Ugo Mazzucchelli (5 June 1903 – 6 January 1997) was an Italian anarchist, anti-fascist and wartime partisan leader. He is best remembered as the commander of the Lucetti Battalion which became known as a tough opponent for the German and Fascist forces, when Italy became a critical battleground between 1943 and 1945, following the arrest of Mussolini.
Biography Provenance and early years Ugo Mazzucchelli was the second of his parents' five sons, born into a large working-class family in Tuscany at Carrara, a prosperous midsized town, well known for the marble quarries in the surrounding hills and, among the politically engaged, as a long-standing hotbed of anarchism. Ariodante Mazzucchelli, his father, was a quarryman and a powerful influence throughout and beyond his childhood. After completing his basic schooling, Ugo Mazzucchelli was sent to work in the quarries nearby. Italy became inveigled in the war during 1915, and in 1917 Mazzucchelli's family sent the boy to help behind the frontline, where he joined a "youth team" deployed to bury the bodies of dead fighting men after the slaughter at Caporetto. This would have meant one mouth fewer for the family to feed and a few more lire for the family budget.
On his return to Carrara, he resumed his work in the marble quarries. Around this time Mazzucchelli came into contact with the anarchist-philosopher and trades union activist Alberto Meschi, by whom he became and remained fascinated, and the local "Chamber of Labour" He would already have been conscious of the intensifying social and political conflicts of the immediate post-war period, since the marble quarries of Carrera had long been powerfully politicised: it is apparent that his political awareness was further raised through his contacts with Meschi. By the time he was eighteen, Mazzucchelli had moved with his family to Nazzano, which at that time was a separate municipality just outside Carrara (into which it has subsequently been subsumed). He became an eager reader of the left-wing "anarchist" leaflets passed to him by Natale Romiti, an old comrade from nearby Pontremoli, and of the periodical "Cavatore", published by the Carrara "Chamber of Labour". He also teamed up with a number of like-minded young men to set up "Né Dio né padrone" (loosely, "No God, No boss"), an anarchist youth group which can also be seen as a version of the Arditi del Popolo and other proletarian anti-fascist groups emerging across northern and central Italy in reaction (supporters and sympathisers assert) to the Fascist paramilitary organisation launched (in the first instance) in Milan in 1919 by Benito Mussolini.
Arrest and imprisonment On the night of 19/20 June 1921, in the aftermath of the so-called "Biennio Rosso" ("two red years"), Ugo Mazzucchelli was one of approximately fifteen young men who became involved in a gunfight with a Carabinieri (armed police) unit. The incident ended in the arrest of Mazzucchelli and the other anarchist gunmen. The incident arose after the comrades had taken up positions around the offices of the local "Lega Cavatori e Segatori" (trades union organization) in order to defend the building from an anticipated attack by Fascist paramilitaries. Their plans were ruined when a unit of Carabinieri turned up in place of the expected Fascists. Six months later, the anarchist gunmen faced trial, and were each sentenced to twenty-six months and nineteen days. On top of that, there was a fine to pay of 150 lire and a supplementary statutory penalty (pena pecuniara) of 106 lire. In March 1922 an appeal court in Genoa reduced his prison sentence to one of nine months and fourteen days, while the total fine was reduced to 150 lire. Mazzucchelli served his sentence in a succession of prisons in Massa, Lucca, Pisa e Genoa.
Release and ostracism On his release, he returned home to Nazzano. He found that during his absence Fascism had become more mainstream in the villages and towns around Carrara. The Fascist gangs had become powerful only after a succession of violent confrontations, but they had nevertheless managed to attract support from large numbers of manual workers, and particularly from among the non-unionized unemployed. Nazzano was now controlled by a fascist squastrista (later a government minister) called Renato Ricci, who was well aware of Mazzucchelli's record of antifascist activism, and had no intention of allowing such a man back into the Nazzano community. Forced out of Nazzano, Mazzucchelli tried to find quarry work in Seravezza, along the coast beyond Massa to the south, but there was no work to be had in Serravezza either, so he returned to Carrara. There he found the fascists as unforgiving as before. He later sought and found refuge with a cousin in Pianamaggio. It was here that he met Giuseppina Michelini, whose brother Arturo Michelini was an anarchist comrade treacherously killed by fascists. Ugo Mazzucchelli and Giuseppina "Peppa" Michelini teamed up during the early 1920s and subsequently married. It is not clear whether it was before or after meeting Giuseppina that in desperation Ugo Mazzucchelli tried to escape along the coast into France. However, he had evidently failed to obtain the necessary permits, since after someone betrayed him to the authorities, he was stopped and repatriated.
