il magistrato dell’ordine, 16:5 (1939), 49. 23 For the introduction of the Roman salute and step throughout the fascist state, see S. Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle. The Aesthetics of Power in Mussolini’s Italy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), pp. 110–16. 24 Decree-law, 5 September 1938, n. 1524. 25 According to Falasca-Zamponi (Fascist Spectacle, p. 240, note 49), in ancient Rome the eagle preceded the legionnaires. 26 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Segreteria Capo della Polizia, (hereafter, ACS, SCP), Cat. IV, b. 4, f. Uniforme Funzionari di Polizia. Police uniforms were also distinguished from other state uniforms by amaranth-coloured edges to the epaulets and braiding on the caps. 27 Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle, p. 103. 28 Cited in Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle, p. 242, note 66. 29 E. Gentile, La via italiana al totalitarismo. Il partito e lo Stato nel regime fascista (Rome: La Nuova Italia Scientifica, 1995), pp. 162–4; S. Battente, Alfredo Rocco. Dal nazionalismo al fascismo 1907–1935 (Milan: FrancoAngeli, 2005), p. 364, note 25. 30 Gentile, La via italiana al totalitarismo, p. 169. 31 R. De Felice, Mussolini il fascista, Vol.2, L’organizzazione dello Stato fascista, 1925–1929 (Turin: Einaudi, 1968), pp. 62–3; Battente, Alfredo Rocco, p. 364, note 25. 32 A. J. De Grand, The Italian Nationalist Association and the Rise of Fascism in Italy (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1978), p. 173. 33 Battente, Alfredo Rocco, p. 364. 34 Ibid., pp. 374–81; De Felice, Mussolini il fascista, Vol. 2, pp. 211–12. 35 Gentile, La via italiana al totalitarismo, p. 177. 36 De Felice, Mussolini il fascista, Vol. 2, p. 196. 37 For the prohibition of AGFPI membership for Interior Ministry personnel, see P. Morgan, ‘The Prefects and Party–State Relations in Fascist Italy’, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 3:3 (1998), 241–72 (255); Salvati, Il

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regime e gli impiegati, pp. 165, 191–2. See also entry for ‘Associazioni sindacali’ in L. Salerno, Enciclopedia di polizia (Milan: Fratelli Bocca Editori, 1938), pp. 89–90. 38 D. L. Germino, The Italian Fascist Party in Power. A Study in Totalitarian Rule (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1959), p. 119. Germino mainly refers to the memoirs of one of Bocchini’s principle collaborators, Guido Leto, as his source. It is plausible that Leto overstressed Party interference in policing matters in order to minimise the responsibility of career personnel. For the organisation of POLPOL, see Canali, Le spie del regime, pp. 59–86. 39 A. Macchi (ed.), 1927. Il diario di un ministro del fascismo. Luigi Federzoni (Florence: Passigli Editori, 1993), p. 123. 40 Germino, The Italian Fascist Party in Power, p. 119. 41 Canali, Le spie del regime, pp. 61–2. 42 S. Lupo, Il fascismo. La politica in un regime totalitario (Rome: Donzelli, 2000), p. 214. Lupo also notes that Bocchini began his career by putting himself under the protection of Farinacci. 43 See, for example, Lupo’s references to alliances between Farinacci and state officials, in ibid., pp. 214–15. 44 See I. G. Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”: Arturo Bocchini, the Fascist OVRA, and the Italian Police Tradition’ (Ph.D dissertation, University of Rochester, New York, 1996), pp. 13–14. Savella notes that Buffarini Guidi, appointed as Undersecretary of the Interior in 1932, diminished Bocchini’s influence over Mussolini by reducing his visits to the dictator’s office from daily to weekly. 45 For a detailed description, see ibid., pp. 198–207. 46 Ibid., p. 205. 47 Ibid., pp. 207–10. 48 Dunnage, The Italian Police, p. 159. 49 Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, pp. 212–13. Savella raises doubts about whether the alleged control system worked. He suggests that ‘it may be possible that Bocchini simply let the rumour about the system fly in order to intimidate apprehensive voters’ (p. 212). My own earlier research on the province of Bologna reveals that Bocchini was concerned to find a means which would allow fascists inside polling stations to check how people voted and that he wrote to the Government with suggestions relating to this. See Archivio di Stato di Bologna, Gabinetto Prefettura, Cat. 5, Elezioni Amministrative dei Comuni, Elezioni politiche, 1924, 321 Gab. Prefetto Bologna to Presidenza del Consiglio, 28 January 1924. 50 Dunnage, The Italian Police, p. 160. 51 Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, pp. 220–5 (p. 222). 52 Ibid., pp. 213–14. 53 Ibid., p. 226. 54 Collin, ‘Police and Internal Security’, p. 430. 55 Lupo, Il fascismo, pp. 213–14.

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56 De Felice, Mussolini il fascista, Vol. 2, pp. 464–5. 57 Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, pp. 199, 205. 58 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 151, f. Roselli Ermindo, letter from Prefetto Ascoli Piceno to DGPS, 12 April 1927. 59 See Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, pp. 228–39. 60 E. Saracini, ‘Ciò che resta da fare…’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 7:7 (1930), 97. 61 R. Di Rienzo, ‘Burocrazia problema di Stato’, reproduced in Il magistrato dell’ordine, 7:9 (1930), 130–1, originally published in Il pubblico impiego, 4:13 (1–14 July 1930), 8. 62 The ban on membership for Public Security guards was only lifted in 1934. 63 Morgan, ‘The Prefects and Party–State Relations’, 254–5. 64 Ibid., 255. 65 See E. Lolini, ‘L’iscrizione alle Associazioni fasciste’, Le forze civili, 4.3 (March 1934), 1. 66 This was sanctioned by Decree-law 1743 of 24 June 1937, which revoked the relevant prohibitive articles of Decree-law 563 of April 1926, and by the foglio disposizoni PNF n. 903 of 13 November 1937. 67 ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 9, f. Associazione Nazionale Fascista del Pubblico Impiego, telegram 333/1721 from Ministero Interno (Bocchini) to Prefetti Regno, 16 January 1938. 68 This is evident from correspondence contained in ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 8, f. 9071–21. 69 ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 20, f. Impiegati dello Stato iscritti alla Milizia Volontaria chiamati in servizio di PS. 70 ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 20, f. 9007–3 MVSN quesiti. 71 Ibid., f. Funzionari e impiegati PS. Iscrizione alla MVSN. 72 Ibid., f. Funzionari ed agenti non debbono essere iscritti alla MVSN, telegram 17987/442 Ministero Interno (Bocchini) to Prefetti Regno, Questore Roma, 3 June 1936. 73 ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 9, f. Sabato fascista. In an anonymous letter dated 1 February 1936, addressed to Mussolini, a group of Public Security office employees described themselves as fascists working in the spirit of the new climate modelled on the ‘Roman style’ who were not prepared to tolerate slavish work conditions imposed by their bosses. 74 See G. Melis, Storia dell’amministrazione italiana, 1861–1993 (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1996), pp. 314–15. 75 Germino, The Italian Fascist Party in Power, p. 94. Germino quoted Arendt from C. J. Friedrich (ed.), Totalitarianism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard, 1954), pp. 336–7. 76 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 158 bis, f. 2, Scuola Tecnica di Polizia Caserta, Numerico Unico, Giuramento III Corso, September 1928. 77 Ibid., ‘La cerimonia del giuramento’. 78 Ibid., Roberto Diana, allievo del 3° corso, ‘Rito’.

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79 The Battle of Vittorio Veneto marked the final Italian victory against the Austrians in the First World War. 80 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 158 bis, f. 3, letter signed ‘I componenti il Reparto Permanente della Scuola Allievi di Caserta’, dated 6 February 1939. Details of the investigation are available in b. 158 bis, f. 2 and f. 3. 81 See ibid., b. 158 bis, f. 2, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza (hereafter DGPS), DP, Foglio di addebiti, 22 January 1940. 82 Paglione also stated that he had fallen victim to Bocchini because of his open criticism of the Interior Ministry Police. In May 1943, the fascist Prefect and Militia Commander Giovanni Mosconi supported such a hypothesis in a letter to the fascist Chief of Police, Renzo Chierici. Yet, well into the 1950s, the Interior Ministry Police rejected any suggestion that Paglione was a victim of persecution and upheld the original charges. For a more detailed analysis, see J. Dunnage, ‘Ideology, Clientelism and the “Fascistisation” of the Italian State: Fascists in the Interior Ministry Police’, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 14:3 (2009), 267–84 (277–9). 83 ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 16, f. Istituzione dell’Ispett.to Gen. per le Scuole Allievi Guardie di PS, Ispettore Generale di Pubblica Sicurezza (hereafter IGPS) (Giuseppe Cocchia) to Capo Polizia, 4 December 1939. 84 ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 16, f. Istituzione dell’Ispett.to Gen. per le Scuole Allievi Guardie di PS. 85 Notably Decree-law 2960 of 30 December 1923. 86 M. Missori, Governi, alte cariche dello stato, alti magistrati e prefetti del Regno d’Italia (Rome: Ministero per i beni culturali e ambientali, 1989), p. 609. 87 For an analysis of ventottismo, see A. Aquarone, L’organizzazione dello stato totalitario (Turin: Einaudi, 1965), pp. 73–4. The terms ventottismo and ventottista referred to the year in which these appointments reached their peak, 1928. 88 The association of the competition with ventottismo is referred to by A. Osti Guerrazzi, Poliziotti. I direttori dei campi di concentramento italiani 1940–1943 (Rome: Cooper, 2004), p. 65 and note 3. 89 Morgan, ‘The Prefects and Party–State Relations’, 254. 90 R. J. B. Bosworth, Mussolini’s Italy. Life under the Dictatorship, 1915–1945 (London: Allen Lane, 2005), pp. 237, 249. According to Lupo (Il fascismo, p. 367), Turati himself used his position to favour his supporters in his native province of Brescia, by obtaining disproportionately large subsidies for public works. 91 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 151, f. Roselli Ermindo, letter from Roselli to Interior Minister, 29 April 1925. 92 Morgan, ‘The Prefects and Party-State Relations’, 255. 93 Decree-law 1706 of 13 December 1933. 94 Decree-law 1176 of 5 July 1934: Graduatoria dei titoli di preferenza per le ammissioni ai pubblici impieghi.

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95 Salerno, Enciclopedia di polizia, ‘Corpo degli Agenti di Pubblica Sicurezza’, pp. 298–301. 96 Article 6, Regolamento per il Corpo degli agenti di Pubblica Sicurezza (Rome: Istituto Poligrafico dello Stato, 1936). 97 See Decree-law 513 of 16 February 1939: Modificazioni alle norme che regolano l’ammissone al corso di vice-brigadiere. 98 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 155 bis, f. Fiorentini Luigi. 99 This was the case of Antonio Colasurdo who became Deputy Commissioner in 1937, after having served in the 3rd Blackshirt (Camicie Nere) Division in Ethiopia between September 1935 and April 1937 (ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 21, f. Colasurdo Antonio). 100 Regolamento per il Corpo degli Agenti di Pubblica Sicurezza (1936). 101 ASS, Q, filza 94 (1934), Cat. C.10 Agenti. 102 Ibid. In cases where personal information of a sexual nature is disclosed, I have supplied the initials rather than the names of the individuals concerned. 103 Ibid., f. Cingottini Memo (Cat. C.12). 104 Ibid., f. Gonnelli Guidi (Cat. C.12). 105 ASS, Q, filza 356 (1937), Aspiranti Agenti PS, f. Poggiolesi Alvaro (Cat. C.12). 106 ASS, Q, filza 255 (1936), Cat. C.12 Agenti di PS, f. Leopoldo Chiavai. 107 ASS, Q, filza 356 (1937), Cat. C.12 Aspiranti Agenti PS, f. Cini Carlo. 108 According to Carucci (‘L’organizzazione dei servizi di polizia’, 99, notes 1 and 2), the Interior Ministry was authorised in 1927 to create separate units of guards entrusted with technical competencies, distinguishing them from guards employed in the Public Security offices. 109 Cadets at the school in Rome were also instructed in urban policing. 110 For a comparison here with the Town Guard, see Article 34 of the Testo Unico del Regolamento pel Corpo delle Guardie di Città (Rome: Tipografia delle Mantellate, 1914). 111 L. Miranda (Prefetto del Regno), ‘Le premesse del Nuovo Diritto di Polizia’, in E. Saracini, Nuova pratica di polizia amministrativa (Naples: Elpis, 1929), p. v. 112 Manuale d’Istruzione per il Carabiniere, p. 7. 113 Ibid., p. 8. 114 Ibid., pp. 189–92. 115 Salerno, Enciclopedia di polizia, ‘Partito Nazionale Fascista’, pp. 684–9. 116 Ibid., ‘Balilla’, pp. 115–16. 117 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 158 and b. 158 bis. 118 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 298, f. Giglio Armando. It is hardly a coincidence that Giglio joined the Fascist Party on 30 March 1926, the day before he was promoted to commander of the Public Security Guard. 119 Franzinelli, I tentacoli dell’OVRA, p. 563. 120 Melis, Due modelli di amministrazione, pp. 220–30. 121 Ibid., pp. 223–4, 230.

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122 Ibid., pp. 219–20, 230–1. 123 Ibid., pp. 233–4, and note 118. 124 Carucci, ‘L’organizzazione dei servizi di polizia’, 97–8. 125 For a detailed analysis of the development of scientific policing in Italy and of the school, see M. Gibson, Born to Crime. Cesare Lombroso and the Origins of Biological Criminology (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2002), particularly pp. 135–51. 126 C.  Emsley, Crime, Police and Penal Policy. European Experiences 1750–1940 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 257. 127 For instructions in the use of the cartella biografica del pregiudicato, see Salerno, Enciclopedia di polizia, pp. 160–74. 128 Reproduced in S. Ottolenghi, ‘La preparazione del Funzionario di PS e la Polizia Scientifica’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 11:11 (1928), 174–5. Tosatti argues that Salvatore Ottolenghi was an enthusiastic convert to fascism (‘La repressione del dissenso politico’, 250, note 125). 129 P. Bianconi, ‘Il servizio della cartella biografica del pregiudicato nella polizia coloniale ai fini anche razziali’, paper given at Congresso di Medicina Legale e delle Assicurazioni e dell’Antropologia Criminale, Naples 30–31 May 1940, in ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 152 bis, f. Bianconi Pietro. 130 Gibson, Born to Crime, p. 151. 131 Ibid. 132 The careers of police officials working for the POLPOL and the OVRA are detailed in Canali, Le spie del regime. 133 For the increase in fascism’s totalitarian impulses during the 1930s, see Gentile, La via italiana al totalitarismo, p. 137. 134 For a more detailed analysis, see Oliva, Storia dei Carabinieri, pp. 185–6. 135 For a more detailed comparison, see J. Dunnage, ‘Policing Right-Wing Dictatorships: Some Preliminary Comparisons of Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany and Franco’s Spain’, Crime, Histoire & Sociétés/Crime, History & Societies, 10:1 (2006), 93–122 (97–9). 136 For a detailed analysis, see ibid., 108–9. 137 For a detailed analysis, see M. Broszat, The Hitler State. The Foundation and Development of the Internal Structure of the Third Reich (London: Longman, 1981), pp. 270–7. For recruitment of police members into the SS, see H. Buchheim, ‘The SS – Instrument of Domination’, in H. Krausnick et al., Anatomy of the SS State (London: Collins, 1968), pp. 125–301 (203–13). For the facilitation of entry to the police of SS, SA and Stahlhelm members, see E. B. Westermann, ‘“Ordinary Men” or “Ideological Soldiers”? Police Battalion 310 in Russia, 1942’, German Studies Review, 21:1 (1998), 41–68 (44–6). 138 Westermann, ‘“Ordinary Men” or “Ideological Soldiers”?’, 46. 139 According to Buchheim, ‘The SS – Instrument of Domination’, p. 213, Himmler was anxious to attract the maximum number of members of the Ordnungspolizei (Schutzpolizei, municipal police, fire brigade and

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administrative police) into the SS, though insisting on more careful selection of candidates from the Sicherheitspolizei (Gestapo and Kriminalpolizei). 140 Broszat, The Hitler State, p. 277. 41 R.  Gellately, Backing Hitler. Consent and Coercion in Nazi Germany 1 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), p. 23. 142 Westermann, ‘“Ordinary Men” or “Ideological Soldiers”?’, 44–5.

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3 Oppression and consensus-building: policing communities in fascist Italy Mussolini’s policemen

Policing communities in fascist Italy

Though endowing the police with greater powers and bringing opportunities for reform, the fascist dictatorship increased the burden and breadth of police tasks. This saw, above all, an intensification in political policing, determined by a wider definition than previously of what constituted ‘anti-national’ activity. Partly based on a detailed case study of the province and city of Siena, this chapter examines the function and activities of members of the regular forces of Mussolini’s police in Italian communities. As well as considering the impact of the dictatorship on the working lives of police personnel, the chapter analyses how fascism determined their relationship with the public. Given the new scenario in which the regime invested the Fascist Party with functions of social control and education, the chapter additionally examines the relationship between police units and fascist organisations at the community level, bearing in mind that policemen and blackshirts may have been allies in their repression of political ‘subversion’ but they were often rivals in authority. Controlling communities Many of the daily activities which the police undertook during the fascist period were barely different to those of the liberal era. They still had to prevent and detect crime and be available when called to intervene at the scene of incidents. They still had to deal with calamities and public order emergencies, including strikes and protests which, though declared illegal, continued well into the 1930s. As in the past, they were expected to be present at public events, whether ceremonies, community festivals or theatrical performances, and they were responsible for carrying out such bureaucratic tasks as the issuing of passports and property rental licences. Inevitably, political policing, though a key aspect of liberal public order policy, took up an increasing amount of energy of the regular

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police forces, particularly those commissioners, Public Security guards and office clerks employed in the sphere of ‘public order and political services’ of the questure.1 During the early years of the regime, as would be expected, police operations focused particularly on the elimination of underground dissidence. Figures found in the files of the Interior Ministry Police reveal that as part of the regime’s battle against organised anti-fascism, during the week of 11–18 January 1930, the Milan police carried out 4,058 visits to public premises (shops, restaurants, taverns, etc.), 325 arrests, 54 of which resulted in formal charges, 986 body searches and 67 house searches, as well as confiscating a fire-arm and a batch of ‘illegal’ printed material.2 Similar measures were carried out in other major urban centres. These operations, once underground anti-fascist organisations had from the early 1930s been largely disbanded, became less intensive but never disappeared altogether. They were supported by systematic and highly penetrative surveillance measures which, if particularly affecting dissidents, aimed to establish the firm control of the state over all citizens. In liberal Italy police officers and officials had spent a good part of their energies controlling mass political and labour movements. This had often involved maintaining order at the scenes of strikes and protests. During the dictatorship, in the context of the outlawing of the political opposition and the banning of strikes, they were less likely to have to deal with mass protest, especially once underground anti-fascist organisations had been infiltrated and broken up. In place of this, checking and monitoring activities took up much more of their time, focusing not merely on underground anti-fascism, but extending over a far wider range of citizens, and social, religious and ethnic groups. Policemen monitored all foreign citizens, including tourists, in their areas of jurisdiction. From the mid-1930s onwards, in the context of the invasion of Ethiopia and Italy’s growing alignment with Nazi Germany, they intensified surveillance of citizens of ‘enemy’ nations, including British nationals and foreign Jews. Following the Race Laws of 1938, Italian Jews were subject to similar measures. Policemen also engaged in the surveillance of the local fascist environment in order to detect dissidence. Reflecting the regime’s fear of religious orders as rival centres of political influence, they checked the movements and actions of the clergy and Catholic organisations, as well as members of minority religions.3 Under the dictatorship, political policing saw a broadening of areas of intervention, which reflected in some instances intensification of liberal policy and in others new strategies. Examples of the former

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included efforts to prevent sexual ‘deviancy’ and illegal abortion, ‘crimes’ which were now policed in defence of the Italian race and carried higher penalties than previously. Regular reports on crime levels supplied by the provincial police forces show the importance which the fascist regime gave to the prevention of abortion, rape, ‘obscene’ acts and corruption of minors.4 Marking something of a departure from past duties, the police played a significant role in monitoring Fascist Party organisations in order to ensure their correct functioning and ability to attract the support of the local population; though the police had previously assisted the Prefect in keeping government-supporting parties in good health, this had never amounted to such levels of supervision and control. While the liberal police had been empowered to enforce censorship measures, these intensified notably during the fascist period, as the regime established tighter control over cultural manifestations and the dissemination of information. The files of the Questura of Siena illustrate the practical implications of the creation of a police state for Public Security personnel. The provincial police authorities were expected to keep tabs on the movements of political suspects and trace those whose whereabouts were unknown, and this often involved liaising with colleagues in other provinces. If, for example, a listed ‘subversive’ undertook a journey, his/her arrival at the designated place of destination and subsequent departure had to be confirmed by the relevant police authority. Illustrating the volume of procedures of this type undertaken, in 1934, the Sienese police carried out 891 routine checking procedures regarding registered ‘subversives’, and 607 regarding foreigners. While these figures may not seem excessive, a further 1,188 procedures concerned more thorough investigative measures provoked by suspicious behaviour. As a result of these activities, there was an inevitable increase in bureaucratic work for staff employed in the offices and archives of the questure, as the details of procedures had to be recorded. This need was partly met by the provision in January 1927 of an extra eight hundred posts for office staff nationwide.5 In line with the new demands of the dictatorship, the political register of the police, re-organised during the late 1920s and for the occasion re-named the Casellario Politico Centrale, was flanked by new ones, several of which had, however, been temporarily employed during the liberal period. The register for foreigners had been set up during the First World War. The Servizio Anagrafico, created at the end of the nineteenth century, allowed the continuous monitoring of the inhabitants of each area, including those staying in hotels and rented accommodation. Registers of political suspects (Schedario delle Carte di Identità), and priests were also

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adopted.6 An examination of the files of the Questura of Siena additionally reveals the adoption of registers for dangerous individuals (to be temporarily arrested when security measures tightened, such as the visit of a Government minister or member of the Royal Family), individuals with a criminal record (pregiudicati), fugitives (latitanti), ‘suspects’ living abroad, Jewish refugees (from 1933), British citizens (from 1935) and gypsies. These registers had to be regularly updated as the situations of the individuals concerned changed. This involved cross-checking between registers and against information provided by the central police headquarters in Rome and other questure. Police officers spent a considerable amount of time checking the identities of visitors from outside the province. Before the dictatorship, hotel owners and landlords had been obliged to inform the local police of the names of their guests within twenty-four hours of their arrival and to confirm their departure. The fascist Public Security Law also required them to ensure that all guests were in possession of an identity card and to inform the police of their destination on departure.7 Police officers checked information on the registration forms delivered to them against registers of fugitives. If the data appeared suspect, it was necessary to contact the police authorities in the location where the individual concerned resided, and, in the case of foreigners, the relevant consulate.8 Although the new procedures for registering hotel and rented accommodation guests allowed the authorities to know in advance where citizens were travelling on to, unforeseen occurrences, such as an innocent change of itinerary made en route by a foreign visitor, took up hours of time to resolve, as police authorities in several provinces could be engaged in locating the whereabouts of the person in question.9 Members of the regular Italian police forces were familiar with undercover surveillance activities, which during the liberal period had been employed to monitor left-wing political and labour organisations, and criminal environments. The fascist system of surveillance was broadened to encompass a far wider range of targets and was applied more systematically. The creation in November 1926 of the Political Police Division (the POLPOL) at the Interior Ministry Police headquarters in Rome allowed the establishment of firmer control from the centre over secret policing initiatives of the prefectures and questure, including their appointment of paid informers. Political sections (uffici politici), manned by Public Security officials and guards, were set up in the questure, though they usually developed out of pre-existing units. The Ministry created a special fund for each prefecture to pay informers.10 If necessary, the questori and prefects could make use

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of the Carabinieri, who employed their own informers,11 as well as the intelligence services of the Party Militia (uffici di investigazione politica).12 They could also enlist the collaboration of other organs of the Party, which in themselves functioned as instruments for monitoring society. Undercover surveillance and the employment of informers by the regular police occupied a relatively low position in the hierarchy of multiple spy networks, of which the OVRA was the most notorious. When the regular forces discovered evidence of organised underground opposition activities, the OVRA, which operated over several provinces and over which the questore and prefect had no control, normally took over the investigative operations, though it could request the assistance of the regular police in this.13 We should not understate the extent to which the regular police were empowered by the instruments which the dictatorship put at their disposal. Paid informers, for example, were in a highly subordinate relationship with the local police, given the fixed-term nature of their appointments, which could be renewed on a monthly basis. This is illustrated by the servile tone of their reports and their fears of falling out of favour if they did not come up with evidence of illegal behaviour. ‘Giulio’, the informer for the town of Chiusi (Siena), felt it necessary, for example, to explain to the Questore that in spite of his failure to discover anything of significance in his interactions with local ‘subversives’, he was still good at his job: ‘I believed that sooner or later I would discover a secret agreement, but you must not blame me, because I have investigated and been everywhere, doing everything possible to find out what they are doing and thinking, I even made some suggestions but without obtaining the desired result.’14 While there is no information relating to the circumstances in which Siena’s informers were recruited, their ability, if we believe their reports, to enter into discussions and extract information from individuals hostile to fascism implies that they themselves had ‘subversive’ pasts and may have been forced to undertake informative activities following arrest. Independent of formal procedures, in their monitoring of outsiders, police officers could unexpectedly turn up at hotels to check the registers, ask for information about certain guests and demand assistance from staff to carry out secret enquiries about them. Hotel owners and property landlords were bound to comply since the police issued their licences. Similarly, porters and caretakers in public buildings and apartment blocks could be expected to collaborate with the police by reporting ‘illegal’ behaviour or monitoring the activities and movements of ‘suspects’. From 1926 they had to register with the Public Security authorities on an annual basis. The police had the

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authority to determine the moral and political suitability of citizens who aspired to occupy such positions.15 The notable quantity of information which the police collected as a result of surveillance activities and investigations enabled the regime to discriminate against ‘undeserving’ citizens in such areas as employment and welfare. Candidates for posts and promotions in state administration, for example, could only be selected after the police had certified their good political and moral conduct and state of health. Similar procedures were employed by private companies, and for vetting applications to join the Fascist Party. In Siena, 1,193 checks were carried out by the Questura for this purpose in 1934. Although such checks had been customary under the liberal state, the fascist police paid more attention than previously to candidates’ political leanings and, in line with the regime’s racial and demographic policies, their physical and mental health. The case of Annita Bacchini gives us an insight into the level to which the fascist police probed the lives of citizens for the purpose of selecting state personnel. In May 1933, following her submission of an application to participate in a state competition for primary school teachers, the Prefect of Siena requested from the Questore information ‘relating both to the moral and political conduct and to the health of the … applicant and her family’. The Questore was, moreover, invited to express an opinion as to whether the provincial education authorities could be assured that they were admitting ‘not only a serious-minded, upstanding Italian Teacher who is devoted to the Regime, but also a healthy person who is immune from any illness which can be transmitted to the pupils’. The request was passed on to the Political Section, which carried out enquiries. The ensuing report certified that Bacchini was an upright citizen who belonged to the local youth organisation for young women (fasci femminili). It stressed, however, that her father suffered from mental illness, and that both her father and uncle had been entered on the register of ‘subversives’, though more recently they had kept out of trouble.16 We do not know whether Bacchini’s application was accepted. Nevertheless, her case provides an example of the ability of the fascist police to determine the fate of citizens. Although the fascist regime never applied a policy of directly ridding society of individuals who failed to conform to fascist values, there are indications that the police were able to use the instrument of confino as a pretext for removing them from their communities, if only temporarily. As Michael Ebner’s research demonstrates, those individuals who were not reputed to be upstanding members of the community were more likely to face harsher

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sanctions if caught for even fairly trivial ‘offences’. Ebner cites the case of a gardener setting a live rabbit down on a table in a trattoria in Aglié (Turin), slapping its haunches and saying ‘Move it, Mussolini!’ Two carabinieri witnessed this and arrested him. From the ensuing investigations, the police judged his ‘political and moral conduct’ negatively. They based this on a string of motives, including his alcoholism and affliction by venereal disease, his and his brothers’ criminal records, the punishments he faced when serving in the army, his socialist past and indifference towards the fascist regime, and his failure to keep jobs. He was sentenced to one year’s confino, which he served in the province of Matera in southern Italy.17 According to Ebner, policemen often reported their actions against ‘offenders’ in such a manner as to demonstrate to their superiors that they were motivated by fascist concepts: hence, they were punishing abortionists because they were guilty of impeding ‘the demographic growth of the race’, or of ‘crimes against maternity’.18 More usually, however, fascist rhetoric encouraged them to act upon pre-existing personal prejudices and stereotypes. Thus, for example, ‘the [fascist] conceptualisation of homosexuals as dangerous degenerates found a sympathetic audience among local police authorities, who corroborated the regime’s ideology and program with their own prejudices and views on homosexual criminality’.19 Falling into the hands of the fascist police cannot have been a pleasant experience, especially for ‘enemies’ of the regime and more generally for those who did not appeal to the better instincts of Public Security personnel. While the liberal police had not infrequently faced accusations of maltreatment of individuals in their custody, greater powers enjoyed during the dictatorship increased the risks of abuse. An inspection of the Questura at Palermo in the autumn of 1942 concluded that personnel belonging to the Judicial Section there had employed torture to obtain confessions among individuals accused of crimes associated with food rationing. The latter were subsequently referred to the Special Tribunal, which the fascist regime had created to deal with the most serious crimes against the state. Suspicions were raised because all concerned had written identical confessions, which they had subsequently refuted in front of the Investigating Magistrate. In his report the official entrusted with the investigation described how police officers would painfully bind the victim’s body to a large wooden box (which he had discovered during an inspection of the premises of the Questura), in such a manner that his body was flexed backwards in the shape of an arch. His head was lowered into a zinc bath containing salted water, thereby producing breathing difficulties. The torture was

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intensified by stuffing the victim’s mouth with a wet cloth containing salt, walking over his stomach, punching his sides and squeezing his testicles. The Inspector confirmed the allegations of abuse, adding that one of the commissioners he had questioned had argued that it was accepted in Sicily that it was impossible to fight crime without the use of torture. Those responsible, a commissioner, deputy commissioner and six Public Security guards were transferred and banned from further activities in the Judicial Section. Significantly, however, the Questore was merely reminded of the necessity to ensure the correct treatment of members of the public and individuals under arrest.20 It is probable that many other cases of torture and beatings were never investigated or that if they reached the attention of Bocchini they were not always acted upon. Moreover, if the police tried to limit fascist violence, they were likely to turn a blind eye to rough treatment administered by members of the local Party headquarters or Militia, especially when the victims were considered to be ‘subversive’. Though fascist propaganda emphasised the role of a ‘new’ police that would protect citizens from crime, the creation of an all-pervading dictatorship determined the intensification of fear and suspicion of law enforcement institutions which had historically characterised social relations in Italy. In a country where levels of literacy were low and local cultural identity was strong, particularly in rural areas, such lack of trust may have conditioned the ability of the fascist police to engage the co-operation of the public in defending the national community. Denunciation figures for fascist Italy are notably lower than those registered for Nazi Germany, and this could be attributed in part to comparatively lower levels of civic consciousness and identification with the state in Italy. Moreover, the fact that police officers and officials were often ‘outsiders’ who did not necessarily understand local dialects and customs had never facilitated police–community relations. It was probably easier for the police to rely on the services of informers, whether through coercion or pecuniary reward, than on the limited spontaneous co-operation of the public in reporting ‘crimes’ and ‘offences’. Yet the fascist regime undoubtedly went some way towards breaking down the traditions of omertà which inhibited willingness to report crimes to the authorities.21 In point of fact, well before the arrival of the dictatorship, denunciations, although they were most likely to be anonymous, 22 had been conceived as one means of dealing with a rival or obtaining revenge. Owing to its ability to ‘punish’ those who did not demonstrate their compliance, the new regime placed greater pressure on the public than before to do their duty as upright members of the ‘national’ community by openly denouncing ‘crimes’.23

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Awe-inspiring as it might have been, the police state implemented under fascism was hardly as perfect as the regime’s propaganda claimed. The amount of work required to run an efficient and far-reaching system of repression was not always matched by suitable resources for training and adequate manpower, particularly for the regular police forces. From early in the dictatorship, Saracini lamented from the pages of Il magistrato dell’ordine the deficiencies which legislative measures to improve the performance of the police concealed. In an article in the February 1927 issue dedicated to recent legislation on the re-organisation of Public Security personnel, alongside the many advantages, he noted that the intention to create sixteen new Questure had not been matched by an increase in the number of Public Security officials, adding that demands on the police service had intensified as a result of the new Public Security Law. He also criticised the fact that the standard qualification of a university degree would not be required for entry to the commissioner ranks over the following two years, arguing that new recruits would lack the necessary juridical and legislative competencies.24 If they did not necessarily refer such matters to their bosses in Rome, there is evidence that the provincial police authorities were concerned about how efficiently checking procedures were being followed. In Siena the Questore, Riccardo Secreti, on several occasions took issue with the Carabinieri stationed in rural areas of the province in regard to their inability to adequately enforce regulations for the registration of hotel guests. Registration forms often reached the Questura late and had not been filled out properly, as a result of which it was impossible to check the authenticity of the data provided. For their part, the Carabinieri argued that it was impossible for hotels in isolated parts of the province without regular transport services to deliver their registration forms on time.25 Laxness enabled people to slip through the police net. In 1935 a hotel owner in the town of Sinalunga (Siena) faced prosecution for failing to register a guest whom the OVRA suspected of being a communist secret agent. 26 Apart from political policing, police reports suggest a poor level of detection of the perpetrators of ordinary crimes, particularly in rural areas. Some of these crimes, such as sexual ‘offences’, were of crucial importance to a regime intent on protecting the health of the Italian race.27 The performance difficulties encountered by the fascist police are discussed at length in the following chapter. Though such deficiencies might raise questions regarding how far citizens feared the consequences of illegal acts, we should not underestimate the psychological effects of the intensified presence of the police and their informers, and the

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penetration of society by the Fascist Party. Both institutions had the capacity to administer violence and other forms of abuse against ‘transgressors’. Moreover, as Chapter 4 demonstrates, members of the police could easily get away with underhand practices which, though theoretically jeopardising the efficiency of the state, were nevertheless a product of their increased powers. In July 1929, the Questore of Siena requested that the Commander of the Public Security Guard, Luigi Piscitelli, be transferred away from the province, following a denunciation signed by ‘a group of honest and hard-working shopkeepers’. They accused Piscitelli’s wife of taking advantage of her husband’s position of authority to force local shopkeepers to offer her discounts on purchases. Moreover, Piscitelli had threatened those of them not complying with his wife’s wishes with imprisonment or confino on the pretext that they ignored price regulations. 28 In this particular case, the police official concerned had fallen victim to the system of denunciations which the fascist police encouraged among the public for detecting political ‘crime’. It is likely, however, that many episodes of this type of conduct went undetected. Policing the economy; policing fascism The above paragraphs have brought to light the notable powers enjoyed by the fascist police, powers which, besides equipping them to enforce the oppressive policies of the state, they could use to their personal advantage. Nevertheless, in their daily interaction with citizens policemen were prepared to be tolerant and understanding, albeit within the confines of an authoritarian order. In attempting to interpret fascist policy correctly during the course of their duties, they had to take account of the demands of different, sometimes conflicting, groups, without neglecting the overriding need to maintain order. Police actions sometimes reflected the notion that negotiation and concession would do more than repressive measures to solve problems. Their strategies were also determined by the availability of resources on the ground. An analysis of how labour relations and Party activities were policed illustrates these points. The policing of communities during the fascist period, though often highly oppressive, should be considered in the broader context of the regime’s desire to generate consensus, particularly among the most disaffected. If, for example, work and welfare benefits could be denied to ‘unworthy’ citizens on account of the recommendations of the police, the higher authorities on occasion showed greater indulgence. Prefects received frequent requests for help from among the unemployed of their

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provinces, and it was not unusual for them to attempt to arrange for work or welfare payments for those with criminal records or known for their ‘subversive’ ideas, especially when they were poor, had dependents, and were showing signs of rehabilitation.29 The intervention of the authorities to limit unemployment was partly motivated by the need to limit the negative repercussions of redundancies on public order and to avoid damaging the image of fascism. In this regard, they expected employers to put the needs of the nation before their own. In practice, there is little evidence that the authorities were able to enforce this. When employers were incompliant, the police sometimes hoped that the fascist unions would be able to help. In December 1932, following the sacking of twenty workers at the travertine quarries in Rapolano (Siena), the Carabinieri asked the Prefect to appeal to the local union to establish work shifts. This, they argued, would guarantee all workers employment at the quarry and lower the risks of disorder.30 If the police authorities relied on the co-operation of the fascist unions, on occasion they intervened directly to pressurise employers who they felt were not doing enough to meet local employment needs. They were generally intolerant when the unions resorted to more intransigent tactics in their dealings with employers, in spite of the political weight which the former carried. In the spring of 1930, the Carabinieri launched an enquiry into the conduct of Vittore Voltolini, an inspector employed by the Day-Labourers’ and Sharecroppers’ Union at Castiglion d’Orcia (Siena), whom they accused of behaving in a confrontational manner towards local employers. Denoting fears that fascist unions risked infiltration by disorderly elements, Voltolini’s eventual substitution was partly motivated by his alleged involvement in ‘communist activities’ during the ‘Bolshevik period’ and the assistance he enjoyed from ‘subversives of the worst kind’. The Carabinieri also intervened to block a petition against Voltolini’s removal.31 Disagreement between prefects and police authorities regarding how far the fascist unions could push during disputes could lead to serious consequences. In October 1933, the Questore of Massa Carrara, Epifanio Pennetta, was transferred after the Prefect complained that he was excessive in his claims that union leaders operated a leftist strategy to the benefit of the underground communist movement. According to the Prefect, they were merely trying to make sure that employers respected contracts.32 In the face of labour disputes, the police authorities not infrequently distinguished between the behaviour of union officials and the needs of workers. Though strikes and protests had become illegal, when they appreciated the economic motives behind them they often reserved

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repressive action for the ring-leaders. On the occasion of the strike by a thousand or so mercury miners in the town of Abbadia San Salvatore (Siena), in January 1929, only twenty-eight of the participants, mainly union and Fascist Party representatives, were arrested.33 In May 1931 in the village of San Matteo della Decima (Bologna), 150 unemployed women staged a protest. The Carabinieri ordered the demonstrators to go home. One of the women, Elisa Marisi, noted as being a communist, disobeyed the order and was consequently arrested. She was subsequently put forward for ammonizione. This also appeared to be motivated by the fact that the authorities considered her participation in the protest unjustified because she did not have serious economic problems.34 Lenient treatment of strikers may in part be attributed to the fascist regime’s desire to reach out, where possible, to those sectors of society which were particularly disaffected. Nevertheless, this still happened in the climate of a police state in which the threat of oppression was ever present. It is hardly surprising that following the work stoppages at Abbadia San Salvatore in January 1929, reinforcements of carabinieri, militiamen and military troops were called. Their intimidating presence no doubt played a part, alongside formal negotiations, in encouraging a return to ‘normality’.35 Yet lack of resources may also have conditioned the attitudes of policemen at the scenes of protest and other public order disturbances. As illustrated in the chapter that follows, police commanders often lamented that they had limited forces. The notable difficulties which small units of policemen posted in isolated rural areas could face when confronting hostile communities must have been experienced as humiliating. In June 1930, a protest was reported in the village of Mandatoriccio in the province of Cosenza (Calabria). During the course of the disturbances, telegraph lines were knocked down. Public Security officers and carabinieri intervened to arrest the ring-leaders. As they escorted them down a mule track to lock them in a jail 8km away, relatives hurled stones at the policemen. Ironically, on the occasion of earlier disturbances in October 1929 the Prefect himself had journeyed for an hour and a half by mule to reach the village in order to restore calm. He informed the Government that his arrival had demonstrated that the authorities were present everywhere, even in the remotest community.36 Illustrating how their political responsibilities were widened under fascism, the police exercised functions of control and supervision over the regime’s various organisations in each town and village. They were expected to advise on the moral and political suitability not only of applicants for Party membership, but more importantly of

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candidates for positions of responsibility in the Party. Major considerations governing their recommendations were the encouragement of healthy relations between the Party and the public as well as the need for orderly behaviour in the community. Hence, the police authorities usually did not put forward fascists who had a reputation for ‘immoral’ conduct or unruliness. Hence, they rejected Ezio Franci, proposed as leader of the Party section in the district of Camollia in Siena at the end of 1938. According to the Questore’s report on him, he was violent by nature, illustrated by his tendency to slap people in public: he had apparently slapped onlookers during the King’s visit to Siena the previous October.37 Underlining the powers of the Interior Ministry over the Party, the prefects, supported by the police, regularly monitored social, educational and political activities entrusted to the Fascists. In Siena, the Federal Secretary provided the Prefect with monthly reports and figures on Party welfare initiatives, which included donations of fuel, bread and sugar, and the running of soup kitchens and school refectories.38 The Prefect also received regular reports from the Questore and Carabinieri on local Party organs. Police checks on Party activities were partly necessitated by their awareness that in some communities experience in the organisation of mass politics was limited, or was influenced by the legacy of left-wing militancy. In this respect, the Sienese Questore’s report of December 1932 underlined the inadequacies of many of the youth organisers in the province. Among them, Mario Fè, presidente of the Opera Nazionale Balilla (organisation for young boys – ONB) at Sarteano had only a limited education and was considered an excessively authoritarian character, which made him unpopular with the local public. Dorindo Ciani, Commander of the Fascio giovanile at San Gimignano, had many ‘subversive’ relatives and was unpopular on account of his superficial and vindictive manner. Though joining the Party in 1921, he had been expelled for lack of discipline, and had only been allowed back in through the intervention of influential people.39 On occasion the police intervened to remove petty corruption from fascist organisations. In March 1936, the Carabinieri forced the President of the Provincial Committee of the ONB at Siena to suspend the President of the ONB Committee at Chianciano, Emilio Orsolini, since he was unable to account for holes in the budget, consistently failed to pay local suppliers for various services to the ONB and had allegedly pocketed the proceeds of enrolment fees. The Carabinieri emphasised that if Orsolini stayed in office it was unlikely that residents of Chianciano would be prepared to make donations to the ONB because it was commonly assumed that only he would benefit

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from them.40 The link between police measures and the generation of support for fascism is clearly evident in their monitoring of the political achievements of the Party. In September 1931 the Carabinieri claimed that local fascist unions failed to encourage membership among workers in Montepulciano (Siena) because their manner towards them was rough, sometimes menacing, with the workers being unjustly accused of harbouring anti-fascist sentiments.41 From the perspective of the police, Party organisations, if supervised properly, could facilitate their work not only in controlling the local populace, but also in providing a healthy counter-ideology to ‘anti-national’ ideas. Hence, in 1934, in the light of the discovery of an underground communist organisation in the town of Montalcino, the Questore of Siena, Riccardo Secreti, expressed his concern that there were a large number of youngsters who, though not involved in ‘subversive’ political activities, were equally indifferent to the fascist regime. Secreti ordered his forces to keep an eye on these young people but he urged the Party to do more to encourage them to join their ranks in order to ‘immunise’ them against ‘subversive’ ideas.42 Many of the measures taken by the police against fascists were intended to limit reckless or aggressive behaviour which not only affected attitudes towards the regime but could pose a public order threat. On the night of 27 October 1928, a Militia officer, Nello Susini, was employed in the emergency evacuation of territory hit by flooding near Colle Val d’Elsa (Siena). He attempted to stop and requisition a passing car in order to use its headlights for illumination purposes. In the confusion of the darkness and flooding, the driver of the vehicle misunderstood the order but proceeded slowly enough for Susini to grab him by the hair. The vehicle ground to a halt and its passenger, a Captain Treves of the merchant navy, got out, intent on demanding an explanation. Susini mistook the electric torch Treves was carrying for a fire-arm and shouted out, as a result of which thirty youngsters, mainly fascists employed in the evacuation, rushed over and set upon Treves, who consequently suffered head injuries and damage to his dentures. Only following the intervention of the Carabinieri were the fascists restrained and the matter clarified. Susini was given a severe warning from the local Militia command and reprimanded for not behaving like an officer.43 In many cases, the Party was compliant with requests for the punishment or dismissal of unruly or violent fascists. There were exceptions. In November 1928 the Carabinieri of Siena failed to have Dante Scarselli, a local Militia leader, expelled from the corps. They argued that he was provocative, high-handed, of limited intelligence,

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and had recently attacked the son of the Podestà (fascist mayor) of Pienza (Siena), Francesco Carletti. In Scarselli’s defence, the Militia Legion Commander played down the accusations against him, as well as claiming that Carletti had also behaved provocatively. He explained that their quarrel was the result of hostilities between two opposed factions of fascists in the town. Scarselli was merely issued with a severe warning.44 There is much to suggest that, under the supervision of the prefects, the police helped to moderate local fascism by isolating the most unruly personalities. This went some way towards fulfilling the regime’s desire to establish a firmer hold over provincial fascism from the centre. As the above example shows, they sometimes had to intervene in internal feuds. More crucially, they also had to confront or tolerate the machinations of those (usually fascist) prefects who became involved in factional disputes with the Federal Secretary or rival fascist groups.45 Policemen, especially fascists among them, could become directly involved in such conflicts. In June 1935 Stefano Bonfiglio, the Party Federal Secretary of Savona (Liguria), requested and obtained the posting elsewhere of Commissioner Attilio d’Ambrosi. D’Ambrosi, who had joined the police in 1919, had been a member of the Party since September 1922. In 1927 he had already been transferred away from the town of Ventimiglia on the French coastal border, since his position had become untenable in view of the appointment of his brother-in-law as Podestà. At Savona, d’Ambrosi had become intimate with dissident fascists in the nearby town of Vado Ligure, as a result of which he had fallen out with the Federal Secretary. Bonfiglio had the dissidents replaced but claimed that d’Ambrosi’s removal was essential in order to resolve the political crisis in the town.46 Conversely, representatives of the police without fascist credentials were easily exposed to accusations of ideological inadequacy from the local political authorities. More often such accusations reflected fascist resentment at not being given a free rein of power. A commissioner stationed in Campobasso in the southern region of Molise during the second half of the 1920s was repeatedly suspected of ‘sentimenti non fascisti’ among the local Fascists, particularly in view of his efforts to contain demonstrations in reaction to assassination attempts against Mussolini. The ensuing investigation concluded that the accusations were ungrounded, but argued that the Commissioner, considered of rigid temperament, and perhaps over-concerned to carry out his duties correctly, lacked tact in his dealings with the fascist community.47 It was not always easy for the police to maintain cordial relations with the fascist authorities and maintain a professional distance. In

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October 1927, a young girl resident in the town of Sinalunga (Siena) drowned herself. The line of inquiry adopted by the local Carabinieri was based on widespread rumours that the girl had been seduced and then abandoned by the Secretary of the local fascio, R. B. In spite of the discretion adopted in carrying out the investigation, Ferdinando Di Cerbo, the Carabinieri officer entrusted with the inquiry, soon found himself accused of being hostile towards B., of failing to carry out his duties properly and of ignorance about the local situation. His superiors defended him as hardworking, and highly knowledgeable of what happened in Sinalunga without becoming directly involved in local disputes. He had always acted in consultation with B., but had maintained a healthy distance ‘because he does not like becoming too familiar with anyone’. The Carabinieri authorities suggested that one of Di Cerbo’s accusers had a grudge against him because he had previously charged a brother-in-law of his with fraud.48 The arrival in 1923 of the Party Militia to work in parallel with existing police forces inevitably generated tensions and rivalries. In May 1928 in the town of Chiusi (Siena) during a procession to commemorate Italy’s entry to the First World War, the local Militia leader, Waldemar Bossi, asked officers of the Carabinieri present to arrest some bystanders for acting disrespectfully. According to Bossi, Carabinieri Lieutenant Sanna later stopped him, insisting that a Militia commander could not order the Carabinieri to arrest a citizen, and pushed him backwards. Bossi retorted that this did not correspond to Militia regulations or to the will of the Duce. At this point, Sanna allegedly responded ‘What Duce, what bloody Militia!’ (‘Ma che Duce, ma che Milizia un cazzo!’), before having him arrested. When Bossi subsequently protested about his treatment, several members of the local authorities, including the Podestà, advised him that it would be inopportune to get on the wrong side of the Carabinieri. These allegations were contained in a request for an investigation into the incident which Bossi addressed to the Militia authorities in Rome the following October, since it had prompted his dismissal from the corps. The ensuing inquiry carried out by the Militia Legion command confirmed most of Bossi’s allegations, but corrected Sanna’s ‘offensive’ outburst to: ‘What Duce or Militia! Leave the Duce alone, it’s got nothing to do with him.’ It concluded that Bossi’s expulsion from the Militia was an excessive punishment, given his limited experience, and urged that his position be reconsidered.49 Conflict between the police forces and the fascist community should not be overstressed, however. If the Fascists were suspicious of the poor political credentials of the former, they depended on those organs of the

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state which had the juridical authority to act where they could not. They relied on the police as major forces in the repression of ‘subversion’ and for controlling the rank and file of their own organisations; hence their denunciation to the police of suspicious behaviour among their own members. The police were also employed, with the help of informers, to investigate dissidence in fascist circles or more generally sound out local politics. In July 1929, for example, the Carabinieri sent the Party Directorate a report on the situation regarding the Party in Siena and its province, in response to a request to investigate the claims of an anonymous letter.50 For their part, the police benefited from the collaboration of the Party in their task of exercising control over the community. The regime’s capillary network of political, youth, after-work, welfare and union organisations played a notable role here. Thus, attempts to prevent fascist excesses did not alter the fact that where ideologically ‘undesirable’ individuals responsible for ‘crimes’ or ‘offences’ were victims of fascist abuse, the police were less sympathetic. It is telling that Captain Treves, victim of the assault cited above, decided not to take any formal action against the Militia officer and fascists who had beaten him. It must have occurred to him that it probably was not worth the hassle, and it is unlikely that the Carabinieri who dealt with the case encouraged him to take such measures. Conclusion The rise to power of Mussolini saw an intensification of police measures of prevention that had been applied more discriminately and usually with less severity under the liberal state. This involved an attempted rationalisation of procedures in several areas. Left-wing activists, the traditional ‘enemies’ of the liberal state, were likely to face more restrictions than previously, and harsher penalties if they committed ‘crimes’ and ‘offences’. Other citizens were by nature of their class, politics, religion, nationality, race or sexuality labelled as potentially ‘subversive’ or a threat to the national order and subjected to greater checks and restrictions than in the past. All citizens were monitored more systematically and intensely, with greater emphasis placed on their political and moral conduct and new attention paid to their physical and mental health. Flanked by the Fascist Party, the police oversaw the creation of a highly politicised society which thrived on a notable dose of compulsion, conformity, suspicion and fear. As this chapter has begun to illustrate, during the fascist years the Italian policeman presented himself to the public with many faces.

