Pier Amato Perretta
Pier Amato Perretta , originally Pietro Amato (born February 24, 1885 in Laurenzana , † November 15, 1944 in Milan ) was an Italian judge, anti-fascist and partisan.
Origin, family and occupation before the First World War
He came from a family that had supported the Italian unification movement in the 19th century, the Risorgimento , his father Fortunato Perretta had participated in the Battle of Volturno under Garibaldi , and his mother Vincenzina Romano had been active in the Carbonari movement.
He began to study law in Naples and graduated with honors on December 7, 1906. Initially employed as an auditor at the Court of Appeal in Naples, he was appointed judge there in April 1910.
In the same year he married Gemma De Feo , who came from a family of lawyers, from whom four children emerged: Lucio Vero (Naples 1912), Fortunato Renato Libero Austero ( Locorotondo 1914), Vittoria Elena Antonietta ( Conselve 1916), Giusto Ultimo (Naples 1919).
At the beginning of his career he publicly advocated an independent judiciary. This led to several conflicts with his superiors and the local executive powers, as a result of which he changed offices several times, from Naples to Locorotondo and then to Conselve.
First World War
On March 15, 1915 he was drafted into the 8th Bersaglieri Regiment in Verona and was stationed on the Cadore Front until June 13, 1917 after the Italian entry into World War I. Due to illness, he left the front unit and worked as a judge and military lawyer from October 1917 until the end of the war. He received several awards for his war effort.
Between the world wars
In 1919 he worked as a judge at the Maritime Court in Naples, in February 1921 he was assigned to the court in Como, where he worked and lived until his death.
After the fascists came to power in 1922, he opposed the new rulers. He published several articles in anti-fascist and socialist periodicals advocating the right to freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary. The local prefect and the Lombard judges' association informed the fascist justice minister Alfredo Rocco and in 1925 disciplinary proceedings were opened against him, which on May 22, 1925 led to a transfer to the court in Lanciano . Rationale: He is a disruptor of the balance within the realms of power .
He did not take up his duties there, appealed to the king and forbade the Minister of Justice to intervene in the proceedings, without success. The appeal was denied on December 28, 1925. Perretta gave up, quit his job and opened a law firm in Como. On November 1, 1926, after Anteo Zamboni's failed assassination attempt on Mussolini, vengeful fascists devastated his office, he was arrested for his anti-fascist attitude, which was classified as dangerous to public order, and spent two years in his southern Italian birthplace in Basilicata banished. His lawsuit against it was dismissed, but the banishment was converted into a restrictive exit restriction with a notification obligation that lasted until 1929. Under difficulties, constantly harassed by the fascist authorities, he managed to continue working as a lawyer in Como until he was expelled from the bar in 1936 and he could no longer practice as a lawyer.
He switched to entrepreneurial activities, dealing with the industrial manufacture of textile fibers and even setting up his own production facilities.
Second World War until Mussolini was deposed in 1943
When Italy entered World War II in 1940, his sons were called up: Giusto was captured by the British in Sidi Barrani in December 1940 , Fortunato fell on the Greek-Albanian front in 1942, and Lucio was forced to work in Germany in 1943 as a military intern of the German occupying forces deported. Perretta failed with his industrial projects.
Resistance and death
After Mussolini's arrest on July 25, 1943, liberals, socialists and Catholics founded the secret Lega insurrezionale Italia Libera in Como on the initiative of Perretta , the uprising league of Free Italy, in order to promote liberation from fascism and help shape change in the resulting power vacuum.
On the day of the Cassibile armistice between Italy and the Allies, on September 8, 1943, he gave a speech in Como at an anti-fascist demonstration which then went to the prefecture to demand the surrender of the arms, without success.
The German invasion took place immediately, on September 12, 1943 the Wehrmacht arrived in Como and closed the border with Switzerland, the fascists stayed or were back in power, Perretta had to go into hiding.
He fled and hid with his wife and daughter with friends in Tuscany. In February 1944 he went to Milan and joined the Voluntary Corps of Freedom, the Corpo volontari della libertà (CVL), a movement recognized by the National Liberation Committee, the Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale (CLN), which promotes armed partisan struggle in northern Italy Resistancea , against the German occupation and the Italian fascists. In the CVL, he took on central tasks for the province of Como: coordinating the resistance, obtaining funds and weapons, recruiting new partisans. At the same time he joined the communist party, the ( KPI ).
