"Aldo says 26 X 1" Liberation and Twenty-Five April in the Langhe.

Twenty-fifth of April, a date to remember. And not only because it is a national holiday, but also because the mere mention of it evokes moments of a Liberation that has now become legend. Yet, the twenty-fifth is a symbolic day, chosen to represent a frame of history, to channel weeks, whole months of fervor into twenty-four hours.

For those who experienced the frame in the flesh, for those for whom the events were first harsh reality than history, April twenty-fifth was Spring ’45. A spring that sprouted amid snipers and reprisals and exploded into a summer of freedom and harried reconstruction.

The struggle in the countryside between fervor and reluctance

Today, eighty years after that twenty-fifth of April, the memories have faded and the testimonies, though many, remain on paper, photos and videos. Whatever these were unable to capture becomes more elusive, and with it the delicate and numerous details that make up the whole.

We, the children of snapshots and the pen and not of reality, imagine huge processions, jubilant crowds and irrepressible shared optimism. Yet, the road to Liberation was not always easy

We, the children of snapshots and the pen and not of reality, imagine huge processions, jubilant crowds and irrepressible shared optimism. Yet, the road to Liberation was not always easy and the very concept of Liberation did not always take root without some effort outside the big urban centers.

A resistance not always shared

Cities were suffering more intensely, bombs were falling on their buildings, and their jails were filling up for more futile reasons every day. But how much of this was felt in the placid countryside? Not all of it and not always with the same intensity.

The Resistance, which began in small steps in 1943 and exploded from 1944, was extremely active throughout Piedmont, but this does not mean that it was immediately embraced by everyone. In the fields and valleys, people sought quiet above all, and were willing to go unheard and sometimes unseen in order to maintain it.

Politics and patriotism in the rural Langhe

The proverbial lack of interest in politics persisted even in the darkest hours.

The proverbial lack of interest in politics lingered even in the darkest hours, and the typical ardor of the citizens, that of those who had dragged the peasants into two wars in less than fifty years and were now asking for their help in getting out of them, struggled to change into patriotism as soon as the concrete gave way to flowers.

In the Langhe, destined later to become protagonists of the Liberty movement, and in other parts of Piedmont, it was necessary to leverage monarchical, Savoyard values, closer to the rural masses that had always been slow to embrace political change. And it was then necessary to appeal to the mediation of friendlier, more familiar figures, to township parish priests and the small clergy of the parishes.

Freedom overcoming divisions

And yet twenty years of fascism, which if nothing catastrophic ever brought anything good to the Langhe, and half a century of warsnow weighed a little on everyone. The young did not know a world without gunfire, and the old no longer remembered it. The message of the Resistance finally took hold.

Variety and unity of partisan formations

The organization of the Resistance mirrored the varied popular sentiments. The most sensitive ears opted for Divisions oriented to socialist values, the most faithful to the traditions of the area chose pro-monarchist and pro-Sabaudi compartments. If one must believe in something, at least let it have Piedmontese origins!

Matteotti Brigades, Giustizia e Libertà, Garibaldini and Autonomi. Amid communication difficulties, scarce supplies and perennial disputes, the Langhe filled with fighters.

Matteotti Brigades, Justice and Freedom, Garibaldini and Autonomi. Amid communication difficulties, scarce supplies and perennial disputes, the Langhe was filled with fighters, each with their own creed and color, but all ultimately united for the same goal.

The difficult path to land control

With some closer to those who were destined to define the future (the CLN in the lead) and some more inclined to dialogue with local administrations, gradually a widespread, if not always unassailable control of the territory was achieved.

The larger urban centers could never be taken and then held until the enemy’s demise, but the struggle never knew any real respite, finally reaching its climax in that April eighty years ago.

April 1945: the month of Liberation

If in believing that everything exploded and then vanished on the twenty-fifth of April we are mistaken, the belief that the Resistance expected to reach its denouement when it then came is also an illusion.

The invader’s strength had been waning for months, years perhaps. Yet it never ran out.

When no one could imagine victory

Still in March 1945, the partisans and civilian population did not know, they waited but did not dare to imagine. The enemy always seemed to find ways to recharge, to regain control. Better supplied, better clothed and better armed, he continued his personal resistance.

At one o’clock the fascists show a white handkerchief and surrender; we watch them with curiosity rather than hatred

For months now, preparations for the final insurrection had been underway, plans had been drawn up and advance orders given to the Divisions for weeks. But then when? No one knew .

April ’45, however, seemed different. Positive and reassuring news followed one another, events finally seemed to be precipitating. Germany was on the verge of surrender, Mussolini was now rumored to be looking for a way out. Perhaps this really was the time.

The renewed wave of optimism shook shrunken but long-vigilant spirits. And here was the thirst for justice, and perhaps even revenge, emerging among the people and in the Divisions. In the early days of the month the momentum became unstoppable, in the Tura people sang “In a few days we will descend to the plain,” and the Langhe quivered and awaited the final call.