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For some citizens, he was there to uphold the law and prevent crimes from being committed, but for others he was an oppressive figure to be feared and mistrusted or upon whom it was necessary to depend in order to get by. Yet, on occasion, albeit within the context of a police state, he was a helper, even to those who were disaffected with the regime he defended. For considerable numbers of citizens, he was a symbol of fascist authority. Among the Fascists, he was an ally or a rival in the enforcement of the regime’s policies; for some of Mussolini’s followers he was politically suspect and resented on account of his interference in their affairs. In the previous chapter I briefly compared the policeman of fascist Italy with his Nazi counterpart, particularly as regards the levels of ideological training each underwent. Although space restrictions prevent a detailed analysis, some comparison with the policemen of liberal-democratic states and their empires during the early–mid twentieth century is also warranted; distinctions between them are not always as clear-cut as we might expect, when considering their functions and behaviour. However, account should be taken of the diverse forms of policing often characterising a country or its colonies; hence, the following paragraphs can only suggest general parallels and contrasts. Comparisons between fascist and liberal police forces (and their representatives) will inevitably reveal the higher levels of political dependence and more systematic use of coercion characterising the former. However, questions regarding the extent to which the police were political instruments and how far they employed coercive forms of policing have also been the focus of comparisons of different liberal states. In this regard, the British police constable was commonly hailed as a model of civility, and not infrequently contrasted with his counterpart on the continent. Illustrating the stress placed on policing by consent in his country, he was officially instructed to ‘maintain public support to maintain the law’.51 He ‘was presented as responsible to the law alone, not to the government’, in the belief that this ‘would lead to a higher degree of political legitimacy for the regime and government in the long term than would “political” control’. 52 Yet, in practice, domestic policing in the twentieth century could be influenced by the more coercive experiences of Britain’s colonies. Chief constable ranks were not unusually taken up by people who had served with the army or the colonial police. Moreover, successive commissioners of the Metropolitan Police ‘were ex-military men who had played key roles in haut police and counter-insurgency operations in the Empire’.53 On the other side of the English Channel, efforts from towards the

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end of the nineteenth century to present the police forces of the French Third Republic as democratic reflected a desire to remove long-standing perceptions of ‘an essentially political tool in the service of arbitrary power’, juxtaposed to the British model of the ‘New Police’.54 As Jean-Marc Berlière argues extensively, such endeavours, representing a difficult balancing act between upholding civil liberties, guaranteeing the security of all citizens, and defending the Republic, were not always fulfilled. Thus, the Third Republic enforced the principle of municipal control of the police from 1884, but this was not observed for the cities of Paris and Lyon, and from 1908 onwards a number of other cities underwent étatisation. Moreover, governments of the Third Republic cautiously tried to exercise influence over the police, whose own members saw centralised state control as a means of enhancing their professional abilities and benefits.55 Attempts to make the methods and culture of the French police more in tune with democratic forms of government were of questionable success, too. In this regard, the expansion and transformation of the Police Judiciaire, particularly through the introduction of new technical and scientific methods of criminal investigation, would, it was hoped, ‘rid the force of “dirty” practices: use of informers, forced confessions and the methods used to obtain them, such as the “third degree”’. 56 Yet, the creation in 1907 of mobile units, the Brigades Mobiles Régionales de Police Judiciaire, to help deal with growing crime in rural areas increasingly led to political forms of policing, including the monitoring and file-keeping of wanderers (nomades), counter-espionage and national security operations. According to Berlière, their politically oriented activities later led to the involvement of some of their members in political repression under the authoritarian state of Vichy.57 During the Third Republic, the attempted ‘civilising’ of order-keeping tactics for mass protest, particularly through the creation in the 1920s of a special riot police, the Garde Républicaine Mobile, led to a lower number of injuries and deaths.58 Yet police moderation was difficult to encourage when the demonstrators they encountered were not always willing to behave likewise. During the late 1920s and the 1930s, both the extreme Right and the Communists regularly insulted the police, the latter urging their followers to engage in combat with policemen (labelled ‘guard dogs of capitalism’) in their confrontations with them. Not dissimilar to the scenario facing Italy’s policemen during the ‘Red Two Years’, this also helps to explain police collaboration with Vichy in the fight against communism and ‘terrorism’ later.59 But there are other possible explanations for why the majority of French police personnel of the Third Republic went over to serving the Vichy regime.

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Beyond attraction to its anti-communism and xenophobic policies, Berlière suggests that ‘the culture of obedience and loyalty to the lawful government, the constantly proclaimed professional neutrality in political matters’, and ‘belief in blind submission to the law because it is the law’, are significant factors.60 The policeman of the French Third Republic may have been closer in function and mentality to the policeman of liberal Italy than to his British counterpart, particularly in his loyalty to the government of the day and his ideal of the French Republic, which inevitably politicised his role and threatened his ability to serve democracy. The British constable was generally not a political figure, in spite of the fact that the local character of his appointment and supervision became increasingly nominal.61 He was less coercive and more accountable to the public than his liberal or fascist Italian colleague. Nevertheless, Joanne Klein’s recent study of the lives and careers of constables operating in three major cities between 1900 and 1939 reveals that on occasion they did abuse their powers, as exemplified by cases of excessive or unwarranted use of their truncheons against prisoners, and could get away with this.62 Policemen sometimes resorted to forms of rough justice, including the withholding of vital information from the courts to ensure that a defendant accused of crimes was sentenced as they saw fit.63 Yet cases of violence and rough justice were linked to the working-class masculine culture of British police constables, rather than to politics.64 Undoubtedly, we can make a closer comparison between the policeman of Mussolini’s Italy and those of the empires of France and Britain. All were accustomed to policing through coercion, rather than by consent, and empowered over citizens to the point that they were more likely to commit abuses (and with impunity). They also had in common their roles as enforcers of intensive social control.65 Their functions were largely premised on the idea that state security was threatened by an internal enemy. Like his fascist counterpart, the colonial policeman may well have been involved in gathering political intelligence, especially in the face of nationalist insurgency. Significantly, in the case of French Algeria, such techniques had previously been employed as part of the anti-Jewish police measures applied under Vichy: these included special intelligence agencies for the policing of target groups, a census of minority populations, and the creation of an elaborate card index file system for identifying and locating individuals.66 The colonial policeman was motivated in his actions by ideologically based notions relating to white supremacy, which we can parallel with the fascist notion of the national community which guided police actions in Italy and Germany.

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There were, of course, differences, too. A colonial policeman was more likely to be a military or paramilitary figure, though, for example, in some British colonies, notably Ireland, there was a gradual move in the direction of civil forms of policing, with less emphasis on ‘drill and musketry training’ and more on ‘detective training and instruction on weights and measures’.67 Military or semi-military forms of policing in colonies denoted situations characterised by a state of siege from within, as the security and prosperity of the dominant society were (or were perceived to be) under serious, physical threat. This was epitomised, for example, in the construction of reinforced concrete police stations with defence towers in British Palestine.68 Forms of repression against the indigenous population which the colonial law enforcer policed were thus likely to be more brutal, widespread and indiscriminate, given also that colonial societies were characterised by stark geographical and physical delineations. In his analysis of French Algeria, Jean-Pierre Peyroulou describes the policeman as the immediate point of contact and conflict between French colonial society and Algerian Muslim society. The latter, stripped of its wealth, despised and exploited, was subject, alongside common law, to a special police code created in 1881 to control the indigenous population.69 Although authoritarian regimes like fascist Italy monitored all citizens as potentially ‘subversive’, the ‘enemy’ was not always so easily identifiable. Moreover, as we have seen, Mussolini’s policeman played a role in forms of mediation (albeit within a context of oppression) in order to help the regime to generate consensus amongst potentially hostile individuals and sections of the population. There is some suggestion, too, that colonial policemen were often less subject to the watchful eyes of their political masters and professional superiors than their fascist counterparts. Though theoretically more accountable to government than in domestic contexts, colonial police forces enjoyed a significant amount of independence.70 They underwent limited training, yet had important responsibilities and were given considerable latitude in their work.71 In contrast, the police of fascist regimes were, arguably, subject to stricter hierarchical and ideological regulation, though how effectively this was enforced in fascist Italy is questionable, as has been documented in Chapter 2. Indeed, as revealed in the following chapter, the conduct and performance of Mussolini’s policemen, particularly those of the regular forces stationed in the provinces, did not always fulfil the rationalising intentions of their bosses in Rome, raising doubts about how much control the latter exercised over the police environment. This is evident in not infrequent revelations of failure to engage in hard and

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efficient work and of petty corruption. Though such behaviour hardly corresponded to that espoused in the regime’s model of the tireless fascist civil servant, it cut across ideological boundaries. Limited resources available for training and police services, which made for difficult working conditions, also played their part in determining this. Poor performance may equally be attributed to the continued dominance in Italian public life of clientelistic practices and factional rivalries which inhibited attempts to forge dedicated servants of the new state. Notes 1 Known as the Prima Divisione, this area of competence distinguished itself from the Seconda Divisione (Polizia Giudiziaria), concerned with ordinary crimes, and the Terza Divisione (Polizia Amministrativa) for such services as the issue of licenses. 2 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1930–31, b. 336, Servizio Polizia Politica, Risultati dei servizi preventivi di Polizia Politica ottenuti nella settimana dall’11/01/30 al 18/01/30. 3 For a more detailed analysis and case study, see J.  Dunnage, ‘Surveillance and Denunciation in Fascist Siena, 1927–1943’, European History Quarterly, 38:2 (2008), 244–65 (250–2). A broader analysis of the policing of Siena during the fascist period was undertaken in J. Dunnage, ‘The Policing of an Italian Province during the Fascist Period: Siena, 1926–1943’, in G. Oram (ed.), Conflict and Legality. Policing Mid-Twentieth Century Europe (London: Francis Boutle, 2003), pp. 23–41. 4 See, for example, ASS, Q, filza 357 (1937), f. Cat. D.7 Relazione semestrale sulle condizioni della PS in rapporto alla criminalità. 5 Decree-law 33, 9 January 1927. See E. Saracini, ‘Tiriamo le somme’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 4:2 (1927), 21–3 (23). 6 Tosatti, ‘La repressione del dissenso politico’, 251. 7 M. Galizia, ‘La libertà di circolazione e soggiorno dall’Unificazione alla Costituzione repubblicana’, in Barile (ed.), La pubblica sicurezza, pp. 483–563 (pp. 513, 535). 8 See, for example, ASS, Q, filza 258 (1936), Cat. E.3 Relazioni giornaliere. See also Galizia, ‘La libertà di circolazione’, 535–6. 9 This is evident in the files of the ASS, Q, Cat. A.4.b. Vigilanza Prevenzione. 10 The relative POLPOL directive to the questure is found in Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Servizi Informativi e Speciali, b. Varie PS, f. Servizio Confidenziale durante il Fascismo. Disposizioni di Massima ed Elenchi, 500/410 Divisione Polizia Politica to Prefetti, 7 February 1927. The directive also established the recruitment of secret agents

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from among up to 6% of Public Security guards in each province. For a more detailed case study of the employment of informers, see Dunnage, ‘Surveillance and Denunciation in Fascist Siena’, 246–52. 11 According to Oliva, Storia dei Carabinieri, p. 185, the Carabinieri operated an information service that produced over 33 million reports (‘rapporti segnaletici’) nationwide between 1931 and 1938. 12 Carucci, ‘L’organizzazione dei servizi di polizia’, 100–1. 13 For the relationship between the regular police and the OVRA and the POLPOL, see Canali, Le spie del regime, pp. 70–1. 14 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Polizia Politica, fascicoli per materia (1926–1944), (hereafter ACS, DPP), P. 195, f. Cat. A–2 bis/73 Siena, report of Giulio to Sig. Ernesto (Cutrera, Questore), thought to be dated 23 June 1928 (scarcely legible). 15 Tosatti, ‘La repressione del dissenso’, 243 note 101; P. Barile, ‘Relazione generale’, in Barile, La pubblica sicurezza, pp. 9–49 (p. 32). 16 ASS, Q, filza 10 (1933), Cat. A.1 Informazioni A-Be, f. Anita Bacchini. 17 M. R. Ebner, ‘The Fascist Archipelago: Political Internment, Exile, and Everyday Life in Mussolini’s Italy, 1926–1943’ (Ph.D dissertation, Columbia University, 2004), pp. 322–3. 18 Ibid., pp. 446–8. For a detailed analysis of the policing of abortion under fascism, see pp. 432–48. 19 Ibid., p. 471. For a detailed analysis of the persecution of homosexuals under fascism, see pp. 448–72. 20 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 178, f. Palermo. R. Questura, various documents including report of IGPS (Antonacci) to Capo Polizia, 24 October 1942. 21 For a more detailed analysis of denunciations, see Dunnage, ‘Surveillance and Denunciation in Fascist Siena’, 253–9. 22 Suggesting contrasting national civic cultures, it is significant that while in Nazi Germany over 70% of letters of denunciation carried the author’s name, in Italy, according to Mimmo Franzinelli’s calculation, over 80% of such letters were anonymous. See Delatori. Spie e confidenti anonimi: l’arma segreta del regime fascista (Milan: Mondadori, 2001), p. 16. 23 M. R. Ebner, ‘Terror und Bevölkerung im italienischen Faschismus’, in S. Reichardt and A. Nolzen (eds), Faschismus in Italien und Deutschland. Studien zu Transfer und Vergleich (Göttingen: Wallstein, 2005), pp. 201–24 (pp. 217–19). 24 E. Saracini, ‘Tiriamo le somme’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 4:2 (1927), 21–3. 25 ASS, Q, filza 161 (1935), Cat. E.3 Servizio Anagrafico Compilazione Schedine; ASS, Q, filza 359 (1937), Cat. E.1 Servizio anagrafico. 26 ASS, Q, filza 139 (1935), Cat. A.9, Sovversivi, f. Fabiani Mario. 27 See, for example, reports on Siena in ASS, Q, filza 357 (1937–1938), Cat. D.1 Cont.Div; D.2 trasf., D.3 citaz., f. Cat. D.7 Relazione semestrale sulle condizioni della PS in rapporto alla criminalità.

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28 ASS, GP, b. 220 (1929), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, 1043 Prefetto Siena to Questore Siena, 23 July 1929. For letter of denunciation, dated 10 December 1928, see ASS, Q, filza 158, Cat. C.1.b, Sottufficiali ed agenti di PS, f. Piscitelli, Luigi, Cat. C.1.a. 29 See, for example, cases of Ottavio Albertini and Umberto Zinelli in ASS, GP, b. 17 (1932), f. Cat. 44 Disoccupazione operaia. 30 ASS, GP, b. 18 (1932), f. Cat. 44 Disoccupazione operaia, 27/113 Tenenza Carabinieri Siena to Prefetto Siena, 19 December 1932. 31 ASS, GP, b. 8 (1931), f. Cat. 57 Organizzazioni sindacali, 2335 Tenenza Carabinieri Siena to Prefetto Siena, 26 March 1930, and other documents. 32 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 180 bis, f. Pennetta Epifanio, 387/2082 Prefetto Massa Carrara to Bocchini, 11 September 1933. 33 ASS, GP, b. 224 (1929), f. Cat. 28 Ordine pubblico. 34 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1930–1931, b. 312, f. Disoccupazione, sf. Bologna. 35 ASS, GP, b. 224 (1929), f. Cat. 28 Ordine pubblico. 36 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1930–31, b. 315, f. Mandatoriccio Vertenza Dott. Talarico e Comune. 37 ASS, GP, b. 79 (1938), f. Cat. 27 Partiti politici, 27213 Questore Siena to Prefetto Siena, 1 December 1938. 38 ASS, GP, b. 62 (1936), f. Cat. 59 Organizzazioni fasciste ed opere assistenziali, 4334/37/70/S.P Segretario Federale PNF Siena to Prefetto Siena, 16 January 1936. 39 ASS, GP, b. 18 (1932), f. Cat. 59 Organizzazioni fasciste, 43 Questore Siena to Prefetto Siena, 16 December 1932. 40 ASS, GP, b. 62 (1936), f. Cat. 59 Organizzazioni fasciste, esp. 15/1 Divisione Carabinieri Siena to Prefetto Siena, 20 January 1936; 15/3 Divisione Carabinieri Siena to Prefetto Siena, 18 February 1936. 41 ASS, GP, b. 8 (1931), f. Cat. 57 Organizzazioni sindacali, 350/4 Comando Divisione Carabinieri Siena to Prefetto Siena, 13 September 1931. 42 ASB, GP, b. 31 (1934), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, 4139 Questore Siena to Comandi Comp. Int-Est. Carabinieri, Tenenze Carabinieri and Sezione Carabinieri Montalcino, Comando Agenti di PS – Squadra Politica, 19 June 1934. 43 ASS, GP, b. 217 (1928), f. Cat. 48 MVSN, 48, fonogramma, Comando Tenenza Carabinieri Colle Val d’Elsa to Prefetto Siena, 28 October 1928. 44 ASS, GP, b. 217 (1928), f. Cat. 28 Ordine pubblico, 11/89 Comando Divisone Carabinieri Siena to Prefetto Siena, 13 November 1928; 782 Comandante 97a Legione MVSN to Prefetto Siena, 23 November 1928. 45 For an analysis of the factional disputes characterising fascist society, see P. Corner, ‘Everyday Fascism in the 1930s: Centre and Periphery in the Decline of Mussolini’s Dictatorship’, Contemporary European History, 15:2 (2006), 195–222 (206–11). For an analysis of the involvement of prefects in factional struggles, see Morgan, ‘The Prefects and Party–State Relations’, 260, 266–7. 46 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 58 bis, f. d’Ambrosi Attilio.

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47 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 170, f. Relazione d’inchiesta … sul commissario di PS De Santis Giov. Domenico, IGPS (Carcaterra) to Capo Polizia, 28 February 1929. 48 ASS, GP, b. 217 (1928), f. Cat. 27 Partiti politici, 58/75 Comandante Divisione Carabinieri Siena to Prefetto Siena, 9 October 1927; 433/4 Comandante Divisione Carabinieri di Siena to Prefetto Siena, 8 November 1927. 49 ASS, GP, b. 217 (1928), Cat. 48 MVSN, Esposto Waldemar Bossi to Comando Generale MVSN Ufficio Disciplina Roma, 3 October 1928; 837 Comando 97a Legione MVSN to Comando VIII Zona MVSN Firenze Ufficio Disciplina, 28 December 1928. 50 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Partito Nazionale Fascista, Direttorio Nazionale Situazione Politica delle Provincie, b. 21, f. Siena Situazione Generale, 75/4 Comando Generale Arma Carabinieri to On. Direttorio Partito Nazionale Fascista Roma, 27/7/29, with enclosed report. 51 J. Klein, Invisible Men. The Secret Lives of Police Constables in Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham, 1900–1939 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010), p. 21. 52 G. Sinclair and C. A. Williams, ‘“Home and Away”: The Cross-Fertilisation between “Colonial” and “British” Policing, 1921–85’, The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 35:2 (2007), 221–38 (223). 53 Ibid., 229–30. 54 J.-M. Berlière, ‘The Difficult Construction of a “Republican” Police: The French Third Republic’, in G. Blaney, Jr (ed.), Policing Interwar Europe. Continuity, Change and Crisis, 1918–1940 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), pp. 14–30 (p. 15). 55 Ibid., pp. 16–17. 56 Ibid., pp. 22–3. 57 Ibid., pp. 23–4. 58 Ibid., p. 21. Berlière notes (pp. 21–2) that in Paris, where the new riot police did not have exclusive influence over public order operations, casualties continued to be high. 59 Ibid., pp. 20–2. 60 Ibid., p. 25. 61 On who organised and controlled British police officers outside London, see Sinclair and Williams, ‘“Home and Away”’, 223. 62 Klein, Invisible Men, pp. 173–4. 63 Ibid., pp. 95–6. 64 For a detailed analysis of the culture of the British constable, see ibid., esp. Chapters 3 and 6. 65 For the purpose of this comparison, my use of the term ‘colonial policeman’ refers mainly to the white European law enforcer, bearing in mind that members of the indigenous population and people from the peripheral areas of the colony were also employed for policing. For a useful introduction to the colonial policeman and the context in which he

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worked, see D. M. Anderson and D. Killingray, ‘Consent, Coercion and Colonial Control: Policing the Empire, 1830–1940’, in D. M. Anderson and D. Killingray (eds), Policing the Empire. Government, Authority and Control, 1830–1940 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1991), pp. 1–15 (pp. 3–12). 66 J. House and N. MacMaster, Paris 1961: Algerians, State Terror, and Memory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 34. 67 G. Sinclair, ‘The “Irish” Policeman and the Empire: Influencing the Policing of the British Empire-Commonwealth’, Irish Historical Studies, 36:142 (2008), 173–87 (180). Sinclair notes (182) how the Punjab police adopted both civilian and military police forces as separate entities. 68 Ibid., 181. 69 J.-P. Peyroulou, ‘Rétablir et maintenir l’ordre colonial: la police française e les Algériens en Algérie française de 1945 à 1962’, in B. Stora and M. Harbi (eds), La guerre d’Algérie. 1954–2004, la fin de l’amnésie (Paris: Robert Laffont, 2004), pp. 97–130 (pp. 97–8). 70 Sinclair and Williams, ‘“Home and Away”’, 223. 71 Anderson and Killingray, ‘Consent, Coercion and Colonial Control’, p. 8.

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4 The performance of Mussolini’s policemen: reflections on institutional culture, working conditions and welfare Mussolini’s policemen

The performance of Mussolini’s policemen

As part of its design to empower and restructure the police, the fascist regime aimed to deal with what it saw as a legacy of decades of disorganisation, neglect and malpractice left by the liberal state. Such intentions undoubtedly appealed to many of those in the Interior Ministry Police who for decades had campaigned for an institutional overhaul. Fascist concepts of reform were related to a desire to ‘fascistise’ the ranks of the police, though there was difference of opinion regarding how and how far this should be enforced. Indeed, although politically ‘unreliable’ policemen were removed from their posts in the mid–late 1920s, during that period local fascist movements were often able to exercise control over policing environments to the extent that in some cases directives from Rome were disregarded and local commanders had difficulty maintaining discipline among their personnel. When analysing the ability of the fascist police to respond to the requirements of the dictatorship, an issue which emerges is how much energy and resources the regime could spend on improving services provided by regular units which were considered of secondary importance in the fight against underground anti-fascism. The late 1920s saw a drive against poor work attitudes and corruption in the questure and smaller headquarters. Yet, as illustrated in the paragraphs which follow, there is evidence that institutional defects of this type persisted throughout the fascist period, in spite of a notable increase in the Public Security budget. This raises questions about the ability and willingness of the fascist regime to replace the liberal culture of public office which fascist propaganda claimed had become redundant.

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Enforcing discipline: investigations and inspections of the Interior Ministry Police The fascist drive to ‘clean up’ the police was marked by a significant increase in inspections and investigations from 1922 onwards. This reflected the need for more regular supervision and co-ordination of policing activities, which was partly met through the increased employment of Public Security inspectors directly dependent on Bocchini. By expanding the Inspectors’ service, the Chief of Police also aimed to counteract the extension of powers which the new regime had granted to the prefects, allowing a greater concentration of power in his hands and in the General Directorate of Public Security.1 The Inspectors were invited to carry out investigations when members of the police faced accusations of ideological inadequacy from the fascist community or became embroiled in internal disputes within the Fascist Party. However, once politically ‘unreliable’ personnel had been removed, the Inspectors focused above all on professional performance. On the basis of my reading of a sample of their reports available in the Central State Archive, it is clear that during the late 1920s the Inspectors encountered notable defects in the police service. Many of the reports revealed problems of indiscipline, incompetence and petty corruption among personnel. In several instances the Inspectors were scathing in their descriptions of the environments they came across. The report on the inspection of the police headquarters at Naro, near Agrigento in the south of Sicily, carried out in 1927, brings to light significant obstacles to the enforcement of the fascist system of repression in a remote part of Italy. The author of the report noted that ‘on entering [the police headquarters] one has the impression of a state of squalor and neglect’. This referred not only to the lack of hygiene and poor furnishings. Revealing the inadequate staffing of smaller stations, the Inspector went on to note that the office was directed by Commissioner Onofrio Nicolaci, without the assistance of any office clerks or Public Security guards. Nicolaci had been stationed at Naro, where he had married into a local family, for four years. While he devoted his attention to basic crime prevention, which he was reported as being good at, he neglected all other aspects of his job, particularly essential bureaucratic procedures required for controlling political dissidence. Consequently, the Inspector described the state of his office as follows: A pile of moulding papers and registers thrown haphazardly on to a shelf … a quantity of acts confusedly deposited on another shelf, making up the present archive; a load of files … not updated as a result of changes which have occurred … Office correspondence … remains on the

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official’s desk for whole weeks, if not months … I discovered that the office had neglected to respond to over forty letters of reminder, many of which concerned investigations in 1926. 2

The Inspector concluded that because of the disorderliness which reigned, it was not actually possible to specify the precise number of ‘subversives’ living within the jurisdiction of the headquarters. If one might be tempted to identify the state of neglect characterising the police at Naro with traditional perceptions of disorder and chaos in public administration in the South, several stations in the north of the country presented equally serious problems. The report following the investigation of the Questura at Parma in February 1926 stressed the sense of disgust felt by anyone entering the headquarters. A good part of the report focused on the involvement of police personnel in the internal feuds characterising the local fascist movement. The authorities’ attempts to control factional violence were inhibited because several police officials were related to the leaders of the rival groups.3 Similar to the case of Parma, an investigation of the Milan headquarters in July 1928 revealed how far the police were conditioned by their contacts with local fascists. According to Inspector Giuseppe Cocchia, the Questura was more or less at the disposal of the local Party Federation, because of the protection which it afforded to many officials, with the result that acts of violence committed by fascists were unjustly tolerated. These officials believed that Party membership guaranteed them impunity. The Fascists for their part failed to understand that the Questura was a highly delicate organ of the state, which was directly answerable to the Government and Prefect, and that police officials had to be able to carry out their tasks without interference from the Party. Those officials whom Cocchia had proposed for transfer had responded by staging a public protest in the centre of Milan, which the Questore, Silvio Silvestri had joined, presenting, in the words of the Inspector, ‘a sad spectacle’. Cocchia noted that Silvestri was a puppet in the hands of those under his command connected with the Fascist Federation. Indeed, one of them boasted that it was only thanks to an agreement he had brokered with the Federation that Silvestri had become Questore in Milan.4 The Milan investigation brought to light other failings. Cocchia’s report claimed that the police service was thoroughly disorganised. In the Political Section, several of the registers prescribed for anti-fascists were non-existent, while there were delays in searches for ‘dangerous’ or ‘suspect’ persons. Passports were only obtainable through underthe-counter payments. The regulation of local prostitution had been jeopardised because some brothels enjoyed the protection of police

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commissioners. The premises of the police station were outdated and lacking in hygiene and the layout of the rooms allowed excessively promiscuous contact between police personnel, members of the public and prostitutes.5 As the above report shows, several investigations focused on the sexual behaviour of police employees. That of January 1929 on the Questura of Novara (Piedmont), again conducted by Giuseppe Cocchia, described the police headquarters as having been ‘reduced to a cesspit’, particularly on account of the ‘continuous trafficking of women of every sort’. Cocchia asked himself whether those responsible for this situation had completely forgotten their status as citizens and as officials of the state. The Questore, G. M., and one of his dependents, Commissioner E. T.-L., were accused of having embezzled funding in order to take women on pleasure trips using service vehicles. Between February and October 1928, the Questore had allegedly claimed around 1,000 Lire per month for this purpose from a special fund normally reserved for important missions, on the pretext that he was carrying out secret investigations.6 If the work of the Inspectors aimed to remove ‘vice’ seen as pre-dating the fascist rise of power, in practice the dictatorship further empowered state officials to behave corruptly. Exemplifying the ability of the police to employ a regime of fear to personal advantage, T.-L. was accused of attempting to seduce the daughter of an arrested communist in exchange for promises that he would help her father in his impending trial at the Special Tribunal. It was alleged that he had additionally had a sexual affair with the wife of a lower-ranking commissioner stationed at the same headquarters. While the extra-marital sexual activities of personnel had concerned the police authorities in liberal Italy, one wonders whether there is a connection between the notably high levels of promiscuity registered in some of these reports and the influence of squadrismo over police headquarters during the 1920s, as revealed, for example, in Cocchia’s investigation of Milan. The fact that T.-L. had been close to the early fascist movement may be a pure coincidence. Yet his alleged lifestyle and attitude towards sex and women were somewhat reminiscent of the behaviour of squad members who typically stressed their sexual potency (describing themselves as men with ‘hard balls’) and in some cases lived in brothels or had close relations with prostitutes.7 Following the investigation at Novara, the Rome leadership ordered exemplary punishments. M., who denied the accusations, was retired, having reached the age of fifty-nine. T.-L., eleven years his junior, was sacked on the advice of Cocchia, who argued that he would repeat this type of behaviour if transferred elsewhere.8

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On occasion investigations were prompted by denunciations from inside the police. Indeed, the advent of the dictatorship may have created opportunities for policemen to rebel against unethical behaviour, or practices which, if forming part of the traditional police culture, had been outdated by the new mood of modernity which fascism hailed. Notable in this regard is an anonymous letter denouncing the Questore of Reggio Calabria, Aurelio Hyerace. The letter, which the ensuing investigation attributed to an employee of the Questura, referred to the personal fiefdom which the Questore had created, as a result of which police officials, employees and Public Security guards were obliged to take part in rituals of deference. This involved giving Hyerace and his wife costly gifts on special occasions. Following an investigation, the Questore was warned not to accept presents in future.9 The Inspectors also found themselves dealing with nepotism and the factional rivalry ensuing from this inside police stations. In the autumn of 1930, in response to several anonymous letters addressed to the Interior Ministry and to Mussolini, the police investigated allegations that the Questura at Turin was dominated by kinship ties. The letters claimed that the police headquarters was run by officials from the southern region of Apulia with close family connections. Expressing and attempting to play on traditional anti-southern prejudices, the letters referred to the formation of an ‘Apulian colony’ and to the Questore surrounding himself with ‘hired bullies’ belonging to the ‘Mafia’ from his home town.10 The subsequent inspection revealed that, effectively, several officials employed at the Turin headquarters were from Apulia and had close family connections. The Questore was the godfather of one of the children of the head of the Political Section, and his brother-in-law was the head of his cabinet (Capo Gabinetto). According to the report, the appointment of these individuals to positions of leadership had been the object of criticism among other officials, particularly those from Piedmont, criticism which had been voiced beyond the confines of the Questura.11 The Prefect of Turin, Umberto Ricci, in response to the recommendations of the Inspector, agreed that the two officials closest to the Questore should be transferred. He argued, however, that there were plenty of officials who had spent most of their careers in Turin, were born there or had married local women, and who had interests and friendships in the local environment to the point that they had lost all sense of initiative, sacrifice and fighting spirit. Their main preoccupation was that of making sure that they did not get posted elsewhere. There followed a list of eleven officials, most of whom he recommended for substitution by individuals from outside Turin. He concluded,

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therefore, that although the two officials related to the Questore were at fault: equally, if it should be necessary to renew the personnel, this process should begin by removing from Turin many of the torinesi who cannot be thoroughly trusted, especially those who, whether through their wives or close relatives, have an interest in [local] industries or commerce and, because of this, cannot carry out their delicate duty with the required serenity of judgement and freedom of action.12

Scribbled in pencil over seven of the names supplied by Ricci was the destination to which these individuals were subsequently transferred. The investigation at Turin reveals a scenario not untypical of public life and politics in fascist Italy in which each warring faction attempted to gain advantage by making accusations against its rival. Not all police stations were the object of harsh criticism. Moreover, several of those singled out for drastic measures were reformed. The Siena police provide an example of success in bringing improvements, which in this particular case had been initiated through the appointment of a new Questore, Francesco Fiocca. In July 1929, six months after coming to Siena, Fiocca informed the Prefect of the sorry state in which he had found the police headquarters when he took up office there. Suggesting his fascist inclinations,13 the new Questore claimed that before his arrival the police at Siena had been ‘dozing’, because they lacked the influence of a ‘fascist pulse’. This, he argued, was demonstrated by the fact that Public Security personnel were without the required professional skills and attended to their duties for only a few hours each day. The transfer of a work-shy commissioner had not resolved the situation, since the official who took his place was equally incapable; he too had to be replaced. Fiocca’s report brings to light teething problems encountered in the enforcement of more sophisticated methods for preventing anti-national activities. He noted how officials and office employees lacked practical experience and showed ignorance of the new Public Security Law and other recent legislation, as a result of which the various registers were not kept properly. Thus, despite the introduction of new regulations making it harder to emigrate, police personnel followed outdated procedures when issuing passports.14 Inspections of the Questura of Siena in 1932 and 1933 revealed notable improvements in levels of diligence and efficiency.15 If the police of Siena and of other provinces illustrate the ability of the fascist regime to improve efficiency and discipline, it was not always easy to enforce reforms. In October 1930, a further inspection of the police headquarters at Naro, referred to above, showed that

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Commissioner Nicolaci was still in charge, in spite of the serious reservations expressed about his performance three years previously. The police archive had not been satisfactorily re-organised, even though an employee from the Questura at Agrigento had been sent to assist Nicolaci. Moreover, the Commissioner had inappropriately entrusted the job of dealing with the bureaucratic procedures of his office to an ex-Public Security guard, now head of the local fascist Militia. Nicolaci was unable to carry out his job impartially, because of family connections and friendships in the town. Notably, he had failed to prosecute one Rosario Rinaldi, who had allegedly assaulted him in public, since Rinaldi was the nephew of a parliamentary deputy, a friend of Nicolaci’s.16 Only after this inspection was it proposed that the police headquarters at Naro be closed, concentrating resources in the nearby towns of Canicattì or Licata. Nicolaci was transferred, rather than dismissed, probably on account of his particular aptitude for the policing of ordinary crimes. Where personnel declared incompetent were close to finishing their careers, they could be pensioned off. This happened to the Questore of Savona, Enrico Pianavia, in 1929, following an inspection which reported that he was failing to take adequate measures in order to fight the underground communist movement. His conduct was attributed to limited awareness of the seriousness of the threat posed by ‘subversive’ activities.17 One of the main obstacles to reform was the fact that large numbers of officials considered professionally wanting managed to hold on to their jobs. Partly reflecting funding difficulties, inspections and investigations tended to result in recommendation for transfers rather than forced retirement or dismissal, often on the grounds that the individuals concerned needed to get away from an environment in which they had relatives or long-standing friendships, and that they would be reformed by being stationed elsewhere. In this scenario, problems persisted. An investigation in August 1936 of the police of Varese close to the Swiss border revealed how at the height of the fascist regime police headquarters could be plagued by underhand practices which jeopardised the efficiency of the police state and which might only have been dealt with if inspectors were called in. The ensuing report brought to light serious misconduct. This included gambling, cultivation of friendships with individuals with criminal records, unethical behaviour in the issuing of passports, protection of contraband activities, and the taking of cuts from shopkeepers and travelling salesmen. Illustrating how the regime’s measures against political dissidence could be internally ‘subverted’, a brigadier of the Public Security Guard was reported to have provided

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an individual subject to ammonizione with an advance warning about police measures to be taken against him; this was attributed to the fact that the individual concerned had lent the Brigadier 700 Lire.18 Implying that issues relating to sexual behaviour revealed during the late 1920s had not been cleared up, another matter of concern to the Inspector emerging in the investigation of Varese was the involvement of police personnel in extra-marital relationships. This included affairs with prostitutes. Such relationships may well have been encouraged when the fascist state established greater control than previously over prostitution, in an attempt to prevent the spread of venereal disease and regulate sexual behaviour.19 Police personnel were empowered in their relationships with prostitutes to the extent that they could ‘protect’ and exploit their businesses. Hence, following an investigation of the police of Imperia (Liguria) in 1935, an official was punitively transferred for having attempted to obtain 2,000 Lire in exchange for issuing a regular licence for a brothel in the town of Oneglia.20 Problems relating to internal discipline which the overbearing influence of local Party federations had sometimes upset during the 1920s may not always have been solved in the long term either. In spite of Inspector General Cocchia’s efforts to bring back order to the Milan police in 1928, during the early 1930s the fascist Questore, Pietro Bruno, appointed to the Lombard capital in June 1930, was, according to an anonymous letter, excessively close to the Party and Militia, to the point that some of the officials under his command were annoyed. On taking up office, he had allegedly ordered the various section leaders of the Questura to present themselves to the local Party district leaders. Revealing the concern of some police officials to maintain a professional distance from the political organs of the regime, they resented such an imposition, especially on account of their strained relations with the ‘most riotous’ of fascists against whom they had applied repressive measures only two years previously. Officials had also been antagonised by the fact that boxes in the city theatres reserved for Questura personnel on duty at performances were occupied by Militia officers, thanks to their close relationship with Bruno. 21 It was not easy to impose internal discipline when the fascist regime failed to discourage factional rivalries and the system of favours (raccomandazioni) continued to be culturally acceptable. As illustrated in Chapter 2, policemen were encouraged to seek the patronage of influential fascists as a means of enhancing their careers. It was more or less customary for them to use contacts in the Party to request favours on their behalf. On occasion, these contacts were employed to challenge superiors. In February 1932, the fascist Questore of Catanzaro,

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Alfredo Granito, allegedly tried to engage the support of the Federal Secretary and the Podestà to prevent the Prefect from having him punitively transferred.22 Inspections of headquarters during the 1930s suggested that, even when profiteering and shady dealings were lacking, work-shyness, disorganisation and inefficiency persisted. The report on the inspection of the police at Crotone, in the southern Italian region of Calabria, in February 1936 referred to the Commissioner in charge taking little interest in crime investigations. Moreover, in a municipality consisting of 20,000 inhabitants, with 60 registered ‘subversives’ and 1,046 previous offenders (pregiudicati), not one was subject to ammonizione. The author of the report added that the Public Security Guard acted with the same laxness, neglecting to check hotel registrations, considered important for tracing suspects and dangerous persons. Consequently, his own registration form, filled out at 5.00pm on 27 February, only reached the police headquarters the following midday. The Inspector went on to note that neither the Commissioner running the police headquarters, nor his employees, observed office hours, so that the police station never opened before 9.30am: ‘In any case,’ he noted in his report, ‘on 28 February, having got to the station at 9.20, I found that it was closed, and I was only able to enter around 9.30, after having got someone to find Agente Migliaccio, who was in possession of the keys. The official [in charge] turned up at 10.00pm, claiming that he had arrived late because he had been indisposed.’23 Inspections of the headquarters at Grosseto (Tuscany) in January 1933 and September 1934 revealed a similar state of confusion and laxness, owing to the repeated absence of the ageing Questore, Alfredo Granito, whom one of the ensuing reports described as ‘demoralised’ and ‘debilitated’. Moreover, the Inspector claimed in his report for September 1934 that on arrival at the Questura he noted that several commissioners, Granito included, were absent; that there were no Public Security guards or ushers present; that: ‘a crowd of people were demanding arms permits yet to be signed, that Archivist Fondi shouted down the corridors in the morning because he was nervous, in the afternoon because he was full of wine’. 24 Granito’s retirement did not appear to resolve the situation, judging from the inspection of February 1936, which revealed that any attempt to reform procedures was partly inhibited by lack of personnel. The inspection report referred to a shortage of Public Security guards, making it particularly difficult for the Questura to fulfil its many tasks. Revision of the political register (schedario politico), which had begun in 1934 and had still not been completed, brought to light several shortcomings,

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which made it harder for the police to trace or check the movements of anti-fascists.25 Inspection reports of several other provinces I have examined showed similar deficiencies, often exacerbated by poor working and living conditions. By the early 1930s, the police at Parma appeared to have rid themselves of the malpractices registered in 1926. From 1935 onwards, however, there were problems of lack of personnel, inadequate maintenance of registers, incompetence and misconduct. An inspection report of January 1939 noted that although the number of officials and office employees assigned to the Questura were sufficient the abilities of the Public Security Guard were continually hampered by requests from outside the province for reinforcements. Furthermore, their commander was considered unsuitable and incompetent. Indicating the inability of the police to rationalise work procedures and improve training in the regular forces of the Interior Ministry, the register of associations was reported as not having been kept in order or revised since 1936; the political register had not been filled out properly; the list of ‘fugitives’ had not been updated since 1936, as a result of which some anti-fascists were registered as such, when their files contained precise information on their whereabouts which had recently been provided by Italian consulates abroad!26 During the fascist period, several new police stations were constructed or existing questure were transferred to more spacious buildings which had been renovated to accommodate them. They were inaugurated with customary fascist pomp as evidence of the progress of the new era. 27 However, inspections revealed that living and working conditions in many headquarters continued to be inadequate. The report on Parma noted, for example, that buildings of the Questura were insufficiently heated. In the living quarters for the Public Security Guard sheets, blankets and towels were old and worn, mattresses damp and dirty, lighting insufficient, and heating almost non-existent. In some provinces transport and communication facilities were registered as inadequate. In Catanzaro, for example, the Questura was reported in 1936 as being without telegraphic facilities and having to share a telephone switchboard with the local Prefecture.28 It is hardly surprising that inspections often registered low morale and lack of diligence. In July 1937, the report on the police headquarters of Modena (Emilia) summed up the attitude of personnel as follows: Only a few officials and employees … are animated by a spirit of sacrifice or by a sense of honour towards their profession and duty or by that feeling of devotion towards their superiors which is often the stimulus for passionate dedication to work. The others lack all sense

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of initiative, showing no sign of any predisposition towards active engagement in police work, but merely desire to do as little as possible, at best hurrying through office procedures. There is no understanding or amicability amongst the officials, who instead tend to gossip, to grumble and to arrange themselves in groups of two or three in order to spy and comment on the actions of their superiors or colleagues. 29