He was denounced, his whereabouts were revealed and on the evening of November 13, 1944, black shirts and SS men broke into his hiding place in Viale Lombardia in Milan, he was shot trying to escape, and two days later he died in the Niguarda hospital at 7 O'clock in the morning from the consequences of his injury.
Memorial sites and memories
- Guisto Perretta (1919–2008), his son, came back to Como after the war and was involved in coming to terms with fascism, commemorating and researching the resistance; founded the Comer Resistance Institute in 1977, was its director until 1994 and president until 1997; Author of numerous local history studies on fascism and resistance.
- Name of the Resistance Institute in Como: Istituto di Storia Contemporanea "Pier Amato Perretta" (ISC), founded in 1977; collects all sources, remains and secondary literature on Perretta in the Fondo Perretta; researches and publishes primarily on resistance and fascism in Lombardy.
- Memorial plaque placed in 1976 in the lobby of the new courthouse ( Palazzo di Giustizia , built in 1968) in Como, Via Vincenzo Spallino; see literature Fabio Cani.
- Commemorative plaque on the wall of the house in Piazza Pietro Perretta , in Como, attached in 1955 with a text by the writer Libero Bigiaretti : Andava per le case / a svegliare nell'uomo / la coscienza dell'uomo / Viveva braccato dai / fascisti perché voleva / la lotta che conduce alla pace / per questo / fu ucciso a tradimento / ed ora vive in milioni / di uomini. He went to the houses / to awaken in man / the conscience of man / he lived, hunted by the / fascists, because he wanted / the struggle that leads to peace / that is why / he was viciously killed / and now he lives further in millions / of people , see literature Fabio Cani.
- Memorial plaque with a quote from one of his letters at the monument to the European resistance Monumento alla Resistenza europea : Questa tremenda esperienza avrà giovato a qualche cosa? S'impone una rieducazione profonda e costante, altrimenti nemmeno questa lezione servirà. Is this horrific experience going to be of any use? Deep and constant re-education is required, otherwise this lesson will also be of no avail.
- Commemorative plaque on the Como Partisan Monument , Monumento ai caduti della Resistenza , in the Monumental Cemetery in Como, Cimitero Monumentale di Como , with the heading: Garibaldino Martire per la libertà, Garibaldin Martyrs for Freedom ; see literature Fabio Cani.
literature
Publications of the Resistance Institute ISC in Como:
- Fabio Cani: Memoria resistente, Parole immagini e luoghi della Resistenza italiana europea in provincia di Como , ed. ISC, Como 2012, page 14: Partisan memorial Monumentalfriedhof, page 28: Memorial plaques in Piazza Perretta and courthouse, readable online on the website calameo.com ; detailed descriptions with pictures.
- Raffaella Bianchi, Riva-Elisabetta D'Amico, Matteo Dominioni: Pier Amato Perretta, un uomo in difesa della libertà , ed. ISC, Como 2005; Biography with pictures and sources.
- Giusto Perretta: Vita e morte di un giudice antifascista ... per futura memoria dell'uomo e del carattere di lui . Testo manoscritto di cui si conservano le bozze in ISC, Fondo Perretta, doc. 392; unpublished manuscript with a selection of Perretta's writings in the archives of the ISC.
- Guisto Perretta, Gerardo Santoni: L'antifascismo nel comasco 1919-1943 , ed. ISC, Como 1997.
Web links
- Detailed description of the legal disputes surrounding his judicial activity on the website questionegiustizia.it
- Short biography on the website Associazione Nazionale Partigiani d'Italia - anpi.it
Notes and individual references
- ↑ Perturbatore degli equilibri all'interno dei corridoi del potere , from Raffaella Bianchi p. 22, see literature.
- ^ Giuseppe Calzati: Pier Amato Perretta. Una vita per la libertà. In: questionegiustizia.it. September 18, 2018, accessed May 20, 2020 (Italian).
- ^ That means: a follower of Garibaldi ; in the figurative sense a partisan, a freedom fighter.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Perretta, Pier Amato |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Amato, Pietro (real first name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Italian judge, anti-fascist and partisan |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 24, 1885 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Laurenzana |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 15, 1944 |
| Place of death | Milan |