Alba: symbol of Piedmontese resistance

On April 15, partisans encircled Alba, the local symbol of Freedom, already won in 1944 and then lost. The episode was a dress rehearsal, a stage for the grand final event.

Franco Foglino’s words in his “Partisan Youth” about the action on Alba bring back the fervor of those days:

At one o’clock the fascists show a white handkerchief and surrender; they are let down, they come out in a line. […] We watch them with curiosity, rather than hatred; they are young people, and to me it seems incomprehensible that there are still young people who have not understood, who do not know what crimes the Nazis and their poor fascist allies have been guilty of, and who persist in fighting to thwart the unstoppable march of humanity toward a better world of justice and peace!

Franco foglino

Aldo says 26 X 1: the Langhe in Turin.

In the Langhe, the twenty-fifth of April comes and goes in a flash, and is almost entirely punctuated by anticipation. The longed-for coded message has been delivered the night before, and the heavens open: “Aldo says 26 X 1,” the twenty-sixth of April is the designated day, day X, the Divisions are called to converge on Turin, it is time for insurrection.

As Foglino was able to tell us so well, those are unforgettable hours for those who experienced them, slipping away as fast as only moments of happiness and optimism can. The radio is listened to, bottles are uncorked, flags and handkerchiefs are waved, and toasts to the future to come are ventured.

Arriving in Turin in an almost always triumphant march well received by the local population, the Langhe fighters find a city different from what our imagination might invite us to picture. The Germans and Republicans are in retreat, but it is a confused flight, and when it meets the victors it becomes violent and not without spilled blood.

Turin between fear, celebration and summary justice

The people of Turin are afraid; they still fear the enemy snipers lurking at every corner. And yet when they can they shoot and strike, reaffirming a sense of justice, albeit summary, directed toward those who until recently had unjustly treated them. Partisans arriving from the countryside watch, sometimes sharing, sometimes trying to restrain, sometimes already trying to imagine a new order, with no more blood or violence some.

The remaining towns still in enemy hands were all liberated by the end of the month. In the region, Biella had been the first, but the situation would unravel almost everywhere in the days between the twenty-sixth and twenty-ninth of April, not without triumphal processions and small improvised occupations, and even here only following armed clashes and last-minute shootings that would weigh on everyone’s hearts.

In the capital, one would have to wait until the dawn of May to see jubilant crowds and a sense of complete rebirth populate the streets. Foglino will fondly remember the Turin of those days, where the whole of Piedmont came together to celebrate the end of decades of misery.

Beyond April 25: rebuilding normalcy

Victory is always irrational contentment. However, when the frenzy of the moment passes, the wounds become evident again.

As testified to us also by the experience of Giorgio Agosti, a great protagonist of the local Resistance, Turin and Piedmont experienced difficult months after the longed-for twenty-fifth of April, albeit with new awareness and tenacious rejection of all war.

Victory is always irrational contentment. However, when the frenzy of the moment passes, the wounds become evident again.

But while no one wanted a war anymore, the world in the early summer of ’45 still looked very much like a wartime scenario. Devastated cities, poorly connected country towns, blown bridges and administrations to rebuild. It was time for the fighting partisan to step back, lay down his arms and welcome the newfound peace.

The postwar bewilderment of combatants.

But was that what everyone wanted? There were those in the ranks of the Resistance who could not imagine a different life. Raised among the war and accustomed to it, some partisans struggled to adjust to the new world. And then the enemy had sown so much hatred that now there was no end to the harvest.

Justice took time to legalize and normalize, and the various CLN and PCI were able to channel the partisans into the new order not without effort.

In the Langhe, May was time to disband the formations, mourn the last fallen, and begin the process of reconstruction, which in its most immediate and crucial stages would continue at least until September. Meanwhile, a new state apparatus was being formed, and a new communal era began.

Fenoglio, Foglino and the others: tales from the Resistance

If no book or photograph can ever fully restore to us the sense of what the days of April twenty-fifth were, of those moments that defined an era, some testimonies are so valuable that they cannot be overlooked.

Beppe Fenoglio

The great Beppe Fenoglio, undisputed spokesman of the Resistance in the Langhe, brings us back various important aspects. If in his “Appunti partigiani 1944-1945” and the unforgettable “Il partigiano Johnny” he provides us with a glimpse of the partisan experience in the territory, in “La malora” he gives us an account of the Langhe in the early 20th century and makes us understand the context in which the freedom fighters had to make their way.

In “Saturday’s Pay,” however, it is the post-war bewilderment, that of the partisans who, once the struggle was over, struggled to find themselves again.

Franco Foglino

And then the aforementioned Franco Foglino, whose “Partisan Youth” leaves us with a raw, didactic and sometimes somewhat naïve account of his experience in the Langhe and then the call to Turin. A short but important read to better understand the human aspect of the Liberation.

David Lajolo

And to delve even deeper, the figures of Davide Lajolo, who in “Il voltagabbana” tells us about his Vinchio and those who switched to the Resistance after a fascist interlude, or the more tragic one of Cuneo’s Duccio Galimberti, offer invaluable insights and deserve a close look.