Despite regular inspections and numerous investigations, in several police stations and headquarters the fascist Government had failed to create fully the work ethic which individuals in the police closest to fascism were calling for, and which the Fascist Party had demanded of all state employees and officials. As the reports themselves suggest, negative work attitudes were difficult to eradicate when poor-quality personnel kept their jobs, men were lacking and overall working conditions were tough. Besides having to help run an expanded system of political surveillance, regular forces were still expected to detect ordinary crime, patrol the streets, guard state buildings, be present at public gatherings and deal with public order emergencies. Such needs were not always matched by sufficient resources, and, as the above report on Parma shows, this affected the quality of basic living facilities. Lack of good-quality policemen was a clear issue facing the Interior Ministry Police throughout the fascist period. If sackings and compulsory retirements of police personnel during the late 1920s were part of a drive to weed out poor performers, they were not adequately made up for by new recruits. Italo Savella argues that as early as February 1928, owing to lack of personnel, the Government was forced to relax regulations concerning recruitment and dismissals which had only been introduced the year before.30 The waiving of the standard degree requirement for the 1927 competition for police commissioners, though possibly motivated by the need to facilitate the influx of fascists into the police and/or fill up vacant posts, already put quality at risk. In any case, the need for additional forces remained largely unresolved. A communication addressed to the Prefects from the Personnel Division of the Interior Ministry headquarters in Rome, dated 16 March 1930, argued that it was impossible to grant requests for extra personnel in the questure and smaller headquarters because 140 police officials and three hundred office employees had been purged or had retired.31 From the autumn of 1930, owing to a reduction in the ministerial budget, the provincial authorities were ordered to limit their requests for police reinforcements to situations where public order was seriously under threat.32 Lack of permanent Public Security guards in the province of Siena was frequently reported as jeopardising the ability of

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the authorities to maintain law and order.33 In January 1932 prefects were told not to request permanent postings of Public Security guards, since, as a result of sackings and retirements, the number of personnel had been reduced overall by a thousand.34 During the early 1930s the Carabinieri were dramatically reduced from sixty-five thousand to fifty thousand men, to which there corresponded a closure of headquarters in provincial capitals. If this measure reflected the desire of the regime to relegate the Carabinieri to the countryside, judging from the reports of the prefects, there was a reduction in rural forces, too. In order to make up for their own shortages of men, the questure were forced to request reinforcements of carabinieri from rural stations, which in turn threatened the ability to maintain law and order outside urban areas.35 While the Militia were theoretically able to provide men to make up for shortages of Public Security guards and carabinieri, budget restrictions could prevent this. Hence the Prefect of Florence’s request in May 1931 for fifteen fascists to assist in political policing services, in view of recent ‘subversive’ manifestations in and around the town of Empoli, was turned down.36 In the light of the situation described above, traditional tensions between the Interior Ministry Police and the Carabinieri continued during the fascist period. As illustrated in the previous chapter, the questure relied on the willingness of rural forces of the Carabinieri to report crimes and other incidents to them and to monitor behaviour among citizens. While the number of carabinieri was reduced, continued requests for men for public order tasks generated friction. This was the consequence of not only frustrations surrounding the limited availability of forces but also the Carabinieri’s resentment of the Interior Ministry’s entitlement to request the assistance of their forces. In May 1930, for example, the Questore of Reggio Emilia reported to the Prefect that the Carabinieri had refused to provide an escort for some arrested men on the grounds that the tone of the written request gave the impression that the Carabinieri were hierarchically dependent on the Interior Ministry Police when they were not.37 As an investigation revealed in May 1929, breakdowns in relations between the Carabinieri and the Interior Ministry Police could be counterproductive and politically damaging. At Fidenza (Emilia), the Commissioner in charge had little knowledge of the activities of the Carabinieri, in spite of the fact that the two police forces were meant to confer on a daily basis. Hence, in the early hours of 3 March 1929, the Carabinieri carried out a major operation involving over a hundred house searches for the purpose of finding arms and ‘subversive’ leaflets, without the Commissioner being informed in advance, and using an

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outdated list of individuals, many of whom had since converted to fascism. Local Party leaders protested vociferously, in view of the fact that, on the eve of a national plebiscite, potential supporters of the regime had been wrongly targeted in the operation.38 Hierarchical confusion and rivalry were exacerbated by the creation of new secret police networks, as well as the Militia, while other organs of the Party were entrusted with roles which bordered on policing. This resulted in the duplication of tasks with a notable waste of resources. On one occasion in Siena, for example, informers of the OVRA, of the Questura and of one of the Party district sections made the discovery that they had all been separately engaged in observing the same underground political activities.39 In May 1935 the number of posts in the Public Security Guard increased by one thousand to a total of 16,699 men, although this partly compensated for the call-up of guards already in service for the invasion of Ethiopia.40 In March the following year, an extra eight hundred guards were to be taken on for the creation of a special police force for Naples, though this was intended partly to make up for the abolition of the city’s municipal police.41 Corresponding to concerns about the shortage of Public Security guards voiced by the provincial police authorities, figures cited by Savella show a drop in spending starting in 1931–1932. Only from 1936–1937 was spending on the Guard increased, as a result of which the rolls of the PS were fixed at 1,799 officials and 17,649 guards. Spending on the Guard would continue to increase, as would the Pubblica Sicurezza (Interior Ministry Police) budget as a whole, into the 1940s.42 Yet the benefits of these measures for the regular forces are questionable, when policemen were increasingly needed for other tasks, as exemplified by the transfer of personnel to the Colonial Police (PAI). In consequence of the shortages, in February 1938 retired guards had to be temporarily called back into service to manage intensified security measures in preparation for Hitler’s visit to Italy in May, and the following August provision was made for the fixed-term employment of a further thousand to ensure ‘an adequate increase in the effective number of posts in the provinces’.43 Savella argues that the ‘swelling of the PS rolls’ after 1937 aimed above all to meet policing requirements in the new African colonies, and subsequently, tasks dictated by the Second World War. These included the running of concentration camps for ‘enemy’ citizens, protection of property, counter-espionage operations, and the policing of the Dalmatian provinces annexed from Yugoslavia.44 Though occasionally admitting that there was a shortage of men and facilities, police bosses in Rome argued that in the past police stations

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had been spoilt by an overabundance of personnel. Inspectors, while admitting shortages, often took a similar line. The Prefect and Questore of the town of Imperia on the Italian Riviera close to the French border both blamed the poor quality of police services on limited numbers of men who faced an increase in work. An Inspector thought otherwise. In a report dated October 1933, he stated that the continued requests for reinforcements hardly reflected the relatively small population of the province, concluding that difficulties were caused by ‘old habits that have never been vigorously and thoroughly removed, a deep-rooted laxness in the running of affairs and a lack of genuine enthusiasm on the part of the personnel’.45 If the provincial authorities were dissuaded from requesting reinforcements from other police forces or extra permanent staff, they were equally criticised for resorting too easily to punitive transfers. Towards the end of 1931, for example, the Armed Forces Division of the Interior Ministry Police informed the prefects that they should limit the transfer of Public Security guards on the grounds that they were costly, as well as lowering the morale and material welfare of those involved and their families. The circular advised that a severe warning or punishment and greater attention on the part of the officials in charge were the best means of dealing with bad discipline. Highlighting abuse of what was intended as a punitive measure, it argued that guards sometimes committed infractions in the hope that this would provoke transfer to a more advantageous location; they needed to be warned that an excessive number of punishments could result in their contracts not being renewed, and that the most serious infractions would result in immediate dismissal.46 Bad discipline appeared to stem from the lack of authority of police commanders themselves. In some reports Public Security inspectors criticised those in charge for their inability to manage those under their command, as illustrated by a subsequent investigation of the Imperia police in September 1936. It described the Questore, Augusto Bonnet, as: upstanding, publicly admired, with whom … the Prefect indicates his satisfaction, [he] is too weak towards his personnel, who often take advantage of his kindness … [he] is burdened with an immense amount of work in order to compensate for the negligence of his personnel, and he works all day, swamped by office procedures, and so he loses sight of the overall sense of direction which the police headquarters requires.47

These words raise questions about the ability of fascism to enforce strict hierarchies so essential for authoritarian rule. While the articles

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of Il magistrato dell’ordine boasted the creation of an all-powerful, highly esteemed Interior Ministry Police, some directors of provincial headquarters were unable to maintain order and command respect among their own forces! The research undertaken brings to the fore the creation of two career paths, one of which allowed the more dynamic advancement of high-quality officials, many of whom were employed in the POLPOL and the OVRA, while the other accommodated less shining colleagues for more regular policing positions.48 Although the best commissioners were appointed as questori of the most important cities, there is much to suggest that the leadership of provincial forces was neglected. Regular inspections and special investigations indicate that the provincial police were hardly immune from scrutiny. There is evidence, however, that it took time for malpractice to be detected and that police commanders were sometimes reluctant to report it. If the fascist regime had set out to create an efficient public order system which responded to the requirements of a one-party dictatorship, budget restrictions made it difficult to enact serious reforms, particularly among those organs of the police which occupied a relatively low status within the machinery of control and repression. Officers and commissioners who had believed that the new political climate would bring improvements may have become disillusioned. Moreover, as the dictatorship consolidated itself, previous (albeit restricted) channels for collective and public expression of professional grievances more or less disappeared. Criticism of inadequate structures and poor career opportunities was mildly voiced in Il magistrato dell’ordine. Otherwise, policemen were generally restricted to denouncing problems internally, and usually anonymously, though occasionally they wrote directly to Mussolini to invoke his help. As we shall see in the following chapter, their grievances were often related to desire for personal advancement as opposed to the collective well-being of the force. Discipline and welfare: the fascist policeman’s quality of life The personal files of Interior Ministry Police officials, employees and guards stationed in Siena, alongside cases cited from other provinces, illustrate the kind of ‘infractions’ which Mussolini’s policemen committed and the punishments arising from them, as well as providing a glimpse of the general conditions under which they worked and the nature and quality of their lives beyond the confines of the job. A number of cases of dismissal and suspension are

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recorded for personnel stationed in Siena. In July 1929 Giovanni de Vita, a police commissioner, was retired because he was suspected of having behaved corruptly when issuing passports and arms permits.49 In September 1929, Domenico Napoli, a Public Security guard was dismissed for various infractions, including the loss of his revolver and his constant tendency to get into debt, which harmed the prestige of the corps.50 In November 1931, Vincenzo Schettini, an office employee of the Questura, faced suspension because during a previous posting he had been accused of providing a false political testimonial for an individual with a criminal record in exchange for 200 Lire. In January 1932 Schettini’s indefinite suspension from service was changed to four months, possibly on account of a letter he wrote to the Questore repenting of his actions. The letter was posted from the sanatorium at Terranuova Bracciolini (Arezzo), where Schettini was being treated for tuberculosis. This episode reveals the comparative leniency adopted in some cases. Such leniency may have been motivated by fear that dismissed personnel might not be replaced.51 Pecuniary fines could be issued for less serious infractions, as exemplified by the 20% salary reduction inflicted on Commissioner Gino Carli for two weeks, on the orders of Bocchini, for failing to trace the whereabouts of an individual under police surveillance after he left Siena without permission.52 Beyond professional negligence and petty corruption, sexual ‘infractions’ caused the Sienese police authorities a considerable amount of headache as well as public embarrassment. In August 1934, a police employee, A. P., was transferred to Ferrara because of his involvement in an extra-marital relationship with a twenty-four-yearold woman, the daughter of a retired railway worker. The situation had come to a head when P. was approached by the girl’s brother and uncle, one of whom hit him. This led to an immediate investigation of the family by the Political Section. The girl and members of her family were summoned to the Questura to make statements, the former allegedly admitting that she had accepted P.’s advances in the full knowledge that he was married. A draft of a letter, undated and most probably written by the Questore to the Personnel Division in Rome, found in P.’s file, stated that the girl’s family had not demanded ‘satisfaction’ in the form of disciplinary measures against P. Indeed, while they urged that he be transferred, they did not want his own family situation to be damaged further. They were equally concerned that the reputation of the girl (whom they intended to send away to relatives in Romagna) and their own reputation should not be affected by further enquiries. The letter appeared to want to cover P., by alleging that the girl’s family ‘was not among the most

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upright’.53 How spontaneous the attitude adopted towards P. by the girl’s family was in the context of an all-controlling police state is not easy to determine. Nevertheless, the wording of the documentation implies that the police accepted that families ‘dishonoured’ by their members would demand justice. The following October, L. B., a vice-brigadier in the Public Security Guard was transferred to Perugia on similar grounds. He was the object of several anonymous denunciations, as well as statements from other members of the Public Security Guard, one of whom lived in his apartment block, which referred to his relationship with a ‘disreputable’ woman (‘donna di facili costumi’). In this case, however, the main concerns of the police authorities appeared to relate to the public scenes of jealousy that his wife made as a result of his affair. Moreover, B. was reported to be suffering from cardiac difficulties, intestinal problems and a nervous breakdown, and his transfer was particularly motivated by the fact that he persisted in the extra-marital relationship, despite warnings, and because of his state of mind which was of embarrassment to the force.54 The Sienese police authorities naturally had to accommodate personnel who had been transferred from other parts of the country for similar behaviour. Hence, in July 1929 the Prefect of Rovigo (Veneto) warned the Prefect of Siena that R. G., a deputy commissioner recently posted to the Tuscan town, had shown a negative working attitude in his previous post. He had kept bad company, becoming excessively friendly with local prostitutes. It was hoped that the transfer to Siena would allow him to change for the better. The Prefect asked the Questore to warn him against returning to his old habits, and, indicating that punitive transfers could have a reforming effect, the documents in G.’s file show how he subsequently did well in his career, being promoted to Commissioner in May 1934 and receiving an award in July 1936 for solving a murder case.55 Concerns to discourage policemen from entering extra-marital relationships are suggestive of how the fascist regime, in promoting racial health, penetrated the private lives of state officials. As the above examples illustrate, this was also dictated by the risks which ‘irregular’ sexual behaviour posed to the image of the police. In July 1941, following an inspection at Macerata (Marches), the transfer of an office employee was recommended because of his effeminate mannerisms and the questions consequently being asked about his sexuality in a ‘small community where everything is noted and commented upon in various ways’.56 The regulation of the private lives of police personnel was manifest in

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the careful enquiries which followed requests for permission to marry among members of the Public Security Guard. Customary restrictions on marriage in the corps, which might partly have accounted for liaisons with prostitutes and other extra-marital relationships, clearly came up against the regime’s demographic campaign. Low-ranking guards had to have reached the age of twenty-eight and to have completed at least ten years of service in state administration before being allowed to apply to marry. In 1936, however, the minimum service period was reduced to eight years.57 From February 1939 guards could apply to marry from age twenty-eight upwards without having to have completed a minimum number of years’ service. In June 1940 the minimum age dropped to twenty-five. 58 The following year, indicating the regime’s desire to encourage marriage, guards aged twenty-six or over could only apply for promotion to the rank of Brigadiere if they were married or widowed.59 Demographic imperatives may have been allowed to enjoy priority over other concerns when it came to granting permission to marry. In the case of Vice-Brigadiere G. R., stationed at Siena, before giving consent, the police authorities had to verify that, as well as being reasonably educated and presentable, his ‘promessa sposa’ did not suffer from any contagious disease, and that there were no hereditary, mental or infectious illnesses in her family. A report by the Carabinieri of Montefiascone (Viterbo), from where she originated, dated 27 November 1931, confirmed that to the best of their knowledge she fulfilled these requirements, though they were unable to comment on her physical constitution, education and character. The following month, however, the Questore of Rome informed his colleague in Siena that she had previously been sentenced to three months’ imprisonment for threatening an individual with a weapon (minaccia a mano armata). Yet this did not prevent the marriage from going ahead, with the imperative of family honour taking precedence over all others. In a note of December 1931 to the central police headquarters at Rome, the Prefect explained that R. wished to marry the young lady on moral grounds, since ‘he has apparently already possessed her’, and he urged that R. be given permission to marry her, given that five years had elapsed since the sentence.60 Letters uncovered in the personal files of policemen provide insights into the hardships and frustrations surrounding their private lives, as well as illustrating how far they were prepared to confide intimate thoughts to their masters. Particularly illuminating is the confession of Assistant Deputy Commissioner G. M. to the Head of the Personnel Division, dated 14 March 1942, in which he lamented how hard it

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was to obtain promotion owing to his unmarried status. He added that as a result of cost-of-living difficulties in Genoa, where he was posted, he expected to remain a bachelor. Moreover, it was hard for employees of southern Italian origin to marry into families in Genoa, ‘as throughout most of northern Italy’, given ‘an instinctive, latent, but unjustified, sense of aversion’ towards them. M. requested a transfer to a southern province or to Sicily or Sardinia. He had evidently been excessively anxious about his prospects of marriage as on 23rd of the same month he wrote to the Head of Division again, asking him to ignore the previous request on the grounds that he had met a woman ‘who will very soon become my life companion’.61 Returning to the province of Siena, the files of Public Security guards also bring to light the case of Vice-Brigadier Ettore Cleri, whom his commanders accused of feigning illness in order to avoid work. Such behaviour had allegedly been encouraged by the malleability of the service doctor. On one occasion, he took time off work on the grounds that his wife was ill and that he had to look after his four children. The same evening the whole family was spotted at the Siena wine fair.62 It is not obvious what type of punishment was meted out to the Vice-Brigadier, but the manner in which he behaved suggests he was confident that he was not putting his career at risk, dispelling any idea that legislation passed in the late 1920s to tighten discipline was rigidly enforced. Moreover, at the end of 1932 many punishments and suspensions in the Interior Ministry Police were erased from personal records as part of an amnesty to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the March on Rome. Francesco Suria, an office employee, who during a previous posting had been suspended for a month for taking cuts for the issue of licences and on suspicion of stealing tax stamps, benefited in this manner.63 The personal files of policemen stationed at Siena reveal a significant correlation between infractions and welfare problems, which, in the context of the economic ups and downs of the inter-war period, were fairly common, particularly in the lower ranks. Vincenzo Schettini, referred to above, was clearly in financial trouble. He was pursued by a tailor with whom he had got into debt during his previous posting at Genoa, and he did not have enough money to pay for the treatment of his tuberculosis, having to rely on help from his mother and from the War Volunteers Association.64 Illustrating their concern for the well-being of dependents, the Siena police authorities intervened to help solve welfare or financial difficulties on several occasions when funding permitted. In December 1927, Giuseppe de Falco, an office employee of the Questura, was the subject of an anonymous letter,

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accusing him of gambling and drinking. While the papers in his file do not allow us to trace how his superiors dealt with this accusation, it is clear that he faced financial problems which got him into debt. The following February, he was granted a welfare payment of 100 Lire on the recommendation of the Prefect of Siena as a contribution to his mother’s medical and funeral expenses. The Prefect noted that he also had to help look after two unmarried sisters who were unable to support themselves. The following year, the Ministry was unable to grant a similar request, owing to lack of funding.65 In the case of Francesco Suria, his improper conduct (mentioned earlier) may additionally be accounted for by financial problems. Pointing to the more general issue of salary cuts which state employees had to confront, in December 1930 Suria, who faced a punitive transfer from Fiume (Istria) to Alessandria (Piedmont), had written to the central police headquarters at Rome requesting not to be transferred to that location, given the severe winters in that part of Italy (he was originally from Calabria in the South). He argued that in view of a 12% salary cut he would not be able to afford heating bills. Effectively, all state personnel faced salary cuts in 1930 and 1934. If we look at the salary figures in Suria’s file, we see that, having entered the police in 1927 on an overall annual salary of 5,400 Lire before tax, he was promoted to the rank of Applicato di Pubblica Sicurezza in September 1928 with an increase in annual salary to 7,000 Lire. In May 1934, Suria was able to benefit from the recognition of his status as a ‘first-hour’ fascist. Based on a calculation of the number of days he had been a member of the Fascist Party before the March on Rome, promotion to his current rank was backdated from 16 September 1928 to 1 August 1928, with the result that subsequent pay increases would come into force on the earlier date. In spite of nominal increases in salary corresponding to years of service and his ability to benefit from ‘vantaggi fascisti’, Suria’s income did not increase in real terms, owing to cuts of 12% in 1930 and 6% in 1934.66 How justified Suria was in complaining is questionable. Mariuccia Salvati argues that during the fascist years state employees exaggerated the effects of salary reductions following the revaluation of the Lira in 1927 and between 1930 and 1934, when such measures corresponded to a fall in the cost of living and when most of them at least enjoyed the benefit of a safe earning.67 Yet Suria’s situation appears to have been particularly difficult because he had to look after two permanently sick daughters. In 1934 he was granted a state benefit in order to pay for their medical expenses.68 While Salvati’s analysis may be accurate, instances of police authorities intervening on behalf of dependents

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facing economic hardship appear to have been fairly frequent. In March 1935, the Sienese Public Security Guard contacted the Questore to request financial help for one of its men, stressing that on a salary of 600 Lire per month he was unable to pay his father’s medical and funeral expenses, especially in view of the fact that he had to support a wife, child and unmarried sister, and paid 135 Lire housing rent a month.69 From 1926, Public Security officials were able to take advantage of a state pension and insurance scheme (Cassa Previdenza Funzionari di Pubblica Sicurezza) which formed part of the developing and much-vaunted fascist welfare system. Thus, the family of Deputy Commissioner Emilio Todisco Grande, who died in Siena at the end of 1934 on account of a sudden illness, was covered by his insurance contributions; his eldest son was granted a lump sum of 10,000 Lire, while his widow and younger offspring received a pension.70 All policemen benefited from family and cost-of-living allowances, though not all categories were entitled to national insurance. Only from 1928 could police office employees receive help towards medical expenses by paying contributions to a special fund, and only from 1932 onwards did they benefit from the kind of cover already set up for officials.71 The situation for Public Security guards appears to have been particularly precarious in that they were only fully covered for illness or injury directly arising from the course of their duties. Otherwise, a proportion of medical expenses or hospital bills had to be paid for from their wages. Indeed, the Siena police files reveal a number of cases of guards who attempted to have their medical conditions certified as work related in order to avoid hefty bills.72 Even when they were offered to them, considerable numbers of officials chose not to join health and pension insurance schemes. In March 1930, the Personnel Division of the Interior Ministry Police contacted the prefects and the questori lamenting the fact that in several instances the provincial authorities requested financial help on behalf of the widows and orphans of deceased Public Security officials who had opted not to pay ­contributions to the state pension fund.73 How well Public Security personnel lived during the fascist years, independent of whether they benefited from insurance schemes, is questionable. During the mid-1930s the effects of cost-of-living difficulties on personnel, particularly in large urban areas, were of concern to the police authorities. In 1934, the Interior Ministry Police central headquarters at Rome looked to facilitate transfers of employees desiring to move to the less costly provinces.74 In February 1935, in the face of economic hardships experienced in the capital, a special

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convention with the employees’ association granted Public Security officials and employees, and their families, access to cut-price medical visits and medicines.75 In spite of the different political contexts, Joanne Klein’s recent study of the working lives of English police constables during the first decades of the twentieth century reveals professional attitudes and levels of material well-being not dissimilar to their counterparts in fascist Italy. Once on the street British police recruits soon learnt, for example, that it was impossible or inappropriate to go by the rule book. Most superior officers and several Chief Constables accepted that not all regulations could be observed at all times. This was notably the case in Manchester, which had two Chief Constables who had begun their own careers as beat constables, and who, therefore, ‘understood the problems and resentments caused by fines and pay reductions that could seem out of proportion to offences’.76 The behaviour of British police constables was not usually subject to excessive scrutiny and control by their superiors. This also meant that petty forms of corruption, which were far from lacking, and minor defaulting could be overlooked or dealt with informally.77 Like their colleagues in Italy, British constables were subject to a fair amount of monitoring by their superiors regarding behaviour with women and their family lives. As in Italy, this had much to do with the public reputation of the force. This not untypically involved dealing with police constables who caused pregnancies out of wedlock, who had affairs with married women or who attempted to have physical contact with women against their will. The latter offence included having sex with prostitutes in return for not arresting or harassing them.78 Although there was no minimum marrying age for police constables, they still had to ask permission to marry so that their future wives could be checked for suitability. Moreover, once married, they faced restrictions on where they could reside. They could not live too close to their families or on premises where their families had businesses, bearing in mind that, in comparison to Italy, a higher proportion of policemen were of local origin. As members of the working class, they found it comparatively hard to afford housing in locations deemed ‘satisfactory’ by the force.79 Although the Police Act of 1919 improved pay, pensions and working conditions, cases of family debt, sometimes resulting from medical bills, were common. In 1926, for example, the Liverpool Constabulary had to set up a fund to help families in financial difficulty.80 Comparison with the situations described by Klein shows how many of the disciplinary and welfare issues facing Italian police personnel

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cut across national and ideological boundaries. They reflected the generally low social and institutional status of the regular lower-ranking policeman and the hierarchical interference and additional hardships he and his family often had to endure, but also the recognition which his immediate superiors gave to the difficulties he faced and their willingness on occasion to be lenient when he committed infractions, if they were not too serious. Clearly, however, we should not neglect to take account of the different political regimes in which Italian and British policemen worked when considering their attitudes. Notably, the latter had to face far greater public criticism, which was often expressed vocally, if not physically, at the scene of incidents. They also had to take account of the existence of channels for public redress against police abuses of power, even if they were not always effective.81 Their Italian colleagues may often have felt that their lot was a hard one, and they may not have been convinced by the much propagandised national status awarded to their institution, especially when it did not tally with their material well-being. They were more regularly transferred around the country, which was unsettling for their families. But they had more direct power over citizens, and were less likely to have to put up with ‘harassment’ from the public. They could more easily commit abuses to overcome financial difficulties, even if they were not totally immune from punishment. This was a consequence of both the dictatorial context in which they operated and a longerstanding culture concerning public office and the relationship between citizens and public officials, as described below. Conclusion Focusing mainly on the regular forces of the Interior Ministry, this chapter has demonstrated how the fascist regime’s desire for the creation of a new class of policemen worthy of the task of running and enforcing an authoritarian dictatorship – in the context of the intensification and widening of the sphere of public security measures – was partly inhibited by the survival of a ‘backward’ internal culture and lack of adequate resources. It is impossible to measure exactly the extent of poor performance among the regular forces of fascist Italy’s police. Nevertheless, the data examined from my sample of inspection and investigation reports, combined with other sources, including the files of Public Security personnel, suggests that poor professional skills, indiscipline and petty corruption were fairly characteristic. How seriously the deficiencies of the regular Italian police affected the functional capacity of the regime’s repressive apparatus is questionable,

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particularly when special secret police units were principally entrusted with the task of detecting and eradicating organised political dissent. Many of the more mundane activities of the former were nevertheless considered important for controlling both ‘subversive’ activities and society as a whole. As described in the previous chapter, the alleged inability of the Carabinieri to monitor efficiently hotel registrations in parts of the Siena province had been of particular concern to Questore Secreti. This appears to have reflected a national phenomenon, if we consider that Interior Ministry circulars often reminded prefects and questori of the importance of enforcing the registration system in order to trace the movements of ‘subversives’ and ‘suspects’.82 It is striking that police reports from Siena on the prevention of other ‘crimes’, including those of a sexual nature, were optimistic in tone, although several indicated an ability to detect around only 50% of offenders. This implies that the recipients of the reports in the capital did not expect a better performance. Indeed, several of the reports argued that such a success rate was to be considered an achievement, particularly when the number of carabinieri stationed in the province had been reduced for a lengthy period and when few serious crimes (for example, murder) had been committed.83 This presumably reflects the higher priority which the fascist regime gave to the prevention of political ‘subversion’. Much of the data examined in this chapter would appear to vindicate criticism voiced by experts in policing. This is evident in articles which Emilio Saracini published in his journal, Il magistrato dell’ordine. Writing in 1926 and 1927, Saracini acknowledged that the new Public Security Law of 1926 granted effective powers and autonomy of action to the police for the first time since the unification of Italy. He added, however, that in order to allow the instruments granted by the law to be applied to full potential, the fascist regime should also have taken adequate measures to bring about a long overdue transformation of the police organs, in terms of availability of personnel, organisation of tasks, career treatment and professional quality of personnel.84 Although often imbued with fascist ideology, his and other articles in the journal quietly indicted fascism for failing to create better working conditions. While, as illustrated in Chapter 2, several of Saracini’s articles pointed to the alleged lack of a fascist conscience among policemen, many focused more specifically on professional hardships and poor career prospects. Hence, an article of July 1932 argued that if not all officials had opted to pay insurance contributions, this was an indication of not only lack of comradeship (the fascist term ‘cameratismo’ was used), but absence of a collective conscience. This

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was attributed to the fact that officials, who had lost all sensibility in the hardships of the profession, lived on a day-to-day basis, without any higher values to support them in their daily toil.85 Likewise, an article published in July 1934 claimed that there were too many deserving commissioners who had been awaiting promotion for far too long. At the current pace of promotions, they would never reach the top ranks; aged between forty and fifty, many of them war veterans, they were destined to pale in their present ranks and only remained in the police because economic difficulties forced them to do so.86 In an article dated 5 March 1938, Saracini argued that the Scuola Superiore di Polizia was a model of excellence for the police forces of other nations. He added, however, that the brief duration (three months) of courses for newly appointed commissioners meant that teachings in scientific policing were of limited effectiveness, especially since there was no opportunity for follow-up courses.87 This point would appear vindicated by the deficiencies noted during the course of inspections and investigations. The ability of the fascist regime to create a modern and efficient police state depended on how state resources were allocated. Failure to take radical steps to eradicate incompetence and vice among the regular forces may be attributed to the belief that, ultimately, they occupied a secondary role in the Public Security hierarchy and that the limited resources available should be utilised for specialist forms of policing. In spite of the institution of a more rigid vetting system that would appear to reflect fascist ideological requisites, there is little evidence that the quality of recruits to the police improved under Mussolini. If, on the one hand, the system of raccomandazioni might have conditioned the results of state competitions, the motivations for joining the police appear to have maintained their historically negative connotations. This is partly explained by the geographical origins of police personnel. My examination of a sample of eighty-eight Public Security officials and employees whose birth places were identifiable shows that 72%, though educated and generally of comparatively well-off middle-class or lower-middle-class backgrounds, originated from the South, with notably high proportions from Campania (27%) and Sicily (15%). Recruitment patterns do not appear to have changed during the ventennio. Out of forty-four cases of personnel who entered the police after 1923, thirty (68%) came from the southern regions. It is plausible that the largely southern Italian make-up of personnel facilitated poor performance inside the police, which can be attributed to a more general culture of self-preservation and advancement. Many had entered an undesirable profession to guarantee themselves a

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living.88 It is tempting to link the geographical origins of policemen to the clientelistic strategies and petty corruption revealed by inspections and investigations, assuming that such practices were culturally more acceptable in the South, but the evidence hardly corroborates this. The ‘southernisation’ of the state bureaucracy dating back to the 1870s may have helped to spread a backward-looking culture of public office throughout the Centre and North.89 As the 1930 investigation of the Questura at Turin shows, nepotism and petty corruption abounded equally among southerners, those of southern origin who had settled permanently in the city, and those who were born there. We may surmise that a traditionally higher level of civic resistance against state corruption in central and northern Italian society inhibited illicit activities to some extent. It is plausible, for example, that in Siena shopkeepers were prepared to take action against the police officer whose wife had tried to enforce cuts on purchases, mentioned in the previous chapter, because they were unaccustomed to this sort of behaviour. Their reference to the officer in question as ‘faccia da bandito’ (bandit face) suggests that he was from the South or that they identified his conduct as typically ‘southern’.90 It is conceivable that in the South of Italy there was less public resistance to this type of conduct, because people were more accustomed to it, but distinctions in civic behaviour should not be overstressed here. Where the police enjoyed notable powers over citizens, they were able to take advantage of this, wherever they were stationed. It is telling that the Sienese shopkeepers felt that they had to resort to an anonymous denunciation to obtain justice. The extent of engagement in underhand practices was more likely to depend on the level of vigilance to which police forces were subjected and how far their superiors were themselves involved or prepared to turn a blind eye. Moreover, it is plausible that peripheral areas of the country were less subject to the watchful eyes of inspectors, who may have paid fuller attention to those parts of Italy where levels of dissidence and clandestine political activity were higher. The following chapter investigates the lives and careers of a selection of Public Security officials and employees. Building on the images of working environments, social relationships and lifestyles which have so far emerged in the course of this volume, it sheds further light on the professional culture(s) which pervaded the Interior Ministry Police during the period of the dictatorship. It focuses especially on understanding how personnel related to fascism, how far the success of their careers depended on their political ‘status’, and whether their attitudes and behaviour can be distinguished according to their ideological position.

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Notes 1 See Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, pp. 254–6. 2 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 176, f. Naro: Ufficio di PS Ispezioni, 9129 IGPS to DGPS, 1 July 1927. 3 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 178, f. Parma. R. Questura Inchiesta, 6 IGPS to DGPS, 8 February 1926. 4 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 178, f. Milano. Inchiesta alla Questura, IGPS to Capo Polizia, 26 July 1928. 5 Ibid. 6 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 170, f. Novara, IGPS to Capo Polizia, 6 January 1929. 7 Discussed in S. Reichardt, Faschistische Kampfbünde. Gewalt und Gemeinschaft im italienischen Squadrismus und in der deutschen SA (Cologne: Böhlau, 2002), pp. 677–8. 8 ACS, FPFS, 1949, b. 358 ter; ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 19 bis. 9 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 170, f. Relazione di inchiesta … a carico del questore Cav. Uff Aurelio Oreste Hyerace, 9 June 1929. 10 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 179, f. Torino. R.  Questura. Inchiesta, in particular anonymous letters addressed to Mussolini, 8 April 1930 and to Ministero dell’Interno, 24 September 1930. 11 Ibid., IGPS to Capo Polizia, 21 October 1930. 12 Ibid., 333/9180–1 Prefetto Torino to DGPS, 8 December 1930. 13 Documentation in G. M.’s file reveals that before the March on Rome he and Fiocca, both stationed at Mantova, were suspected of being so close to the fascist movement that the Questore no longer felt he could rely on them. See ACS, FPFS, 1949, b. 358 ter. 14 ASS, GP, b. 220 (1929), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, Questore Siena to Prefetto Siena, 10 July 1929. 15 ASS, GP, b. 20 (1933), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, sf. Varie, IGPS Tuscany to DGPS, reports of 23 January 1932 (7–380) and 15 January 1933 (7–224). 16 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 176, f. Naro: Ufficio di PS Ispezioni, 158 IGPS to DGPS, 29 October 1930. 17 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 170, f. Inchiesta a carico del Questore di Savona, IGPS to Capo Polizia, 10 March 1929. 18 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 174, f. Relazione di inchiesta … a carico dei funzionari di PS della Questura di Varese, 15/10 IGPS to Capo Polizia, 11 August 1936. 19 For fascist regulation of prostitution and sexual behaviour, see V. De Grazia, How Fascism Ruled Women: Italy 1922–1945 (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1992), pp. 42–5. 20 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 174, f. Relazione di inchiesta … sui funzionari addetti alla R. Questura di Imperia, DGPS to Capo Polizia, 15 September 1936.

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21 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 58 bis, f. Bruno Pietro. 22 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 47 bis, f. Granito Alfredo, declaration (promemoria confidenziale) to Bocchini, 21 February 1932; 744 Prefetto Catanzaro to DGPS, 7 March 1932. 23 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 194, f. Catanzaro, 9121–1 IGPS to DGPS, 2 March 1936. 24 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 194, f. Ispezione della Provincia di Grosseto, IGPS per la Toscana to DGPS, 20 January 1933; ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 178, f. Grosseto R. Questura, 9136–1 IGPS to Capo Polizia, 7 September 1934. 25 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 194, f. Ispezione della Provincia di Grosseto, 9136–1 IGPS della Toscana to DGPS, 27 February 1936. 26 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 178, f. Parma. R Questura Ispezione, 3 IGPS di Zona to DGPS, 14 January 1939. It is curious perhaps that by contrast the register of Jews, instituted in the light of recent race discrimination measures, was reported as up to standard. 27 See, for example, the article on the new police headquarters in Turin, inaugurated in May 1935, ‘La sede della nuova Questura di Torino’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 12:6 (1935), 81–2. During the late 1930s and early 1940s several new questure were celebrated as examples of fascist architecture, encompassing modernity and rationality without ignoring tradition. They sometimes formed part of a larger complex, the Palazzo del Governo, which also housed the prefecture. See, for example Marcello Piacentini’s article on the Palazzo del Governo at Arezzo, ‘Recenti opere di Giovanni Michelucci’, Architettura. Rivista del Sindacato Nazionale Fascista Architetti, 19, fascicolo 2 (1940), 55–9. 28 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 194, f. Catanzaro, 9121–1 IGPS di Zona to DGPS, 2 March 1936. 29 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 183 bis, f. Modena, 60 IGPS di Zona to DGPS, 21 July 1937. 30 Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, pp. 313–14. 31 ASS, GP, b. 230 (1930), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, 333/9018–10 DP to Prefetti Regno and Alto Commissariato Napoli, 16 March 1930. 32 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1930–1931, b. 302, f. Organico Arma Reali Carabinieri, 442/2811 Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Affari Generali e Riservati (hereafter DAGR) to Alto Commissario Napoli, Prefetti Regno, Questore Roma, 7 February 1931. 33 ASS, Q, filza 254 (1936), Cat. C.1.b, Sottufficiali ed agenti di PS, f. Agenti di PS. Forza organica della provincia di Siena. 34 Ibid., 800/9806.C.20 Divisione Forze Armate di Polizia to Prefetti Regno, 11 January 1932. 35 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1930–1931, b. 302, f. Organico Arma Reali Carabinieri. 36 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1930–1931, b. 304, 11317 Prefetto Firenze to DGPS, 22 May 1931; response telegram 14152 Ministero dell’Interno, 24 May 1931.

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37 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1930–1931, b. 302, f. Reggio Emilia. Relazioni tra l’Arma e l’autorità di PS, 1637 Questore Reggio Emilia to Prefetto Reggio Emilia, 11 May 1930. 38 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 170, f. Relazione d’inchiesta a carico del Commissario Aggiunto di PS Impellizzeri Luigi, IGPS to Capo Polizia, 21 May 1929. 39 ASS, Q, filza 457 (1938), Cat. A.4.a Ordine pubblico, f. Siena e Provincia Attività Comunista. 40 Decree-law 681 of 13 May 1935. 41 Decree-law 472 of 9 March 1936. 42 Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, pp. 314, 315a. Decree-law 323 of 20 February 1939 increased the number of posts in the Public Security Guard to 19,100 (to be increased further to 20,000 on 1 July 1940) and the number of Public Security officials to 1,819. 43 Decree-law 57, 21 February 1938; Circolare Ministero Interno 800–9802, 10 August 1938, cited in Il magistrato dell’ordine, 15:11 (1938), 145. 44 Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, p. 314. 45 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 194, f. Ispezione della provincia di Imperia, 43 Ispettore Generale Regionale di PS to DGPS, 25 October 1933. 46 ASS, GP, b. 2 (1931), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, 800/9806-B Divisione Forze Armate di Polizia, Sezione 1a (pel Ministro) to Prefetti Regno, 11 November 1931. 47 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 174, f. Imperia. Relazione d’inchiesta … sui funzionari addetti alla R. Questura, IGPS to Capo Polizia, 15 September 1936. 48 I am grateful to Mauro Canali for his suggestions relating to this. Career opportunities offered by the POLPOL and the OVRA for skilled police officials are widely documented in Le spie del regime. 49 ASS, GP, b. 215 (1928), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, sf. De Vita Giovanni. 50 ASS, Q, filza 93 (1934), Cat. C.1.b, Sottufficiali e agenti di p.s. trasferiti (fasc. pers.), f. Napoli Domenico (Cat. C.1.a). 51 ASS, Q, filza 92 (1934), Cat. B.1.b, Funzionari e impiegati di PS trasferiti (fascicoli pers.), f. Schettini Vincenzo. 52 ASS, GP, b. 230 (1930), f. Cat. 7, Personale di PS, sf. Carli Gino. 53 ASS, Q, filza 92 (1934), Cat. B.1.b, Funzionari e impiegati di PS trasferiti. An examination of P.’s file revealed two sealed envelopes containing love messages between him and the girl. 54 ASS, Q, filza 93 (1934), Cat. C.1.b, Sottufficiali e agenti di p.s. trasferiti (fasc. pers.). 55 ASS, Q, filza 554 (1938), Cat. B.1.b Funzionari e impiegati PS, 7/3267 Prefetto Siena to Questore Siena, 30 July 1929. 56 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 178, f. Macerata Questura, 610 IGPS della Zona to DGPS, Divisione Forze Armate di Polizia, DP, 16 July 1941. 57 Decree-law 450 of 9 March 1936. According to the legislation, there were now no service or age limits for marriage for those occupying the ranks of

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Brigadiere and Vice-Brigadiere, as previously enjoyed by those occupying the higher rank of Maresciallo. 58 Decree-laws 385 of 8 February 1939 and 866 of 13 June 1940. 59 Decree-law 225 of 11 March 1941. 60 ASS.Q, filza 254 (1936), Cat. C.1.b. Sottufficiali ed Agenti di PS. 61 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 94. 62 ASS, Q, filza 555 (1938), Cat. C.1.b Sottufficiali e agenti di PS, f. Cleri Ettore (Cat. C.1.a). 63 Bollettino ufficiale del personale del Ministero dell’Interno., 1933, p. 95; ACS, FPFS, 1949, b. 527, f. Suria Francesco. 64 ASS, Q, filza 92 (1934), Cat. B.1.b, Funzionari e impiegati di PS trasferiti (fascicoli pers.), f. Schettini Vincenzo. 65 ASS, Q, filza 92 (1934), Cat. B.1.b, Funzionari e impiegati di PS trasferiti (fascicoli pers.), f. De Falco Giuseppe (Cat. B.1.a). 66 ACS, FPFS, 1949, b. 527, f. Suria Francesco. 67 Salvati, Il regime e gli impiegati, pp. 130, 173–4. In June 1937 state salaries and wages increased by 8% in order to cope with inflation difficulties (RD 1033 26 June 1937). 68 ACS, FPFS, 1949, b. 527, f. Suria Francesco. 69 ASS, Q, filza 158 (1935), Cat. C.1.b, Sottoufficiali e agenti PS, f. Moccia Aniello, Cat. C.1.a. 70 ASS, Q, filza 157 (1935), B.1.b Funzionari PS, f. Todisco Grande Emilio. 71 ASS, GP, B. 20 (1933), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, 333/9014.18 Ufficio Personale, Sezione 2 a (pel Ministro) to Prefetti Regno, 14 December 1932. 72 See, for example, the unsuccessful efforts of Aniello Curciotti to convince the Public Security authorities that his tuberculosis derived from his professional activities, in ASS, Q, filza 93 (1934), Cat. C.1.b, Sottufficiali e agenti di p.s. trasferiti (fasc. pers.), f. Aniello Curciotti. 73 ASS, GP, b. 230 (1930), f. Cat. 7 Personale di PS, 333/9014/17 Divisione Personale to Prefetti/Alto Commissario Napoli, Questori, 23 March 1930. 74 ACS, SCP, Cat. IV^, B. 3, f. Personale dipendente dalla DGPS che desidera il trasferimento in provincia per il costo della vita. 75 ACS, SCP, Cat. IV^, B. 3, f. Facilitazioni ad impiegati dello Stato per l’acquisto medicinali. 76 Klein, Invisible Men, p. 76. 77 Disciplinary issues concerning constables are discussed at length in Klein, Invisible Men, Chapter 3. The majority of infractions were for neglect of duty and drinking on duty. Other infractions included insubordination, overstepping orders and taking the law into their own hands. Corruption included involvement in street betting, acceptance of bribes, petty theft, holding on to money or objects handed in to them, and, more occasionally, extortion of bribes by means of threats. 78 Ibid., Chapter 8. 79 Ibid., pp. 253–5. Klein notes (p. 15) that the ‘vast majority of recruits

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came from regions immediately surrounding the city, and then from a widening geographic circle’. 80 Ibid., pp. 260–1. 81 For a detailed and vivid analysis of the different forms of confrontational encounter between English constables and the public, see Klein, Invisible Men, Chapter 6. 82 For examples of circulars, see Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Affari Generali e Riservati (1870–1958), Atti diversi (1898–1943) (hereafter ACS, DAGR-AD), b. 6, f. Organizzazione della Div.A.G.R. (1932–45); b. 7, f. Circolari (1935–37). 83 See, ASS, Q, filza 357 (1937–1938), Cat. D.1 Cont.Div; D.2 trasf., D.3 citaz., f. Cat. D.7 Relazione semestrale sulle condizioni della PS in rapporto alla criminalità, 4473 Prefetto Siena: Relazione trimestrale sulle condizioni della PS nella provincia di Siena, 8 October 1934. 84 E. Saracini, ‘Riassumiamo’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 3:12 (1926), 238–9. See also E. Saracini, ‘Tiriamo le somme’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 4:2 (1927), 21–3. 85 S. da Procida, ‘Amministrazione di PS. Impressioni’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 9:8 (1932), 121. 86 ‘Polizia e esercito’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 11:7 (1934), 101–2. 87 E. Saracini, ‘Commento’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 15:3 (1938), 15. 88 On the relation between ‘southernisation’ of state personnel and administrative performance, see Salvati, Il regime e gli impiegati, pp. 43–4. 89 Carlo Tullio-Altan argues (La nostra Italia, p. 81) that during the reign of the Sinistra Storica the Italian bureaucracy was progressively ‘southernised’ as jobs were allocated through clientelistic favours as a means of guaranteeing support for the Government from electors from the South. 90 ASS, Q, filza 158 (1935), Cat. C.1.b Sottoufficiali e agenti PS, f. Luigi Piscitelli (Cat. C. 1.a), ‘un gruppo di esercenti onesti e laboriosi’ to Questore Siena, 10 December 1928. It has not been possible to confirm which part of Italy Piscitelli originated from.

