Enrico Martini

Enrico Martini (nom de guerre "Mauri") Mondovì, 29 January 1911 – Turkey, 19 September 1976) was an Italian soldier and partisan, an Alpini Major, founder of the 1 Group Alpine Divisions in the Italian Resistance, and a recipient of the Gold Medal of Military Valor.

Biography Upon leaving Liceo Classico, Martini entered the Modena Military Academy in 1929; after graduation he was assigned to the Alpini Corps where he started his officer career. In 1936 he participated in the Second Italo-Abyssinian War with 7th Reggimento Alpini of 5 Alpine Division Pusteria; during this campaign he received the Croce di Guerra for the gallantry demonstrated in the battle of Lake Ashenge. In April 1941 he was sent to North Africa where he remained until Spring 1943, taking part to the battles in Marmarica and in the Egyptian desert. He received three more awards for military valor and advanced to the rank of Maggiore (Major).

Resistance leader Repatriated in the spring of 1943, he was assigned to the Regio Esercito General Staff, where he stayed up till 8 September 1943, on which date he took part to the battle of Rome, embedded in a Grenadier unit.

Later, he traveled back to Piedmont to join units belonging to the Italian Fourth Army, so as to carry on the anti-German resistance.

He was captured by the Germans and interned in the Apuania concentration camp, from which he managed to escape and he reached his native province of Cuneo on 17 September.

A supporter of the Italian monarchy, he set up the first network of units from the valleys around Cuneo, in the Langhe, in the Monferrato: in twenty months of unstinting and merciless fighting against Nazi and Fascist forces, he raised 1 Gruppo Divisioni Alpine (1 Group Alpine Divisions) within C.V.L. which, at the time of the final uprising of 25 April 1945 consisted of nine partisan Divisions roughly numbering ten thousand men each. He largely contributed to the liberation of Turin, Asti, Alessandria, Alba, Bra, Mondovì, Ceva, Savona, after paying a toll of nine-hundred dead and one thousand wounded or mutilated to the cause of freedom.

Up to the end of the war, 1 Gruppo Divisioni Alpine earned eleven medals on the field, of which 3 Medals of Military Valor. The entire dossier of 1 Gruppo Divisioni Alpine is stored in the archive of the Piedmontese "Giorgio Agosti" Institute for the History of the Resistance and contemporary society.

Confrontation with the CLN "Mauri" even had some trouble in being recognized as a commander by the Cuneo provincial branch of the National Liberation Committee which did not deem him sufficiently well-known. "Mauri"'s reply was sharp: "... In fact, in twenty months of war waged on two thirds of that province, I haven't had the pleasure to know that a local CLN existed. But I do not bother to know today either. |Mauri, Con la Libertà e per la libertà, pag. 9 "

Postwar period At the end of the war he became a member of the Consulta Nazionale (National Council) as a representative of the Formazioni Autonome (non-political partisan units), and a strenuous supporter of the award of the Gold Medal of Military Valor to the city of Alba by means of a letter sent to the Piedmontese military commission, whereas the Silver medal had been officially proposed.

In 1947 he requested and obtained the transfer to the military reserve, leaving active Army service with the rank of Tenente colonnello (Lieutenant Colonel). He earned a degree in Law at the Università di Torino and became a company executive.

In 1971 he entered the Committees of Democratic Resistance, raised by fellow monarchist partisan Edgardo Sogno with "anti-communist" goals.

He died in a plane crash in Turkey on 19 September 1976.

Literature Johnny the Partisan (Il partigiano Johnny) by Beppe Fenoglio