Ardeatine massacre
| Ardeatine massacre | |
|---|---|
Entry to caves in the Fosse Ardeatine Monument
|
|
| Location | Outside of Rome, Italy |
| Date | 24 March 1944 |
| Deaths | 335 |
| Victims | Italian (political) prisoners Jewish civilians |
| Perpetrators |
Herbert Kappler Erich Priebke Karl Hass Kurt Mälzer SS Police Regiment Bozen |
The Ardeatine massacre, or Fosse Ardeatine massacre (Italian: Eccidio delle Fosse Ardeatine) was a mass killing carried out in Rome on 24 March 1944 by German occupation troops during the Second World War as a reprisal for a partisan attack conducted on the previous day in central Rome against the SS Police Regiment Bozen.
Subsequently, the Ardeatine Caves site (Fosse Ardeatine) was declared a Memorial Cemetery and National Monument open daily to visitors. Every year, on the anniversary of the slaughter and in the presence of the senior officials of the Italian Republic, a solemn State commemoration is held at the monument in honor of the fallen. Popes Paul VI and John Paul II each visited the memorial once during their respective reigns, as did Pope Benedict XVI on 27 March 2011.
In July 1943, the Allies landed in Sicily, preparing to invade the mainland, and Rome was bombed for the first time. On 24 July, the Fascist Grand Council, which the dictator Benito Mussolini had not convened since 1939, met and overwhelmingly voted no confidence in Mussolini. The following day, anxious to extricate his country from an unsustainable war, King Victor Emanuel III, the titular head of the Italian government and Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces under Mussolini, appointed Marshal Pietro Badoglio to head a new military government. He then ordered his gendarmerie, the Carabinieri, to arrest and imprison Mussolini.
In August 1943, Rome was bombed again, and the Badoglio government began secret surrender negotiations with the Allies in Sicily, although still outwardly allied to Germany. In accordance with the Pope's wishes, the Italian government also unilaterally declared Rome an Open City, i.e., a demilitarized zone, a declaration the Allies would refuse to recognize and the Germans to respect. The Germans, anticipating an Italian defection, meanwhile began moving more and more troops into Italy (Operation Achse). Foreseeing a German invasion, a coalition of Anti-Fascist parties and Monarchists formed the Committee of National Liberation (CLN). On 3 September the Badoglio government signed an unconditional surrender, which U.S. General Eisenhower made public on the eve of the Fifth Army's amphibious landing at Salerno (8 September). At the same time, Badoglio issued the Badoglio Proclamation, directing Italian troops to end hostilities against the Allies but to oppose attacks "from any other quarter".
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