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5 Personal profiles Mussolini’s policemen

Personal profiles

The previous chapters have enabled us to develop a picture of the impact of fascism on the regular forces of the Italian police. As well as highlighting some of the difficulties encountered in creating an institution which responded to the professional and political demands of the regime, they have attempted to understand what it was like ‘being’ a policeman in Mussolini’s Italy. This chapter takes a closer look the lives and careers of a selection of Public Security officials and employees of the Interior Ministry Police.1 It addresses the issues of how police personnel ‘managed’ and ‘survived’ the fascist establishment and how far ideological factors determined successful careers in the force. If Party control over the police was limited, fascists made up a notable proportion of their members. What were the consequences of their presence? Did they enjoy career advantages over other colleagues, and if so, did this shape the emergence of a specific model of policeman? In addressing these questions, the chapter also seeks to understand whether the varying attitudes among police personnel revealed in the profiles I have analysed can be related to specific political outlooks. Did fascists in the police distinguish themselves in the manner in which they attended to their tasks? It needs to be stressed that the personal files of members of the Interior Ministry Police vary in the amount of material which they contain. Some are fairly skimpy in their contents, as a result of which it is not at all easy to put together a professional and biographical profile. Some contain enough documents for the researcher to trace the career path of the individual concerned from the moment he joined the police to his retirement. They contain his original application for employment accompanied by certification of the required entrance qualifications, details of his postings and professional advancement, references to disciplinary, family and health matters, and salary statements. Of particular significance to the researcher are letters which policemen or their protectors not infrequently addressed to the bosses in Rome to

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request favours, or appeal against a failed promotion. As revealed in the previous chapter, these letters can be quite illuminating in their presentation of professional and more intimate anxieties among personnel. Most files contain documents relating to the post-war investigations which large numbers of policemen underwent in relation to their conduct during the fascist period, and these also aid our reconstruction of their lives and careers. Our ability to create accurate ideological profiles of our subjects is hampered by the fact that many, armed with the raccomandazioni of their protectors, were anxious to ‘sell’ their ‘fascist’ qualities in order to do well. In this context, several adopted the bombastic language of fascism in personal declarations. This is evident in the report addressed to Bocchini by Commissioner Tommaso Pennetta on the occasion of his completion of the task of re-organising the Casellario Politico Centrale, which he had been entrusted with in 1926. Although he belonged among the many ‘flankers’ of fascism, Pennetta expressed his satisfaction that the work he had undertaken would in future contribute to an efficient defence of the fascist regime ‘against assaults from enemies of the Nation’.2 Such posturing in itself tells us much about the manner in which Italian state employees negotiated career advancement, allowing us to consolidate the picture we have started to put together in previous chapters of the broader cultural environment characterising the Interior Ministry Police during the ventennio. In spite of these interpretative limitations, I attempt to link patterns of behaviour emerging from these files to the political experiences of the individuals concerned. Several of the Public Security officials and employees I have chosen to analyse were briefly introduced in previous chapters. My examination of personnel mainly employed in the questure, as opposed, for example, to those staffing the secret police organs like the OVRA, is intentional, given the attention which the historiography has already paid to the latter.3 In later chapters, analysis of some of the individuals I have chosen continues as they face the Second World War, the Nazi occupation of Italy, the final defeat of fascism and the policing of the early Republic. The first three profiles examined might be representative of a considerable number of police professionals who, independent of their political beliefs, generally made successful careers in service to the fascist state. They mainly belonged to cohorts of men who had joined the police during the first two decades of the century. Without necessarily fully identifying with fascist ideology, they served the dictatorship arguably to the point of becoming effectively more fascist

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than many ill-disciplined colleagues who formally qualified as such. In this regard, Alberto Aquarone argues that a ‘fascistisation’ of the state bureaucracy, rather than depending on the recruitment of fascists, took place as individuals whom it already employed gradually and not always enthusiastically adhered to it.4 Those who were fascist among them maintained an overriding loyalty to their profession. Owing to their professional qualities, many such individuals quickly found themselves employed in the main headquarters of Interior Ministry Police in Rome, or as zone commanders for the OVRA secret police. Others continued to work in the questure, which many of them were eventually promoted to run. They sometimes distinguished themselves in their confrontations with Party leaders in the provinces, earning themselves reputations in the local fascist community as ideologically hostile. Nevertheless, most used the customary channels of patronage and raccomandazioni in order to aid their careers, taking advantage of their contacts in the Party and Government ministries. Epifanio Pennetta Epifanio Pennetta exemplifies a promising career in service to the fascist state. Pennetta was born in 1881 in the province of Avellino in the southern region of Campania. His father and brother were both lawyers. In 1906, shortly after taking a solicitor’s qualification at the University of Naples (he would subsequently graduate with a law degree at the same university), Pennetta entered the police as a low-ranking commissioner (delegato di Pubblica Sicurezza). After postings to Bari, Casoria (Naples), Reggio Calabria and Bracciano (Rome), from 1910 onwards he spent a lengthy period in the capital. Between 1919 (the year he was promoted to Commissioner) and 1926, he directed the Judicial Section (Polizia Giudiziaria) at the Questura of Rome. Following a brief period as commander of the headquarters of the Campitelli district, in 1928 he returned to the Questura, becoming Deputy Questore (Vice-Questore) in 1928.5 Suggesting the extent to which informal channels of political influence were essential for promotions during the mid–late 1920s, Pennetta would inform the post-Liberation anti-fascist Purge Commission that he had been ‘obliged’ to take up membership of the Party in 1929, when policemen were officially banned from joining, in order to ensure his promotion to Vice-Questore Vicario (Principal Deputy Questore), a promotion which, he argued, in normal circumstances would have been automatic, since he was the longest serving of the Vice-Questori stationed at the Rome headquarters.

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Although it is unclear whether Pennetta’s subsequent promotion only three years later to Questore may also be attributed to his Party membership, this did not earn the Fascists political dividends. In the course of his directorship of a number of provincial police headquarters during the early–mid 1930s, Pennetta was on several occasions involved in show-downs with the local fascist organisations. As already stated in Chapter 3, in 1933 he was transferred away from the province of Massa Carrara (Tuscany) on account of his hostility towards the fascist unions, which he accused of being over-militant in their defence of workers’ rights.6 His subsequent appointment as Questore of the province of Gorizia, close to the Yugoslav border, led to his direct confrontation with the local Party Federation after he carried out an inquiry into the activities of the Provincial Secretary. A report by the Carabinieri General Command, dated 6 July 1935, brings to light Pennetta’s uncompromising and hot-headed attitude towards the Fascist Party. It claimed that there was little hope of reconciliation between the two sides because of the irascibility and impulsiveness of the Questore.7 That very month, Starace complained to Bocchini that an operation undertaken by the Party to uncover the smuggling of Yugoslav newspapers across the nearby frontier had been ruined after Pennetta had carried out a series of premature arrests.8 As not infrequently happened to provincial police chiefs who fell out with the Party, at the end of 1935 Pennetta was transferred to the Interior Ministry Police headquarters at Rome, where he was appointed Public Security Inspector. He was subsequently presented with several career opportunities, which illustrate how highly the leadership of the Interior Ministry Police valued him. During the late 1930s, following the invasion of Ethiopia and against the background of the on-going Spanish Civil War, the governments of Peru, Bolivia and Portugal invited Italian police delegations to advise and instruct them in how to defend their countries against the threat of communism.9 If we are to believe Pennetta, his refusal in 1937 of the leadership of the police mission to Bolivia, though officially on health grounds, was actually motivated by the fact that he would be working alongside Militia officers and that previous experience as a questore in the provinces had taught him that it was impossible to get on with individuals who were factious and tended to be overbearing and arrogant.10 In 1938 Pennetta took up the direction of the Interior Ministry Police General and Confidential Affairs Division (Divisione Affari Generali e Riservati – DAGR), which, as amply demonstrated by Mauro Canali, played a key role in political repression during the fascist period, co-ordinating the work of the provincial questure with that of the OVRA and

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the POLPOL,11 though Pennetta would subsequently minimise the ideological significance of this office. His promotion was possibly also owed to earlier collaboration in counter-intelligence operations, for which he had earned praise from the Military Intelligence Service (Servizio Informazione Militare) of the War Ministry in February 1935.12 The Fascist Party’s longstanding suspicions against Pennetta would be confirmed on the occasion of the appointment in April 1943 of Renzo Chierici, previously Commander of the Forestry Militia, as Chief of Police. Chierici had Pennetta transferred to the Scuola Superiore di Polizia, where he took up the directorship. Following the overthrow of Mussolini in July 1943, Pennetta was reappointed as Director of the DAGR. If Pennetta’s conflicts with the Party would help him in his efforts to convince the post-Liberation Purge Commission that he should not be considered fascist, his insistence that he had from the latter years of the regime directed a police division (the DAGR), which had existed well before Mussolini’s rise to power, equally served to minimise the key role he had played in running a police state which had persecuted political dissidents. Alfonso Molina During the course of the dictatorship, Alfonso Molina gained a reputation as a zealous fascist. Born at Cava dei Tirreni near Salerno in 1885, Molina joined the profession in 1909.13 His promotion in 1934 to Questore at the relatively young age of forty-nine is perhaps an indication of the regime’s appreciation of his professional qualities, though it may equally reflect his ability to establish support and protection in places that mattered. Following the Liberation, Molina was targeted for having allegedly gone out of his way to persecute anti-fascists, as a result of which he had to defend himself against the accusation of being fascist. Notably, the socialist partisan leader and future President of the Italian Republic, Sandro Pertini, wrote to the Undersecretary of the Interior in October 1944 to protest that Molina, ‘who had previously persecuted all Catanian anti-fascists’, had been freed after initially being arrested by the British occupiers, and had since been appointed as Police Inspector in Chief for the island of Sicily.14 Molina’s ideological position is difficult to ascertain with precision. There is nothing in his files to suggest that he was involved in the fascist movement before the March on Rome or held the qualification of ‘firsthour’ fascist. We know that his brother, Martino Molina, was Secretary

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of the Salerno branch of the National Association of Fascist Railway Workers during the mid-1920s. In 1926 Alfonso was transferred away from his post at the Questura in Salerno in order to avoid conflicts of interest when his brother became the subject of a police investigation. Molina joined the Party in July 1925, just a few months before police personnel were banned from taking up membership. There is a hint of evidence in Molina’s file that Bocchini registered him as being close to the Party Secretary, Augusto Turati.15 It is significant that Molina’s file contains documentation of several commendations for acts of bravery, including his capture in 1928 of a ‘dangerous’ criminal on the run, and his successful handling, the same year, of violent demonstrations in Santa Marina (Salerno), in spite of the injuries he sustained. In October 1941 the Prefect of Catania (Sicily) praised Molina for his ‘constant’ and ‘fearless’ presence at the scene of enemy bombings of the city.16 The following month, he received a commendation for organising and directing operations leading to the discovery and arrest of bands of criminals responsible for armed robbery in the south-eastern provinces of Sicily. When considering Molina’s role as a questore during the 1930s, what emerges is an individual who rigidly executed the regime’s directives against anti-fascists and other ‘anti-national’ individuals. His persecution, illustrated by Michael Ebner,17 of forty-four homosexuals, subsequently sentenced to confino, when directing the police at Catania in 1939, may have been a consequence of his identification with fascist theory on sexual ‘deviation’, but may also have been the result of his personal prejudices, upon which the regime was able to play in order to fulfil its race policies. Ebner suggests that Molina’s emphasis in a general report to Rome on the risks posed by homosexuality in Catania to the ‘health and improvement of the race’ was somewhat contrasted by rather more mundane assessments of individual cases, which ‘mainly focused on criminality, the corruption of minors, and … the mannerisms and appearance of homosexuals’.18 Following the defeat of fascism, Molina defended his conduct on the grounds that he was zealous by character, demanded perfection from those he commanded and was accustomed to inflexibly enforcing the law, and as such had carried out his professional duties through enforcement of fascist legislation, but had never been prepared to turn a blind eye to law-breakers, whatever their political affiliation. Reflecting the common tendency after the Liberation to stress the neutrality of the police during the dictatorship, reports compiled on Molina in 1945 claimed that he had been unpopular because of his authoritarian and intransigent demeanour, which, however, they argued, should not be

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mistaken for ‘fascist’ behaviour or a fanatical attitude. Molina himself exclaimed in a defensive statement that if his manner of conduct, ‘instead of calling itself conscientiousness and sense of duty, is called severity then I am endowed with such severity! But do not tell me that this severity amounts to fascist behaviour.’19 Like many of his colleagues, Molina involved himself, or found himself embroiled, in local fascist rivalries. In the mid-1930s during his office as Questore of Avellino (Campania), Molina was unpopular with the Party Federation, which accused him of exercising undue influence over the fascist Prefect, Tullio Tamburrini. Molina allegedly encouraged the Prefect to turn against the Provincial Secretary. In September 1937, following denunciations received by both the National Party Secretary, Starace, and Mussolini, Bocchini was forced to reassure the former that Molina’s moral integrity was beyond suspicion, and cited similar assurances from Tamburrini. 20 In defending his conduct during the fascist years, Molina would make much of the fact that he had supported prefects in their confrontations with the local Party federations. He cited the example of his tough stance against the ‘high-handed and violent’ Party Federal Secretary at Catania, Pietrangelo Mammano, as proof that he was not fascist.21 A report written by the Carabinieri Division Commander of Avellino in January 1944 following the Allied liberation of the province brings into question Molina’s self-declared rectitude and paints an image of a rather more manipulative individual. It referred to his success in obtaining the friendship and protection of Bocchini’s secretary, Emilio Manganiello, in order to get into the good graces of the Chief of Police, and to his ability to dominate the prefects under whom he served, until the appointment of Tamburrini, who, because of the high level of protection he enjoyed from the Party leadership, ‘had no reason to be afraid of him’. The report continued that: ‘The province has a bad memory of Dr Molina because of his abrasive and authoritarian manner as a result of which everyone thinks badly of him and he is intolerable even to his collaborators. I have gained the impression that it would be difficult to find anyone prepared to talk positively of him.’ The report concluded that Molina was unscrupulous in his sole desire to obtain the approval of his superiors, even to the point of letting others take the blame for his failings. 22 The above report may have been flavoured by its author’s personal antipathy towards Molina or a desire to isolate him as a scapegoat in a climate dominated by accusations and counter-accusations regarding the recent past. Nevertheless, it suggests a rather more complex personality, who, for all his claims, employed less than honourable strategies to

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advance in his career. There is, indeed, ample evidence from the files of Bocchini’s secretariat that Manganiello and Molina exchanged favours and that on several occasions Molina asked Manganiello to speak to Bocchini on his behalf.23 It is perhaps telling that Bocchini should make note of Molina’s ‘limited culture’ (indicating that he formulated articulated prepositions incorrectly) and refer to his tendency to behave high-handedly towards those under his command while showing excessive deference towards his superiors.24 More significantly, however, it is possible that Molina’s stress on his desire to uphold the law, and his superiors’ insistence that there was no hint of fascism in his behaviour, concealed a rather more fanatical approach to dealing with the enemies of the regime. A communication from the Prefect of Salerno to the Personnel Division of the Interior Ministry Police, dated 31 January 1945, referred, for example, to rumours that Molina had employed violence during the interrogation of a socialist militant, who was accused of having thrown flyers containing ‘subversive’ messages from the balcony of a theatre in Salerno on 1 May 1925. Though stressing that these suspicions had not been corroborated, the Prefect of Salerno confirmed Molina’s ‘at times impulsive temperament’ as a result of which it was likely that the interrogation would have been conducted ‘vigorously’. 25 Whether such behaviour can be attributed to fascist beliefs, natural temperament or to a desire to curry favour with his political masters is not easy to ascertain; yet it is likely that Molina at the very least was attracted to a regime which gave the police greater margins of power (and protection from accusations of abuse) when it came to law enforcement and which sanctioned harsh treatment of individuals whom he found morally and politically objectionable. Leone Santoro A number of early supporters of fascism in the police made successful careers during the years of the dictatorship. Following the March on Rome, some were rewarded for their services to the movement through promotions. How far this represented or was envisaged as a ‘fascistisation’ of the institution is questionable. While these policemen may have benefited from the support of fascist leaders or been noted for their fascist ‘qualities’, their success appears to have depended above all on professional ability. Leone Santoro, born in Avellino in 1883, entered the police in 1911. He was stationed in the Po Valley province of Cremona from 1916 to 1931, where the authorities often noted his efforts to repress the local socialist movement. During the

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period of ascendancy of fascism he established a close relationship with the fascist Ras, Roberto Farinacci, ensuring that the latter’s punitive expeditions were unopposed by the police authorities. In return for this Farinacci used his influence to assist his career advancement. This included a failed attempt to get him promoted to Vice-Questore in 1927. Mussolini was clearly suspicious of Santoro’s closeness to Farinacci. However, Santoro’s increasing fortunes were mainly due to the ability of the fascist leader to separate him from Farinacci. 26 Reflecting the centralisation of fascist authority and weakening of ‘rassismo’ which the regime undertook during the late 1920s, 27 following his transfer away from Cremona in 1931 Santoro became a more loyal servant of the fascist state, and this determined the success of his career. In supporting Santoro, the Prefect of Ancona, Giuseppe Catalano, under whom he had served during the mid-1930s, referred to an excellent civil servant whose fascist credentials could not be doubted. He underlined Santoro’s professional services which had, ‘without hesitation and from the very start’, been determined by ‘a profound fascist faith which he managed to uphold, in spite of difficulties experienced in the environment in which he worked’, and referred to the ‘tenacious and assiduous work he has continuously carried out, enlightened and animated by the purest ideas of fascism, over four long years in which he has run the Questure of Grosseto, Vicenza and Ancona’.28 In 1937 Santoro was promoted to Questore on ‘exceptionally meritorious’ grounds. He was appointed to lead the Italian police mission to Salazar’s Portugal, and this resulted in further promotions to the top grade of ‘first-class’ Questore, then Inspector General of the Interior Ministry.29 If the profile provided by the Prefect of Ancona may not be objective, Santoro’s writings bring to evidence the ideological rationale characterising his official assessment of the Portuguese situation and his recommendations to Salazar’s Government. In a report to the Portuguese Interior Minister marking the conclusion of the mission, dated 25 April 1940, Santoro stressed the need to centralise the Portuguese police command (‘since a powerful state cannot have a fragmented police’) within the Interior Ministry and to re-organise the Portuguese police according to the Italian police system, which he described as ‘Latin and fascist’, in order to guarantee social order. This should entail the creation of a more efficient system of filing of information on suspects and ‘subversives’. Moreover, in the area of recruitment of personnel it was imperative to adopt rigid selection criteria, since ‘policing cannot be considered a profession but a mission; it must therefore be founded on

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sacrifice’.30 Fascist racial issues also informed the work of the mission. In September 1938, Santoro expressed his concerns to Bocchini about lack of decisiveness in confronting the ‘Jewish question’ on the part of the Portuguese Government and press.31 Subsequently, however, he reacted positively when the Portuguese Government accepted 150 Polish- and German-Jewish refugees (who had been expelled from Italy in September 1938) only on condition that they leave the country within a year. He interpreted this as a sign of hope that the Italian police mission would in future be able to inject anti-Semitism into the Portuguese ruling class.32 What comes across from a reading of the papers in Santoro’s file is an individual who was anxious to show Bocchini that his work was recognised by the Portuguese authorities, once he had succeeded in overcoming the initial hostility and scepticism of a considerable number of police commanders. He sent the Chief of Police copies of articles on the mission published in the police journal, Policìa Portuguesa. In July 1939 he wrote informing him that he had received a letter of thanks from Salazar for his work, noting that only very rarely did Salazar write ‘in his own hand’.33 In his report to Bocchini at the conclusion of the mission in April 1940, Santoro noted the Portuguese police’s adoption of many of the Italian policing techniques, expressing his satisfaction that: Before we came here, little was known about the Italian Police in Portugal, and little was written about the Italian Police, given the influence of England and France. The examples of Scotland Yard and of the French Republican National Guard were constantly cited in the press. Now, however, they talk and write about the Italian Police with greater knowledge and more conscious admiration. 34

If Santoro expressed the (in reality fairly limited) success of his mission in terms of the new international prestige it had earned for the Italian police, Mario Ivani stresses how the mission gradually took on a diplomatic character of symbolic importance for Italian fascism. In July 1939, Santoro and his assistant, Deputy Commissioner Alfio Canto, received awards at a public ceremony, at which the Portuguese Interior Minister underlined the ‘indestructible Italo-Portuguese friendship, based on common origins and ideological ties which bring the New [Portuguese] State and the Fascist Regime together’.35 According to Ivani, the Legation of the Italian Foreign Ministry interpreted the event as demonstrating the ability of the fascist regime to create a new police organisation which fascist Europe (‘l’Europa rinnovata’) was beginning to use as a model.36

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Santoro presents the biography of a talented police professional who distinguished himself as a servant of the fascist state. By all accounts, he was a genuine fascist believer, but even if he was not, the documentation available shows how, in encouraging Salazar’s regime to inject fascist ideology into the Portuguese police, he was instrumental in spreading the fascist word. Alfredo Granito Unlike Santoro, many early supporters of fascism in the police failed to distinguish themselves as professionals, even though some were rewarded for their services to the movement. Alfredo Granito (born in Salerno in 1874), whom we have already come across in the previous chapter, initially suffered setbacks to his career when it was discovered that he had secretly joined the fascist movement in Ferrara (Emilia), where he held the office of Vice-Questore. Had Mussolini not become Prime Minister, his career would have been ruined. This is what the fascist Prefect, Mario Limongelli, claimed in a letter to Bocchini dated 10 September 1930.37 In March 1932, Granito, who by then occupied the rank of Questore, wrote to Mussolini, stating that he had joined the Fascist Party at the beginning of 1922. According to Granito, once his dedication to the fascist cause had become apparent, he was suspended from the rank of Vice-Questore and transferred, though this was officially attributed to bad health. Immediately following the March on Rome, he returned to Ferrara to direct the police there.38 Granito’s good standing in the eyes of the new Government is evident in his promotion up two ranks from Commissioner to Questore on 1 August 1923. He continued to run the police at Ferrara until 1925. Granito claimed that he faced new career difficulties in 1923. He was accused of having protected fascists responsible for the murder of the anti-fascist priest of Argenta, Don Giovanni Minzoni, shortly after his promotion. His name, so he claims, featured in a highly compromising memorandum, written by a disaffected fascist, Tommaso Beltrani, ex-Secretary of the Ferrarese Party Federation. The memorandum testified to the climate of violence and intimidation characterising the rule of the provincial Ras, Italo Balbo, to whom the police and judicial authorities were allegedly subservient. Together with a collection of incriminating letters, it came into the possession of anti-fascist journalist Giuseppe Donati, after Balbo had refused to be blackmailed into buying it.39 Granito claimed that he had reacted to the accusation by publicly refuting the memorandum and unmasking the fascistturned-communist informer Beltrani. This earned him the praise of

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the future Minister for Italian Africa, Attilio Teruzzi, who stated that his name should be added to the ‘golden register’ of fascist questori, though Limongelli noted in his letter to Bocchini that Granito’s reaction almost cost him a transfer. This is hardly surprising if we consider that Beltrani’s revelations in the autumn of 1924 and Granito’s alleged counter-attack coincided with the major crisis which Mussolini’s Government faced following the murder of Giacomo Matteotti. The declarations of both Limongelli and Granito are perhaps most significant in their revelation of how police officials attempted to exploit their fascist ‘qualities’ for personal ends and made use of high-ranking fascists, or appealed to Mussolini in person, in the hope of exerting pressure on their bosses in the Interior Ministry Police. In his letter to Mussolini, Granito made much of his public reputation as a fascist and of the extent to which he had suffered for the fascist cause. The more recent ‘suffering’ to which Granito referred in his letter was his transfer from the Calabrian provincial capital of Catanzaro, because, he alleged, he had fallen foul of the local Party after having ordered an investigation into its activities.40 As illustrated in the previous chapter, it is more plausible that Granito was transferred for having involved himself in local politics to the point of overstepping the boundaries of his office. Indicating a not uncommon tendency among policemen to shift all blame for their professional misfortunes onto their alleged detractors, Granito portrayed himself as a victim. He noted with some theatricality that the very sheet of paper on which he was writing was moistened by his tears, tears which he hoped would wash away the sins and lies of his adversaries. Both letters expounded career difficulties which, in the view of their authors, did not correspond to Granito’s fascist ‘qualities’. As Limongelli stated, ‘it seems that a strange cloud has passed over his path, which without ruining his reputation or lowering his morale, has certainly not spared him bitterness of spirit’. Granito, he argued, had not attained adequate career satisfaction, when others had been prepared merely to emulate his example in line with changed political circumstances and had been more fortunate.41 Granito’s promotion to Questore, if rewarded for his services to the fascist movement, was hardly matched by professional competence and loyalty to his superiors. His poor leadership of the Questura at Grosseto in Tuscany during the final years of his career was noted in the previous chapter. If Mussolini passed on Granito’s letter to Bocchini, by all accounts he did not intervene to help the ageing Questore. In August 1934 his retirement was recommended on the grounds that ‘he has shown that he is no longer able to manage a Questura of even modest importance,

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such as that of Grosseto, and since it is equally impossible, for obvious reasons, to employ him in other offices’.42 Luigi Salerno Like Granito, Luigi Salerno made much of his services to the fascist movement in order to assist his career advancement and called on the support of high-ranking fascists for this purpose. Born in Gallipoli (Apulia) in 1885, the son of a veterinary doctor, Salerno joined the police in 1907 with the rank of Delegato di Pubblica Sicurezza.43 The following year he was decorated for his role in rescue operations in the aftermath of the earthquake at Messina. He completed his law degree at the University of Messina in 1911. In 1913, he was posted to Libya, annexed to Italy since 1912, where, on account of his ability to speak Arabic, he served in the Judicial Police Division under the Ministry of Colonies.44 This posting was temporarily interrupted by a period on the Austro-Italian front during the First World War. In 1919 Salerno failed in his first attempt to be promoted to Commissioner. In a report dated 18 October 1919 to the Interior Ministry Police headquarters in Rome, Salerno’s bosses in Tripolitania noted that in spite of professional qualities he was ‘not particularly sincere’ and ‘guided by an excessive desire for popularity’.45 The following year he was punitively transferred back to Italy on account of the way he had handled an investigation into the misconduct of colonial officers. Salerno had allegedly questioned an acquaintance of his, the father-in-law of one of the officers under investigation, about the affair; thus, details of the enquiry became known to the officers concerned, as a result of which ‘all attempts to discover the truth were ineffectual’.46 Salerno himself claimed that he was the victim of a conspiracy. On his return to Italy Salerno was posted to the town of Lugo in Romagna, where he assisted the fascist squads, joining the Fascist Party on 22 October 1922. Salerno was promoted to Chief Commissioner (Commissario Capo) in January 1927, during a period in which several commissioners who had previously aided the fascist movement saw advancement in their careers. In 1928, Salerno obtained written statements from the Fascist Party headquarters of the towns of Lugo, Conselice, Cotignola and Lavezzola, situated close to the Adriatic port of Ravenna, which certified his support of the squads. In particular, a declaration of the Fascio at Lavezzola, dated 1 September 1928, stated that ‘in the police environment during those years, Cavalier Salerno was considered a traitor, but to us he was an invaluable and courageous volunteer: he received anonymous letters, threats of punishment and

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almost lost his stripes’. The document went on to explain how one night in September 1922, at the scene of a punitive expedition at Cotignola, when his fellow commissioners carried out mass arrests of fascists, Salerno intervened to ensure that only one was detained, for illegal possession of a fire-arm. Salerno later liberated the fascist and returned his weapon to him, as a result of which he was reported by one of his men.47 Significantly, however, the above statements accompanied Salerno’s appeal in October 1940 against an unsuccessful application for promotion to Vice-Questore, which the Director of the Military Liaison Centre of the Fascist Party addressed to the Deputy Chief of Police, Carmine Senise, on the instructions of the Party Secretary, Ettore Muti. In his appeal, Salerno supplied the names of individuals who would attest to his ‘fascist’ activities in 1921, and claimed that from the pages of the since defunct periodical, La voce repubblicana, ‘it will be easy to reveal that the enemies of fascism distinguished me as “the notorious Commissioner Salerno”’. Evidently, Salerno’s political exploits did not appeal to Senise, who responded to the Party headquarters that during his career Salerno had not received those positive judgements required for promotion to Vice-Questore, for which rigid selection criteria were applied.48 Salerno’s professional record during the fascist period was hardly exemplary. In 1932, he was transferred away from Genoa on suspicion of having fraudulently claimed extra allowances for overtime related to his task of inspecting passenger ships arriving at the port. In 1934, he had faced a transfer from a posting at L’Aquila (Abruzzo) because, in spite of his fascist leanings, he was not looked favourably upon by the local Party Federation and Militia. His superiors reported a number of character defects: they regarded him as being intolerant, untrusting and insincere; he over-prioritised private and family interests, because of the influence which his ‘interfering’ and ‘unscrupulous’ wife and daughter had over him. Yet Salerno’s superiors noted his intellectual qualities. His publication of the Enciclopedia di polizia in 1938, discussed in Chapter 2, undoubtedly contributed in some manner to the ‘fascistisation’ of police culture, earning him praise from the pages of Saracini’s journal, Il magistrato dell’ordine.49 During the late 1930s he became an instructor for fascist youth groups of the Gioventù Italiana del Littorio (GIL) attached to the Colonial Police. Like many cases examined in the course of this study, a picture emerges, however, of an individual who had an inflated view of his right to a successful career because he was fascist, and who, whenever he faced career disappointments, felt it necessary to remind his bosses

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of his contributions to the fascist cause, sometimes with backing of the Party. It is ironic that in a declaration to Senise, dated 5 April 1942, inspired by another failure to achieve promotion, Salerno should state: ‘I do not wish to stress my participation in the March on Rome or my acquittal through amnesty by the judicial authorities for a crime committed in the fascist cause, since I would not want anyone to think that I expect my fascist qualities to conceal any possible failings.’ Nevertheless, he proceeded to quote a statement of his ideological merits provided by a fascist authority!50 The latter years of Salerno’s career are described in the following chapter. Francesco Suria Chapter 2 highlighted the recruitment of a number of ‘first-hour’ fascists to the Interior Ministry Police during the mid–late 1920s. Judging from the cases examined in this study, their presence did not appear to correspond to a serious programme for transforming the institution. Many failed to prove themselves as competent police professionals. Among these political recruits was Francesco Suria, to whom we have already referred in Chapter 4.51 We know from the documents in his personal file that Suria was born in 1904 at Palmi on the Tyrrhenian Coast in the province of Reggio Calabria and that he completed all but the final year of study at grammar school (liceo classico). He joined the Fascist Party on 1 September 1922, but we know little about his role in the movement. In 1926 he took part in the state competition for office employees in the Interior Ministry Police, and was appointed Junior Clerical Officer (Alunno d’Ordine) in May 1927, being made permanent after six months’ probation. In September 1928 he was promoted to the next rank (Applicato). It is significant that the decree by which he was promoted cited Article 18 of Law 33 of January 1927, which gave the Interior Ministry the right to overlook the minimum period of service required before promotion to that rank could be made. It is not clear why Suria was promoted so quickly. This may have been a reflection of the need to speed up promotions in the light of the shortage of manpower created by sackings during this period. Suria’s fascist credentials may have played an informal role in his appointment and subsequent promotion. As noted in the previous chapter, only in May 1934 was his status as a ‘first-hour’ fascist officially recognised. Suria’s career in the police was not at all successful; nor did his being a fascist contribute positively to the police service, if we are to take the reports of his superiors seriously. In April 1929 he was transferred away from his post at Reggio Calabria owing to his debts

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and friendships with people of ill-repute. His next posting, to Fiume on the Istrian peninsula, was equally unsuccessful. In a communication to the Interior Ministry Police headquarters dated 29 December 1930, the Prefect claimed that he had had to move him to another office in order to break all contact with the public, given that he had taken advantage of his responsibility for issuing property rental licences to obtain personal favours. In order to achieve this, he had deliberately removed documents, which he subsequently claimed had been mislaid. The ensuing investigation revealed that he had also stolen tax stamps. Hence, the Prefect stated that: Suria has already been sent away from Fiume … – precisely in order to remove him from this environment where he could have created serious problems, and where his permanence, in matters of personal well-being, too, would have been trying, given his and his family’s precarious conditions – illnesses, poverty, and a breakdown in personal relationships, owing, it would seem, to his wife’s nervous condition. 52

During his next posting at Alessandria (Piedmont), Suria faced a month’s suspension for the infractions committed while stationed at Fiume. It is not clear whether his posting to Siena in August 1931 was motivated by further problems relating to conduct. That year he failed to be admitted to the competition for promotion to the rank of Police Clerk (Impiegato di Polizia), because he did not pass the preliminary oral examination. In April 1933, he was transferred to Brindisi in Apulia, possibly in response to his request for employment at a coastal location owing to his daughter’s tuberculosis.53 His file also contains the letter which his wife wrote to Mussolini pleading for his transfer. Suria’s career in the police finished at the end of 1935 when he transferred to the Ministry of Justice. As the Prefect of Fiume’s report argues, Suria’s case is a sad tale of an unpromising career amid family woes and financial difficulties. Ideological status often appeared to have no bearing on professional conduct, which seemed more firmly lodged in the imperative of day-to-day survival. Ernesto Paglione, Pietro Bruno and Francesco Barbarotta Though individuals like Suria failed to stand up to the regime’s model of state employee, we may tentatively link some aspects of conduct among fascist personnel to their political beliefs and experiences. If many distinguished themselves as fascists, it was often in their lack of discipline and recklessness, which hardly squared with the propagandised image of the orderly and dedicated fascist employee.

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5.1  Ernesto Paglione (third from right), Director of the Scuola Tecnica di Polizia, Caserta (date unknown). Source: Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Personale di Pubblica Sicurezza (1890–1973), Fascicoli Personale Fuori Servizio (1890–1966), versamento 1973, b. 158 bis, f. 2. By permission of the Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali. Authorised by the Archivio Centrale dello Stato, 2011, n. 961/2011.

In some cases, such behaviour reflected ideological resentment against superiors whom they considered ideologically unfit. The downfall of Ernesto Paglione, Director of the Police School at Caserta, described in Chapter 2, may be attributed in some measure to his outspoken disrespect for the police hierarchy. Moreover, it is plausible that for a decorated veteran of the First World War, a belief in permanent activism, which had been moulded in the trenches and later inspired the fascist movement, was difficult to reconcile with the hierarchy and protocol of the institution where he was employed, especially if, in his view, that institution failed to fulfil the requirements of the ‘Revolution’. The underhand behaviour of which Paglione was accused, if confirmed, was possibly the product of arrogance and disregard for regulations nurtured by fascist ideology, but it should also be considered in the broader context in which corruption continued to be rife during the dictatorship.54 Certain types of aggressive behaviour within the police may be

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cautiously attributed to a fascist mindset, in which the concept of the objective and absolute ‘enemy’ (whether liberal, socialist, communist, ‘anti-national’ or bourgeois) was particularly marked.55 The notorious fascist Questore, Pietro Bruno, gained a reputation for his authoritarian, impulsive and violent character which led him to behave viciously towards anti-fascists who fell into his hands, to the point that in 1928 two of his own subordinates at the Questura of Genoa, which he directed, worked up the courage to report him. Yet the allegations of the two police commissioners were denied by the Prefect in an effort to protect Bruno. Moreover, as Canali points out, he kept his position and did not alter his interrogation methods, while his rapid career ascendancy continued (he became a prefect in 1933), suggesting that Bocchini may have appreciated his methods.56 Francesco Barbarotta, a ‘first-hour’ fascist who joined the police in 1928,57 was not so lucky. He faced an inquiry in 1932 following accusations that he had assaulted two individuals during the course of questioning in his office at the police station in Nola (Sicily). Although Barbarotta was not found guilty of the specific charge, it being argued that his accusers had personal reasons for making allegations against him, his superiors recommended his departure from Nola. They were evidently concerned about his lack of discretion, admitting that on a previous occasion he had publicly slapped one of his accusers in the face for unseemly behaviour with an under-age prostitute. Without specifying that he was fascist, Barbarotta’s superiors referred to his ‘exuberant’ and ‘excitable’ character. Can we attribute Barbarotta’s behaviour to a typically fascist mentality moulded by particular life experiences? My linking here of particular forms of conduct to ideology is admittedly hypothetical. For one thing, where the subjects concerned qualified as ‘first hour’ fascists, it is not so easy to ascertain what roles they had occupied in the blackshirt movement, and whether, for example, they had engaged in squad violence. Aggressive behaviour, together with disregard for official hierarchy and abuse of power, were certainly not restricted to fascist personnel. However, the fascists among them, particularly those of the ‘first-hour’, often showed a particular propensity towards roughness, recklessness and arrogance. Edoardo Mezza Edoardo Mezza’s profile illustrates a seemingly less excitable ‘first-hour’ fascist who nevertheless encouraged an application of the regime’s ideology to the police profession. Born in 1898, Mezza was a decorated

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veteran of the First World War, who participated in the March on Rome and later became a centurion of the Militia. He entered the profession through the 1927 competition for officials, under the recommendation of Dino Grandi, Ras of Bologna during the period of fascist ascendancy to power, and at that time Undersecretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Mezza’s career appeared to get off to a reasonably promising start. Posted to Genoa in 1928 on his appointment, he was judged by the Prefect as ‘excellent’, above all for his intellectual qualities and discretion, though some reservations were expressed about how dedicated he was to his work. In 1933, fairly early in his career, Mezza was promoted to the rank of Assistant Commissioner.58 Reflecting the ‘intellectual qualities’ to which the Prefect of Genoa referred, an article which Mezza published in Il magistrato dell’ordine in August 1934 is significant in so far as it brings to evidence those issues surrounding the organisation of the police which might have culturally separated fascist personnel from their non-fascist colleagues. Entitled ‘Saluto ai giovani’ (‘Welcome to the Youngsters’), 59 the article was inspired by the recruitment of a new cohort of young commissioners who had been educated and brought up in the climate of the ‘Revolution’. Mezza argued that these fascists would bring an impulse of renewal to the institutions of the state. The article clearly revealed hostility to the old ways of the Italian state and a belief that it was the role of young recruits to shake things up: ‘Under Mussolini, the bureaucracy of the Italians will increasingly detach itself from its many bourgeois and traditionalist features and from the obsolete systems of “old style” officialdom […] And it is precisely the youngest who have to make lightning progress in order to align the bureaucracy with our wonderful fascist Italy.’ Addressing an issue which was hardly new to Saracini’s journal, Mezza also noted that policemen should engage in regular physical exercise – whereas the institution had traditionally considered sport merely a pastime – while cultural facilities and activities (libraries and conferences) should not be lacking either.60 He recommended sports as a means of reinforcing the spirit and increasing individual and collective moral strength. The article went on to stress the role of new recruits in bringing fascism into the police: ‘Tomorrow’s official must be technically and physically trained in order to guide his men, through doctrine and by his own example, shaping them according to the marvellous and most noble human qualities which produced the infantrymen of the Piave and the squadristi of the “Revolution”.’ Mezza concluded by expressing his wish that these young fascists would one day be able to engage in sport on a daily basis, as a result of

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which ‘nineteenth-century desires’ for the top hat or frock-coat would disappear. It is difficult to gauge how far Mezza applied his fascist beliefs to his own work as a police commissioner, though we have some clues. There is evidence that his career started to go downhill from the late 1930s. In March 1937, the Prefect of Genoa demanded Mezza’s punitive transfer in view of negligence in his job at the Political Section of the Questura. He was subsequently posted to Bolzano (Trentino). His poor performance may simply denote irreconcilability between his purported political beliefs and his ability to behave in line with them. Yet his subsequent appointment as a major in the Colonial Police (Polizia dell’Africa Italiana – PAI) in 1938, beyond offering him a more stimulating professional challenge and opportunities for adventure, may have allowed him to get out of a working environment which failed to live up to his ideals.61 In the absence of more detailed documentation we can merely speculate on what led Mezza to change his job. He was one of several fascist officials who in the late 1930s left the Interior Ministry Police to become officers in the PAI. Ulderico Caputo A general impression gained from examination of personal files is that those fascists who attempted to impose their ideological beliefs upon their colleagues risked arousing their resentment. This was the case, for example, of a low-ranking commissioner, Ulderico Caputo,62 about whom precise information is lacking (his file has yet to be released or is missing), but who clearly belonged to a younger cohort of commissioners. He joined the force around 1935. Suggesting that both his superiors and the Party recognised and in some measure put to use his fascist ‘qualities’, in February 1938 Caputo was appointed as Deputy Group Leader of the Fascist Association of Public Employment for the police headquarters of Florence.63 Marking the beginning of a period during which, after a long-term ban from membership, those working for the Interior Ministry were now expected to join the employee association, Caputo’s appointment reflected a new era in which the Party was, in theory, able to extend its control more directly over the police environment. A report of the Florentine Committee of National Liberation on officials of the local Questura written in the autumn of 1944 gives us some idea of the impact which the presence of more radical fascists had on the policing environment. It argued that those under Caputo’s command had suffered his constant propagandising in favour of fascism and Nazism, as well as his exaltation of ‘Prussian

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militarism’. This had involved putting on German language courses. Unsurprisingly, the report noted that Caputo had been an assiduous frequenter of the local Party Federation.64 Caputo’s conduct may have been somewhat distorted by the Committee of National Liberation. However, such propagandising was also evident in several articles Caputo published in Il magistrato dell’ordine. These publications bring to light the demands of junior commissioners for a more complete ‘fascistisation’ of their institution. Though they were, inevitably, the product of a period dominated by political conformity and mimicry, and as such should be interpreted with caution, they illustrate that there was space in Saracini’s journal for ideologically based criticism of the police, as well as highlighting an underlying rift between younger- and older-generation policemen in relation to what the police should become in the new fascist era. How widely Caputo’s views were shared amongst policemen of his generation is questionable, however. Caputo’s ‘vocation’ as a writer for the fascist cause appears to have been shaped while he was an active member of the Party organisation for university students (Gruppi Universitari Fascisti – GUF). There is an obvious link between his desire for the police to be reformed ‘alla fascista’ and the role which he had earlier envisaged for the GUF in training civilian administrative personnel. In an article which appeared in the weekly publication of the Milan section of the GUF, Libro e moschetto, in November 1932, Caputo argued that graduates belonging to the Gruppi should be entrusted with the task of training personnel for the civilian administration.65 On joining the police he evidently saw himself and fellow recruits as playing a similar role. He was, however, entering territory in which there was limited space for direct Party influence over training procedures and in which older colleagues were undoubtedly hostile towards the reforming intentions of newcomers. If the police leadership was not averse to the expression of revolutionary aspirations, it was probably confident that those occupying such positions were fairly isolated. One of Caputo’s first articles in Il magistrato dell’ordine appeared on the front page of the issue of April 1935. Entitled ‘La Polizia di Mussolini’,66 it emphasised the need to transform the police so that they would be increasingly ‘adapted to the new era’ and become a perfect and healthy ‘instrument in the hands of the Duce’. Caputo explained to the reader on behalf of his generation that such a desire was inspired by ‘our youthful spirit so profoundly moulded by the experience of the fascist organisations’. Their objective was to work together to ensure that ‘the many organs of the State respond to the creative will of fascism’.

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Caputo went on to argue that few young men wanted to join the police. The solution to this problem lay in advertising more effectively the need for men who were ‘highly intelligent, open minded and physically and morally courageous’. Training at the Scuola Superiore di Polizia, he continued, was too theoretical and too brief. He added: We believe that the Scuola Superiore di Polizia should train Public Security officials in the same manner in which military schools train Officers; that is through a true and proper academy for officers. Teaching, which is already divided into the two branches, juridical and scientific, should be concerned, as regards the former, with the practical application of laws … As for the latter, teaching should be much less restricted than at present, without neglecting any aspect of the police service. Alongside the teaching of juridical and professional disciplines, a course should be run on the structures of the State and on National issues of current importance, subordinate to the objectives of the Fascist Revolution. Nor should adequate physical training be omitted.

