Mussolini's Death March: Eyewitness Accounts of Italian Soldiers on the Eastern Front

by Nuto Revelli, John Penuel (Translator)

Overview

In his quest for military glory, Benito Mussolini sent the Italian Eighth Army to the Eastern Front to help fight the Russians, only to have his forces routed within little more than a month of the launch of the Soviet counteroffensives of the winter of 1942-1943. The Cuneense, a division of mountain troops, was hit especially hard, with only a small percentage of its troops straggling back to Italy; the rest were killed in action or died of frostbite or in captivity from malnourishment, overwork, and disease. All told, the Italians suffered roughly 75,000 dead, more than in their six-month campaign in Greece and Albania or in their three years in North Africa.

Nuto Revelli, who fought in Russia himself, interviewed forty-three other survivors of the campaign for a book that has become a classic among Italian war memoirs. First published in Italian in 1966 as La strada del davai, Revelli's account, now available in English, vividly recaptures the experiences and sobering reflections of these men. It provides a chilling look at an experience that, in English-language writing, has been overshadowed by that of the main actors on the Eastern Front.

When news of the rout reached Italy, the shock was devastating. In Revelli's home province of Cuneo, the recruiting territory of the annihilated Cuneense Division, some villages lost almost all men of military age. The resulting rage and bitterness later fueled the partisan war against the Germans and Italian fascists.

The veterans of Mussolini's Death March speak candidly of nights in the open, of extreme cold, gnawing hunger, and eruptive madness. Thousands who survived the Soviet onslaught were taken prisoner and died on the so-called davai marches—named for Russian guards' command to keep prisoners moving—or later in the camps themselves. Even so, they developed a favorable impression of the Russian people, who provided hospitality in their small houses and aid to the wounded. Together, their recollections provide an eye-opening look at a largely neglected aspect of World War II.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780700619085
Publisher:	University Press of Kansas
Publication date:	04/05/2013
Series:	Modern War Studies
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	566
Product dimensions:	6.70(w) x 9.50(h) x 1.50(d)

Table of Contents

Nuto Revelli’s Wars by John Penuel

Note on the Translation

Preface

Part One

-If I Have a Third Daughter, I’ll Name her Vera

-It’ll Be War and Not Much Else

-Be Strong, Hold Out, You Have a Family

-Fascists Worse than Bedbugs

-If You’re a Capitalist, Go Back to Italy

-Get Out of Here before It Gets Cold

-Mussolini, Empire, Just War

-I Don’t Want to Go Back to Italy

-Courage, If We Get Through, We’re Home Free

-I Love the Country More than Before

-A Little Tube of Shaving Cream

-Around the World like a Bunch of Marmots

-Russians Are Fair People

-We’ll Win and It Will All Be Over

-Anyone from Valgrana?

-In Russia We Go Numb

-We’ll Die Like Rats

-It’s a Single Cry: “Help, Help, Mother, Mother”

-The Timid Are Bound to Die

-Surrender, Italians, You’re Already Prisoners

-For Lots of People, War Means Making Money

-Every Sunset Meant One Day Less

-Not Fascists: Alpinist!

-Alpini, You’ll All Make It Back

-Try It Again and I’ll Smack You Upside the Head, Too

-I Know Where Russia Is and That’s It

-How Many Fountains I Dreamed of in Russia

-You Laugh Once When You Go to War

-The War Is Over

Part Two

-A Never-Ending Job

-Those Who Flee Make It

-We Are All Generals

-We’ll Go Where They Take Us

-It Won’t Be Long Now

-Whoever Is Singing Is Drunk

-Let Mussolini Burn Alive

-I’ll Never Go to Italy to Kill Italians

-Finally, an Order: Every Man for Himself

-Come to Japan with Us

-Come on, We Have to Make it to Turin

-The Heroic Sacrifice of the Cuneense

-Homo Homini Lupus

Afterword: The Retreat from Russia

Notes

Index

Editorial Reviews

"This is an extraordinary book. The testimonies collected by the author are heartbreaking, shocking, brutal, and at times, uplifting. They tell a terrible story of disaster, death, and suffering."—The Historian

"Mussolini’s Death March is a worthwhile read for those wanting to understand the Second World War from the perspective of the Italian army. The book is not only a window onto the wretched lives of the Italian soldiers on the Russian front, but also onto the Italian war experience in other theaters."—Journal of Military History

"John Penuel’s lyric introduction and annotated translation summarize the tragedy of Italy’s Eighth Army. A vivid contribution to the Italian debacle during WWII."—Choice

“The tragedy of the Italian mountain troops, who marched to their doom in the service of Mussolini’s great ambitions, deserves universal recognition as a monument to heroism in the face of impossible odds. Anyone who reads this superb English-language translation and edition of Revelli’s original work will understand why.”—Brian Sullivan, coauthor of Il Duce’s Other Woman: The Untold Story of Margherita Sarfatti, Mussolini’s Jewish Mistress

“Revelli tells it all in the words of the men who fought there, sacrificial victims to a lunatic national strategy. An essential book for anyone interested in the history of World War II.”—Robert M. Citino, author of German Way of War and The Wehrmacht Retreats

From the Publisher