This was followed by a lengthy period of hiding, inland in the Apuan Alps. He lived with a number of other semi-outlaws in the countryside near the Lorano quarry. The Mussolini government had taken power in October 1922. Mazzucchelli's political record and continuing refusal to contemplate joining the party made him a "legitimate target" for discrimination and persecution. Sometimes there was casual work available at the quarry, generally restricted to the more off-beat or dangerous jobs, and despite a boycott by the quarry owners, who would not have considered formally employing a "left-wing subversive" who openly thought of May Day as a public holiday. From time to time, Mazzucchelli was able briefly to meet up with his wife and family. In the end, continuous police checks and searches drove him to move to La Spezia. Surveillance was not so relentless as to prevent him from keeping in touch with friends and numerous political allies. These comrades included Gino Lucetti, Gino Bibbi, Stefano Vatteroni and Pasquale Binazzi. Mazzucchelli's time as a semi-outlaw living in the mountains, and the extent of the antifascist network he was able to sustain through the Mussolini years, constituted excellent preparation for his subsequent role as a partisan leader after 1943.
Another war During the later 1930s, official memories of Mazzucchelli's anti-fascist activism seem to have receded, and shortly before the outbreak of war in (from an Italian perspective) June 1940 he was able, after much difficulty and delay, to purchase the concession on a small marble quarry from the Carrara city authorities. As a quarry owner, Ugo Mazzucchelli's principal activities until 1943 involved excavating, processing and trading blocks of marble. The second half of 1942 was a time of military setbacks for Italy and its allies, both on account of the appearance of large numbers of Anglo-American forces in North Africa and because of the destruction of German armies at Stalingrad. In the Balkans and in Italy's African colonies, the news was less dramatic, but there was an absence of glorious military victories by Italian armies and their German allies: "collaboration on the ground" between the two armies was often far from smooth. The war was becoming unpopular with mainstream opinion, and during 1943, discussions began among anti-fascist about possible ways forward. Mazzucchelli retained links with comrades, but initially remained on the sidelines of the discussions, which may explain why at this stage he was still left alone by the security services. Later, during the summer of that year. a meeting was held at Mazzucchelli's home in the city's San Ceccardo quarter at which a "Citizens' Committee" ("Comitato civico") was established. That was followed by a succession of further initiatives over the next few weeks which, taken together, amounted to the formation of a local branch of what was launched in September 1943 as the "National Liberation Committee" ("Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale" / CLN). Additionally, Mazzucchelli was now welcoming various military deserters and others sought by the authorities to the "Lorano 2" quarry, over which he seems by this stage to have had some level of control. The place was hard to find and harder to reach, except by foot, which made it a suitable place for hiding men and for storing the weapons which comrades were by this time beginning to gather.
Anti-fascist resistance In the city News came through of Italy's military capitulation early in September 1943. During September and October 1943, across Italy, small anti-fascist armed groups were forming: these would form the nuclei of the first partisan units. Carrara anarchists, driven in part by the constant encouragement and inspiration coming from Romulado Del Papa and Onofrio Lodovici, were among the first to establish these armed groups. Importantly, they were also able to provide practical logistical support for the emerging CLN, which frequently convened in the so-called "Buco" (loosely, "[underground] hole") alongside the via Beccheria, which was virtually on a level with the little Carriona River, flowing in a channel round the centre of Carrara. The meeting location had numerous escape points, including a series of carefully concealed doorways installed by the anarchists.
On 8 September 1943, Mazzucchelli launched a little "flying patrol" ("Pattuglia volante") which developed into the "Mazzucchelli unit". Members at launch were Ugo Mazzucchelli, his sons Alvaro and Carlo, and the colourful Carrara anarchist Romualdo Del Papa. A few days after launch, acting in response to urgent rumours of German army plans to take over the facility from their Italian "allies" following the signing of the armistice on 3 September, the "flying patrol" linked up with other local groups to lead a successful assault on the Dogali barracks. The anti-fascist fighters succeeded in requisitioning the munitions that were stored at the barracks and set about urging the elite Alpini troops accommodated there to desert the government side and join the partisans. It was the first of many such missions. The weapons and those comrades persuaded to abandon their army posts were taken away to the relative safety of what would become known as the partisan mountain hide-out at the "Lorano 2" quarry.
In the mountains