Following in the footsteps of a large number of critics and commentators, much of Caputo’s vision of a future fascist police appeared to focus primarily on the need for higher levels of professionalism, though this was to be achieved through the integration of fascist concepts. He repeated the comment familiar to observers of the liberal police that an official or officer, once recruited, is ‘left on his own’. Caputo concluded his article by addressing the older generation of colleagues, to whom he expressed gratitude for the ‘baggage of experience which they pass on to us’; but he urged them not to be jealous, rather, to look favourably upon the advancement of younger policemen, since ‘the entry to the police of new ideas and new men can only further enhance their work, often carried out in difficult conditions, and almost always to the indifference and incomprehension of the Nation’. In an article entitled ‘La Polizia e lo Sport’,67 published the following month, Caputo focused on the limited physical instruction which personnel underwent, taking as his inspiration Police Day celebrations. He argued that training programmes were inadequate, reflecting, he claimed, the dominance of outdated concepts. He noted that on these grounds the displays of skill characterising Police Day performed by the Polizia Metropolitana could not be emulated outside the capital. Caputo attributed this state of affairs to the fact that the new fascist police were being constructed upon an older institution, without knocking down the ‘ruins that are still standing, and starting all over again, structuring the police on a new foundation, upon new concepts, upon, that is, the new demands of this marvellous era of rebirth and greatness’. He warned that the police had erroneously entered a phase

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of ‘bureaucratisation’ in the belief that ‘order now reigned sovereign’. Caputo’s desire that the police profession should be driven by the fascist notion of continuous struggle is evident in the article. This mirrored Mussolini’s words that ‘the Nation should be served in the office and in the trenches, with pen and with rifle’.68 In response to older critics, Caputo claimed that young fascists desired neither honours nor high office. What they did want were resources, allowing them to carry out their duties enthusiastically and healthily, and adequate training in order to ‘be able to sustain combat and win’.69 Caputo’s sympathies for the Nazi police emerge in an article published in September 1938, and it is clear that such admiration equally reflected his misgivings about his own institution.70 The article was inspired by his visit, as part of a police delegation, to the Schutzpolizei in Berlin. Caputo expressed how struck he had been by the athletic brilliance and physical superiority of the policemen he witnessed, the militaristic manner in which they had been trained, and the extent of public admiration they enjoyed. Caputo went on to argue that the Italian police had made giant steps since 1922, under the will of Mussolini, and that he had noted how much respect the institution enjoyed abroad, especially in Germany. In the context of the Axis alliance, he recommended exchanges of German and Italian officials, allowing them not only to learn from each other professionally, but also to attain fluency in each other’s language. Yet, Caputo argued, more needed to be done to improve the Italian police. Returning to a familiar theme, he lamented the continued lack of training of personnel in sports. He urged that the merits of the Italian police should be propagandised throughout the nation, particularly in schools and youth organisations. It was imperative to carry through a thorough reform of the police and increase its administrative manpower, which was ‘more or less insufficient in relation to the enormous and multiple tasks it faced’. Such measures would turn the Italian police into the best force in the world, as desired by young and older members alike. Caputo concluded: ‘Will we get there one day? I would say yes, because in Italy we have Mussolini!’ In constructing Caputo’s profile I have had to rely mainly on his own writings. Information about his career from other sources is not easy to come by, at least for the fascist years.71 This leaves us with several unanswered questions. How, for example, was Caputo’s desire for ‘combat’ translated into his daily work as a police commissioner? How did this determine the nature of his encounters with ‘subversives’ and other ‘enemies’? While there is evidence to suggest that he attempted to impose his ideological beliefs on those he commanded, was this of

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his own inspiration or a response to directives from the Party or from the employees’ association? Vincenzo Basile In the case of Vincenzo Basile, another self-proclaimed fascist revolutionary, any initial idealism did not appear to lead to professional or political fulfilment in the long run. I do not want to present Basile’s case as typical, but if analysed from the point of view of the individual concerned, it does give rise to a number of significant hypotheses. Born in Caserta in 1912, a member of the GUF before joining the Party, Basile entered the police at the relatively young age of twenty-four, in August 1936, at the start of what appeared to herald a brilliant career. Posted to the Questura at Rome, within ten months he passed his probation. He reached the rank of Deputy Commissioner in May 1940.72 Basile’s ideas about how the police should be transformed are stated in an article which he contributed to Saracini’s journal in January 1939. Entitled ‘L’Accademia di Polizia’, it criticised existing cultural and physical training programmes for police recruits as inadequate. The three-month course for officials at the Scuola Superiore di Polizia was incompatible with a regime ‘which desires to achieve totalitarian conquest in all areas of life’. Police training needed to be modelled on other academies, such as the Fascist Academy of Physical Education (Accademia Fascista di Educazione Fisica) run by the GIL. Yet, Basile continued, the school already possessed the necessary elements for the type of training environment envisaged, but ‘it is only too hidden from the attention of the world and from the knowledge of certain mummified groups who are still afraid to admit that the new Italian Police are a highly noble instrument for educating and improving the masses under our protection’. The reformed institution would ensure provision of highly specialised personnel and of the best qualities which military training could achieve: ‘constant dedication to the job, absolute discipline, a strict sense of hierarchy, and profound and personally experienced faith in the nation’.73 If Basile was intent on bringing ideologically inspired reforms to his institution, his superiors, though usually grading him ‘distinto’ or ‘ottimo’, harboured some doubts about his qualities. In 1940, the Questore of Rome referred in his annual report on Basile to a young, gifted commissioner who, however, would work better after having developed a sense of responsibility and a greater understanding of the nature of his tasks. He was not fully reliable in view of his

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‘inattentiveness’ (‘leggerezza’).74 In May 1941, Basile’s career started to go downhill, as he faced a punitive transfer from Rome to the town of Cagliari in Sardinia for professional shortcomings. That very month, he was diagnosed with a nervous breakdown, as a result of which he was granted leave. Subsequently, he appears to have resisted the transfer to Sardinia on health grounds, in spite of a medical check declaring him fit for work. Only in November 1941 did he reach Cagliari, after having been warned that he risked dismissal otherwise. In May 1942 Basile’s application to be promoted to Assistant Commissioner was unsuccessful. A month later he was accused of extortion in connection with the administration of food rationing and suspended without salary. The following October, Basile committed suicide, shooting himself in the head with his revolver, when police officers turned up at his home to arrest him.75 This is obviously only a single case, but it does raise significant questions. If Basile was the committed fascist he appeared to be at the start of his career, what went wrong? Was it a sense of disappointment at the moment he discovered that life in the real world was not what his education in the Fascist Party had prepared him for; or the realisation that there was no place in the police for that elite of young fascists to which he believed he belonged? Perhaps the economic hardships experienced during the Second World War, which had been raging since 1940, shook him out of any previous illusions and forced him into a daily struggle for survival without any ethical considerations. One might even question how genuine Basile’s ideological zeal had been in the first place. In writing for Il magistrato dell’ordine, was he perhaps merely going through the expected motions and saying the right things in the hope that this would be of benefit to him? The documentation available does not seek to address the deeper motives for his behaviour. Conclusion Reflecting the profiles which have emerged from my examination of personal files of the Interior Ministry Police, it is not easy to identify distinct patterns of behaviour, according to generation or ideological perspective. We should bear in mind that the sample of cases I have examined is relatively small, and that any delineations cannot take full account of the myriad characteristics defining each individual analysed. Many policemen served the fascist state diligently and efficiently, often making successful careers, even if they did not always fully identify with the regime’s ideology. Although we should not over-stress differences between ‘political’ and ‘career’ personnel, the lack of discipline and

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restlessness displayed by a considerable number of ‘first-hour’ fascists (including those who had supported the early movement from within the police), is striking. Nevertheless, as the results of inspections and investigations of police headquarters indicated, poor performance and negative work attitudes were fairly common among police personnel, whatever their ideological persuasion. While all policemen became more powerful under the dictatorship and could usually get away with rough treatment of those who fell into their hands, ‘first-hour’ fascists among them were more likely to be excessive and indiscreet in their employment of violence. Members of younger cohorts educated in the climate of fascism may have been more disciplined and professionally oriented than their ‘first-hour’ comrades. Underlining possible tensions between the generations, several junior commissioners appointed during the 1930s expressed enthusiasm for the ‘totalitarian’ social order in the making, urging that the ‘outdated’ institutions of the police undergo more thorough ideological reform. Such attitudes were not always reflected in their professional conduct. It is likely that just as many who had trained alongside them did not share their revolutionary fervour. As the profiles analysed in this chapter illustrate, if fascist personnel did well professionally, it was mainly because they were skilled policemen. When less promising personnel benefited from being fascist it was more often through their connections, though the leadership of the Interior Ministry Police did its best to resist external pressure of this kind. It was difficult for ideologically motivated personnel to put into practice a fascist model of police professionalism, because of a fairly ad hoc and unco-ordinated approach to the ‘fascistisation’ of police culture in general. While members of younger cohorts of fascist recruits might have desired a more direct translation of their beliefs into the profession, this would have been hard to achieve in an environment which did not fully identify with fascist culture and which was characterised by high levels of factionalism. Though the impact of fascists like Ulderico Caputo on the policing environment should not be underestimated, in all probability they represented a minority of officials who, because of their relatively young age, did not occupy positions of serious influence within the hierarchy. In his study of Hitler’s police, George Browder argues that the ‘brutalisation’ of behaviour in the Gestapo and the Kriminalpolizei was partly encouraged by the presence of uniformed Nazi infiltrators who goaded the professional policeman ‘to take the extra step that proved patriotism and dedication’.76 In Mussolini’s Italy, ‘career’ policemen were usually able to fulfil most of the tasks assigned to them without the need for

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encouragement by fascist colleagues, though a minority of fanatics occupying leadership positions may have intimidated subordinates into committing or tolerating uncustomary levels of violence and abuse during interrogations. Any analogy with the situation Browder describes for Nazi Germany might be more relevant to the more radicalised forms of policing employed by the Italian Social Republic (analysed in the next chapter), which, under the leadership of many newly appointed fascist questori, involved round-ups of partisans and the handing over of Jews to the Nazi occupiers for deportation. My study of police biographies reinforces the impression of a flourishing individualist culture among personnel, in spite of the regime’s efforts to galvanise state employees into engaging in work inspired by selfless dedication to the fatherland. Reflecting equally the political conformity characterising the dictatorship and the survival of the system of patronage, considerable numbers of policemen felt obliged to attempt to curry favour with their political masters to ensure smooth career progression. Their files on occasion reveal obsessive behaviour regarding a disappointing annual grading or an unsuccessful application for promotion, exemplified by appeals to their superiors sometimes accompanied by declarations of support from Party hacks, members of the Government or high-ranking state officials. Such behaviour cut across ideological boundaries, though fascist policemen, displaying a characteristic lack of discretion, may have distinguished themselves from their ‘flanker’ colleagues in their failure to understand how far they could push for concessions without stepping over the line. This raises serious questions about the internal cohesion of the fascist authoritarian state. In what way did it hold together, and to whom were its members ultimately loyal? As demonstrated in the pages which follow, this would be largely tested when in the context of military disaster, following Italy’s entry to the Second World War, the regime’s fortunes turned dramatically. Notes 1 The chapter focuses on the lives and careers of officials and office employees of the Interior Ministry Police. Personal files for these ranks are available at the Central State Archive in Rome. It is difficult to reconstruct fully the careers of Public Security guards. Where it is possible to gain access to their files, as, for example, in the Siena State Archive, they only cover the generally brief periods in which each guard was stationed in a particular province. 2 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 177 bis, f. Pennetta Tommaso, report to Bocchini, October 1929.

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3 For detailed analyses, see Canali, Le spie del regime and Franzinelli, I tentacoli dell’OVRA. 4 Aquarone, L’organizzazione dello stato totalitario, p. 74. 5 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 180 bis, Pennetta Epifanio. 6 Ibid., 11113 Questore Massa Carrara to Commissario PS Carrara, 20 August 1933; 387/2082 Prefetto Massa Carrara to Bocchini, 11 September 1933. 7 Ibid., Promemoria Comandante Generale Arma Carabinieri to Bocchini, 6 July 1935. 8 Ibid., 8976/B-X Partito Nazionale Fascista, Direttorio Nazionale to Capo Polizia, 17 July 1935. 9 Analysed in detail in Canali, Le spie del regime, pp. 123–30. 10 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 180 bis, Pennetta Epifanio, curriculum vitae signed Epifanio Pennetta, dated 16 February 1945. 11 Canali, Le spie del regime, pp. 86–106. 12 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 180 bis, Pennetta Epifanio, Rapporto Informativo on Pennetta, February 1945; 443/46542 DAGR, Vice Capo Polizia to DP, 26 February 1935. 13 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 31, f. Molina Alfonso. 14 Ibid., Segreteria PSI (Sandro Pertini) to Sottosegretario Interni, Emilio Canevari, 2 October 1944. 15 Ibid. This is suggested by a document in Molina’s file marked ‘movimento turatiano’ 1P 32/Bocchini, but it has not been possible to find further evidence to support such a hypothesis. 16 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 31, f. Molina Alfonso, 7613 Prefetto Catania to DGPS, 24 October 1941. 17 Ebner, ‘The Fascist Archipelago’, pp. 467–70. It is telling that there are no references to Molina’s persecution of homosexuals in the denunciations written against him found in his file. 18 Ibid., p. 468. 19 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 31, f. Molina Alfonso, Deduzioni Questore Molina avverso Ricorso Presentato nei suoi Confronti dall’ACA, 30 July 1945; see also 707/8 Prefetto Avellino to DGPS, DP, 15 February 1945, in defence of Molina. 20 Ibid., Bocchini letter to Starace, 11 September 1937. 21 Ibid., Molina statements to IGPS, 11 and 13 October 1944. 22 Ibid., b. 31 bis, f. Molina Alfonso, 87/8 Report of Carabinieri Reali Napoli, Gruppo Avellino, 20 January 1944. 23 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Segreteria Capo della Polizia, Segreteria del Capo della Polizia Arturo Bocchini (1927–1940), (hereafter ACS, SAB), Atti riservati (1919–1942), b. 6, f. Molina Alfonso; b. 23, f. Molina Alfonso. 24 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 31, f. Molina Alfonso, see document marked ‘movimento turatiano’ 1P 32/Bocchini. 25 Ibid., 192 Prefetto Salerno to DGPS, DP, 31 January 1945.

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26 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 170, f. Santoro Leone; M. Ivani, Esportare il fascismo. Collaborazione di polizia e diplomazia culturale tra Italia fascista e Portogallo di Salazar (1928–1945) (Bologna: CLUEB, 2008), pp. 113–14. 27 See Lupo, Il fascismo, pp. 23–4. 28 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 170, f. Santoro Leone, 319 Prefetto Ancona to DGPS, DP, 12 February 1935. 29 Ivani, Esportare il fascismo, p. 114. Ivani’s volume provides a detailed analysis of the police mission to Portugal. 30 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 170, f. Santoro Leone, 159 E Santoro to Ministro Interno Lisbona, 25 April 1940. 31 Ivani, Esportare il fascismo, pp. 147–8. The police mission was also concerned about the presence of freemasons in the Portuguese public administration. 32 Canali, Le spie del regime, p. 130. 33 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 170, f. Santoro Leone, 39 (per corriere) Santoro to Bocchini, 26 July 1939. 34 Ibid., 51 (riservata per corriere), Santoro to Bocchini, 27 April 1940. 35 Ivani, Esportare il fascismo, pp. 148–9. 36 Ibid., p. 149. 37 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 47 bis, f. Granito Alfredo, 3386 Prefetto Catanzaro to Bocchini, 10 September 1930. 38 Ibid., letter from Granito to Mussolini, 10 March 1932. 39 For more information on Beltrani’s memorandum, see C. G. Segrè, Italo Balbo. A Fascist Life (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1987), pp. 126–31. 40 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 47 bis, f. Granito Alfredo, letter from Granito to Mussolini, 10 March 1932. 41 Ibid., 3386 Prefetto Catanzaro to Bocchini, 10 September 1930. 42 Ibid., 333/1072, DGPS DP to Ministero Finanze, Ragioneria Generale dello Stato, 22 August 1934. 43 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 288, f. Salerno Luigi. 44 Public Security officials and employees could be transferred to Libya under the dependency of the Ministry of Colonies, while maintaining their police rank and career entitlements. 45 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 288, f. Salerno Luigi, 7119 Segretariato Generale per Gli Affari Civili e Politici, Governo della Tripolitania, Ufficio Gabinetto to DGPS, 18 October 1919. 46 Ibid., 343 Ministero delle Colonie, Divisione Generale Affari Civili e delle Opere Pubbliche, Ufficio 1 to DGPS, 13 February 1921. 47 Ibid., declaration from Sezione Partito Nazionale Fascista Lavezzola, 1 September 1928. Patchy documentation in his file suggests that Salerno faced judicial proceedings for his involvement in the fascist movement, but benefited from an amnesty issued to deal with crimes committed for the fascist cause.

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48 Ibid., 12/1052 Direttorio Nazionale PNF, Centro Coordinamento Militare to Senise, 21 October 1940; Senise’s response 2064, 12 November 1940. 49 ‘Bibliografia’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 15:9 (1938), 114. 50 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 288, f. Salerno Luigi, promemoria to Senise, 5 April 1942. 51 ACS, FPFS, 1949, b. 527, f. Suria Francesco. 52 Ibid., 5010 Prefetto del Carnaro to DGPS, 29 December 1930. 53 See Bolletino del Ministero dell’Interno. Personale, 1931, p. 956, and 1933, p. 343 for dates of Suria’s transfers to and from Siena. 54 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 158 and b. 158 bis. 55 For a detailed analysis of what constituted a fascist mindset, see Reichardt, Faschistische Kampfbünde, pp. 611–24. 56 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 58 bis, f. Bruno Pietro; Canali, Le spie del regime, pp. 84–5. 57 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 322, f. Barbarotta Francesco. Barbarotta entered the police as Deputy Commissioner through the competition of 1927, recommended by the Chief Secretary of the Ministry of Colonies as an ‘old-guard fascist’. 58 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 58, f. Mezza Edoardo. 59 E. Mezza, ‘Saluto ai giovani’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 11:8 (1934), 120–1. 60 At this point in the article, Saracini added an editorial note. He agreed that cultural activities in the police were totally lacking. This was attributed to the belief that the practice of policing was incompatible with the cultivation of professional literature. Yet the falseness of such a belief had been exposed by the Mussolinian formula of ‘libro e moschetto’ (book and musket), which concerned all Italians, and should be applied to police personnel, too. 61 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 58, f. Mezza Edoardo. 62 In the documentation I have examined, Caputo’s first name appears in several versions (Ulderico, Udelrico, Udalrigo, etc.). For the sake of consistency, I have used the form Ulderico throughout the volume. 63 ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 9, f. Associazione Nazionale Fascista del Pubblico Impiego. 64 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 28 bis, f. Cecchetti Leonello, 333.9130.9 DGPS, DP Sez. II to Prefetto Firenze, 3 November 1944. 65 U. Caputo, ‘Per una nuova funzione dei Guf’, Libro e moschetto, 7:2–3 (12 November 1932), 2. 66 U. Caputo, ‘La polizia di Mussolini’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 12:4 (1935), 50–1. 67 U. Caputo ‘La Polizia e lo Sport’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 12:5 (1935), 71. 68 See ‘I funzionari dello Stato Fascista’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 9:2 (1932), 17. 69 Caputo ‘La Polizia e lo Sport’, 71.

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70 U. Caputo, ‘Le polizie dell’Asse’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 15:9 (1938), 109. 71 The above-cited report of the Florentine Committee for National Liberation provides confusing and unconfirmed information regarding Caputo’s conduct during the Nazi occupation, suggesting that he obtained a safe conduct northwards from the Nazis when the Allies liberated Florence (ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 28 bis, f. Cecchetti Leonello, 333.9130.9 DGPS, DP Sez. II to Prefetto Firenze, 3 November 1944). Caputo’s career in post-war Italy is discussed in Chapter 7. 72 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 137, f. Basile Vincenzo. 73 Vincenzo Basile, ‘L’Accademia di Polizia’, Il magistrato dell’ordine, 16:1 (1939), 6. 74 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 137, f. Basile Vincenzo, career summary (scheda generale). 75 Ibid. Basile claimed that he was innocent and the victim of an act of vendetta, but the ensuing investigation confirmed that all allegations of corruption were founded. For the report, see 676 IGPS to Capo Polizia, 3 November 1942. 76 G. C. Browder, Hitler’s Enforcers. The Gestapo and the SS Security Service in the Nazi Revolution (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 242.

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6 Facing the demise of fascism Mussolini’s policemen

Facing the demise of fascism

In formal representations the creation of a police organisation which was both at the service of and assimilated into a fascist totalitarian civilisation was more or less complete by the end of the 1930s. This is exemplified by images of Public Security guards marching in Roman step and by the fascist symbols displayed on police uniforms. Junior fascist officials evidently saw this period as heralding completion of the ‘Revolution’ in the new era of international fascism, marked by greater alignment with Nazi Germany and Italy’s intervention in the Spanish Civil War in support of Franco. Yet their writings betray an underlying sense of frustration at the amount of time this process was taking. Behind the iconography and black shirts, efforts to turn the police into a modern force at the service of the regime were inhibited, particularly in the provincial headquarters, by a lack of resources and by cultural resistance. If failure to create a deep-rooted fascist culture in the police did not prevent the enforcement of fascist public order policy, the loyalty of large numbers of policemen towards the regime hardly rested on unswerving faith in the genius of Mussolini. Italy’s fateful entry to the Second World War as an ally of Germany in June 1940 saw the start of a process of disintegration of the fascist police state against the background of economic collapse, military defeat and subsequent occupations by two foreign armies. As for most Italians, during the latter years of the conflict police personnel faced difficult choices as well as having to account for previous political associations. The appointment of Marshal Pietro Badoglio as Prime Minister, following Mussolini’s temporary overthrow on 25 July 1943, was of limited consequence for most policemen, indicating the high level of continuity of the new Government with the fascist state. In September 1943, the Nazis’ occupation of all but the southern-most regions of the Italian peninsula and the creation under their auspices of the Italian Social Republic (RSI) saw an attempted revival of fascism in its more radical original form. After twenty years of relatively painless

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and ideologically undemanding adaptation to the requirements of the dictatorship, the loyalty of the police to fascism was put to the test more firmly. The landings of the Anglo-American military forces in Sicily in July 1943, followed by their gradual, at times deadlocked, northwards advancement through the Italian mainland, posed some threat to policemen who had distinguished themselves as fascists or had been associated with fascist persecution. For those who continued their jobs in the Italian Social Republic, the arrival of the Allies undoubtedly represented some relief from the dangers posed by anti-fascist partisan bands who took control of whole areas of territory ahead of them, administering summary justice in the process. This chapter analyses how the Italian police confronted the many twists and turns characterising the final dramatic years of fascism. It examines how police personnel reacted to the breakdown in the machinery of the fascist state and the collapse of social cohesion in the scenario of the ‘fascist war’ (June 1940 to July 1943), and subsequently to changes in regime in the dramatic situation of military occupation and civil conflict. If political belief partly determined their choices and fate, the period in question could present surprising opportunities for self-advancement, which did not necessarily depend on ideological outlook. Consideration in the latter part of the chapter of how, following the Liberation of Italy, Interior Ministry Police personnel confronted ‘de-fascistisation’ measures feeds into our broader analysis of the evolution of police culture during the dictatorship and immediately following its demise. From the Race Laws to the ‘fascist war’: between enforcement and dissociation Between the late 1930s and Mussolini’s dismissal in July 1943, the regime entrusted the police forces with enforcement of intensified measures of social control. These took place in the context of Italy’s near permanent state of belligerency and her strengthened ties with Germany, and amid increasingly tough working conditions. Reflecting in part Mussolini’s alignment with Nazi policy but also the longerstanding anti-Semitic orientation of fascism, the Race Laws, decreed in September 1938, sanctioned the ostracism of Italian Jews from the Italian community. The police authorities played a key role in the census which preluded enforcement of the discrimination procedures. This involved carrying out enquiries to identify positions occupied by Jews in the local economy and administration, amounting to an extension of the bureaucratised system of checks characteristically directed against

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‘enemy’ citizens. The police assisted ministries with investigations relating to those they commanded or members of professions which they oversaw. Hence, for example, in September 1938 the Press Office of the Ministry of Popular Culture sent a circular to the prefects, duly passed on to the questori, requesting a list of periodicals published in each province. The lists had to indicate whether the editors and their assistants were Jewish and, in the case of positive outcomes, provide genealogical details of those concerned. Moreover, where individuals with surnames which were commonly Jewish declared they were Aryan, this had to be documented for two generations.1 Each Questura had to deal with requests from other parts of the country regarding the racial identity of individuals originating from the province it had jurisdiction over. Once the Race Laws came into force, it carried out enquiries about the racial suitability of personnel put forward to replace Jews who had lost their jobs.2 Though the movements and activities of foreign Jews had been monitored since the mid-1930s, and had intensified during the final years of that decade, in the light of the laws the police were now expected to extend their attention to surveillance of Italian Jews and to provide regular reports on the behaviour of their communities. Measures taken on the occasion of the visit of King Victor Emanuel III to Siena in September 1938 to officiate at celebrations of the five hundredth anniversary of the birth of the Sienese painter, Jacopo della Quercia, illustrate how, more or less overnight, Italian Jews were suddenly deemed capable of engaging in ‘subversive’ activity. The Questore, Riccardo Secreti, ordered his forces to exercise strict but discreet vigilance over the Jewish community, stressing that even the slightest movement should not be missed.3 If Questore Secreti may have merely been conforming to orders, other factors could have motivated him in his anti-Jewish measures. Why, for example, in a report dated 30 September 1942, by which time the regime’s fortunes were seriously waning, did he consider it necessary to inform the Chief of Police, Carmine Senise,4 that numerous Jews were visiting the spa town of Chianciano and recommend that, although they were not in any apparent breach of the law, their visits should be of limited duration and only permitted outside the high season, so that contact with ‘Aryans’ be avoided?5 Though he was, by all appearances, not a staunch fascist, one wonders whether genuine anti-Semitic feeling was at play here; or was he merely making a show of his desire to zealously enforce fascist policy? Some of Secreti’s colleagues were more open in their contempt for Jews in a manner which would seem to surpass any sensible lip-service. In a report written in July 1940, the Questore of Ferrara went out of his way to emphasise the threat

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which they allegedly posed to the national community. He noted that following Italy’s entry to the war the Ferrarese Jews had hoped that military defeat would signal ‘the end of fascism and the triumph of international Judaism’. When subsequently members of the Jewish community were ‘intimidated’ into complying with the demands of the authorities, the Questore mocked this attitude as a form of servility which was ‘typical of their race’. He indicated that he had tolerated a hostile anti-Jewish campaign organised by local fascists, which, he argued, had not affected public order.6 There is evidence that during this period individual police officials offered assistance to Jews facing particular difficulties, sometimes to the point of violating regulations, reflecting a not uncommon practice within Italian society as a whole. In doing so, their motives could be highly ambivalent, especially when they were able to take advantage of their authority to gain personally from people who were in a vulnerable position. Typical among those affected were Jews of foreign nationality, who in September 1938 were prohibited from living permanently in Italy and its occupied territories.7 In May that year, the Director of the Ufficio Stranieri (Foreigners Section) at the Questura of Genoa, Deputy Commissioner Giulio Altamura, was accused of helping foreign Jews facing expulsion, allegedly because this eased his debts to some of the individuals concerned. What started as an enquiry into allegations of illicit assistance eventually led to judicial procedures for embezzlement of foreigners’ money and belongings over a period dating back to 1937. This resulted in a three-year prison sentence (subsequently reduced to one year), and permanent prohibition from holding public office.8 The particularly tough line taken against Altamura evidently reflected the need to enforce efficiently the regime’s expulsion procedures against foreign Jews. Yet, following an appeal, Altamura was acquitted in November 1940 on lack of evidence and on the grounds that he had not acted with deliberate intent. In March 1941 an internal disciplinary committee concluded that he was nevertheless guilty of grave negligence and on one count considered his actions – withholding of personal belongings and money from a couple arrested for pick-pocketing and subsequently expelled – intentional. The committee punished him with a three-month salary cut of 20%, though this measure was later revoked as a result of a general amnesty issued by Mussolini. Besides ‘mishandling’ the money and effects of others, Altamura was accused of allowing a married couple to complete a declaration of stay (dichiarazione di soggiorno) as Greek citizens, without producing identity cards. This enabled them to request passports from the Greek Embassy, when in reality they had recently taken up Italian citizenship which

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was now in the process of being revoked because they were Jewish. A reading of the papers in Altamura’s file suggests that his superiors felt that he had over-benefited from lack of evidence and that they thereafter obstructed any further advancement in his career. Significantly, he was not granted permission to participate in a competition for promotion to the next rank, and in March 1942 he left the police. Following Italy’s entry to the war, police officials assisted by Public Security guards directed concentration camps which had been constructed for the internment of foreign Jews and subjects belonging to nations hostile to Italy, as well as Italian Jews suspected of ‘subversive’ activities. The limited prestige and relative unimportance surrounding the policing of the camps is demonstrated by the fact that those appointed to direct them were usually being ‘exiled’ or punished because they were professionally unreliable or (in fewer cases) were without the support of political patrons.9 It is recognised that there can be little comparison between the Nazi death camps and the fascist camps, at least in homeland territory. Carlo Spartaco Capogreco argues that those running the camps were generally tolerant towards inmates, usually conforming to the norms established by the Geneva Convention of 1929 regarding prisoners of war. The treatment of civilians in prison camps set up in occupied Yugoslavia after April 1941 and run by the Italian army was far harsher.10 The work of Amedeo Osti Guerrazzi on the directors of concentration camps in Italy generally supports the theory that the behaviour of police personnel towards internees was usually reasonably humane, though sometimes characterised by petty corruption or mild forms of abuse, which did not necessarily go unpunished. Hence, Domenico P. who directed the camp at Civitella del Tronto (Teramo) between July 1942 and February 1943 was accused of acts of favouritism towards a British Jewish couple and of embezzling food parcels destined for the internees. This resulted in suspension from his rank without salary for six months.11 Similarly, another Domenico P., Director of the camp for Italian and foreign women at Pollenza (Macerata), faced a warning in October 1941 after internees had complained to a visiting British and US delegation of his offensive behaviour towards them. In April 1943, following allegations of inhumane treatment (including the administration of slaps to internees), his removal from the camp became urgent.12 On occasion, however, the intervention of inspectors attempted to ensure that treatment of Jewish internees be hardened after periods of relative comfort and liberties. According to Osti Guerrazzi, Paolo S., Director of the Ferramonti camp at Tarsia (Calabria), and a veteran

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of the Fiume expedition, who had entered the police in 1928, faced an investigation in December 1942 prompted by excessive humanity shown towards the Jewish internees. Such humanity was effectively demonstrated by S.’s efforts to make conditions at the camp as bearable as possible by permitting them to have a synagogue, schooling facilities, a library and a music room, and to engage in sports activities. This appears to have become unacceptable as the regime became increasingly hostile towards the Jews, who were blamed for the continued military defeats facing the Axis powers. The ensuing investigation focused particularly on alleged irregularities committed by the Director. It concluded that S. had bought some silver from an internee at above the market price, had offered internees lifts in the camp car and had invited a married couple of internees to eat at his residence. In advising S.’s substitution (which took place the following January), the Inspector in charge of the investigation noted, alongside improper use of the camp car, the excessive familiarity and courteousness shown to some internees, which did not correspond to the impartiality which a camp director should exercise.13 Any relatively humane behaviour shown towards foreign Jews has to be considered against the severe traumas resulting from fascist racial policy. Many had originally fled Nazi persecution and taken refuge in Italy in the belief that they would be safe there. As a prelude to their internment, the Interior Ministry Police and Carabinieri usually arrested them without prior warning in what amounted to full-scale round-ups. They were subsequently transferred to prison cells where for several weeks they experienced particularly harsh conditions in the company of common criminals and lived in terror of being handed over to the German authorities.14 In contrast to the above examples, Questore Vincenzo Genovese’s treatment of foreign Jews during the early years of the war may well have been inspired by fascist beliefs. Although the post-war police authorities generally defended the actions of their officials, a report provided by the Personnel Division of the Interior Ministry police dated 25 July 1949 noted that Genovese had been accused of improving his economic position through ‘persecutory action’ against wealthy Jews while he directed the police at the port of Fiume, close to the Yugoslav border. The report noted that an investigation had confirmed the allegations, and that the fascist Chief of Police, Chierici, had demanded his resignation. Dismissal proceedings had been discontinued in the complex institutional scenario of the fall of the fascist Government in July 1943. The report concluded that Genovese was a ‘morally ­controversial’ figure.15

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Immediately after the Liberation of Italy, Genovese had been accused of far worse, having been registered as a war criminal. Between 1941 and 1943 he had, it was claimed, persecuted Jews and partisans, and was held guilty of atrocities against ‘enemy’ civilians in territory annexed to Fiume.16 Genovese’s alleged actions should be considered in the context of fascist policy in the north-east of Italy and in occupied Yugoslavia. Well before the war, the Venezia Giulia region had witnessed repression against large Slovenian and Croat populations living there. These had intensified in June 1940 with police action against clandestine Slav organisations. After the invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, the authorities responded to the threat of partisan invasions of Venezia Giulia through hard-line tactics, including the torching of villages and arrests of whole families.17 The Italian police were directly involved in such activities. The Special Public Security Inspectorate for Venezia Giulia (Ispettorato Generale di Pubblica Sicurezza per la VeneziaGiulia) set up in Trieste in June 1942 became notorious for its harsh repression of Slav and Italian anti-fascism. Directly dependent on the Interior Ministry, it was able to determine whether civilians should be interned, without recourse to local questure and prefectures.18 The Inspectorate functioned thanks to the support of the regular police forces. The Police War Services Inspectorate (Ispettorato di Polizia per i Servizi di Guerra), staffed by militarised Public Security officials dependent on the military High Command, was responsible for hunting down Slovenian partisans and irredentists. It commanded special anti-guerrilla squads made up of carabinieri and Public Security guards for this purpose.19 How far Genovese was directly responsible for atrocities committed against Slav civilians and partisans is difficult to confirm. In 1942 Yugoslav villages close to the port of Fiume, where Genovese was posted, were torched by the 5th Italian Army Division and their inhabitants interned. Notably, on the occasion of the torching of the village of Pothum on 12 July, Genovese’s direct superior, the fascist Prefect of Fiume, Temistocle Testa, had 108 villagers shot and a further 800 deported.20 Fiume was also the scene of the continuous arrival of Jewish refugees escaping from the Ustašas in Croatia. Davide Rodogno notes that while all foreign refugees were to be refused entry to Italian territory or expelled, these measures were strictly enforced in the case of Jews trying to enter the annexed provinces, reflecting the Italian Government’s desire for the new provinces to become ‘free of Jews’. Rodogno argues that Genovese and Testa took a tough line in expelling Jewish refugees who entered Fiume. Dispelling claims that Italian treatment of Jews was humane, the authorities in Fiume, Dalmatia and

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Rome knew full well that Jews handed over to the Croats would face horrific conditions at the Jasenovac concentration camp.21 There is evidence in Genovese’s personal file that in expelling Jewish refugees (and were he, indeed involved in atrocities against Slavs, as was alleged) he was not merely following directives. He claimed in a defence statement dated 4 April 1946 that he had been forced to obey the orders of a ‘highly authoritarian’ fascist Prefect, and that he had requested transfer because of this. Yet, it appears that, at least initially, he was committed to serving Testa to the extent that in the summer of 1938 he had asked to be allowed to join him in Fiume, on the grounds that under Testa, ‘one lives and one does not vegetate, one creates, one establishes and does not destroy, one becomes useful in some manner to the Regime to which I have been faithfully and enthusiastically dedicated ever since the days of its ascendancy’.22 It is not implausible that Genovese’s conduct was partly encouraged by the desire for rapid career advancement, too. Whatever the case, during his posting at Fiume, Genovese’s actions appear to have impressed the fascist Government, as well as the Italian and German military authorities. Given the fierce oppression characterising military action in the Fiume area, such recognition would indicate that he was actively involved in human rights abuses. In June 1941, the Interior Minister, Buffarini Guidi, commended him for his assistance in military operations against Yugoslavia, for keeping under control ‘the numerous Jewish elements who are hostile towards us’ and for ‘suppressing all enemy military and political espionage’. 23 In June 1942, General Mario Roatta, Commander of the 2nd Army, who was responsible for the policy of deportations and torching of villages in occupied Yugoslavia, 24 urged that Genovese and other officials be decorated. This was heartily supported by Testa, on the grounds that these officials had made notable ‘sacrifices’ for the benefit of the fascist regime. The following August, the German Government proposed Genovese for an award of the ‘Order of the German Eagle’.25 Although, following the Liberation, he was arrested, suspended from his post and imprisoned alongside Testa, in August 1946, in circumstances which are far from clear, Genovese was released, judicial proceedings against him were interrupted, and in December that year his suspension from the police was revoked. In March 1947, the Public Prosecutor of the Special Section of the Rome Assize Court requested that, where the alleged crimes he had committed were not covered by the June 1946 amnesty for fascist and partisan crimes (analysed below), Genovese be acquitted. This was on the grounds that he had not acted against Jews on his own initiative and that in many cases he had

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tried to soften measures against them and against individuals facing deportation. Although Genovese refused to avail himself of the benefits of the amnesty, the following May the Rome Appeal Court acquitted him, partly on lack of evidence. However, as has been illustrated, many of the documents in his file, though not fully corroborating the charges Genovese faced, paint a rather different picture. It is significant that the post-war Purge Commission for police personnel resisted his re-employment, even after the sentence of May 1947, claiming that he had voluntarily collaborated with Testa and could easily have refused to carry out orders of a criminal nature.26 The case of Genovese is strongly suggestive of how in the scenario of Italian military occupation the involvement of police officials in war crimes, or actions closely resembling war crimes, could be guided by fascist ideology. When they were not motivated by ideological belief, the abuse or irregularities police personnel committed in their treatment of Jews may be explained in the context of institutional empowerment and petty corruption underlining the police environment during the fascist period. The likelihood of police involvement in illicit behaviour increased in the scenario of the tough working and living conditions they faced during the war. In the light of both the military call-up of younger commissioners employed in the questure and the inevitable burden on policing resources which came with the conflict, the chances of being able to deal adequately with poor professional performance were thin. Reports on the condition of the police and the behaviour of personnel are particularly illuminating in this regard. The results of an inspection of the Livorno police carried out in December 1941 revealed a high level of apathy and indiscipline. As Inspector General Fernando Soleti noted in a report to Senise, most striking was the state of the police headquarters at Ardenza which he described as ‘the parody of police stations’. He went on to say: It is manned by a single petty officer, Vice Brigadier Cecconi Francesco (currently detained), who, with his family consisting of wife and four children, has moved into the station premises. Cecconi, an element who lacks the necessary competence for the police service, prefers to spend actively his time tending to the orchard in the courtyard of the station, hunting, and making furniture, having transformed the detention room into a workshop for this purpose. He is ignorant of local matters and situations; he normally goes around unarmed (I caught him without pistol and chains); he frequents disreputable taverns, also accompanied by individuals whom he should be watching; he is prone to drink, and, I am told, to get into debt with people from the port. 27

Soleti went on to explain how a dramatic drop in the number of

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Public Security officials and guards had reduced all district police stations in Livorno to a similar state. The number of officials had decreased by over two-thirds. The eight who remained were hardly able to manage the demands of the central police headquarters. There had been a reduction in the number of guards from around 300 to 130, of whom 30 had since been called up to fight. Those remaining found themselves dealing with an increased bureaucratic load when they should have been policing the streets. 28 If policemen, like most Italians, faced economic difficulties during the war, they were in a position to profit from their access to state resources, especially if they were covered by their superiors. An investigation of May 1942 concluded that Public Security guards had been able to sell petrol vouchers destined for the police authorities of Trento (South Tyrol) to local car hire firms on the black market, pocketing the proceeds, because their actions were covered by the Questore himself. This led Giuseppe Cocchia, the Inspector entrusted with the investigation, to stress the public disgrace into which what should have been a model police institution had fallen. Cocchia argued that such a disgrace was confounded by the fact that local people commented that before South Tyrol had become part of Italy the behaviour of the Austrian police had never given rise to scandal.29 Senise would subsequently claim in his memoirs that during that period he succeeded in increasing the number of Public Security guards by over twelve thousand. He armed them more effectively, thanks also to his creation of special battalions in the largest cities. Moreover, he increased discipline in the corps by returning to the use of commanding officers (abolished in 1927) in place of civilian Public Security officials.30 Measures were, indeed, taken between 1940 and 1943 to increase the number of policemen nationally. In June 1940 an extra 1,000 posts for Public Security guards and 45 posts for Public Security officials were funded. Illustrating, however, how hard it was to find suitable personnel, in September a new decree authorised the Interior Ministry to temporarily call back into service former personnel of the Public Security Guard and ex-members of the Royal Guard, abolished at the end of 1922. In February 1941 provision was made for an extra 3,500 guards and 70 officials. The minimum recruitment age was reduced from twenty to eighteen.31 How adequately these measures made up for shortages of men who had been drafted to the military or transferred to occupied territories is questionable. The increases of June 1940 partly compensated for the transfer of 360 guards and 82 officials to assist in the creation of an armed police force in Albania, which Italy had invaded in April

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1939.32 Senise faced particular pressure from the police authorities in the annexed territories. In November 1941, the Prefect and Director of Police Services in Dalmatia claimed that new Public Security headquarters were poorly manned. He told Rome that police forces had to be superior to those of questure in Italy given the hostility of the indigenous population.33 If Senise claimed that under his leadership the Public Security Guard had become more disciplined, on-the-ground reports paint a rather different picture. An investigation of the recently formed Mobile Brigade at Milan in August 1941 revealed that the newly recruited commanding officers were numerically inadequate and incompetent, owing to lack of experience and good will. Several indicated that they wanted to return to civilian positions in the police or take part in competitions for posts in the magistracy and prefectures. The lowerranking troops were unhappy about the length of their postings in the Brigade and resented having to wear uniforms, feelings which were exacerbated by the presence of plain-clothed agenti.34 The quality of training for the new recruits was affected by the war; with the measure of February 1941 to increase the number of Public Security guards and officials came the stipulation that the length of the training course for guards was reduced to a period of two months, while successful candidates for commissioner posts were subject to a year’s probation without the need to attend the customary training course at the Scuola Superiore di Polizia, which was suspended. By June 1943 the Director, Epifanio Pennetta, was lamenting the fact that new police recruits had no possibility of technical training, though he subsequently managed to obtain funding to run a shorter three-week course at the school.35 The scenario described above raises questions about the ability of the police to maintain procedures required for efficiently running the home front. While the authorities were expected to be particularly vigilant in preventing the public expression of ‘subversive’ and ‘defeatist’ opinion and to administer exemplary punishments to those caught, it is likely that as the war progressed it became increasingly hard to keep control over the situation. According to Mimmo Franzinelli, from 1941 onwards Carabinieri headquarters and questure were flooded with denunciations of defeatist comments. Growing dissent often manifested itself in the form of jokes at Mussolini’s and the regime’s expense, a phenomenon which by the end of 1942 had reached such dimensions that police measures to stop it were ineffective. In the context of imminent military disaster police leaders had more urgent issues to solve anyway.36 In the knowledge of the growing unpopularity of fascism and in the

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realisation that military defeat was irreversible, members of the police quietly began to dissociate themselves from the regime. In the summer of 1942 several decided not to renew their membership of the Partycontrolled employee association.37 Such attitudes reflected disquiet at the top of the police hierarchy. During this period, the Chief of Police, Senise, took measures to aid the defeat of fascism and help secure a monarchist succession. He signalled his dissociation from the regime by refusing to take measures against Jews unless they were engaged in ‘anti-national’ activities, by taking a soft line on the censorship of letters sent to soldiers serving on the war fronts, and by concealing from Mussolini the extent of opposition among Catholics and the clergy towards Nazism and the war.38 In his memoirs, Senise emphasises that on taking up the office of Chief of Police he planned to reinforce the institution as a politically independent organ of the state that would join forces with the Carabinieri to be ready for when the King liberated the country from fascism. He also claims that he did everything in his power to ‘de-fascistise’ the police, abolishing the parades and meetings of the questori with Mussolini which took place on Police Day, and which ‘inevitably ended up appearing as a sign of devotion to the regime’. He transformed police officials’ uniforms to remove any visible fascist symbols.39 Senise’s memoirs were undoubtedly framed in such a way as to conceal or minimise previous services to the dictatorship. In spite of his mild manner and good humour, in his role from 1932 as Deputy Chief of Police and as long as fascism thrived, he had toughly enforced the regime’s Public Security policy, possibly with greater zeal than Bocchini.40 The picture he paints of his efforts to reinforce the police in anticipation of an institutional coup do not appear to correspond to the real state of his forces on the eve of Mussolini’s downfall. In any case such measures were undoubtedly intended to contain any widespread popular uprising as well. In many respects Senise’s change in attitude represented a more general trend which was founded on both expediency and disillusionment, but which hardly concealed a prevailing authoritarian mentality. It is telling that during the summer of 1943, after the ousting of Mussolini by the Fascist Grand Council, the Chief of Police was suspiciously slow in releasing political prisoners, notably delaying the liberation of communists, anarchists and Slavs. Crucially, he only allowed the release of foreign internees from the concentration camps (a condition of the Armistice with the Anglo-Americans) from 10 September. This put Jews interned in areas about to be occupied by the Nazis in serious danger.41

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The Italian police and the Social Republic In institutional terms, the dismissal of Mussolini in July 1943 by King Victor Emanuel III and his replacement by Marshal Pietro Badoglio legally obliged police personnel, as servants of the Italian state, to abandon any previous loyalty to the ex-dictator. By swearing the fascist oath of induction to public office, with its focus on untiring dedication to the interests of the state, employees and civil servants had made no ideological commitment to Mussolini’s regime. More problematic, at least in theory, was the oath which state personnel would have additionally sworn to the Duce upon joining the Party, once membership became obligatory. Though many would not have felt particularly guilty about disregarding the Party oath in the light of Mussolini’s removal from power and the disastrous state into which he had thrown the country, those policemen who were ‘first-hour’ fascists or had been educated as fascists may have faced considerable dilemmas over this, but there is little evidence that they attempted to obstruct the change in regime. Police personnel faced far greater dilemmas in the wake of the Nazi occupation, which followed Badoglio’s announcement on 8 September 1943 of Italy’s surrender to the Anglo-American forces, and the founding of the Italian Social Republic. Staying in their posts amounted to betrayal of the Italian Government, which had taken refuge in the South of Italy, and collaboration with the Germans, against whom Badoglio had declared war. The large-scale investiture in the autumn of 1943 of radical fascists as prefects, under the new denomination of Capi della Provincia, and the replacement of several questori by political appointees added to their difficulties. The Carabinieri faced an institutional upheaval, as they were incorporated with the Militia and the Colonial Police (PAI) into a new force, the National Republican Guard (Guardia Nazionale Repubblicana – GNR). Both the Carabinieri and the Interior Ministry Police (renamed Polizia Repubblicana) were expected, in the scenario of a civil war, to participate in anti-partisan operations and round-ups of Jews and military draft-dodgers. The new political masters frequently expressed reservations about the ideological reliability of police personnel. Representing a culmination of ill-feeling and mutual suspicion that had characterised the relationship between the police and the Fascist Party during the previous twenty years, such suspicions were probably exaggerated. Nevertheless, they were partly justified by the ambivalent, if not hostile, attitudes of their subordinates on many occasions. Moreover, such attitudes cut across ideological boundaries.

