Bye bye, Il Duce. Thank you, cousin Paolo

My mother's birth name is Vigneri. Her roots are in Sicily, with the Vigneri, DeLuca, and Buccheri clans. We visited some relatives in Taormina almost 10 years ago and they pointed out one photo among many family photos on their living room wall. “That’s cousin Paolo. Surely you’ve heard of him?” We hadn’t, so they told us the story. On July 25, 1943 (76 years ago today), cousin Paolo, a captain in the carabinieri, headed a small cadre that arrested Benito Mussolini, on orders from King Vittorio Immanuel. When we got home, we did some research and, sure enough, Paolo Vigneri was the one who took the dictator into custody. Mussolini later escaped in a raid orchestrated by Hitler, but it was too late. The Axis had lost the war and in 1945 Mussolini met a very violent end at the hands of an angry mob.

There is a huge monument to Vittorio Immanuel in Rome. One can climb to the top of it for a commanding view of the city (which we did not realize when we were wandering around the piazza in front of the monument).

 Here's a song that talks about fate and how the dice sometimes seem loaded. Ray Bonneville is from Texas but records for Red House Records in St. Paul.