First the homage at the Altar of the Fatherland, in Rome together with the other major state officials. Then the arrival in San Severino Marche, a municipality awarded the gold medal for civil valor in 2022 by Sergio Mattarella himself. The head of state celebrates the 81st anniversary of the liberation by remembering the sacrifice of soldiers, partisans, civilians, women and priests who right here, in the Marche, they opposed the Nazi-fascist occupation and their collaborators after 8 September 1943. A crucial role was played by the region which was the scene of clashes and resistance. The Polish troops led by General Anders and the Italian Liberation Corps also lent a hand to the Marches. For this reason, the roots of the Italian Republic, born 80 years ago, are inextricably linked to the partisan struggle as a movement for freedom, democracy and peace.
«In San Severino Marche», explains the President of the Republic, «we commemorate April 25th, the date of the Liberation of our country. What moves us is not a formal celebratory feeling. Much less the claim of a history written in obedience to abstract ideological positions. What moves us is the love of our country.”
A love that animated «the soldiers left in disarrayin the absence of orders after 8 September 1943. The young people who fled the bans of the self-styled Italian Social Republic and who joined the partisan formations. The peasants who were torn from the land to be ordered to work on the so-called Gothic Line, Hitler’s last attempt to delay the defeat. The women, the families towards whom blind violence was unleashed, even in these areas. The priests murdered in retaliation, such as Don Enrico Pocognoni, Gold Medal for Civil Merit, parish priest of Braccano di Matelica. The Carabinieri who gave their lives, such as Deputy Brigadier Glorio Della Vecchia, Silver Medal for Military Valor, to whom the Carabinieri Barracks of San Severino was named, and Major Pasquale Infèlisi, Bronze Medal for Military Valor, to whom the Abruzzo and Molise Carabinieri Legion Barracks in Chieti is named.”
The warning comes while speaking in the theater named after Feronia. And Mattarella does not fail to underline that this is almost an inspiration because Feronia is the “Roman goddess of fertility and harvests, as well as – not a secondary character – depicted as a liberator from chains, protector of freedmen, the freed slaves because they too, like the harvests, finally came out into the light of the sun. A sort of goddess of freedom. That’s what Let’s celebrate April 25th: the feast of all Italians who love freedom”. A celebration that comes «from a land then crossed by a line that divided Italy, from the Adriatic to the Tyrrhenian Sea. Which divided Italians. A land marked by the destruction of war. From San Severino, we intend to underline – together with the character of our firm unity – our determination in the defense of our freedoms, our convinced openness to share, with other peoples, the values of justice and peace”.
«The events in these lands, with the decisive advance of the Allied troops, marked the reunification with free Italy of the central-northern provinces that had fallen under Hitler’s domination with his zealous fascist accomplices», underlines the President. «Even in this region, even here in San Severino, in Castel Raimondo, in Matelica, the Liberation anticipated the arrival of the allied troops, in July 1944. Just as the Marche was not exempt from the experience of “free zones”, of centers administered by partisan forces for more or less long periods, “Republics” modeled on principles unheard of in Italian history, embryonic examples of democratic life», he adds.
Mattarella also pays homage to Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa, Enrico Mattei, Sandro Pertini. «The Resistance», in fact, «was an experience that gave the Republic important personalities and ruling classes. Eminent figures had to make choices in these lands which, by impacting their lives, would, at the same time, impact that of Italy. The second lieutenant of the Carabinieri Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa, who operated in those years in San Benedetto del Tronto and in Porto D’Ascoli. A hero of the Republic. Enrico Mattei, protagonist of the economic independence and post-war development of the new Italy. His choice took place right nearby, in Matelica, to subsequently join the Command of the Freedom Volunteer Corps and, in this capacity, parade, together with other commanders, at the head of the victorious partisans on 5 May 1945 in Milan”.
AND «in the Marche, in the hinterland of Macerata, Sandro Pertini, the seventh president of our Republic, had the opportunity to operate after his escape from the Regina Coeli prison in Rome – accomplished together with Giuseppe Saragat, the fifth president of the Republic».