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The creation of RSI police units in itself saw large numbers of policemen trying to leave their forces or deserting. In November 1943, it was noted that the Carabinieri, owing to the long tradition of the corps and their historic allegiance to the Constitution and Crown, were upset by the prospect of being incorporated into the GNR.42 A report of April 1944 stated that some ex-carabinieri refused to wear the fascist black shirt in place of their traditional uniforms.43 The prospect of being deported to Germany, signalling Nazi convictions that the Carabinieri were best disarmed and removed,44 undoubtedly accounted for high levels of desertion from May 1944 onwards. In Padua it was noted that cancellation of leave that month raised suspicions about an imminent departure which, announced at short notice, left commanders with little time to encourage those affected to comply. Hence large numbers deserted, many of whom it was argued, almost certainly joined the partisans. When on 6 June a second group had been ordered to prepare for departure, ninety out of one hundred deserted. A report of the GNR General Commander, Renato Ricci, dated June 1944 noted also that the recruitment to the GNR of ‘morally unsuitable’ individuals and enemy radio broadcasts (including a transmission of the celebratory parade of a Carabinieri battalion in Rome following the city’s liberation) lowered morale at the very moment that the creation of units made up exclusively of carabinieri to be sent to Germany had been ordered. Indeed, the General Commander felt it necessary to ask the German Ambassador Von Rahn to have further departures of carabinieri for Germany suspended. In explaining this request, he referred to the impact of news of the liberation of Rome and Allied landings in France, adding that the announcement of the departure of a third group of carabinieri had led to a dramatic increase in desertions ‘which have already exceeded one thousand’.45 Similar issues surrounding the loyalty of personnel to the RSI were evident in the Interior Ministry Police. In June 1944, the Chief of Police, Tullio Tamburrini, complained to the Capi Provincia that too often Public Security guards allowed themselves to be disarmed by partisans (whom he referred to as ‘rebels’); he decreed that the guards in question should be treated as traitors and judged by military tribunals.46 It was not only the high desertion levels in the police that concerned the RSI authorities. In January 1945 a report claimed that the fascist Questore of Venice, in spite of his intention to ‘cleanse the [policing] environment’, was powerless when the majority of officials he was in charge of were anti-fascist. Moreover, members of the Auxiliary Guard, created to support the Polizia Repubblicana, were made up of youngsters and ‘stragglers’ who had enrolled for their

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personal benefit and in order to avoid military service or German work camps.47 While the above analyses of the state of the RSI police were undoubtedly shaped by a fair dose of fanaticism and paranoia, the overall picture which emerges from this study is of a widespread attitude of dissociation, which manifested itself in varying forms of conduct. These included attempts to avoid direct involvement, internal sabotage, collaboration with partisan units and desertion. It should be stressed, however, that opposition to the RSI and the Germans represented only a partial renunciation of previous allegiances to fascism and to the fascist state. Moreover, the fact that considerable numbers of policemen continued to actively support the RSI should not be overlooked either. The examples below illustrate the impact of the Social Republic on the careers and daily lives of police officials, several of whom have been discussed in the previous chapter. Underlining the moral dilemmas they faced or their hostility towards the new regime, police personnel typically sought to avoid direct involvement in policing activities while safeguarding their jobs in the longer term. U.S. was a career official who spent most of his working life at the Scuola Superiore di Polizia. In November 1943, he was ordered to transfer with the rest of the school to the North of Italy, where the Government of the RSI established itself. S. requested not to go on the grounds that he and his wife had health problems. There is little doubt that the request incurred the displeasure of the new Chief of Police, Tamburrini, who stated that S. should be retired if he was to spend the winter in bed. According to his records, he was retired the following February. A medical examination the following April, 1944, confirmed a dysfunction of the heart, for which he was declared temporarily unfit for service. After the Liberation, S. returned to work and continued his career until he reached the age of sixty-five. He claimed that he had deliberately provoked his retirement in order not to have to swear allegiance to the RSI and that he had subsequently become involved in the partisan Resistance.48 The case of S. is not untypical among Public Security officials, many of whom produced medical certificates in order to be granted long periods of leave. This sometimes involved exaggerating the gravity of real ailments. G.L., a commissioner from the Questura of Bologna, claimed that in June 1944 he simulated the intensification of an existing facial paralysis, with the help of doctors, so that he could leave his desk and be admitted to hospital. Subsequently, he faced deportation to Germany on suspicion of having been designated by the local partisan National Liberation Committee (Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale – CLN) to direct the Questura at the moment of the liberation of the city.

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However, he induced an abscess on his left buttock in order to render himself un-transportable.49 As the above cases indicate, a considerable number of policemen were involved in the Resistance. Pietro Bianconi, employed at the Scuola Superiore, avoided transfer to the North of Italy by deserting his post and joining the partisans. He was decorated for his services to the Resistance and in 1946 formally recognised as a partisan fighter (partigiano combattente).50 According to a declaration of the Prefect of Turin, dated 25 September 1945, Mario Vacca, a young Assistant Commissioner, acted as the main contact between a CLN cell based at the Questura of Turin and the Piedmontese CLN, to whom he supplied valuable information. In September 1944 he had to abandon his job for fear of being arrested, but the following December he returned to the Questura on the orders of the CLN. He participated alongside Public Security guards in the armed insurrection against the Germans on 26 April 1945. The Prefect had him promoted on exceptional grounds to Chief Commissioner in May 1945, and this was ratified by the Allied Military Government. It goes without saying that Vacca’s superiors in Rome, in their desire to preserve their institution from outside influence, and reflecting their suspicions towards the partisan movement, subsequently disregarded the promotion. 51 Though there is no reason to doubt the genuineness of the specific cases mentioned here, caution should be exercised when analysing police participation in the Resistance. As discussed in the following section, policemen often emphasised (or exaggerated) their involvement in partisan activities in order to conceal their previous roles as servants of fascism. Several fascists in the police dissociated themselves from the RSI, too. The case of Luigi Cosenza is significant in this regard. Cosenza was a police Commissioner who had supported the fascist movement before the March on Rome, and who had been able to benefit from a series of promotions through the intervention of his cousin, Achille Starace. 52 While he held on to his position as Questore of Udine (Friuli) after 8 September 1943, Cosenza was subsequently accused of having taken measures against squadristi during the previous summer after Mussolini had been deposed. The Capo Provincia of Udine, ex-Militia Legion Commander Giovanni Mosconi, noted in a report to the Chief of Police, dated 16 November 1943, that ‘with such a scandalous demonstration of anti-fascist zeal, Questore Cosenza undoubtedly intended to erase from memory the fact that he himself had been awarded the March on Rome medal’. He accused Cosenza of ordering the arrest of around eighty squadristi and fascists, several of whom he tried to have interned in concentration camps.53 According to information in his files, having

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also refused membership of the Republican Fascist Party (PFR) for himself and his dependents, Cosenza only stayed at his post on the insistence of the German authorities. Cosenza was arrested by the SS in July 1944 on suspicion of collaboration with partisans, and would have been deported to Mathausen death camp in Germany, had he not been arrested by the RSI authorities on criminal charges. Though the charges were later dropped, he was forced to retire from the profession at the end of 1944.54 Beyond the obvious imperative of survival accounting for compliance with the demands of the RSI among police personnel, several officials were evidently lured by the prospect of professional advancement, though some were hesitant when faced with orders to enforce radical measures. Ermindo Roselli was promoted to Questore of Rome in October 1943.55 His removal from the position in January 1944, and his replacement by the notorious fascist, Pietro Caruso, indicates the difficulties he encountered in fulfilling the anti-Semitic demands of the Interior Minister, Buffarini Guidi. According to Frauke Wildvang, following the first Nazi round-up of the city’s Jews in October 1943, the police under the leadership of Roselli had been hesitant in the face of Buffarini Guidi’s order of 30 November 1943 that all Jews in Italy be arrested and interned, and their property confiscated. Wildvang notes that Roselli did not order the arrest of the Roman Jews and that he delayed ordering the surveillance of ‘misti’ (Jews living in mixed marriages and their offspring) until 20 December 1943. Moreover, in January 1944 Roselli urged ‘vigilance towards the Jewish element’, but did not specifically order arrests. Wildvang argues that we should not ascribe Roselli’s actions to purely humanitarian motives, since he ‘probably had enough common sense to know that the phase of German occupation would only be brief and that he would later be held responsible for his actions’. Yet his hesitancy certainly saved many Jews in Rome from arrest and deportation.56 As would be expected, examination of the files of police personnel reveals active support for the RSI among fascists in particular. Tullio Mango belonged to a younger generation of junior officials who had been trained during the ventennio. Born in Naples in 1910, he had joined the police in 1935. He was described in March 1944 by his superior as a former officer in the Militia and member of the Fascist Party (since 1927), who had occupied positions in the Balilla youth organisation and at the Fascist Party headquarters of the Trastevere district of Rome. During the summer of 1943 and immediately following the Armistice, he had allegedly faced numerous threats and two assaults by ‘subversive elements’ in Rome on account of being fascist. He was

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among the first Republican Fascists in the capital, joining the newly founded PFR in September 1943. That month he participated in several punitive expeditions (azioni squadristiche). He later undertook special missions entrusted to him by Buffarini Guidi and the Chief of Police.57 Mango’s promotion to the rank of Vice-Questore in July 1944, at the relatively young age of thirty-four, may attest to his good standing with Buffarini Guidi and other RSI leaders, as argued by his detractors after the Liberation. While there is little detailed information available concerning the missions he was involved in, there is evidence (subsequently acknowledged by the judicial authorities of Brescia), that Mango ordered and directed operations in Prandaglio (Brescia), which led to the capture and execution of partisans.58 Deputy Commissioner G.N. belonged to an older generation of fascists. Born in 1899, he had supported Mussolini’s movement before the March on Rome. He joined the Royal Guard in 1921. He was among those guards who survived the dissolution of the corps through transfer at the end of 1922 into the Carabinieri, and he continued his career in the Public Security Guard following its re-constitution in 1925, before becoming a Public Security official in 1929. According to his accusers, N. had deliberately requested a posting to the town of Biella in the province of Vercelli (Piedmont) on account of its notable partisan presence, assuring his boss that he would uproot the movement in days. In order to achieve this, he created a special anti-partisan police unit among the local Public Security Guard. He would, allegedly, catch out partisans by addressing individuals he encountered with the communist salute. Those unsuspecting partisans who responded in the same fashion were arrested. The fact that he was the object of a partisan assassination attempt, which he survived, attests to his reputation. N. apparently made his presence felt among colleagues in the police, trying, albeit unsuccessfully, to dismiss personnel of the Questura who refused to join the PFR. Shortly before the liberation of Vercelli province, N. went into hiding and remained so until giving himself up to the police authorities in the capital, where he was arrested on charges of collaborationism, attempted rape of a female prisoner and extortion of sums of money from individuals arrested on suspicion of anti-fascism in exchange for their release.59 As with many such cases, reconstruction of N.’s conduct on the basis of documents in his file should be undertaken with caution, particularly when it comes down to detail. The post-Liberation report, dated 27 June 1945, of the Questore of Vercelli claimed, for example, that after 25 July 1943, for fear of ruining his career, N. had attempted to define himself a victim of fascism, publicly declaring that his qualification as

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squadrista had been awarded unbeknown to him. After 8 September, the report continued, N. had returned to his usual high-handed attitude in his attempt to be promoted. By contrast, a request from the RSI Questore in September 1944 that N. be promoted to Commissioner referred to the tact and vitality he had displayed after 25 July, adding that he was held in esteem by the local political authorities.60 Although the RSI’s view of N. may not be objective, it is plausible that in the later document the (in all probability partisan) Questore was guided by the need to paint the image of an individual driven less by ideological conviction and more by personal opportunism, as part of his desire to discredit fascism and to reinforce the idea of the Social Republic as a puppet state. Although the lives of most police officials and officers who served the RSI were theoretically at risk during or immediately following the Liberation, those individuals who had distinguished themselves in fighting partisans and/or as fascists were in serious danger. ‘First-hour’ fascist and Deputy Commissioner, Francesco Barbarotta, was discussed in Chapter 5 in regard to his alleged assaults against members of the public during the late 1920s. Under the RSI, Barbarotta was promoted to Commissioner, in spite of a mediocre career before July 1943. On 26 April 1945, he was arrested by partisans who accused him of having actively supported the RSI, behaving violently towards citizens in his custody. On the night of 4 May 1945 ‘unidentified persons’ took him out of the jail where he was being held, along with other prisoners, and the following day his dead body was discovered near the town of Oneglia.61 The motives behind the killings of some officials are not always discernible from the documents available. Andrea Santini had been a section leader of the University Militia when studying for his degree in law at Florence and had joined the police in 1938 at the age of twentyseven. In June 1944, he was punitively transferred from Milan to the town of Legnano. This was because during employment at the Political Section of the Questura of Milan he had facilitated (by all accounts accidentally) the escape of an ex-grammar school friend, who had been arrested on suspicion of ‘subversive’ activities. Santini evidently performed better as Director of the Legnano police and impressed his superiors. Promoted to Assistant Commissioner in August 1944, he was recommended for a further promotion to the rank of Commissioner by the Capo Provincia of Milan only weeks later on the grounds of his moral, professional and political qualities. On 9 May 1945, following trial by a partisan People’s Tribunal, Santini was executed by shooting, though the justification for the death sentence is unknown.62

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If fascist officials were more likely to have distinguished themselves for collaborating with the Nazis and for ‘crimes’ associated with the war against partisans and the persecution of Jews, ideological boundaries were often blurred in the final brutal months of Italian fascism. Emblematic here is the case of Deputy Commissioner Carlo De Sanctis. Director of the Political Section of the Ferrara Police, De Sanctis was a descendant of the nationally renowned literary critic, Francesco De Sanctis. He was accused of having run a regime of terror during the Nazi occupation, leading to 23 murders, 300 episodes of torture, and the deportation to Nazi concentration camps of 500 citizens. What puzzled commentators during his trial in October 1945 was why, unlike many of the RSI torturers, an individual like De Sanctis should have become a fanatical persecutor of anti-fascists. He had been well educated, had frequented the household of the philosopher Benedetto Croce as a youngster, and had become an excellent police official who until 8 September 1943 had maintained a low profile and who in ‘normal’ times would probably have had a routine career. His conduct was defined in the local daily, Il Corriere del Po, of 2 October 1945 as ‘a Freudian process of moral disintegration’. The paper asked whether it was determined by career opportunism, sadism, blind devotion to his SS masters, or a combination of all three ‘alongside those imponderable elements of the human psyche which come into play in certain cases and in certain individuals’.63 There is little evidence that De Sanctis’s behaviour was motivated by fascist beliefs. Moreover, he claimed during his interrogation by the Investigating Magistrate that he had been involved in police action against fascists following Mussolini’s overthrow in July 1943 and had consequently been denounced as an anti-fascist by the RSI.64 De Sanctis attributed his actions to an ‘ordinary’ desire for career advancement.65 That his actions were considered possibly those of a psychopath was evident in his defence lawyer’s request for a psychiatrist’s report on the grounds that previous medical examinations had revealed that he suffered from an ‘epileptic tendency towards rage’. More plausible is Carlo Zaghi’s suggestion that De Sanctis’s conduct responded, in psychological terms, to a desire to exit the monotonous routine of a Questura official in order to take on the role of a prima-donna, facilitated by a historical period in which the constraints of the law were no longer present.66 Earlier parts of the volume have briefly contrasted Mussolini’s police with the higher level of political control and indoctrination to which the Nazi regime subjected the German forces of law and order. Though the ‘Nazification’ of training and personnel should not be over-stressed, it

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undoubtedly played a role in determining the participation of German policemen in large-scale racial persecution, deportations and mass murder. Studies of the Nazi police also imply that such teachings needed to be accompanied by various other strategies, including ‘routinisation’, fragmentation of work processes, and inducement of competition among rival police forces, in order to achieve the desired results.67 The considerable levels of dissociation (if not hostility) among police personnel of the RSI, partly in response to orders to carry out inhumane acts, might contrast with the apparently ‘willing’ involvement of German policemen in atrocities. Until 1943, the fascist regime had never pursued a policy of en-masse deportations or killings in Italian home territory. The police had been expected to act more or less within the limits of legality, although new legislation had granted them greater margins of power since 1926. Whatever their ideological shortcomings in the eyes of the Fascist Party, until July 1943, the Italian police on the whole successfully enforced the policies of the fascist regime and kept its enemies at bay without the need for intensive political indoctrination. With the exception of occupied Yugoslavia, and ‘despite occasional extremist voices favouring genocide’ in the African colonies, the outcome of fascist foreign policy hardly matched the racial brutality of the Nazis. Hitler envisaged the creation of a ‘Third Empire’ in which ‘all Germans would live and all non-Germans might die or be reduced to helots in a national final solution, an ethnic cleansing of an ultimate kind’.68 Certainly, in the context of the brutalising experiences of war, fascist emphasis on the racial inferiority of Slavs might have encouraged willingness among policemen (whatever their ideological persuasion) to commit or tolerate atrocities in north-eastern border areas and annexed Balkan territories, especially given the hostility they faced from enemy partisans. If anti-Slav policy undoubtedly appealed to fascists, the regime’s propaganda and ideology probably succeeded in some measure in exploiting the pre-existing fears and prejudices of state personnel in general. Yet, as Bosworth argues, fascist ferocity in war-time occupied territories was ‘limited and conditioned by incompetence and half-suppressed doubts about the value and sense of murder’.69 Similarly, in spite of the persecution of Jews by Mussolini’s regime, killing them ‘never became the central motivating factor in Italy’s war’.70 It is not clear what methods, other than coercion, were employed by the RSI police authorities to induce their members to actively co-operate in the deportation of Jews and round-up and execution of partisans. Notable levels of dissociation from the RSI reflected in some measure the limited ‘fascistisation’ which the Italian police had undergone since

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1922. Even those who were fascist believers suddenly found themselves involved in a different ball game for which they may not have been psychologically prepared. Though we cannot ignore the cruel treatment meted out to the indigenous populations of Italy’s colonies and to Slavs before September 1943, in terms of homeland policing it had never been fascist policy to deport Jews for extermination or to physically eliminate Italian citizens. The imminent defeat of the Axis forces undoubtedly played its part in inhibiting police involvement in atrocities, too. Nevertheless, many policemen stayed at their posts during the Nazi occupation and some distinguished themselves as cruel fanatics, especially, but not only, the ‘first-hour’ and younger-generation fascists among them. This may reflect the ability of an ideologically ‘renewed’ police authority to revive the dampened spirits of fascist personnel after the trauma of Mussolini’s dismissal in July 1943, and, for the more junior fascists, the lasting effects of their education and upbringing. Yet, their actions, if denoting the ethos of violence underlining their ideology and the return to the methods and ‘values’ of the earlier fascist movement inspiring the RSI, were undoubtedly also a reflection of the desperation of the marked days of Mussolinian rule. The post-Liberation trials and purges The investigations of Italian state administration initiated by the Allied Military Government (AMGOT) and subsequently handed over to the Italian Government largely failed to deal with the legacy of over twenty years of fascist rule. Any desire to weed out fascists from public life, as initiated by the Allied occupiers after they invaded Sicily in July 1943, was logistically hard to achieve, given the obvious imperative to prevent a breakdown of the bureaucratic machinery in the dramatic scenario of war. While the task of separating committed fascists from nominal Party members was, at least in theory, to be partly overcome by the Allies’ institution of a questionnaire for state employees and civil servants, the difficulties experienced in attempting to verify each individual’s response were considerable.71 Moreover, being mainly focused on a state employee’s past relationship with the Fascist Party, this approach did not necessarily take account of the authoritarian zeal which the person in question may have exercised during the ventennio, independent of ideological status. As the Allies increasingly entrusted ‘de-fascistisation’ to the Italian Government, the chances of a proper purge diminished even further. As regards the police, even when members were initially suspended, most eventually returned to work. Indeed, in 1946 the Interior Minister, Giuseppe Romita, reinstated

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most of the high-ranking officials according to the notion that they had acted as neutral civil servants during the dictatorship. In his memoirs, he claimed that he had taken this measure because those concerned had merely carried out the orders of the Interior Minister.72 Most of the relative few who were prosecuted for crimes associated with fascism or the RSI and Nazi occupation benefited from the amnesty instituted in June 1946 by the all-party post-war coalition Government. The Allied attitude towards policemen compromised with fascism might have disappointed those who had fought for the eradication of the regime’s legacy from the force. The case of Alfonso Molina, examined in the previous chapter, is emblematic. It is likely that Molina, arrested at AMGOT’s first meeting with the Catanian municipal authorities, had been on a black list of ‘fascists’ considered a threat to military security compiled by Allied intelligence, but he was released following subsequent enquiries by British Field Security Personnel.73 We do not know what these enquiries revealed and the exact circumstances surrounding Molina’s release, other than the role played by the Bishop of Catania in helping to secure it.74 It is probable, however, that the Allies came to believe that he did not pose a security threat and that, moreover, he could be useful to them, given that administrative personnel were lacking; hence his re-instatement and appointment as Chief Inspector for Sicily. On other occasions, the intervention of the Allies led to resentment within police circles. In January 1945 the Questore of liberated Rome, Enrico Morazzini, protested at the favourable treatment received by Antonio Colasurdo. Colasurdo was a young fascist who had served in a blackshirt armed division in East Africa before joining the police in 1937. He had been arrested by the judicial authorities on charges of collaborationism with the Nazis following the Liberation of Rome. Morazzini and AMGOT officers harboured suspicions that Colasurdo had been close to the Questore, Pietro Caruso, who had actively collaborated with the Nazis and was held responsible for torture and other atrocities. Yet, within three weeks of his arrest, Colasurdo was released at the request of the Allied High Command for ‘uncensurable reasons of a military nature’ and judicial proceedings were suspended. Morazzini also objected to the fact that the High Commission for Sanctions against Fascism (referred to below) had requested Colasurdo’s assistance in their investigations. After the Liberation, Colasurdo produced declarations from members of the public and partisans stating that they had benefited from his protection during the Nazi occupation, though Morazzini suspected that he had in practice played a double game. As Morazzini stated to the Chief of Police on

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24 January 1945, the day after Colasurdo’s release, ‘The Allies’ request, with which the Judiciary complied, thus blocking the course of justice, has compromised the prestige of the Police in the face of public opinion … and consequently lowered the morale of its officials.’75 Why exactly the Allies requested the release of Colasurdo is unclear. On the whole, however, they enforced anti-fascist measures more thoroughly than the Italian authorities. Hans Woller argues that on liberating Rome, for example, the new occupying authorities enforced dismissals or arrests of considerable numbers of policemen, informers, fascists and militiamen. Well into 1945 the Allies operated a hard-line policy to purge ex-RSI society and institutions of fascists occupying positions of influence, resulting in the dismissal of hundreds, if not thousands, from their posts, many of whom were interned in makeshift prison camps.76 By contrast, initiatives by Italian Governments, to which the occupiers gradually handed over responsibility, were less successful. Before the Liberation of Rome, Badoglio’s Government in the South had made only half-hearted attempts to impose sackings, sometimes firing officials appointed by AMGOT and reappointing those previously sacked by the Allies.77 Badoglio’s succession by Ivanoe Bonomi’s anti-fascist coalition Government in June 1944 marked greater determination to deal with the fascist legacy. Decree-law 159 of 27 July 1944 superseded all previous provisions in this area, spelling out in detail what constituted a fascist crime.78 However, the High Commission for Sanctions against Fascism, the government organisation responsible for carrying through anti-fascist measures established under the law, was under-resourced, with the result that the success of its investigations depended on how willing the local and provincial authorities were to assist it. These institutions were concerned to avoid enforcing zealous anti-fascist measures and undoubtedly inhibited progress in ‘de-fascistisation’. Prefects, questori and Carabinieri commanders were notably unco-operative with the High Commission as demonstrated by several complaints that requests for information about suspected fascists were either ignored or answered evasively.79 That the police authorities should try to hinder the progress of the anti-fascist measures stands to reason. They could hardly support a process to which they themselves were being subjected. As Mauro Canali notes, survival of the purges by police personnel was facilitated by the fact that the Deputy High Commissioner for Epuration (Alto Commissario Aggiunto per l’Epurazione), responsible for gathering evidence, did not have access to detailed information about the conduct of individual police officials; personal files held at the Interior Ministry headquarters were moved north ahead of the

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Liberation of Rome and were only returned after purge procedures had terminated. In putting together evidence, the Deputy High Commissioner had to rely on career summaries provided by the questure and the central police headquarters in Rome. Given that police officials were mindful of the fact that sooner or later they too would face ‘de-fascistisation’ procedures and were being asked to describe the conduct of ex-colleagues, their reports were deliberately vague.80 Though initial suspensions pending investigation were sometimes enforced by the Allied authorities, usually the High Commission instigated purge procedures against individuals suspected of collaborationism or otherwise compromised with fascism, after being solicited by declarations from anti-fascists or CLN committees, or on the basis of responses to its own questionnaire. It deferred the more serious cases to the law courts. The individuals concerned were suspended from their posts for the duration of the purge or judicial proceedings. As regards the police, the High Commission entrusted the task of judging the greater number of cases, for which penal sanctions were not applicable, to the Purge Commission for Public Security Personnel (Commissione di Primo Grado per l’Epurazione del Personale della PS), which functioned under the auspices of the Interior Ministry, and on which police officials were also represented. Pietro Bianconi of the Scuola Superiore, who during the Nazi occupation had deserted to join the Resistance, was among officials invited to sit on it. The commission responsible for judging police personnel usually saved those under investigation from dismissal. Although, theoretically, many risked sanctions for having advanced in their careers thanks to the support of fascist leaders or favours from the Party, for having publicly manifested support for fascism, and for having demonstrated fascist leanings (‘faziosità fascista’), the absence of their personal files helped to cover them. Those who had sworn an oath of allegiance to the RSI were justified on the grounds that refusal to do so would have led to serious repercussions. Since it was almost invariably accepted that police personnel in enforcing fascist policies and regulations had merely obeyed orders, individuals not accused of specific crimes only risked sanctions if it could be demonstrated that in enforcing directives they had behaved as fascists rather than as upholders of the law, which in practice was difficult to demonstrate.81 Personnel of the questure who had been involved in the persecution of political dissidence also benefited from the High Commission’s focus on the activities of the OVRA and the POLPOL. Yet, in spite of the initial intention of the Deputy High Commissioner to have all OVRA and POLPOL officials, alongside top police leaders, prosecuted and

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suspended from their posts, most were acquitted by the courts from the charges of contribution to the survival of the regime and/or of collaboration with the Nazi occupiers and were able to return to their jobs.82 Those officials in the Public Security forces whose suspensions were upheld could still appeal to a central purge commission (Commissione Centrale di Primo Grado) and, as a last resort, to a jurisdictional organ of the Government, the Council of State (Consiglio di Stato).83 Most significantly, the Purge Commission for Public Security Personnel rarely took advantage of the procedures it was entrusted with to rid the police of ‘first-hour’ fascists and those of later generations. It usually concluded that fascist personnel had kept their politics separate from their work. It seems likely that any attempt to single out police members on ideological grounds was seen as carrying too many risks, given that it was not so easy to distinguish fascists from ‘flankers’ when it came to assessing levels of allegiance to Mussolini’s regime. As already demonstrated in some of the individual profiles of police officials in the previous chapter, personnel facing purge proceedings attempted to save themselves by understating participation in forms of policing which were specifically identifiable with the fascist regime or by minimising the political significance of roles they had undertaken. Epifanio Pennetta, for example, had to justify his role as Director of the General and Confidential Affairs Division (DAGR) at the Interior Ministry Police headquarters for a period of four-and-a-half years. In May 1945 he informed the Purge Commission for Public Security Personnel that the ideological implications of such an important post were limited in so far as the division had existed before the dictatorship. Furthermore, he was able to provide declarations from colleagues in the police and members of public attesting to the humane manner in which he had treated political exiles (confinati) while he directed the division.84 Pennetta emphasised that in 1936 he had declined the offer to direct the OVRA zone headquarters in Bari (Puglia). Such emphasis was undoubtedly motivated by the fact that the OVRA was far more notoriously associated with fascism than the DAGR. As described previously, Pennetta made much of the fact that he had refused to direct the police mission to Bolivia because he wanted to have little to do with Militia officials.85 Like many of his colleagues, Pennetta was able to present himself as a neutral civil servant who had not been directly involved with the Party and Militia. Clearly in Pennetta’s case there was a long-running element of dissociation, if not conflict, surrounding his relationship with fascism, which led to his collaboration with the Roman CLN during the Nazi occupation. This undoubtedly helped to eclipse his role, as Director of the DAGR, in running an authoritarian state.

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Since today’s researcher has access to the personal files, it is possible to trace more accurately the validity of claims of political neutrality. What the Purge Commission would not have been able to take note of, when judging cases, were the advantages which many members of the police had enjoyed through their contacts with high-ranking fascists, as well as their statements of devotion, whether real or expedient, to the regime. Deputy Commissioner Brandisio Vellucci, accused of collaborationism and membership of the PFR, was arrested by the Allies following the liberation of Ferrara and transported to Algeria for internment. In April 1945, he was suspended from service, while investigative procedures were carried out. As part of his defence, he was able to claim in the absence of incriminating evidence that his ‘professional zeal’ had pitted him against the fascist community. He naturally kept quiet about the fact that, in an attempt to be promoted, he had put forward a declaration by the Federal Secretary of Aosta, which certified his ‘highly fascist sentiments’.86 Vellucci’s file also contains a declaration addressed to the police headquarters in Rome, dated 16 May 1940, in which he urged his promotion to Commissioner and informed his superiors that from as early as October 1919, when stationed in Milan, the Fascio di Combattimento, in recognition of his patriotic qualities, had requested his personal support and protection.87 Similarly, if Ermindo Roselli, the first Questore of Nazi-occupied Rome, claimed that he had been forced to take the Party card in 1932, once membership became obligatory, during the fascist years he had on more than one occasion cited his political connections and services to the fascist cause in the hope of increasing his chances of promotion.88 Most significantly, Roselli was able to claim that his sacking from the post of Questore of Rome for inadequate collaboration with the RSI Government was proof of sound ideological credentials.89 As the case of Roselli shows, police officials attempted to exploit their alleged maltreatment under the RSI in order to appear as victims of fascism, when in fact many of them had been fascist and/or had zealously enforced fascist policy during the ventennio. Luigi Cosenza, who had faced prison and the risk of deportation during the Nazi occupation, was once again imprisoned following the Liberation on the charge of collaborationism and alleged anti-partisan measures. In his defence he made much of action taken against numerous fascists before and during the ‘Badoglian’ period (25 July to 8 September 1943), and of the fact that he had subsequently been ‘persecuted’ by the RSI and the Nazis. In the end he was acquitted of the charges, but his forced retirement in December 1944 was re-confirmed in May 1945. If Cosenza had effectively dissociated himself from the fascist regime

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from the summer of 1943 onwards, by presenting himself as a victim of the RSI he was striving to cancel his earlier fascist past. Indeed, in an attempt to get his job back or receive financial assistance, he falsely declared to his bosses that he had never participated in the fascist movement or benefited from fascism, when the very opposite was true. He claimed that his Party membership and March on Rome medal had been awarded to him merely in recognition of his career achievements.90 Cosenza was officially retired on the grounds that he had completed thirty-seven years’ service and reached the age of sixty. However, his associations with the ex-Fascist Party Secretary, Achille Starace, may have embarrassed the police. If the Purge Commission did not have access to his personal file, a report compiled on him by the Questore of Taranto, dated 24 October 1945, referred to his relation with Starace, whose friendship and protection, alongside his fascist ‘qualifications’, he had made a show of among colleagues. Moreover, he had allegedly carried out operations against anti-fascists with particular rigour. Personnel under his dependence did not have fond memories of him.91 Luigi Salerno, whose earlier career was described in the previous chapter, attempted to fend off the charge of collaborationism he faced following the Liberation, by claiming that the Social Republic had victimised him. For this purpose, he cited accusations by the RSI that during the summer of 1943 he had persecuted fascists. He also produced an extract from an RSI report on him, following abandonment of his post on 24 June 1944, which ordered his ‘elimination’ and stressed that he had never been a committed fascist or supported the RSI. Salerno claimed that he was ‘one of the most persecuted Public Security officials under fascism’, but he failed to mention that before deserting his post he had been promoted to Vice-Questore. Moreover, in filling out the customary questionnaire about his career to submit to the High Commission for Sanctions against Fascism, Salerno omitted to declare his earlier support of the fascist movement and his role in Party activities before July 1943.92 Salerno’s superiors in Rome admitted that during the Nazi occupation he had collaborated with the fascist Questori of Pesaro who, owing to their lack of professional expertise, had relied on his. This had led to his promotion to Vice-Questore, which Salerno had ‘incautiously’ accepted, thereafter becoming involved in the machinations of his superiors. They argued that Salerno could not be accused of fascist or immoral behaviour; nor could he be charged with collaborationism.93 The Purge Commission for Public Security Personnel appeared to agree, acquitting him of all charges on 9 January 1947. This included his alleged ‘defence of fascism’ in publications such as Il magistrato dell’ordine. The following

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October he applied for retirement, having failed the previous year to obtain promotion to Questore. When police officials faced charges of crimes associated with fascism and/or the Nazi occupation, they could go before the law courts, but more often than not the actions they were accused of were covered by the ‘Togliatti’ amnesty of 22 June 1946. Named after the Communist Party leader and Minister of Justice responsible for its drafting, desire for national reconciliation and pacification were among the principle motives for the amnesty. On a more practical level it had become urgent in the light of serious prison overcrowding; almost eighty thousand inmates were registered nationwide in March 1946 compared with half that number in 1935, as a result of which the penitentiary system had from the end of 1945 reached breaking point. Twelve thousand among the prisoners were partisan or fascist. The amnesty allowed the interruption of judicial procedures and the suspension of prison sentences. In its final badly formulated version it was more generous towards political prisoners than inmates accused of common crimes, and it gave judges leeway for exonerating individuals accused of serious crimes associated with fascism and for sparing fascist leaders from punishment, when this had not been the original intention behind the measure. The generosity of judges towards fascists contrasted with their reluctance to apply the same amnesty to partisans.94 It is striking, for example, that the Turin Assize Court should in December 1946 sentence G.N. (discussed in the previous section), in absentia, to 18 months’ imprisonment, a 5,000 Lire fine, and interdiction from holding public office for extortion of sums of money from his victims, when the other charges of collaborationism and attempted rape were thrown out on account of the amnesty.95 Judges became notorious for the manner in which they interpreted the unfortunate wording of the Togliatti amnesty, which specified that only ‘particularly brutal forms of torture’ (‘sevizie particolarmente efferate’) would not benefit from the amnesty. Thus, individuals accused of burning prisoners with red hot iron instruments, extracting their finger nails, beating them and raping them (as frequently registered among female prisoners) were freed, because judges were prepared to argue that such acts were not particularly brutal.96 In the above regard, Deputy Commissioner Carlo De Sanctis, accused of torturing and murdering anti-fascists in Ferrara during the RSI period, benefited from the amnesty. Initially sentenced to death, in June 1951 the Assize Court at Macerata (Marches) acquitted him from the charges of murder, partly on lack of evidence, while the crimes of ‘serious personal injury’ and ‘reduction to slavery’ allegedly committed

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against his victims were cancelled by the amnesty. The sentence was motivated by the argument that witnesses had exaggerated the gravity of the torture they had been subjected to; the repeated beatings (punches and slaps) they received had left scars, but this was considered evidence of a beating rather than brutal torture. Such acts, the sentence read, hardly corresponded to the image of a perverse mind which should not be allowed to benefit from the amnesty.97 The police authorities were evidently shamed by the benefits the amnesty afforded to controversial figures within their ranks. In September 1947 the Purge Commission for Public Security Personnel declared G.N. unsuitable for future service in the police. In justifying its decision, the Commission noted that there was enough evidence to prove that N. was guilty of collaborationism and that evidence which would have rendered the amnesty inapplicable had not been taken into consideration.98 The police attempted to isolate those individuals most seriously tainted by fascism, though changing political circumstances helped them to return to their posts. Questore Giulio Monarca had allegedly forged a successful career thanks to the continuous interference of the Interior Minister, Buffarini Guidi, against the will of Bocchini. His persecution of anti-fascists was reputed to have been particularly ferocious. In March 1945 Monarca was retired. A memo of the Personnel Division addressed to the High Commission had advised this, given his lengthy period of service in Pisa, ‘residence of the well-known Buffarini Guidi’. In June 1945 Monarca came out of retirement. It is evident that his services were useful in the politically heated climate of the post-war years. In June 1946, a liaison officer from the Allied Control Commission which oversaw the work of the Italian Government praised him for his ability as Questore of Savona (Liguria) to manage public order during the election of the Constituent Assembly and the referendum on the monarchy earlier that month. A note in his file also referred to Monarca’s success in bringing order back to the Questura, given the presence of ‘unqualified’ personnel belonging to partisan formations, as a result of which he had had ‘noisome elements, previous offenders, and the authors of common crimes’ removed from the ranks of the police.99 Several police officials when facing the Purge Commission emphasised their involvement in the Resistance and their files often reveal declarations to that effect from partisan organisations or members of the public. Likewise, many claimed that they had protected Jews or exercised discretion and compassion in their treatment of political prisoners and were able to provide certification of this. Nevertheless, as suggested by the case of Antonio Colasurdo, such declarations should be interpreted

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with caution, given the tendency of public servants to serve both sides in the civil war scenario. Moreover, as Canali notes, in the aftermath of a period characterised by frequent processes of metamorphosis in the face of regime change, it was not difficult to procure false certification of services to the Resistance from partisan leaders who themselves desired to hide aspects of their past.100 The ‘conversion’ of the ‘first-hour’ fascist, Deputy Commissioner Gerardo Amodeo, to the anti-fascist cause is significant here. Amodeo produced declarations from partisan leaders attesting to his contribution to the War of Liberation. In particular, a statement by Pietro Minetti, Military Commander of the Garibaldini (Communist Party partisans) for the Lombardy region, asserted that Amodeo was known to be anti-fascist, had repeatedly offered him help with partisan operations in the area of Como, where Amodeo was stationed, and had put himself in danger by hiding him in his home. Amodeo risked deportation to Germany for having failed to intervene to prevent a strike organised by the clandestine General Confederation of Labour, until Tamburrini intervened, as a result of which he faced a disciplinary investigation and transfer.101 Amodeo’s collaboration with the Resistance, which we have no evidence to refute, is not necessarily a surprise in itself. Amodeo had never distinguished himself as a particularly ‘upright’ fascist, repeatedly citing his political qualification and enlisting the help of political protectors in the vain attempt to obtain advancement in a profession which he was not particularly good at.102 More significantly, any ideological conversion he experienced did little to change a mentality which thrived on intrigue and failure to take responsibility for his actions. In certifying himself to the Purge Commission as anti-fascist, Amodeo claimed that during the period of the dictatorship fascist questori connected to Starace and Buffarini Guidi had obstructed his career, when in practice he himself had attempted to benefit from the support of both leaders. Such an attitude continued in the post-war Republic. In May 1948, in a letter to the Christian Democrat Interior Minister, Mario Scelba, Amodeo claimed that his recent failure to be promoted to Commissioner was to be attributed, among other things, to a conspiracy against him on the part of the Questore and other officials he worked with at the police headquarters in Reggio Emilia.103 The conversion of Chief Commissioner Umberto Muoio to the Resistance is not without ambivalence either, though consideration has to be given to the possibility that information provided by his superiors is unreliable. Born in Caserta in 1897, Muoio was Commander of the Public Security Guard at Perugia during the mid-1920s before the suppression of officer posts in the Guard in 1928. He then applied for a

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post as Commissioner on the recommendation of the Prefect, Giuseppe Mormino, who attested to his professional qualities and fascist beliefs. By all accounts Muoio made a successful career during the ventennio. In 1937 he joined the Political Section of the Questura of Bologna where he distinguished himself in fighting ‘subversive’ activities. On several occasions, he participated in OVRA operations. His actions earned him several decorations, as well as the recognition of OVRA Zone Commander Giuseppe d’Andrea. He went on to direct the Political Section at Bologna between 1941 and 1942. There is evidence, however, that Muoio tried to soften the impact of the Race Laws on the local Jewish community between 1938 and 1943.104 During the Nazi occupation of Bologna, Muoio apparently established links with the CLN and joined the Communists. Following the Liberation, he returned to work at the Questura at Bologna. In August 1945, the Questore, a career official, Michele Iantaffi, who had recently replaced the temporarily appointed partisan Questore, Romolo Trauzzi, informed the Chief of Police that Muoio had merely supported the CLN in order to ‘to be born again’ in anticipation of reprisals from his earlier victims. Moreover, in an attempt to protect himself further, Muoio had allegedly ruled over the Questura and Trauzzi (who, according to Iantaffi, lacked professional experience). Iantaffi claimed that Muoio had set up an internal commission which initiated suspension proceedings against eleven officials, in anticipation of their making accusations against him, until they complained to the Allied authorities, who intervened to demand his and Trauzzi’s transfer.105 For their part, partisan commissioners claimed that Iantaffi was hostile to personnel who had distinguished themselves in the Resistance and that he had requested the transfer of Muoio and another commissioner on those grounds.106 Iantaffi’s accusations against Muoio should be considered in the post-Liberation context of partisan involvement in policing, which career personnel resented and possibly feared. If Iantaffi claimed that Muoio became a partisan to conceal his fascist past, his own was suspect and the subject of on-going investigations by the High Commission for Sanctions against Fascism. During the dictatorship, Ianfatti had earned himself the nickname of ‘angelo del fascismo’ (‘guardian angel of fascism’) for allegedly helping to cover up fascist involvement in the murder of the socialist deputy Giacomo Matteotti. In June 1924 Iantaffi, who then directed the Railway Police at Rome, had been at the scene of the arrest of Matteotti’s killer, Amerigo Dumini, at the central railway station. He was suspected of handing over Dumini’s luggage (containing blood-stained clothes) to the then

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Chief of Police, Emilio De Bono, rather than the judicial authorities, as a result of which crucial evidence in the trial was concealed. Iantaffi’s detractors argued that for such ‘services’ Mussolini had him promoted to Vice-Questore. They also claimed that he enjoyed the protection of various high-ranking fascists, including Buffarini Guidi and the Foreign Minister, Galeazzo Ciano, and that he had come into property though illicit deals because of such protection. After the Liberation, Iantaffi insisted that following Dumini’s arrest, on realising that the luggage had been taken away by a member of De Bono’s entourage, he had it returned and registered its contents, which he argued had not been tampered with, before depositing it with the judicial authorities.107 Like so many of the personal disputes revealed in this study, it is difficult to get to the bottom of the clash between the two police commissioners. Iantaffi’s request for Muoio’s transfer on disciplinary grounds may have concealed more sinister motives. It is equally plausible that Muoio’s conversion to the Resistance was inspired by opportunism. Even if it was genuine, this still left the problem of his role during the fascist years, which colleagues or superiors could exploit in order to challenge him and defend their own positions. Conclusion It is significant that the majority of policemen, fascists included, kept their jobs after the Liberation, even though some temporarily faced suspension for their role in the dictatorship and/or the Social Republic. What emerges from an examination of the ‘de-fascistisation’ process is a failure on the part of the higher echelons of the institution to consider more critically the attitude of police personnel under the dictatorship. Using the formula ‘merely obeying orders’, the idea that police personnel might have willingly complied with fascist policy was dismissed. As the Prefect of Avellino, Roberto Siragusa, noted with regard to the behaviour of Alfonso Molina, discussed at length in the previous chapter: ‘Of course, during that sad period, the Police were often forced to carry out unpleasant, sometimes odious, tasks, but such specific duties cannot and must not today be treated as [fascist] factiousness and persecution.’108 Behind such an alibi, there is little doubt that in reality many within the police were attracted to a regime which set up an authoritarian system of law enforcement and in doing this offered new career prospects. For such reasons they had been more than happy to comply with it and prove themselves as its willing enforcers. Police officials lied about their pasts or were extremely economical

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with the truth in order to get through the purge procedures unscathed. Beyond the obvious imperative to save their skins one wonders how far they questioned their consciences. We may assume that some of the most fervent fascists among them were unrepentant. It is probable that most members of the police relinquished previous allegiances to fascism as a result of the military disaster and breakdown of society which came with the war, but they did not necessarily reject more deeply set authoritarian and right-wing ideas which had abounded during the ventennio. Among police personnel there was little public repentance of their conduct. Several statements to the Purge Commission by officials who had begun their careers before 1922 suggest a failure to distinguish service to Mussolini’s authoritarian one-party state from service to the previous liberal-democratic order, as they insisted that they had always been guided by the principle of politically neutral state authority. How sincere such statements were is questionable. Police officials played down the amount of human suffering which they had been instrumental in causing. For those belonging to the older generations, any guilt they privately felt about their enforcement of fascist rule may have been attenuated in part by the public order culture under which they had trained in liberal Italy. This accustomed them to enforcing preventive measures of control to deal with internal ‘enemies’ of the state, though not on the scale or intensity subsequently imposed by the fascist dictatorship. The final chapter will briefly show how in the early democratic Republic the police forces, though cautiously embracing narrow forms of pluralism, continued in notable measure to be influenced and guided by the culture which had informed their conduct during the dictatorship. Notes 1 ASS, GP, Cat. 30, b. 91 (1939), 30/2331 Prefetto Siena to Questore Siena and Comando Gruppo Carabinieri Reali Siena, 16 September 1938. 2 ASS, Q, various files for 1938 marked Cat.1, Cat. A.4.b and Cat. 12. 3 ASS, Q, F. 458 (1938), sf. Siena. Onoranze a Iacopo della Quercia (V Centenario), Ordinanza Questura n. 1–20591, 7 September 1938. 4 Senise succeeded Bocchini following the latter’s sudden death in November 1940. 5 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1942, b. 76, Relazioni (trimestrali) dei questori, f. Siena, 06415 Questore Siena to Capo Polizia, 30 September 1942. 6 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1941, b. 51, Relazioni (trimestrali) dei questori, f.  Ferrara, Questore Ferrara to Capo Polizia, 08586 31 July 1940 and 013695 24 December 1940. 7 C. S. Capogreco, I campi del duce. L’internamento civile nell’Italia

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fascista (1940–1943) (Turin: Einaudi, 2004), p. 287. Notably, foreign Jews aged under sixty-five who were not married to Italian citizens and who had taken up residence since January 1919 were ordered to leave the country and its colonies by 12 March 1939. 8 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 100 ter, f. Altamura Giulio. 9 Osti Guerrazzi, Poliziotti, pp. 28–9. 10 C. S. Capogreco, ‘L’entrata in guerra dell’Italia e l’internamento degli ebrei stranieri: il campo di Ferramonti’, in C. Di Sante (ed.), I campi di concentramento in Italia. Dall’internamento alla deportazione (1940–1945) (Milan: FrancoAngeli, 2001), pp. 83–94 (p. 89). 11 Osti Guerrazzi, Poliziotti, pp. 74–6. Guerrazzi’s use of initials for the surnames of police officials is motivated by his desire to conceal confidential information about them in his book from public knowledge. See p. 28. 12 Ibid., pp. 138–40. 13 Ibid., pp. 67–9. The author notes (p. 164, note 16), that the regime’s increased anti-Semitic feeling was also expressed in the prescription in May 1942 of forced labour for Italian Jews. According to E. Collotti and L. Klinkhammer, Il fascismo e l’Italia in guerra (Rome: Ediesse, 1996), pp. 105–8, in May–June 1943 the regime planned the internment of all Italian Jews, as part of a radicalisation of fascist policies in the context of the Nazi ‘Final Solution’ of January 1942 which was drawn up to include Italian Jews. 14 Capogreco, ‘L’entrata in guerra dell’Italia’, pp. 86–7. 15 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 116 bis, f. Genovese Vincenzo, MI, DGPS, DP, report 25 July 1949. 16 The above-cited report of July 1949 confirms that Genovese was initially indicated as a war criminal. Evidence in Genovese’s file suggests that the Investigative Committee for Presumed War Crimes (Commissione d’Inchiesta per i Presunti Crimini di Guerra) set up by the Italian Government in 1946 judged in his favour. It has been argued that the Committee was created in order to consider the accusations against those charged with war crimes and possibly have them tried by Italian courts, rather than allow their extradition to the countries where the alleged crimes had been committed. In point of fact, none of the twenty-nine individuals which the Commission indicated as requiring the judgment of an Italian military tribunal were ever tried. See www.criminidiguerra. it/lacommissione.shtml (accessed 3 August 2011). 17 Capogreco, I campi del duce, pp. 108–9. 18 Ibid., pp. 109–10. 19 Canali, Le spie del regime, pp. 322, 492–4. 20 C. S. Capogreco, ‘Internamento e deportazione dei civili jugoslavi (1941–’43)’, in Di Sante (ed.), I campi di concentramento in Italia, pp. 134–61 (p. 153). 21 D. Rodogno, ‘Italiani brava gente? Fascist Italy’s Policy toward the Jews

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in the Balkans, April 1941–July 1943’, European History Quarterly, 35:2 (2005), 213–40 (119–20, 223–5). 22 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 116 bis, f. Genovese Vincenzo, Memoriale Difensiva, 4 April 1946; letter from Genovese (Questore Udine) to Prefetto Fiume, 6 July 1938. 23 Ibid., Attestato di Merito Speciale, 20 June 1941, signed by Ministro dell’Interno, Guido Buffarini Guidi. 24 For the role played by Roatta, see Capogreco, ‘Internamento e deportazione dei civili jugoslavi’, pp. 144–53. 25 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 116 bis, f. Genovese Vincenzo, 333/1308 DGPS, DP to Gabinetto Ministero Interno, 30 June 1942; Prefetto Fiume to Capo Polizia, 23 June 1942; telespresso 4/07617 Ministero Affari Esteri to DGPS, 19 August 1942. 26 Ibid., Decisione Commissione di 1° Grado per l’Epurazione della Pubblica Sicurezza, 19 June 1947. 27 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 178, f. Livorno Commissariati Sezionali, IGPS to Capo Polizia, 13 December 1941. 28 Ibid. 29 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 175, f. Relazione d’inchiesta … presso la R. Questura di Trento, 25/57 Ispettore Generale di Polizia per i Servizi Motorizzati to Capo Polizia, 18 May 1942. 30 C. Senise, Quando ero Capo della Polizia 1940–1943 (Rome: Ruffolo Editore, 1946), pp. 53–4, 56–7. 31 Decree-laws 642 of 21 June 1940, 1373 of 1 September 1940 and 61 of 17 February 1941. 32 Decree-law 148 of 29 January 1940. 33 ACS, DAGR-CA, 1942, b. 3, f. Dalmazia. Rinforzi, 34991 Governo Dalmazia, Prefetto Direttore dei Servizi di Polizia to Ministero Interno Gabinetto and DGPS, 27 November 1941. 34 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 178, f. Milano: Brigata Mobile di Polizia, Colonello Ispettore Generale del Corpo to Capo Polizia, 1 August 1941. 35 ACS, DP-AG, 1963, b. 200 bis, f. 9054–3. 36 Franzinelli, Delatori, pp. 103, 108. 37 See, for example, ACS, DP-AG, 1961, b. 9, f. Associazione Nazionale Fascista del Pubblico Impiego, 333/9071, DGPS, Capo DP to Capo Gruppo Associazione Fascista Pubblico Impiego, DGPS, 9 July 1942. 38 P. Carucci, ‘Il ministero dell’interno: prefetti, questori e ispettori generali’, in A. Ventura (ed.), Sulla crisi del regime fascista 1938–1943. La società italiana dal ‘consenso’ alla Resistenza (Venice: Marsilio, 1996), pp. 21–73 (pp. 34–50). 39 Senise, Quando ero Capo della Polizia, pp. 51–4. 40 Savella, ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”’, p. 4, n. 7; p. 242. 41 Capogreco, I campi del duce, pp. 171–2. 42 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Repubblic Sociale Italiana, Segreteria Particolare del Duce (hereafter, ACS, RSI, SPD), b. 4, f. 28 GNR,

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Promemoria per Dolfin, Segreteria Particolare del Duce, 26 November 1943. 43 ACS, RSI, SPD, b. 4, f. 28 GNR, 2865 Comando Generale GNR Diramazione Generale, 29 April 1944. 44 L. Ganapini, La repubblica delle camicie nere (Milan: Garzanti, 1999), pp. 38–9. Ganapini notes that in October 1943 carabinieri present in the capital had already been disarmed and deported. In May 1944 German plans to transfer ten thousand carabinieri to Germany for employment in low-ranking air defence jobs and as guards in air force bases were put into practice. On 15 June the Capo Provincia of Verona denounced the fact that carabinieri had been forced to travel to Germany in cattle trucks in what amounted to a deportation measure. 45 ACS, RSI, SPD, b. 4, f. 28 GNR, 57245 report indicated ‘Duce. Viene dal Capo del GNR’, June 1944; 4661 Comandante Generale GNR to Ambasciatore Germania Von Rahn, 14 June 1944; report 59837 on Padua (author not indicated), 21 June 1944. 46 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Repubblica Sociale Italiana, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Segretaria Capo della Polizia (1943–1945), (hereafter, ACS, RSI, SCP), b. 39, f. Agenti di PS che si lasciano disarmare dai ribelli, 555/431 Capo Polizia to Capi Provincia, 28 June 1944. 47 Ibid., b. 64, f. Informazioni fiduciarie, Promemoria Capo della Polizia, 15 January 1945. 48 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 124. My use in this and subsequent cases of the initials rather than the full names of police officials I have analysed is motivated by a seventy-year restriction on the dissemination of confidential data (unless such data are already in the public domain). This especially applies to data on the state of health and sexual lives of individuals. 49 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 177 bis. 50 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 152 bis, f. Bianconi Pietro. 51 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 177, f. Vacca Mario, esp. 014420 Prefetto Torino to DGPS, DP, 25 September 1945. 52 For more detailed analysis of Cosenza’s career up to 1943, see Dunnage, ‘Ideology, Clientelism and the “Fascistisation” of the Italian State’, 273–4. 53 ACS, RSI, SCP, b. 38, f. Segnalazioni, Prefettura Udine to Capo Polizia, 16 November 1943. 54 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 10 bis, f. Cosenza Luigi. 55 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 151, f. Roselli Ermindo, Roselli to Presidente Commissione Epurazione Personale PS, 18 September 1944. 56 F. Wildvang, ‘The Enemy Next Door: Italian Collaboration in Deporting Jews during the German Occupation of Rome’, Modern Italy, 12:2 (2007), 189–204 (192–3). 57 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 327, f. Mango Tullio, 3131/75.A.39 Questore Ufficio Speciale di Polizia (Maderno) to Ministro Interno, 7 March 1944. 58 Ibid., various documents.

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59 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 288 ter, 02976 Gab. Questore Vercelli to Procura Regno Vercelli, 27 June 1945, and other documents. 60 Ibid., 02976 Gab. Questore Vercelli to Procura Regno Vercelli, 27 June 1945; Questore Repubblicano Vercelli to DP Maderno, 28 September 1944. 61 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 322, f. Barbarotta Francesco. 62 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 195 bis, f. Santini Andrea. 63 C. Zaghi, Terrore a Ferrara durante i 18 mesi della repubblica di Salò (Bologna: Istituto Regionale ‘Ferruccio Parri’, 1992), pp. 136–7. 64 R. Sitthi and C. Ticchioni, Ferrara nella Repubblica Sociale Italiana (Ferrara: Liberty House, 1987), p. 80. 65 Zaghi, Terrore a Ferrara, p. 138. 66 Ibid., pp. 141–3. 67 See, for example, George Browder’s analysis of the employment of tactics such as ‘routinisation’ and ‘dehumanisation’ (Hitler’s Enforcers, pp. 83–4). Patrick Wagner argues that Himmler encouraged competition between the Gestapo and Kriminalpolizei in the persecution of homosexuality. See Volksgemeinschaft ohne Verbrecher. Konzeptionen und Praxis der Kriminalpolizei in der Zeit der Weimarer Republik und des Nationalsozialismus (Hamburg: Hans Christians Verlag, 1996), p. 249. Nadine Rossol illustrates how collaboration in racial persecution was more easily achieved by breaking down the process into small administrative tasks. See ‘“Ordinary” Police Work?: The Anti-Jewish Policy of Cologne’s City and Administrative Police during the Nazi Period’, in G. Oram (ed.), Conflict and Legality. Policing Mid-Twentieth Century Europe (London: Francis Boutle, 2003), pp. 78–93. 68 Bosworth, Mussolini’s Italy, p. 389. 69 Ibid., p. 472. 70 Ibid. 71 For closer analysis, see H. Woller, Die Abrechnung mit dem Faschismus in Italien 1943 bis 1948 (Munich: R.  Oldenbourg Verlag, 1996), pp. 56–7; D. Jones, ‘The Impact of Allied Military Government (AMGOT) on the Population of Sicily July 1943 – February 1944: A Case Study of the Towns of Catania and Caltagirone in the Province of Catania’ (Ph.D dissertation, Swansea University, 2009), pp. 167–70. On Allied difficulties in enforcing ‘de-fascistisation’ in southern Italy, see also R. P. Domenico, Italian Fascists on Trial, 1943–1948 (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 1991), pp. 21–34. 72 G. Romita, Dalla monarchia alla repubblica (Pisa: Nistri-Listri, 1959), pp. 92–7. Romita’s reinstatement of prefects and questori who had served during the dictatorship is documented in Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Ufficio Cifra (Partenze), February 1946. 73 Jones, ‘The Impact of Allied Military Government’, pp. 167–8. 74 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 31, f. Molina Alfonso, Segreteria PSI (Sandro Pertini) to Sottosegretario Interni, Emilio Canevari, 2 October 1944.

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75 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 21, f. Colasurdo Antonio, esp. 019843=B.1.C Questore Roma to Capo Polizia, 9 September 1944; 09046 Gab. Cat.B.1.A Questore Roma to Capo Polizia, 24 January 1945. Colasurdo’s future in the police was nevertheless at risk as a result of the charges he had faced. In a statement dated 30 January 1947, the Purge Commission for Public Security Personnel (described below) decided not to continue procedures against him on the grounds that he had resigned from the police, but added that his case would be re-examined if he were re-employed. It noted that in 1946 Colasurdo had faced judicial proceedings, though at the preliminary stage the magistrate declared him not guilty of some of the crimes he had been accused of. 76 Woller, Die Abrechnung mit dem Faschismus, pp. 148, 240–2. 77 Ibid., Chapter 4, esp. pp. 90, 96–7. 78 For a detailed analysis of the provisions of the decree, see Domenico, Italian Fascists on Trial, pp. 75–80. 79 For examples of this behaviour, see J. Dunnage, ‘Inhibiting Democracy in Post-War Italy: The Police Forces, 1943–48’, Italian Studies, 51 (1996), 167–80 (168), and Woller, Die Abrechnung mit dem Faschismus, p. 227. For further evidence, see Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza, Divisione Affari Generali e Riservati, Circolari (1929–1949), b. 18. 80 Canali, Le spie del regime, pp. 500–2. 81 Ibid., p. 502. See pp. 498–500 for an analysis of how the purge and trial procedures were intended to function and of the particular articles of Decree-law 149 employed for this purpose. 82 For a detailed account of this, see ibid., pp. 495–510. 83 Ibid., p. 499. 84 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 180 bis, f. Pennetta Epifanio, Pennetta to Commissione di 1° Grado per l’Epurazione della Pubblica Sicurezza, 18 May 1945. 85 Ibid., curriculum vitae signed Epifanio Pennetta, dated 16 February 1945. 86 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 111, f. Vellucci Brandisio, Vellucci to DGPS, 6 December 1945; declaration by Segretario Federale, Aosta, 30 April 1932. In January 1946, Vellucci’s suspension was revoked, allowing him to return to work, and in March 1947 he was acquitted of accusations related to PFR membership on the grounds that he had been forced to take it. 87 Ibid., declaration by Vellucci to DGPS, 16 May 1940. 88 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 151, f. Roselli Ermindo, Roselli to Ministro Interno, 29 April 1925. 89 Ibid., Roselli to Presidente Commissione Epurazione Personale PS, 18 September 1944. Though dismissed without pension in September 1944, he eventually returned to his job, and in 1948 was promoted to Questore (promotion to the same rank under the RSI having been annulled). 90 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 10 bis, f. Cosenza Luigi, Cosenza to DGPS, 8 April 1945, 17 January 1946, 4 April 1946.

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91 Ibid., 05084 Questore Taranto to DGPS, DP, 24 October 1945. Cosenza died in July 1946. 92 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 288, f. Salerno Luigi. 93 Ibid., 333/2064 DGPS, DP to Alto Commissariato Aggiunto per l’Epurazione, 22 October 1945. 94 For a detailed analysis, see M. Franzinelli, L’amnistia Togliatti. 22 giugno 1946. Colpo di spugna sui crimini fascisti (Milan: Mondadori, 2006), esp. pp. 42–56. 95 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 288 ter. 96 Discussed in M. Dondi, La lunga liberazione. Giustizia e violenza nel dopoguerra italiano (Rome: Editori Riuniti, 1999), pp. 64–6. 97 Sitti and Ticchioni, Ferrara nella Repubblica Sociale Italiana, pp. 151–5, 162–3. 98 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 288 ter. 99 ACS, FPFS, 1957, b. 188 bis, f. Monarca Giulio, esp. 333–3103-E DGPS, DP to Alto Commissariato Aggiunto per l’Epurazione, 20 March 1945, LOP.560 Chief Liaison Officer, Ligurian Liaison Group, Allied Commission, to Prefetto Savona, 10 June 1946, 9175–1/1946 Appunto (Stralcio Savona – Situazione Questura), 12 October 1946. 100 Canali, Le spie del regime, p. 539. 101 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b.33 bis, f. Amodeo Gerardo, declaration by Col. Pietro Minetti, Comandante Comando Militare Gruppi Garibaldini della Lombardia, 2 May 1945; 333/2778 Appunto DGPS, DP, 17 October 1946. 102 For a more detailed analysis of Amodeo’s career before 1943, see Dunnage, ‘Ideology, Clientelism and the “Fascistisation” of the Italian State’, 270, 272. 103 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b.33 bis, f. Amodeo Gerardo, Amodeo memoriale difensiva, 4 February 1946; Capo Polizia to Sottosegretario di Stato, Presidenza del Consiglio, 28 November 1945; Amodeo letter to Mario Scelba, 20 May 1948. 104 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 90, f. Muoio Umberto, inc. telegramme 55242–2 Prefetto Perugia to DGPS, 24 October 1927. Muoio’s alleged protection of Jews is mentioned on the Bolognese Jewish Community website: www.comunitadibologna.it/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=337 (accessed 3 August 2010). 105 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 90, f. Muoio Umberto, 0792 Questore Bologna to Capo Polizia, 7 August 1945. 106 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 110 ter, f. Iantaffi Michele, 7574 Seg. Particolare Presidente Consiglio Ministri to Capo Polizia, 14 September 1945. 107 Ibid., various documents, including a typewritten copy of the list of contents found in Dumini’s baggage, dated 13 June 1924. 108 ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 31, f. Molina Alfonso, 707/8 Prefetto Avellino to DGPS, DP, 15 February 1945.

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7 Conclusion: Mussolini’s policemen and the transition to the Republic Mussolini’s policemen

Conclusion

The evolution of post-war police culture The inhibiting effects of twenty years of dictatorship on processes of democratic renewal in post-war Italy are clearly visible in the police. They were highly suspicious of the new era of freedom which the defeat of fascism hailed and of the risks to public order which it posed. Such suspicions were reinforced by their experiences of the War of Liberation which had been fought against them and by the re-emergence of political forces which they had been instrumental in persecuting during the ventennio. In parts of Italy which had witnessed Nazi occupation and civil war, the situation for the police was particularly critical. Not only did policemen face suspension, but they could fall victim to the violent retribution of the partisans, as illustrated in the previous chapter. Moreover, they had to ‘tolerate’ the appointment of prefects, questori and police commissioners among partisans, as well as the founding of an auxiliary Polizia Partigiana.1 This led to notable tensions inside police stations between partisan and non-partisan personnel until the former were gradually replaced, as suspended career officials were allowed to return to their jobs.2 A series of communications from the Questori of Ferrara to the Chief of Police during the summer and autumn of 1945 illustrate the concerns which the presence of partisans in the police provoked among career personnel during a period characterised by a high level of organised crime, which was not always distinct from political violence attributed to ex-fascists and partisans. The Questura of Ferrara was allegedly controlled by partisans of the Auxiliary Police, to the point that it was difficult to monitor the movements of political parties in the province. The Auxiliary Police were reluctant to collaborate with the Carabinieri. Questore Cianci had almost been killed in an assault, in which he had lost his son, because, his successor believed, he had not complied with partisan demands for the release of comrades under arrest.3

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Career officials also claimed that they were persecuted by superiors who belonged to the partisans. Brandisio Vellucci attributed his transfer from Padua to Reggio Emilia to his falling victim to the partisan Questore following his acquittal by the Purge Commission. In a letter to the Personnel Division in Rome, dated 20 June 1947, Vellucci invoked the new era of democracy to guarantee that he obtain justice in the matter.4 On occasion, tensions inside police stations led to open disputes between the police authorities and the local CLNs. In October 1945 a Public Security guard, Gaetano Ibelli, was transferred from the Questura at Terni (Umbria), allegedly on the grounds that he had joined the partisans during the Nazi occupation. While the CLN accused individuals from the Questura with a ‘suspect past’ of underhand manoeuvring, a commissioner justified the measure on the grounds that Ibelli had behaved in a high-handed manner, refusing, as a partisan, to recognise the authority of his superiors and ‘falsely’ denouncing colleagues as fascist.5 The partisans and local CLNs regularly accused the police authorities of not doing enough to bring fascists to justice, if not deliberately sabotaging their efforts to ‘de-fascistise’ society.6 Accusations of this type were not restricted to areas of Italy which had experienced the Resistance. In rural Calabria, before the return of local elections in 1946, Carabinieri recommendations concerning candidates for positions on municipal councils frequently caused the representatives of left-wing parties to accuse them of pro-fascist tendencies. Not only did the Carabinieri usually support the nomination of members of centre or centre-right parties (Christian Democrats, Monarchists, Liberals) against left-wing candidates, but some of the candidates they favoured had held the office of podestà (mayor) under the previous regime. In all probability, their recommendations indicated hostility towards the Left more than nostalgia for the far Right. Moreover, during the dictatorship positions of municipal leadership in the South had often been occupied by ex-liberal elites who had opportunistically jumped on the fascist bandwagon after 1922. If the attitudes of the Carabinieri suggested a conservative rather than fascist stamp, reflecting fear of disorder in the face of peasant land occupations led by the Communist Party, they were undoubtedly bolstered by twenty years of authoritarian policing, which had seen an intensification both in the repression of ‘subversion’ and the amount of control exercised over society.7 With the onset of the Cold War, the police continued to perceive the main internal public order threat as coming from the Left. This manifested itself most visibly in the repression of the partisan movement, which followed widespread anti-Government demonstrations in July

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1948 in response to the attempted assassination of the Communist leader, Palmiro Togliatti. In what has been described as a ‘trial of the Resistance’, the police assisted judicial enquiries against partisans for alleged ‘crimes’ committed during and after the War of Liberation in a manner which sometimes bordered on a fascist settling of accounts. Silvestro Cau, Carabinieri Commander at Castelfranco Emilia (Modena), was accused of having insulted and administered beatings to partisans in his custody following their arrest. Two of his victims claimed that Cau forced them to exhume from their unmarked burial ground the remains of ‘repubblichini’ summarily executed during the Liberation and that they received threats from ex-fascists, including a member of the notoriously violent RSI Militia (Black Brigades), present at the scene.8 There were certainly cases of contact between members of the police forces, ex-fascists and underground or semi-legal neo-fascist groups during the period in question. Policemen, magistrates and other state officials, together with conservative elites, felt threatened by the presence of communists in government and by the return to trade union militancy and left-wing politics. Their fear of judicial action, dismissal or partisan retribution, and their resentment that the new regime dared to threaten them, contributed to a revival of squadrismo.9 Several policemen accused of collaborationism during the Nazi occupation sought help from a neo-fascist network, the Movimento Italiano Femminile (MIF), founded in October 1946. MIF activities included providing safe havens and new identifies for fascists on the run and supporting those who were on trial or in prison.10 Among the numerous files of the MIF, housed in the State Archive in Cosenza, are folders relating to: Giovanni Corti, a Public Security guard sentenced to thirteen years and four months’ imprisonment for having been a member of an RSI execution platoon, on whose behalf the MIF arranged a judicial appeal – on the grounds that he had merely obeyed orders and should, therefore, benefit from the Togliatti amnesty;11 Giuseppe Curzi, career official of the Questura at Turin, accused of the betrayal, arrest and torture of anti-fascists, whose trial the MIF attempted to have moved from Genoa (an anti-fascist stronghold where memories of fascist oppression were strong) to a southern Italian court;12 and Camillo Santamaria, ex-Questore of Milan under the RSI, sentenced to nine years’ imprisonment for collaborationism, on whose behalf the MIF attempted to contact the judges presiding over his appeal ‘in order to obtain a good result’.13 Contacts which policemen had with the extreme Right may also be interpreted in the broader context of a Cold War defence strategy

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involving American military intelligence. Leone Santoro, the Questore who had led the police mission in Lisbon, and who became head of the Information Service of the Police after the Liberation, appears among individuals allegedly belonging to an underground neo-fascist organisation founded in Rome in 1946 and directed by American military officers.14 Ulderico Caputo, the junior fascist Commissioner discussed in Chapter 5, continued his career in the police after the Liberation. His name appears in documents regarding the subversive activities of an ex-SS officer, Karl Hass,15 and an agent of the American Counter Intelligence Corps, Joseph Luongo. Luongo had been co-founder in the immediate post-war period of an American anti-communist network, involving ex-German officers, ex-militants of the RSI and other members of the extreme Right. The activities of the network, which Caputo had allegedly been involved in, included preparation of a plan to occupy the Monte Mario radio transmitter and the main public buildings in Rome in the event of a left-wing victory in the general election in April 1948. Caputo was reported to have been in contact with Luongo and to have protected Hass during the early 1960s, while he was employed at the Interior Ministry intelligence office (Ufficio Affari Riservati), which he directed from the summer of 1960 until his appointment as Questore of Turin a year later.16 In 1954 Caputo assisted the Deputy Chief of Police and ex-OVRA Zone Commander, Gesualdo Barletta, in an attempt to convince the Americans to pressurise the Interior Minister, Scelba, into enforcing radical measures of repression, which included the internment of Togliatti and other communist leaders.17 It is hardly a coincidence that both Caputo and Santoro, though of different generations, had been ideologically tied to the fascist regime. As the case of Barletta illustrates, ex-officials or collaborators of OVRA and the POLPOL, several of whom occupied positions in the post-war Interior Ministry intelligence, also became involved in subversive activities, supporting and controlling illegal neo-fascist or anti-communist organisations.18 They appear to have been inspired more by anti-communism than by fascist nostalgia, though several were seriously compromised with the previous regime. Notably, the Carabinieri General and OVRA collaborator, Giuseppe Pièche, had from a secret office of the Interior Ministry allegedly encouraged the creation of neo-fascist groups to provoke disorder (to be blamed on the Left) during the general election of 1948. During the war he had commanded a political police unit which he had set up and put at the service of the Ustaša leader of the Croatian Government, Ante Pavelic. ´ 19 The above cases, while significant, must not obfuscate the fact that the

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majority of policemen were not directly involved in subversive activities. Nevertheless, their ability to embrace fully the new democratic order is questionable. Their narrow concepts of pluralism reflected an authoritarian attitude sanctioned by juridical continuity with the previous regime. Much of the fascist legislation determining police powers and procedures remained in force. Failure to fully democratise the post-war police was largely dictated by the strong anti-communist line of the governing Christian Democrats. They appeared oblivious to, and in all probability exploited, the legacy of twenty years of Mussolinian policing. Under the Minister of the Interior, Mario Scelba, appointed in February 1947, they opposed attempts to make serious amendments to the fascist Public Security Code, in spite of the incompatibility of many of its provisions with the new democratic Constitution.20 Moreover, it is difficult to dismiss the suggestion that Scelba purposefully engaged police commissioners who were most notoriously anti-communist and compromised with the previous regime.21 Under Scelba, the police continued to use the Public Security Code to make life hard for the Left, banning demonstrations on the pretext that they were a threat to public order and applying censorship powers to prevent criticism of the Government. It is revealing that in their reports the police authorities were often unashamed to justify repressive measures against the Communists on partisan grounds; hence, for example, they banned the distribution of manifestos and leaflets which called into question the policies of the Christian Democrats.22 In front of the post-Liberation Purge Commission, police personnel had commonly played on the false notion that, although obliged to enforce the policies of the fascist Government, they had applied discretion on account of the survival of their democratic culture. While the fascist experience was not frequently discussed in post-war police literature, when it was, a similar line was adopted. This is evident in articles published in 1953 in the early editions of a new police journal, Ordine pubblico. The author of the articles and Chief Editor of the journal was Carmelo Camilleri who, as described in Chapter 2, had been ousted from the police in 1928 and subsequently sentenced to confino over his handling of the Milan terrorist attack that year. In the articles Camilleri held Mussolini and Bocchini as chiefly responsible for the creation and survival of the authoritarian police state, the latter depicted as reigning over the police despotically. 23 Although Camilleri would have good reason for being particularly hostile towards the previous regime, his depiction of the fascist period is highly problematic in so far as it over-simplifies the relationship between the police and the regime, ignoring the enthusiasm with which

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many officials collaborated with it, whether for personal gain or out of ideological sympathy. A closer reading of post-war police journals and manuals suggests that the fascist experience influenced the Interior Ministry Police in more ways than they would probably admit. 24 Their presentation of a new police at the service of democracy was to a great extent modelled on the same language and myths informing the creation of a new fascist police twenty or so years earlier. In spite of official dissociation from fascism, there was a high level of cultural continuity between the previous regime and the Republic. The evolution, for example, of Luigi Salerno’s Enciclopedia di polizia implies the survival of a police mentality founded on the notion that ability to do their job depended on the amount of authority they, and the Italian state behind them, could command. In spite of the volume’s obvious associations with the previous regime, Salerno produced revised editions during the 1950s, though entries on fascist institutions were removed. Nevertheless, much of the theoretical substance of the fascist years remained. Notably, the entry for ‘Police’ in the 1958 edition refrained from directly naming Mussolini’s dictatorship, but there were few changes to the wording beyond that. Crucially, the entry continued to stress positively the importance of the institution of the ‘new’ fascist Public Security Code which reinforced the authority of the state.25 The manner in which Salerno re-edited his volume illustrates how what was most obviously fascist was removed from police culture. This included any direct aesthetical or ideological link between the police and fascism. Beneath this, much of the cultural, professional and juridical discourse remained relatively unchanged. This is manifest in post-war Police Day celebrations (which resumed from 1948) and the manner of their representation in police journals. Iconography and rituals directly identifiable with fascism were removed from the celebrations, which now stressed the role played by the ‘new’ police in the democratic Republic.26 However, articles in the police journal for Public Security guards, Polizia moderna (founded in 1949), reveal the survival of much of the essence of fascist police discourse. Articles on the 1948 celebrations of Police Day, illustrated by photos of processions of flying squads and motorised battalions, emphasised order, the modern state, technical advancement, discipline, and the nation, in a manner which was in many ways reminiscent of articles appearing in Il magistrato dell’ordine a decade or so earlier.27 Though references to Mussolini and the fascist dictatorship were obviously absent, there were also similarities with the ventennio in the importance given to sacrifice, heroism and the shedding of blood.

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There is evidence, therefore, that post-war police culture continued to be constructed around the myth that a modern and powerful organisation had been entrusted with the vital task of defending the nation. If this was expressed as a means of defending democracy, ritualistic shows of force celebrated on Police Day hardly conjure the ideal image of a new democratic police. On the ground, such incongruity was also reflected in an intensification of the military character of the Interior Ministry Police. The process had begun immediately after Mussolini’s overthrow in July 1943, when Badoglio had the Public Security Guard formally integrated into the armed forces. Its personnel were now answerable to the Military Penal Code. In 1946 flying squads (reparti celeri) and new mobile battalions (battaglioni mobili) had been created to control crowds more efficiently.28 Post-war governments clearly ignored advice given by the Allied Control Commission in 1947 that an ostentatiously over-armed police was hardly conducive to peaceful relations with the public, since it gave the impression that the police, rather than being friends and protectors of the populace, were an oppressive instrument of government or of certain social classes.29 The post-war militarisation of the Interior Ministry Police saw a major influx of personnel from the army, the former fascist colonial police (PAI) and special divisions of the Militia.30 The cultural and ideological impact of the presence of large numbers of ex-members of fascist corps cannot have been insignificant. Among them, we find Edoardo Mezza, the ‘first-hour’ fascist Commissioner who had transferred to the PAI in 1938. Having occupied the position of Vice-Questore first in Eritrea, then in Ethiopia, he was eventually captured by the Allies during the war and held in a prison camp in Kenya. In 1946 he returned to the Interior Ministry Police, where in 1952 he was promoted to the rank of Colonel in the Public Security Guard. In 1962, an essay which he submitted shortly before his death was published by the Foreign Ministry in a series of volumes on Italian Africa. Mezza’s writings bring to evidence his nostalgia for that period. Without naming the regime under which the PAI had served, he underlined his corps’ service to the ‘Fatherland’. He argued that Italian East African rule had been different from traditional systems of colonial exploitation and stressed how the PAI had been created to guarantee the progress and well-being of the indigenous populations.31 The climate of confrontation characterising police management of protest and politics more generally during the late 1940s may be attributed to a combination of factors, relating to both the legacy of the past and new strategies. In the first place, many police officials did not fully recognise provisions in the new Constitution affirming

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the right to hold public meetings and stage strikes. 32 An excessive militarisation of the police helps to explain the significant number of casualties at the scene of strikes and demonstrations. 109 workers are registered as having been killed in confrontations with the police between 1947 and 1954, the period of Mario Scelba’s reign as Interior Minister, though the figure is probably incomplete.33 Donatella della Porta and Herbert Reiter note that the Government always justified these casualties on the grounds that the police were forced to resort to the use of fire-arms in self-defence against threatening crowds. They also stress the willingness among demonstrators to engage in violence, particularly during the late 1940s. The dynamics of the protests reveal the survival in post-war Italy of a tradition of social revolt for the purpose of obtaining immediate justice. The experience of the Resistance accustomed individuals to using violent methods in political battles, though representatives of the Left also fell victim to the assaults of their political adversaries.34 Italian public order strategies were partly determined by the establishment’s fear that protest could turn into civil war. Such a perception had been shaped by tensions surrounding the general election campaign in the spring of 1948, subsequently reinforced by the violent protests which followed the assassination attempt against Togliatti three months later.35 There is evidence, however, that the police authorities exaggerated the willingness and ability of the Communist Party to exploit the July protests for an armed insurrection, in order to justify the mass arrests of left-wing militants and partisans which followed.36 In this highly repressive context, the police applied what della Porta and Reiter call ‘dissuasive strategies with intent to intimidate’ or ‘repressive prevention’. Using the fascist Public Security Code, the questure were able to ban left-wing organisations from holding meetings, displaying posters and collecting funds, and in doing this often violated the Constitution. Even when the law had not been broken, such as during peaceful strikes, the police issued individuals with warnings that they would be held responsible for any future actions in which the law was violated.37 Such tactics would continue into the 1950s, alongside the use of force at the scene of public demonstrations.38 Moreover, in October 1948, new regulations gave the police greater latitude in the use of fire-arms than had been enjoyed during the fascist period. According to Romano Canosa, whereas fascist legislation limited the employment of arms to extreme cases, the new regulation sanctioned the use of rifles, automatic rifles and pistols, as well as hand grenades and armoured vehicles, for more decisive and coercive control over crowds. Underlining the ability

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of the executive to determine the direction of post-war public order strategy, Canosa argues that during the late 1940s and early 1950s the Government effectively encouraged the use of fire-arms, while constantly defending the perpetrators of casualties which ensued.39 It is not implausible that, for some higher-ranking members of the Interior Ministry Police, an uncompromising attitude towards law and order enforcement also stemmed partly from that sense of authority and mission which the fascist regime had brought to their institution, and which was nurtured rather than corrected in the early days of the Republic, as evident in the discourse of Police Day. The 1950s saw a general discrimination against left-wing activists, which in some cases led to loss of jobs in state administration, but more commonly amounted to a form of psychological intimidation. This is evident in the investigations to which civil servants suspected with communist leanings, in particular school teachers, were subjected, usually on the initiative of the questure.40 It is perhaps not surprising that policemen were themselves subject to investigations. In 1955, a commissioner of the Questura of Verona, Luigi Fiorentini, who had been an active fascist supporter before joining the police in 1938, was the object of a report which stated that his father-in-law and brother-in-law were both communists and that he was a close friend of the communist Secretary of the Veronese section of the National Association of Italian Partisans (ANPI). As a result of the investigation, Fiorentini’s superiors requested his transfer.41 In the same context it is significant that the Casellario Politico Centrale, which had expanded during the dictatorship, continued above all to register the names of communists and socialists, while ex-supporters of the RSI and neo-fascists were not generally considered dangerous for the democratic order. During this period, too, the Sicilian Prefects tended to minimise the existence or severity of Mafia-related crime.42 Several of the individuals we have examined in the course of this volume who made their careers during the fascist years distinguished themselves in their ability to manage post-war public order difficulties, earning the praise of their superiors. Not infrequently, the Communist Party accused them of abusing their powers or discriminating against them. Vincenzo Genovese, whose suspected involvement in the persecution of Jews and war crimes was discussed in the previous chapter, continued his career after the war. In June 1950, when he was Questore of Cagliari (Sardinia), Genovese was involved in a dispute with a local communist and deputy of the lower Italian Parliament over a police measure prohibiting the collection of signatures in public venues for petitions against the North Atlantic Pact and the build-up

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of nuclear weapons.43 The following October, the communist weekly of Livorno, L’indicatore, attacked the Questore, Ermindo Roselli, for his disregard of the Constitution; he had allegedly limited free speech in public and went out of his way to hinder the activities of the Communist Party.44 The methods these officials employed to maintain public order were not always above board. De Lutiis suggests that the ex-fascist Ulderico Caputo’s appointment as Questore of Turin in 1961 was hardly coincidental, given his links with the management of the Fiat car industry. Symptomatic of his long-term involvement in subversive anti-communist activities, he was suspected of having engaged in dirty tricks to deal with industrial action by Fiat workers in the province in July 1962, employing agents provocateurs to increase the risks of confrontation with the police at the scene of protests.45 Episodes of torture and beatings at the hands of the police were not uncommon, particularly during the late 1940s. In October 1949, the communist Resistance leader, Pietro Secchia, denounced to the Senate (upper parliament) episodes of beatings which the Carabinieri had allegedly administered to partisans arrested in the province of Modena as characteristic of police interrogations. He attributed this type of behaviour to the continued presence in the police of ex-OVRA directors, ex-RSI fascists and ex-Militia members, who under the previous regime, he claimed, had tortured and murdered anti-fascists. Moreover, he accused the Government of deliberately re-admitting these individuals to the police in place of partisan personnel, in the knowledge that they had no regard for the Constitution and human rights.46 Concerns about police abuse were not only voiced by the Communist Party. The jurist and Social Democrat politician, Piero Calamandrei, lamented acts of violence committed inside prison cells and police interrogation rooms. He stressed that Article 16 of the fascist Criminal Code, which was still in force, prevented Public Security personnel from being prosecuted without the authorisation of the Justice Minister, which magistrates were unlikely to request if they were not convinced that the accusation could be verified.47 If, for reasons discussed earlier in the volume, ex-fascists in the police might have been more predisposed to violent behaviour than their colleagues, recourse to rough treatment in all likelihood cut across ideological boundaries, as it had during the fascist period. Police violence during the post-war years was also attributed to professional frustrations. Writing in Calamandrei’s journal, Il Ponte, in 1949, Riccardo Bauer interpreted such abuse as the consequence of the inferior social and economic status of policemen and prison guards. They felt isolated from civil society as a result of the contempt of the

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public towards them, which had increased after twenty years of fascist dictatorship; hence, only the least capable individuals were willing to be employed in these professions.48 Illustrating the re-emergence of historic tensions afflicting the Italian police before the rise of fascism, della Porta and Reiter underline concerns and disagreement from within the institution over the extent of militarisation which the institution should undergo. Some police members felt that Public Security officials should be militarised in order to be able to manage a corps armed with modern ‘warfare’ equipment in what were effectively conceived as military operations to deal with strikes and demonstrations. Others lamented tension between military and civilian staff and feared that the internal cohesion of the police was threatened as military-style mobile units made up of ex-army personnel risked losing any sense of belonging to a police profession. Moreover, newly recruited guards facing long shifts and poor pay claimed that they felt treated like soldiers rather than policemen.49 At this juncture we return full circle to several unresolved issues which police personnel had lamented and critics had grappled with under the liberal state. The professional difficulties faced, particularly among the lower ranks, contrast notably with the optimism expressed through the pages of Polizia moderna. Indeed, the significance of professional literature, together with such rituals as Police Day, in representing or determining the more general cultural outlook of the post-war Italian police should not be over-emphasised. One wonders how far policemen on the ground shared the official enthusiasm of their institution for a ‘new’ police at the service of democracy, particularly when democracy failed to enter the institution itself. Protests in various questure in the spring of 1946 against, among other things, poor pay and excessive militarisation marked a clear turn after the dictatorship had precluded internal manifestations of dissent for twenty years. Yet, as Reiter notes, with the exception of the period immediately following the Liberation, police personnel were forced to resort to anonymous letters and petitions to render their grievances public, owing to the military hierarchy to which they belonged. In March 1947 a group of ‘democratic guards’ based at the Questura of Rome demanded, beyond material improvement, the democratic reform of the police as a civilian force and the right to union representation.50 Signalling the persistence in Italy of the concept of a police force at the service of the state, nurtured, moreover, by the scenario of the Cold War, such reforms were only achieved in 1981 with the demilitarisation of the Interior Ministry Police and the legalisation of union membership.51

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Concluding remarks: new visions and old habits With its main focus on the forces of the Interior Ministry, this volume has highlighted the contrast between the propagandised image of modern and efficient policing in harmony with fascism and its ideals, and the starker reality of an institution which was often lacking when it came to performance and ideological commitment. This should not imply that the police failed to enforce fascist policies or to identify with many of the ‘values’ of fascism. After the widespread ‘disorder’ of the Biennio Rosso and in the context of professional malaise dating back to the previous century, a considerable number of policemen, particularly among the higher ranks, undoubtedly hailed the new regime’s creation of an authoritarian public order system, which appeared to be more in tune with their ideas about law enforcement and to herald future fulfilment of their desires for reform and modernisation. However, in spite of the rationalising intentions behind the creation of a ‘new’ police, during the period of the dictatorship there was some divergence between the opportunities for specialist policing and careers in the OVRA, the POLPOL and the Scuola Superiore di Polizia, on the one hand, and the lesser opportunities offered by employment in the questure and smaller police stations, on the other. High-ranking officials working in the former areas might have more readily identified with the regime through direct experience of the advancements in policing which it promoted and/or the accompanying career benefits. Those employed in other realms of the Interior Ministry Police who had hoped for reform may not have been as enthusiastic. There was less in the way of innovation for them to benefit from, and resources were often limited. Recruitment and training methods were not substantially altered, either. Opportunities for career advancement were more limited. Inspections and investigations of police stations not infrequently revealed inadequate training in the application of new techniques, incompetent personnel, and lack of effective hierarchical control, reflecting the resistance of the ‘traditional’ culture of the ‘old’ state. Bocchini’s protectionist strategies stood in the way of a thorough ideologically driven transformation of the police. However, a formal though somewhat piecemeal ‘fascistisation’ of procedures and training did take place. The policing environment saw the influx of considerable numbers of ‘first-hour’ fascists and, in later years, militants trained in the ideals of the ‘Revolution’. In some measure, fascism exploited the desires and frustrations of the liberal police to ensure compliance in running the dictatorship. In the case of the Interior Ministry Police, this

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included raising their national profile to overcome a historic ‘Cinderella’ status. In this context, their involvement in choreographed spectacles and adoption of fascist rituals may have been envisaged as a means of creating loyal servants of the new order. The documentation available to the researcher does not fully explain how personnel responded to these, bearing in mind that the greater number of policemen were, arguably, ‘flankers’ rather than full-fledged fascists. It is not always clear how the various processes of ‘fascistisation’ which the police underwent were presented (and justified) to their members and what ‘informal’ discussions relating to this took place. Nor is data available to indicate what obligatory membership of the Fascist Party (from 1932) and of the fascist employee association (from 1937) entailed in practice. Nor do we have a detailed picture of how personnel of different ideological status related to each other, though the archive files and journal articles at our disposal provide us with some hints. Owing to lack of readily available documentary evidence, even less is known about the impact of fascism on the culture and environment of the Carabinieri, who, as has been illustrated in the course of this volume, played a key role in enforcing fascist policy in rural areas. What does clearly come across in the documentation is the regime’s adoption and perpetuation of the backward mechanisms underlining Italian public life. In spite of their purported founding of an ‘ethical’ state, the system of patronage became very much the property of the fascist Government and Party. The survival of this culture helped to inhibit a more thorough ‘fascistisation’ of Italian society. This state of affairs cannot merely be ascribed to the dominance of ‘traditional’ institutions of the Italian state, from the moment that intransigent fascists like Starace adopted the very practices they claimed to be fighting. Under fascism, police personnel continued to be involved in factional rivalries and the system of raccomandazioni continued to condition promotions. The recruitment of ‘first-hour’ militants during the mid–late 1920s, while possibly envisaged by some fascists as a means of bringing the ‘Revolution’ into the police, was largely determined by patronage politics and of limited ideological consequence. Fascist desires to instil a greater sense of public responsibility in the state administration were easily compromised by traditional strategies for self-advancement. As well as availing themselves of the support of fascist protectors, considerable numbers of career policemen were willing, or felt obliged, to make displays of deference to their political masters and impress upon superiors their sound ideological credentials in order to tend to their personal needs. It is apparent that many officials resented the impositions and excesses of the Party, without necessarily

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failing, however, to recognise its indispensability as a meal-ticket. In this context, desires among ‘Young Turks’, educated under the banner of the Party, for completion of the ideological transformation of the police, were contained and neutralised. The ability of the backward-looking practices of Italian officialdom to resist the ‘Revolution’ should not obfuscate the oppressive nature of Mussolini’s police. If poor resources and petty corruption may have inhibited the capacity of the regular forces in some measure, during the dictatorship their members enjoyed greater powers over citizens which they could more easily abuse unpunished. As well as turning a blind eye to fascist excesses when they were directed against ‘enemies’ of the nation, they themselves could employ violent methods during interrogations. The livelihood even of ‘upright’ sections of the community was affected by their ability to oblige citizens to assist in their close monitoring of society. If policemen could be bribed, they were equally empowered to blackmail their victims. Popular notions of a relatively ‘harmless’ fascist dictatorship, founded on the myth of the ‘good Italian’ and favourably contrasted against misguided concepts of blanket Nazi terror, pale considerably in the light of this. Until 1943 the Italian police adapted to the requirements of the regime without the need for intensive political instruction or direct interference from the Party. Fascist theories permeated police environments, though how intensively they were instilled in the minds of personnel probably depended on individual trainers or superiors. In any case, such theories or at least the consequences of their enactment probably appealed to existing police prejudices regarding certain human ‘types’ and groups, as Michael Ebner’s research has demonstrated. If many dissociated themselves from Mussolini’s regime in the face of Italy’s military defeat, there is little doubt that the fascist experience reinforced in the psyche of most policemen ‘negative’ notions relating to race, health, gender and sexuality, which, if not necessarily of purely fascist inspiration, had developed and abounded during the ventennio. These, together with authoritarian concepts of law enforcement and intensified hostility to left-wing politics, represent the ideological legacy of the fascist Public Security system, which would inhibit the transformation to democracy in Italy after 1945. The attractiveness of Mussolini’s dictatorship depended largely on how far police personnel identified with its public order policy, but also on the career opportunities and level of material well-being it offered. For many officers and officials, support of fascism was undoubtedly also determined by whether or not they could be protected from the political encroachments of its more radical exponents. I would argue

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that, as in other areas of Italian society, in the context of a half-hearted ‘fascistisation’ of their institution, willingness to collaborate depended on their not being expected to translate formal ideological alignment into tangible commitment and on their ability to maintain a reasonable level of professional autonomy, such that they could hold on to their traditional habits and lifestyles. This ‘silent pact’ between the police and the regime was broken in the final tragic years of fascist rule. Notes 1 For further information, see C. Pavone, Una Guerra civile. Saggio storico sulla moralità nella Resistenza (Turin: Bollati Boringhieri, 1991), pp. 507–8; G. Magnanini, Dopo la liberazione. Reggio Emilia Aprile 1945 – Settembre 1946 (Bologna: Analisi, 1992), pp. 17–20. 2 In February 1946 partisan questori were retired, and soon afterwards the auxiliary Partisan Police were disbanded. By the summer of 1948, most partisans had been removed from the ranks of the police. For further information, see Magnanini, Dopo la liberazione, pp. 19–20, 44, 47–8; A. Paloscia, I segreti del Viminale (Rome: Newton Compton, 1989), p. 124. 3 ACS, DGPS, Divisione Affari Generali, Categorie annuali, 1944–46, Relazione dei Prefetti, b. 19, esp. 01756 Gab. Questore Ferrara to DGPS, DAGR, 30 September 1945. 4 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 111, f. Vellucci Brandisio, letter to DGPS, DP, 20 June 1947. 5 Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Comitato Centrale di Liberazione Nazionale (hereafter ACS, CCLN), b. 5, f. 68. 6 This is evident in the abundance of complaints lodged by the CLN. See ACS, CCLN, b. 5 and b. 8. 7 For a detailed analysis, see J. Dunnage, ‘Policing and Politics in the Southern Italian Community, 1943–1948’, in J. Dunnage (ed.), After the War. Violence, Justice, Continuity and Renewal in Italian Society (Market Harborough: Troubador, 1999), pp. 32–47 (pp. 34–8). 8 P. Secchia, La Resistenza accusa 1945–1973 (Milan: Gabriele Mazzotta Editore, 1973), pp. 72–3. ‘Repubblichino’ is a derogatory term used for a member or supporter of the RSI. 9 M. Clark, ‘Italian Squadrismo and Contemporary Vigilance’, European History Quarterly, 18:1 (1988), 33–49 (42–3). 10 For a detailed analysis of this organisation, which was directly linked to the MSI, see R. Guarasci, La Lampada e il Fascio (Reggio Calabria: Laruffa, 1987). 11 Archivio di Stato di Cosenza, Movimento Italiano Femminile – Fede e Famiglia (hereafter ASC, MIF), Serie IX, Assistenza Reclusi, b. 51, f. 941. 12 ASC, MIF, Serie IX, Assistenza Reclusi, b. 51, f. 975. 13 ASC, MIF, Serie IX, Assistenza Reclusi, b. 70, f. 2795.

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14 G. Casarrubea and M. J. Cereghino, Tango Connection. L’oro nazifascista, l’America Latina e la guerra al comunismo in Italia, 1943–1947 (Milan: Bompiani, 2007), pp. 102–3. In 1949, Santoro became head of the Public Security Personnel Division. He retired in 1953 (ACS, FPFS, 1959, b. 170, f. Santoro Leone). 15 Hass had been directly involved in the Ardeatine Caves massacre in reprisal for a partisan attack in Nazi-occupied Rome in March 1944. 16 Caputo’s involvement in these activities emerges from the following sources: Relazione della Minoranza, Commissione Parlamentare di Inchiesta sulle Cause dell’Occultamento di Fascicoli Relativi a Crimini 204–21: www.camera.it/_dati/leg14/lavori/documenNazifascisti, esp.  tiparlamentari/indiceetesti/023/018bis/INTERO.pdf (accessed 29 July 2010); www.strano.net/stragi/tstragi/salvini/salvin53.htm (accessed 29 July 2009); G. De Lutiis, Storia dei servizi segreti in Italia (Rome: Editori Riuniti, 1991), p. 87. 17 Franzinelli, I tentacoli dell’OVRA, p. 480. Documentation supplied by the Personnel Section to the High Commission for Sanctions against Fascism also suggested that Barletta had made a successful career on the back of his friendship with Mussolini’s sister, Edvige, who had intervened to ensure his nomination as OVRA Zone Commander against Bocchini’s will. See ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 200, f. Barletta Gesualdo, Rapporto Informativo 333/3259 of 16 December 1944. 18 For details, see De Lutiis, Storia dei servizi segreti, pp. 43–8. 19 Ibid., pp. 46–7. 20 For a detailed analysis of the issue of compatibility of police powers with the democratic Constitution, see R. Canosa, La polizia in Italia dal 1945 a oggi (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1976), pp. 152–7. 21 Paloscia, I segreti del Viminale, p. 164. 22 This situation is evident from numerous documents in post-war police files relating to public order. See, for example, ACS, DGPS, 1947–1948, b. 22. 23 See, for example, C. Camilleri, ‘Un capo della Polizia ideale per la dittatura’, Ordine pubblico, 2 (16–31 March 1953), 2. 24 For a detailed analysis, see J. Dunnage, ‘Surviving Fascism; Narrating Fascism; Transferring Fascism: A Preliminary Investigation of the Evolution of Italian Police Culture from the Dictatorship to the Republic’, The Italianist, 29:3 (2009), 464–84 (473–80). 25 ‘Polizia’, in L. Salerno, Enciclopedia di polizia (Milan: Hoepli, 4th edn, 1958), pp. 653–8 (p. 656). 26 See, for example, La settimana INCOM 00202, 22 October 1948, ‘18 ottobre: festa della Polizia. Milano’: www.archivioluce.com/. 27 ‘Disciplina, fedeltà, sacrificio’, Polizia Moderna, 1 (30 January 1949), 6–7. 28 For a discussion of the post-war militarisation of the Interior Ministry police, see D. della Porta and H. Reiter, Polizia e protesta. L’ordine

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pubblico dalla Liberazione ai ‘no global’ (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2003), pp. 85–8; M. Volpi, ‘Costituzione e polizia’, Politica del diritto, 14:1 (March 1983), 91–117 (91); Paloscia, I segreti del Viminale, pp. 146–7. 29 See Reiter, ‘I progetti degli alleati per una riforma della polizia’, 58. 30 Della Porta and Reiter, Polizia e protesta, p. 85. 31 E. Mezza, ‘La polizia dell’Africa Italiana’, in Ministero degli Esteri, Comitato per la documentazione dell’opera dell’Italia in Africa, L’Italia in Africa. Vol. 4, I Corpi armati con funzioni civili (Rome: I.P.D.S., 1962), pp. 167–210. 32 Della Porta and Reiter, Polizia e protesta, pp. 75–6. 33 Ibid., p. 97. 34 Ibid., pp. 83–4. 35 Ibid., pp. 76–80. 36 For examples, see Dunnage, ‘Inhibiting Democracy in Post-War Italy’, 176–7. 37 Della Porta and Reiter, Polizia e protesta, pp. 80–2. 38 For a detailed analysis, see ibid., pp. 95–106. 39 Canosa, La polizia in Italia, pp. 142–7. 40 G. Crainz, Storia del miracolo italiano. Culture, identità, trasformazioni fra anni cinquanta e sessanta (Rome: Donzelli, 1996), pp. 9–18. 41 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 155 bis, f. Fiorentini Luigi, 1580 memo dated 31 August 1955. 42 Crainz, Storia del miracolo italiano, pp. 10, 12–13, 16–18. 43 ACS, FPFS, 1973, b. 116 bis, f. Genovese Vincenzo. 44 ACS, FPFS, 1963, b. 151, f. Roselli Ermindo, cutting of ‘In alcuni luoghi pubblici non si deve parlare di politica’, L’indicatore, 30 October 1950. 45 De Lutiis, Storia dei servizi segreti, pp. 87–8. 46 Secchia, La Resistenza accusa, pp. 76–86. 47 P. Calamandrei, ‘L’inchiesta sulle carceri e sulla tortura’, Il Ponte, 5:3 (1949), 228–36; P. Calamandrei, ‘Polizia e magistratura’, Il Ponte, 8:2 (1952), 91–3. 48 R. Bauer, ‘Il regime carcerario italiano’, Il Ponte, 5:3 (1949), 238–55. 49 Della Porta and Reiter, Polizia e protesta, pp. 85–8. 50 Reiter, ‘I progetti degli alleati per una riforma della polizia’, 63. 51 For a detailed analysis, see della Porta and Reiter, Polizia e protesta, pp. 268–85.

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Select bibliography Select bibliography

Select bibliography

Archive sources relating to policing and police personnel during the fascist dictatorship Archivio Centrale dello Stato (Rome) Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza: Divisione Personale della Pubblica Sicurezza. Divisione Affari Generali e Riservati. Divisione Affari Generali. Divisione Polizia Politica. Segreteria Capo della Polizia. Divisione Servizi Informativi e Speciali.

Archivio di Stato, Siena Gabinetto Prefettura. Questura.

Police journals and newspapers Arma e dovere. Giornale della Federazione Nazionale del Carabiniere Reale (1932–1934). L’Arma fedelissima (1934–1943). Bollettino della Scuola Superiore di Polizia e dei servizi tecnici annessi (1925–1939). Bollettino ufficiale delle Forze Armate di Polizia (1931–). Bollettino ufficiale del Ministero dell’Interno (1892–1924). Bollettino ufficiale del personale del Ministero dell’Interno (1924–). Il carabiniere (1873–). La difesa sociale. Rivista mensile di sociologia e di giurisprudenza applicata ad uso dei magistrati, funzionari di P.S. delle carceri e delle prefetture (1919–1921). Il magistrato dell’ordine. Rivista mensile di polizia giudiziaria, amministrativa e sociale (1924–1939). Manuale del funzionario di sicurezza pubblica (1863–1912).

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Select bibliography

Ordine pubblico (1952–). Polizia moderna (1949–). Rivista di polizia (1948–). La tutela pubblica. Periodico settimanale politico amministrativo (1909–1925).

Police manuals, treatises, regulations and memoirs Alongi, G., Manuale di polizia scientifica (Milan: Sonzogno, 1898). Antonacci, P., La legge e il regolamento sulla Pubblica Sicurezza esaminati nel loro contenuto teorico, tecnico e pratico (Rome: Arte della Stampa, 3rd edn, 1939). Arnoldi, P.  R., Caratteri fascisti della legge di polizia (Bologna: Società Tipografica Già Compositori, 1930). Camilleri, C., Polizia in azione. Incursione nel mondo che ho combattuto (Rome: Editoriale ‘Ordine Pubblico’, 1958). Corso di lezioni per le scuole di polizia (Rome: Casa Ed. Universale, 1947). Di Tullio, B., Manuale di antropologia e psicologia criminale applicata alla pedagogia emendativa, alla polizia ed al diritto penale e penitenziario (Rome: Anonima Romana Editoriale, 1931). Di Tullio, B., Antropologia criminale (Rome: Luigi Pozzi, 1940). Grossardi, G.  C., Galateo del Carabiniere (Turin: Tipografia Editrice G. Candeletti, 3rd edn, 1879). Legione Territoriale Carabinieri Reali – Bari. Ufficio Comando, Manuale d’Istruzione per il Carabiniere (Bari: Laterza, 1942). Maggiorelli, E., Commento pratico alle leggi di pubblica sicurezza (Florence: Stabilimento Tipografico G. Ramella & C., 1936). Manuale pratico per la Pubblica Sicurezza (Rome: Ditta Carlo Colombo, 1936). Murat, M., Il Carabiniere (Piacenza: Apuana, 1935). Paglione, E., Elementi di tecnica dei servizi di polizia (Caserta: Giuseppe Maffei, 4th edn, 1931). Regolamento organico e regolamento generale per l’Arma dei Carabinieri (Rome: Istituto Poligrafico dello Stato, 1933). Regolamento per il Corpo degli agenti di Pubblica Sicurezza (Rome: Istituto Poligrafico dello Stato, 1936). Salerno, L., Enciclopedia di polizia (Milan: Fratelli Bocca Editori, 1938). Salerno, L., Encicopedia di polizia (Milan: Hoepli, 4th edn, 1958). Saracini, E., I crepuscoli della polizia. Compendio storico della genesi e delle vicende dell’amministrazione di pubblica sicurezza (Naples: S.I.E.M., 1922). Saracini, E., Nuova pratica di polizia amministrativa (Naples: Elpis, 1929). Senise, C., Quando ero Capo della Polizia 1940–1943 (Rome: Ruffolo Editore, 1946). Tamburro, G., Il diritto di polizia. La polizia amministrativa e la polizia di sicurezza nella legislazione fascista (Rome: Edizioni Sormani, 1938).

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225

Testo Unico del Regolamento pel Corpo delle Guardie di Città (Rome: Tipografia delle Mantellate, 1914).

Secondary sources on the Italian police Barile, P. (ed.), La pubblica sicurezza (Milan: Neri Pozza, 1967). Canali, M., Le spie del regime (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2004). Canosa, R., La polizia in Italia dal 1945 a oggi (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1976). Carucci, P., ‘L’organizzazione dei servizi di polizia dopo l’approvazione del testo unico delle leggi di pubblica sicurezza nel 1926’, Rassegna degli archivi di stato, 26:1 (1976), 82–114. Carucci, P., ‘Il ministero dell’interno: prefetti, questori e ispettori generali’, in A.  Ventura (ed.), Sulla crisi del regime fascista 1938–1943. La società italiana dal ‘consenso’ alla Resistenza (Venice: Marsilio, 1996), pp. 21–73. Costantini, C., ‘I fatti di Sarzana nelle relazioni della polizia’, Movimento operaio e socialista, 8 (1962), 61–100. Davis, J.  A., Conflict and Control. Law and Order in Nineteenth Century Italy (London: Macmillan, 1988). della Porta, D. and H.  Reiter, Polizia e protesta. L’ordine pubblico dalla Liberazione ai ‘no global’ (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2003). De Lutiis, G., Storia dei servizi segreti in Italia (Rome: Editori Riuniti, 1991). Donati, L., ‘La Guardia regia’, Storia contemporanea, 8:3 (1977), 441–87. D’Orsi, A., La polizia. Le forze dell’ordine italiane (Milan: Feltrinelli, 1972). Dunnage, J., ‘Inhibiting Democracy in Post-War Italy: The Police Forces, 1943–48’, Italian Studies, 51 (1996), 167–80. Dunnage, J., The Italian Police and the Rise of Fascism. A Case Study of the Province of Bologna, 1897–1925 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997). Dunnage, J., ‘Policing and Politics in the Southern Italian Community, 1943–1948’, in J.  Dunnage (ed.), After the War. Violence, Justice, Continuity and Renewal in Italian Society (Market Harborough: Troubador, 1999), pp. 32–47. Dunnage, J., ‘The Policing of an Italian Province during the Fascist Period: Siena, 1926–1943’, in G.  Oram (ed.), Conflict and Legality. Policing Mid-Twentieth Century Europe (London: Francis Boutle, 2003), pp. 23–41. Dunnage, J., ‘Social Control in Fascist Italy: The Role of the Police’, in C.  Emsley, E.  Johnson and P.  Spierenburg (eds), Social Control in Europe. Vol. 2, 1800–2000 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2004), pp. 261–80. Dunnage, J., ‘Sotto la pelle: per un’analisi sociologica e psicologica della vita del poliziotto’, in L.  Antonielli (ed.), La polizia in Italia e in Europa: punto sugli studi e prospettive di ricerca (Soveria Mannelli: Rubbettino, 2006), pp. 179–89.

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226

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Dunnage, J., ‘Surveillance and Denunciation in Fascist Siena, 1927–1943’, European History Quarterly, 38:2 (2008), 244–65. Dunnage, J., ‘Ideology, Clientelism and the “Fascistisation” of the Italian State: Fascists in the Interior Ministry Police’, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 14:3 (2009), 267–84. Dunnage, J., ‘Surviving Fascism; Narrating Fascism; Transferring Fascism: A Preliminary Investigation of the Evolution of Italian Police Culture from the Dictatorship to the Republic’, The Italianist, 29:3 (2009), 464–84. Ebner, M.  R., ‘The Fascist Archipelago: Political Internment, Exile, and Everyday Life in Mussolini’s Italy, 1926–1943’ (Ph.D dissertation, Columbia University, 2004). Ebner, M. R., ‘The Persecution of Homosexual Men under Fascism’, in Perry Willson (ed.), Gender, Family and Sexuality. The Private Sphere in Italy 1860–1945 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), pp. 139–56. Ebner, M.  R., ‘The Political Police and Denunciation during Fascism: A Review of Recent Historical Literature’, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 11:2 (2006), 209–26. Ebner, M. R., Ordinary Violence in Mussolini’s Italy (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011). Fiorentino, F., Ordine pubblico nell’età giolittiana (Rome: Carecas, 1978). Franzinelli, M., I tentacoli dell’OVRA. Agenti, collaboratori e vittime della polizia politica fascista (Turin: Bollati Boringhieri, 1999). Franzinelli, M., Delatori. Spie e confidenti anonimi: l’arma segreta del regime fascista (Milan: Mondadori, 2001). Fried, R.  C., The Italian Prefects. A Study in Administrative Politics (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1963). Gibson, M., Born to Crime. Cesare Lombroso and the Origins of Biological Criminology (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2002). Ivani, M., Esportare il fascismo. Collaborazione di polizia e diplomazia culturale tra Italia fascista e Portogallo di Salazar (1928–1945) (Bologna: CLUEB, 2008). Jensen, R. B., Liberty and Order. The Theory and Practice of Italian Public Security Policy. 1848 to the Crisis of the 1890s (New York: Garland, 1991). Madrignani, L., ‘Dalla psicosi rivoluzionaria alla guerra civile: la Regia Guardia per la Pubblica Sicurezza e la gestione dell’ordine pubblico nella crisi dello Stato liberale (1919–1922)’ (Ph.D dissertation, University of Siena, 2011). Oliva, G., Storia dei Carabinieri. Immagine e autorappresentazione dell’Arma (1814–1992) (Milan: Leonardo, 1992). Osti Guerrazzi, A., Poliziotti. I direttori dei campi di concentramento italiani 1940–1943 (Rome: Cooper, 2004). Paloscia, A., I segreti del Viminale (Rome: Newton Compton, 1989). Reiter, H., ‘I progetti degli alleati per una riforma della polizia in Italia (1943–1947)’, Passato e presente, 15:42 (1997), 37–64.

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227

Savella, I. G., ‘Mussolini’s “Fouché”: Arturo Bocchini, the Fascist OVRA, and the Italian Police Tradition’ (Ph.D dissertation, University of Rochester, New York), 1996. Tosatti, G., ‘La repressione del dissenso politico tra l’età liberale e il fascismo. L’organizzazione della polizia’, Studi storici, 38:1 (1997), 217–55. Tosatti, G., ‘L’anagrafe dei sovversivi italiani: origini e storia del Casellario politico centrale’, Le carte e la storia, 3:2 (1997), 133–50.

Secondary sources for comparative reading Anderson, D. M. and D. Killingray (eds), Policing the Empire. Government, Authority and Control, 1830–1940 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1991). Berlière, J.-M. and D.  Peschanski (eds), Pouvoirs et polices au XXe siècle. Europe, États-Unis, Japon (Brussels: Éditions Complexe, 1997). Berlière, J.-M., C.  Denys, D.  Kalifa and V.  Milliot (eds), Métiers de police. Être policier en Europe, XVIIIe –XXe siècle (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2008). Bessel, R. and C.  Emsley (eds), Patterns of Provocation. Police and Public Disorder (New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2000). Blaney, Jr, G. (ed.), Policing Interwar Europe. Continuity, Change and Crisis, 1918–1940 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007). Browder, G. C., Hitler’s Enforcers. The Gestapo and the SS Security Service in the Nazi Revolution (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996). Buhlan, H. and W. Jung (eds), Wessen Freund und Wessen Helfer? Die Kölner Polizei im Nationalsozialismus (Cologne: Emons, 2000). Dunnage, J., ‘Policing Right-Wing Dictatorships: Some Preliminary Comparisons of Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany and Franco’s Spain’, Crime, Histoire & Sociétés/Crime, History & Societies, 10:1 (2006), 93–122. Emsley, C., Gendarmes and the State in Nineteenth-Century Europe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999). Emsley, C., Crime, Police and Penal Policy. European Experiences 1750–1940 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). Emsley, C. and B. Weinberger (eds), Policing Western Europe. Politics, Professionalism and Public Order, 1850–1940 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1991). Emsley, C., E.  Johnson and P.  Spierenburg (eds), Social Control in Europe, Vol. 2, 1800–2000 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2004). Part Two: Policing and the State: Liberal vs. Totalitarian Regimes. Gellately, R., The Gestapo and German Society. Enforcing Racial Policy, 1933–1945 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1990). Gellately, R., Backing Hitler. Consent and Coercion in Nazi Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). House, J. and N.  MacMaster, Paris 1961: Algerians, State Terror, and Memory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).

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228

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Johnson, E., The Nazi Terror: The Gestapo, Jews and Ordinary Germans (London: John Murray, 2000). Klein, J., Invisible Men. The Secret Lives of Police Constables in Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham, 1900–1939 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010). Krausnick, H., M. Broszat, H. Buchheim and H.-A. Jacobsen, Anatomy of the SS State (London: Collins, 1968). Matthäus, J., K. Kwiet, J. Förster and R. Breitman, Ausbildungsziel Judenmord? ‘Weltanschauliche Erziehung’ von SS, Polizei und Waffen-SS im Rahmen der Endlösung (Frankfurt: Fischer, 2003). Mazower, M. (ed.), The Policing of Politics in the Twentieth Century. Historical Perspectives (Providence and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 1997). Oram, G. (ed.), Conflict and Legality. Policing Mid-Twentieth Century Europe (London: Francis Boutle, 2003). Peyroulou, J.-P., ‘Rétablir et maintenir l’ordre colonial: la police française e les Algériens en Algérie française de 1945 à 1962’, in B. Stora and M. Harbi (eds), La guerre d’Algérie. 1954–2004, la fin de l’amnésie (Paris: Robert Laffont, 2004), pp. 97–130. Reichardt, S., Faschistische Kampfbünde. Gewalt und Gemeinschaft im italienischen Squadrismus und in der deutschen SA (Cologne: Böhlau, 2002). Reichardt, S. and A.  Nolzen (eds), Faschismus in Italien und Deutschland. Studien zu Transfer und Vergleich (Göttingen: Wallstein, 2005). Sinclair, G. and C. A. Williams, ‘“Home and Away”: The Cross-Fertilisation between “Colonial” and “British” Policing, 1921–85’, The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 35:2 (2007), 221–38. Sinclair, G., ‘The “Irish” Policeman and the Empire: Influencing the Policing of the British Empire-Commonwealth’, Irish Historical Studies, 36:142 (2008), 173–87. Wagner, P., Volksgemeinschaft ohne Verbrecher. Konzeptionen und Praxis der Kriminalpolizei in der Zeit der Weimarer Republik und des Nationalsozialismus (Hamburg: Hans Christians Verlag, 1996). Westermann, E.  B., ‘“Ordinary Men” or “Ideological Soldiers”? Police Battalion 310 in Russia, 1942’, German Studies Review, 21:1 (1998), 41–68.

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Index Index

Index

Note: ‘n’ after a page reference indicates the number of a note on that page; page numbers in italic refer to illustrations abortion policing of 80, 84 abuse (police) 15, 16, 27, 55, 97, 126, 142, 170, 174, 215 atrocities 172–4, 186, 187, 188, 200n16, 214 authoritarian powers 84, 86–7, 107, 126, 142, 219 fascist personnel 152, 161 violence 87, 142, 152, 160–1, 170, 184, 208 rape 183, 194 torture 84–5, 185, 194–5, 215 see also corruption; protest, policing of administrative reform (Italian state) fascism 3, 4, 20, 23, 30, 45, 50, 56, 65–6, 137 post-First World War 24 see also police reform Agenti Investigativi 24, 25 Agrigento 105, 109–10, 152 Albania 175 Alessandria 123, 150 Allies 167 ‘de-fascistisation’ 187, 189, 190 and police personnel 139, 181, 188–9, 192, 195, 197 police reform 212

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ammonizione 10, 27, 89, 111, 112 anarchism 19, 32, 60, 177 Ancona 143 anti-fascism 38, 44, 167, 177, 190 repression 47–8, 49, 64, 79, 80, 104, 106, 112, 113, 139, 140, 142, 152, 172, 183, 185, 193, 194, 195, 215 see also anarchism; communism; Matteotti, G.; registers; Resistance; socialism; Special Tribunal anti-Semitism 79, 81, 144, 199–200n7, 200n13 Italian Social Republic 161, 178, 182, 185, 186, 187 and police officials 168–74, 177, 195, 197 Race Laws (1938) 197 admission to police 59 police enforcement of 79, 97, 131n26, 167–9 Aosta 192 Arezzo 119 army 23 employment for policing 10, 14 in occupied Yugoslavia 170, 172, 173 recruits from 13, 18, 22, 212, 216

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230 associations (police) 12, 25, 216 Police Federation (Federazione Nazionale del Personale di Pubblica Sicurezza) 17, 23, 25 see also Fascist Association for State Employees; Fascist Party, employee associations Avellino 137, 141 Balbo, I. 22, 145 Bari 137, 191 Biella 183 Biennio Rosso (‘Two Red Years’, 1919–1920) 17, 37, 217 police reaction 17–20, 96 Bocchini, A. 47, 49, 85, 119, 141, 142, 144, 152, 199n4 and fascism 2, 46, 47–50, 51, 57, 58–9, 64, 67–8, 72n38, 72n42, 72n44, 72n49, 74n82, 138, 140, 195, 210, 217, 221n17 re-organisation of police 28, 41, 46, 48, 55, 66, 105, 210 Bologna 11, 13, 17, 19, 20, 22–3, 47, 48, 72n49, 89, 153, 180, 197 Bolzano 154 Brescia 46, 47, 74n90, 183 Brindisi 150 Buffarini Guidi, G. 47, 52, 72n44, 173, 182, 183, 195, 196, 198 Cagliari 159, 214 Calabria 123, 170, 207 Campania 128 Campobasso (Molise) 92 Carabinieri 4, 11, 12, 13, 18, 25, 115, 171, 172, 179, 207–8, 215, 218 and fascism 4, 19, 26–7, 42–3, 63–4, 68, 88, 90–2, 93, 94 Fascist Party membership 45 ‘first-hour’ fascists 68

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Index and Interior Ministry Police 13, 14, 86, 115 and monarchy 27, 68, 179 National Republican Guard (Guardia Nazionale Repubblicana) 178, 179 Nazi deportation of 179, 202n44 neo-fascism 209 Resistance 179, 206 Caserta 53, 54, 55, 61, 64, 158, 196 Catania 25, 139, 140, 141, 188 Catanzaro 146 Catholics/clergy 17, 18, 47, 79, 80–1, 177, 207, 210 Chierici, R. 74n82, 139, 171 Christian Democrat Government 210 clerical/office staff (impiegati di Pubblica Sicurezza) 26, 51, 52, 62, 73n73, 80, 109, 113, 114, 119–20, 122–3, 124, 149–50, 161 clientelism/patronage 11, 46, 50, 99, 129, 134n89, 218 and ‘fascistisation’ of the police 4, 57, 218 and police careers 57, 65, 111–12, 137, 161 see also corruption collaborationism (Nazi occupation) 96, 173, 178, 183, 185, 188, 190–5, 208 Colonial Police (Polizia dell’Africa Italiana) 116, 148, 154, 178, 212 commissioners see Public Security officials communism 38, 42, 48, 86, 88, 89, 91, 107, 110, 145, 177, 194, 196, 197, 207–10, 213–15 Como 196 concentration camps (Italy) 116, 170–1, 177, 191 confino 27, 38, 87, 140, 191, 210 removal of ‘undesirables’ 83–4

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Index Corpo della Polizia Metropolitana (Rome special police) 35n86, 39, 40, 41, 44, 156 Corporate State 3, 62, 65 corruption 13, 68, 90, 99, 119, 129, 149, 151, 159, 169, 170, 171, 174, 183, 219 British police 125, 133n77 inspections and investigations 55, 104, 105, 106, 107, 110–11, 126, 129, 165n75, 171, 175 see also abuse (police); clientelism/ patronage Cosenza 89 Cremona 142, 143 crime policing of 9, 11, 13, 14, 16, 24, 64, 66, 78, 80, 85, 86, 112, 114, 115, 127, 140, 206 Criminal Code (1930) 27, 61, 63, 215 Crotone 112 culture (police) 4, 108, 126, 127–8, 146, 153, 217–20 anti-Marxist 37, 207, 219 authoritarian 6, 14, 16, 177, 198, 199, 207, 210, 212–13, 217, 219 compared British/French police 95–8, 125–6 and Fascist Party membership 52–3 fascist penetration of 3, 5, 6, 39–44, 53–6, 57–9, 61–5, 67–8, 142, 151, 155, 156, 157, 160, 166, 211–12, 214, 217–18, 219 individualism 128, 161, 218 journals/newspapers 12, 34n70, 42–3, 68, 210, 211, 218 Il magistrato dell’ordine 26, 28, 29, 36n95, 50, 68, 127, 153, 155, 159, 193, 211 manuals/reference books 11, 18, 42–3, 55, 62–4, 68, 148, 211, 216

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231 self-image 12, 40–1, 42–3, 212, 216, 217–18 work attitudes 1–2, 104, 108–9, 112, 113–14, 117, 119, 125, 128–9, 161, 174, 179–80 see also fascist ideology; organisation of policing; Public Security Code (1931); Public Security Law; training Dalmatia 116, 172, 176 death penalty 45 De Bono, E. 25, 37, 198 ‘de-fascistisation’ 177 amnesty (1946) 173–4, 188, 194–5, 208 Italian Government 187, 189 police obstruction 189, 207 of police personnel 6, 173–4, 187–99, 204n75, 210 denunciations 85, 94, 100n22, 176 against police 87, 129, 120, 122, 141, 162n17 police working conditions 12, 52, 55, 73n73, 108, 111, 118, 216 Director General of Public Security (Direttore Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza) 9–10 see also De Bono, E. disciplinary infractions 117, 118–19, 122–3, 150, 169 British police 125–6, 133n77 sexual 106–7, 111, 119–20, 125 see also corruption; dismissal; transfers dismissal 37, 56, 110, 114, 117, 119, 149, 159, 169, 171 forced retirements 37, 70n2, 110, 119, 146–7, 182, 192–3 politically motivated 37–8, 183, 192, 195 see also disciplinary infractions; transfers

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232 domicilio coatto 10, 27 see also confino employers and prefect/police 14–15, 16, 48, 87, 88 Empoli (Tuscany) 57, 115 factionalism 44, 46, 92, 99, 109, 111, 160 fascist rivalries and police 92, 106, 141, 218 police stations 106, 108, 114 Farinacci, R. 30, 44, 45, 72n42, 143 Fascist Association for State Employees (Associazione Generale Fascista del Pubblico Impiego) 45, 50 see also Fascist Party, employee associations fascist ideology 38, 68, 127, 145, 159, 186 and policing 66–7, 84, 143–4, 219 posturing 84, 136, 168 related to police conduct 136, 140–1, 142, 150–2, 154, 157–61, 167, 171, 173, 174, 185, 187, 215 training 61–5, 68, 217, 219 see also culture (police), fascist penetration of; rituals (fascist regime); symbols (fascist regime) Fascist Party (Partito Nazionale Fascista) 44, 45, 50, 159, 191 badge 43 benefit to police 91, 94 black shirt 42, 43, 166, 179 confrontation with police 137, 138, 141, 148, 192 employee associations 50–1, 154, 157–8, 177, 218

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Index ‘fascistisation’ of bureaucracy 45, 68 Gioventù Italiana del Littorio (GIL) 158 police membership of 148 Gruppi Universitari Fascisti (GUF) police personnel 58, 155, 158 influence over police 44, 46, 50, 56, 61, 67, 106, 111, 139, 154, 155, 157–8, 218–19 police membership 45–6, 50, 56, 178, 193, 218 police monitoring 80, 88–91 reliance on police 94 violence 85, 87, 90, 91–2, 106, 145, 219 see also Farinacci, R.; Fascist Association for State Employees; Militia; oaths; Starace, A.; Turati, A. Fascists see Fascist Party; ‘first-hour’ fascists; younger-generation fascists Federzoni, L. 23, 26, 44, 45, 46 Ferrara 22, 119, 145, 168, 185, 192, 194, 206 Fidenza 115 ‘first-hour’ fascists career priority 50, 56, 57–8, 61, 123, 149 in police 2, 3, 57, 64, 69, 149–54, 159–60, 178, 183, 187, 196, 217, 218 relationships with policemen 18–19, 143 see also younger-generation fascists First World War 24, 64, 80, 93, 147 common experience of fascists and policemen 18–19 inspiration for fascism 42, 54, 151, 153 Fiume 56, 123, 150, 171, 172, 173 Florence 41, 42, 115, 154, 184

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Index foreigners policing of 79, 80, 81, 168, 169–72, 177, 199–200n7 Genoa 48, 122, 148, 152, 153, 154, 169, 208 Giolitti, G. 14–15, 16, 20, 24 Gorizia 138 Grosseto 112, 146 health (police personnel) 1, 59, 120, 124–5, 159, 180 admission to police 59, 61, 135 insurance schemes 124, 127 tuberculosis 119, 122, 133n72, 150 see also welfare (police personnel) Himmler, H. 49, 69, 76–7n139, 203n67 see also Nazi police historiography of fascist repression ix, 136 compared with Nazism 2–3, 4 homosexuality policing of 84, 140, 162n17, 203n67 illness see health (police personnel) image (police) 8, 11–12, 66, 120, 175, 189 representation to public 2, 12, 39–40, 42–3, 56, 157, 166, 211–12, 217 Imperia 111 informers 81–3, 85, 86, 94, 96, 116, 189 see also OVRA; POLPOL; secret policing inspections (police stations) 38, 55, 84, 105–18, 120, 126, 128, 129, 160, 174, 217 see also investigations (police personnel) Interior Minister 48, 188, 209 see also Buffarini Guidi, G.; Federzoni, L.; Romita, G.; Scelba, M.

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233 Interior Ministry 25, 27, 45, 50, 52, 56–7, 65, 90, 108, 127, 149, 154, 172, 175, 190, 209 Interior Ministry Police and Carabinieri 13, 14, 86, 115 and fascism 6, 22, 23, 25–6, 27–8, 29, 37, 38–42, 43–4, 50, 58, 67, 104, 129, 136, 146, 149, 160, 211, 214, 217–18 General and Confidential Affairs Division (Divisione Affari Generali e Riservati) 138, 139, 191 General Directorate of Public Security (Direzione Generale della Pubblica Sicurezza) 24, 66 Italian Social Republic 178, 179 liberal state 9, 12, 17–18, 24 militarisation 212–13, 216 personnel files 135–6, 189–90, 193 role in fascist dictatorship 4–5, 26–7, 79, 113, 114, 116, 117–18, 122, 137, 171 see also individual police forces/ ranks investigations (police personnel) 55, 84, 92, 105–18, 126, 128, 129, 136, 150, 160, 170–1, 175, 176, 214, 217 see also ‘de-fascistisation’, of police personnel; inspections (police stations) Italian Social Republic 161, 166, 182–3, 189, 209, 214 police personnel 166–7, 178–87, 188–9, 192–3, 204n89, 208 L’Aquila 148 La Spezia 42 Legnano 184

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234 liberal Italy arbitrary and underhand tactics 11, 20–1 concept of public order 10, 37, 199 Livorno 174–5, 215 Lombroso, C. 66, 67 Lugo 147 Macerata 120, 170, 194 Mantova 130n13 March on Rome 22–3, 41, 58 amnesty 122 participation of policemen 149, 153, 181, 193 martyrs (police personnel) 15, 42, 54, 63 and fascist movement 42 Massa Carrara 88, 138 Matera 84 Matteotti, G. 29, 197–8 Messina 147 Milan 14, 25, 37–8, 79, 106–7, 111, 155, 176, 184, 192, 208, 210 Militia (Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale) 25, 27, 47, 58, 64, 116, 153, 178, 182, 184, 189, 212, 215 intelligence services (UPI) 82 Italian Social Republic 208 and police 42, 85, 91–2, 93, 94, 110, 111, 138, 148, 191 police membership of 51 as reinforcements 89, 115 Modena 22, 113, 208, 215 monarchy 23, 42, 48, 52, 53, 54, 90, 168 defeat of fascism 177, 178 loyalty of Carabinieri 27, 68 symbols 43 Mussolini, B. 8, 23, 25, 43, 45, 46, 52, 57, 68, 84, 92, 93, 143, 155, 164n60, 169, 176, 177, 178, 198, 210, 221n17 and armed forces 42

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Index and Bocchini, A. 47, 48, 49, 72n44 and Carabinieri 22, 26–7, 42–3 and Fascist Party 44 and Interior Ministry Police 5, 29, 51 letters from policemen 26, 33n39, 52, 73n73, 108, 118, 130n10, 145–6 police admiration 8, 26, 28, 40–1, 42, 53–4, 63, 153, 157 Police Day 39, 177, 211 Naples 25, 26, 47, 64, 116, 137, 182 Nationalists 19, 23, 25, 35n81 employer vigilantism 16 and fascist state 44 see also Federzoni, L.; Rocco, A. Nazi police 2–3, 4, 68–9, 157, 160, 185–6, 203n67 see also Himmler, H. neo-fascism 214 police involvement in 208–9 nepotism 108–9, 110, 129, 181 Nitti, F. 17, 24 Novara 107 oaths to Duce 52–3, 178 of induction to public office 52, 54, 178 to Italian Social Republic 190 Oneglia 111, 184 Opera Nazionale Balilla (ONB) 64, 90, 183 organisation of policing dualism 13, 26, 115–16 facilities 113, 153 funding 4, 12, 29, 104, 107, 110, 114, 115, 116, 118, 122, 123, 176 hierarchical control 55, 98, 104, 117–18, 129, 174, 217 military attributes 14, 18, 24, 212

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Index personnel shortages 80, 86, 87, 89, 105, 113, 114–15, 116–17, 149, 175 new posts 116, 132n42, 175 premises 105, 106, 113, 131n27 professional skills 1–2, 9, 13–14, 16, 39–40, 65, 86, 105–113, 126, 127–8, 156–7, 174, 176, 217 see also administrative reform (Italian state); corruption; inspections (police stations); investigations (police personnel); police reform; police work; recruitment; training; working conditions Orlando, V. 24, 47 Ottolenghi, S. 66, 76n128 OVRA 4, 29, 48, 64, 67, 86, 116, 137, 190–1, 209, 215, 217 and regular police ix, 4, 82, 118, 136, 138–9, 190, 191, 197, 217 Padua 179, 207 Palermo 15, 84 Parma 106, 113, 114, 131n26 patronage see clientelism/patronage pay 9, 13, 14, 58, 119, 123, 124, 125, 133n67, 135, 159, 169, 170, 216 pensions see welfare (police personnel) Perugia 120, 196 Pesaro 193 Pisa 195 Police Chief (Capo della Polizia) see Bocchini, A.; Chierici, R.; Senise, C.; Tamburrini, T. Police Day (festa della polizia) 39–42, 40, 41, 43, 44, 156, 177, 211–12, 214, 216 police-public relations 10, 11–12, 16, 85, 87–8, 94–5 see also abuse (police);

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235 denunciations, against police; image (police); protest, policing of police reform 216 fascism 3–4, 8, 23, 25–7, 37, 38, 39–40, 44, 45, 53, 66, 68, 104, 109, 118, 126, 153, 155–7, 158, 217 liberal state 8, 14, 16, 23–5 see also administrative reform (Italian state) police work censorship 80, 177, 210 fascist dissidence 79, 94 fascist organisations 89–91 foreigners 79, 80, 81, 168, 169 forensic policing 16 hotels/rented property 80, 81, 82, 86, 112, 127 liberal and fascist states compared 78, 79, 80, 81, 83, 84 office tasks 29, 78, 80–1 scientific policing 16, 66–7 sexual ‘crimes’ 80, 84, 86 surveillance 79–83, 114, 167–8, 182, 219 vetting for employment and welfare 59, 83, 87 see also anti-fascism, repression; anti-Semitism; confino; OVRA; POLPOL; protest, policing of; registers; secret policing POLPOL (Political Police Division) 4, 29, 46, 66, 67, 81, 190–1, 209 and regular police 4, 118, 138–9, 190, 217 prefects (prefetti) 10–11, 13, 80–1, 87–8 and factional disputes 92, 141 and Fascist Party 45 Italian Social Republic 178 prerogatives under dictatorship 27

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236 promotions 9, 13, 62, 65, 83, 121, 122, 128, 136, 139, 149, 161, 184, 193, 218 and Fascist Party membership 50, 56, 64, 75n118, 137–8 and fascist ‘qualities’ 142, 145–6, 147–9, 192, 196, 218 of fascists 50, 58, 123, 149, 183 of fascist supporters 56, 57, 142–3, 145, 147, 181, 193 prostitution 106–7, 111, 120 protest of police 17, 216 policing of 10, 14–15, 17–18, 88–9, 207–8, 212–14, 215, 216 Public Security Code (1931) 27, 61, 210, 211, 213 Public Security Guard (Agenti di Pubblica Sicurezza) 26–7, 28–9, 35n86, 43, 44, 51, 79, 85, 87, 99–100n10, 108, 110–11, 112, 113, 115, 116, 117, 119, 120, 122, 124, 125, 132n42, 161n1, 166, 170, 172, 175, 176, 183, 196 fascism 53–5, 64, 71n20, 166, 179, 208, 211, 212 Fascist Party membership 45, 73n62 ‘first-hour’ fascists 58 marriage 120–1, 132–3n57 British constables 125 militarisation (1943) 212 Police Day 39, 41–2, 43, 211 recruitment 28, 58, 59–61 Resistance 179, 181, 207 shortages 105, 112, 114, 115, 175, 176 training 53, 55, 61–2, 64, 75n108 Public Security inspectors (ispettori di Pubblica Sicurezza) 24, 29, 105, 107, 108, 110, 117, 129, 170

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Index Public Security Law (1865) 10 (1926) 27, 28, 44, 50, 62, 63, 81, 86, 109, 127 see also Public Security Code (1931) Public Security officials (funzionari di Pubblica Sicurezza) 3, 14, 16, 17, 25, 28, 34n70, 51, 81, 85, 106–7, 108–9, 110, 112, 113–14, 116, 124–5, 127–8, 132n42, 175, 177, 179–80, 185, 208, 210, 212, 215, 216 anti-Semitism 168–74 ‘de-fascistisation’ 187–9, 190–7, 198–9, 206 fascist movement 9, 18–22, 29, 34n58, 106, 142–3, 145, 147–8 Fascist Party membership 45, 50–1, 52–3, 106, 192, 193 fascist regime 1–2, 23, 27, 29, 37, 43, 67, 70n2, 107, 110, 111, 114, 118, 120, 137, 138, 141, 148, 192, 211, 217–19 fascists 149–59, 160, 166, 181–4 Nazi persecution 194, 196 neo-fascism 208–9 Police Day 39, 41 promotions 29, 57, 128, 146, 147, 161 recruitment 56, 61–2, 86, 114, 176 Resistance 180–1, 182, 195–7 partisan personnel 197, 206–7 training 16, 128, 156, 158, 176 Puglia (Apulia) 108, 147 punishments 107, 117, 119, 122, 126, 147, 169, 170 see also dismissal; transfers

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Index questori 24, 88 anti-Semitism 168–9, 173 career advancement under fascism 29 and Fascist Party 138, 141, 146 Italian Social Republic 178 political policing 81–2 see also Public Security officials raccomandazioni 4, 57, 67, 111, 128, 136, 137, 153, 218 see also clientelism/patronage race policy (fascist) 83, 94, 140, 219 determining recruitment to police 59 linked to sexual ‘offences’ 80, 86 Scuola Superiore di Polizia 66–7 see also anti-Semitism Ravenna 147 recruitment 4, 65, 156, 217 appointments committees 10, 57 competitions 50, 56, 57, 58, 61–2, 114, 128, 149, 150, 153, 164n57, 170 entrance requirements 56, 59, 86, 114, 175 and Fascist Party 46, 56 of fascists 56, 57–9, 149, 153 Public Security Guard 28–9, 59–61 from South 13, 19, 128 vetting of applications 56, 59–60, 128 Reggio Emilia 115, 196, 207 registers 80–1, 82, 83, 105, 106, 109, 112, 113, 131n26 Casellario Politico Centrale 27, 80, 136, 214 Resistance 181, 213 Committee of National Liberation 154–5, 180, 181, 190, 191, 197, 207

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237 partisans in police 195, 197, 206–7, 220n2 police repression 161, 178, 183, 186, 207–8 police support 179, 180–1, 182, 188–9, 195–8 rituals (fascist regime) 2, 40–3, 53–4, 211, 218 Rocco, A. 44–5 Roman salute 43, 71n20 Roman step 43, 55, 166 Rome 8, 25, 35n81, 39, 42, 55, 61, 81, 86, 98, 104, 116, 124, 135, 137, 138, 158, 159, 173–4, 176, 179, 181, 182, 188, 189, 190, 192, 197, 209, 216 Romita, G. 187–8 Rovigo 120 Royal Guard (Regia Guardia) 17–18, 59, 175, 183 disbandment 25–6 and fascist movement 19, 22, 23 Left campaign against 19 military attributes 18, 24 sabato fascista 51–2 Salerno 139, 140, 142, 145 Saracini, E. conversion to fascism 23, 26, 28 police reforms 8, 23–5, 26, 27–9, 50, 86, 127–8, 164n60 Sardinia 122 Sarzana (Liguria) 22 Savona 41, 92, 195 Scelba, M. 196, 210, 213 secret policing 4, 29, 81–2, 116, 126–7, 136 see also informers; OVRA; POLPOL Senise, C. 148, 149, 168, 174, 175, 176, 177, 199n4 Sicily 13, 85, 122, 128, 139, 140, 167, 187, 188

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238 Siena 38, 59, 60, 78, 80, 81, 82, 83, 86, 87, 88, 89–92, 93, 94, 109, 114–15, 116, 118–20, 121, 122–3, 124, 127, 129, 150, 168 Slavs 177, 187 police action against 172, 186 socialism 15, 17, 18–20, 22, 47–8, 84, 90, 139, 142 support from police personnel 17, 25 see also Matteotti, G. South (of Italy) 178, 207 bureaucracy 3, 129, 134n89 police personnel 3, 13, 14, 19, 128–9 prejudice 13–14, 19, 108–9, 122, 129 Special Tribunal (Tribunale Speciale per la Difesa dello Stato) 45, 84, 107 Starace, A. 138, 141, 181, 193, 196, 218 strikes see protest symbols (fascist regime) 43–4, 166, 177 Tamburrini, T. 141, 179, 180, 196 Teramo 170 Terni 207 totalitarianism 50, 64, 68, 158, 160, 166 Town Guard (Guardie di Città) 13, 14, 16, 17, 59 trade union membership see associations (police) training 11, 157, 217 courses 16, 61, 156, 158, 176 fascist influence 49, 53–5, 61–4, 217, 219 instructors 55, 64 manuals 18, 55, 62–4 Public Security Guard Training Schools Inspectorate 55–6

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Index Scuola di Polizia Scientifica 16, 27, 28 Scuola Superiore di Polizia 27, 66–7, 128, 139, 156, 158, 176, 180, 181, 190, 217 Scuola Tecnica di Polizia (Caserta) 53–5, 61, 62, 63, 64, 151 Scuola Tecnica di Polizia (Rome) 55, 61, 64 sport 153–4, 156, 157 transfers 106, 110, 117, 119, 120, 123, 147, 148, 149–50, 159, 171, 175 politically-motivated 92, 138, 143, 145, 146, 148, 197–8, 207, 214 see also disciplinary infractions; dismissal; punishments Trento 175 Trieste 172 Turati, A. 45, 46, 47, 56, 57, 74n90, 140 Turin 1–2, 8, 25, 42, 84, 108–9, 129, 181, 194, 208, 209, 215 Udine 181 uniforms civilian state personnel 43, 71n26, 166, 177 Public Security Guard 44, 176 Varese 110–11 Venice 179 Ventimiglia 92 Vercelli 183 Verona 58, 202n44, 214 Vicenza 143 Viterbo 121 welfare (police personnel) allowances 124 British police 125–6 families 19, 70, 117, 124–5, 126, 150

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Index financial difficulties 122–5, 150, 159, 174 living conditions 13, 17, 113, 123 marriage 120–2, 125 pensions 13, 58, 124, 125 see also health (police personnel); pay working conditions 9–10, 12–13, 14, 16, 17, 19, 113–14, 118, 123, 127–8, 176, 216, 217 British police 126

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239 related to professional status 9, 12, 15, 24–5, 40–1, 44, 54, 126, 215 see also welfare (police personnel) younger-generation fascists 2, 3, 5, 54, 58–9, 68, 153, 154–9, 160, 166, 178, 182, 187, 217, 219 Yugoslavia 116, 170, 172, 173, 186

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