Stories of war and displaced persons

Grandma Norina describes the war

On 27 January 1945, the allies entered the concentration camp in Auschwitz, Poland, freeing the last prisoners. That date has become a symbol of the end of the Holocaust and for that, since 2000, Italy has chosen to celebrate on Jan. 27th, Memorial Day to remember the war and in this way build a future of peace.

The first memories. It was the Day of San Antonio, 17 January 1944, when the allies began bombing Comeana with planes. “I lived in Chioccioli,
roughly where I do now,” says Norina. The bombs fell fortunately only on the fields: one near the church, others into Ombrone. “Two women who were washing the clothes there, however, they took a great fright,” she adds. “But one boy died, hit by shrapnel after he got up on the river bank. He had seen the airplanes and wanted to admire them”. There are no heroes or deportation in the story of Norina Cirri – she’s a bit tottery because of her old age but with two eyes still clear and alive: only a repetition of everyday gestures. But it is with her daily life (and the war a few kilometres and sometimes meters away) that we decided to remember the Memorial Day. With the stories of war she had to put up with and “always unintelligent bombs” as IDPs in Chechnya or Afghanistan today, or in Africa or Palestine.

Holy Mary of peace. In 1944 Norina was 27 years old, now she is 85.
Sitting on the chair she tells about the sirens of Nobel (a bullet factory) that went off whenever the American planes passed, about the stampede over the fields and about the flares that lit up at night. “When on June 11th the partisans blew up the wagons in Poggio alla Malva,” she tells, “the Americans were still far away. Then they arrived and stayed on the other side of the Arno. For Santa Maria’s sake they didn’t shoot – not even one cannon shot,” she notes. “But the next day it all began again.”

Running away from home. In the aftermath of the bombing of Sant’Antonio Norina took her son, who was less than three years old at that time, and went with her ​​husband Napolino to her sister Leda’s “villin delle stelle” (“cottage of the stars”) that was situated along the road that leads to Carmignano and was sheltered by the mountain.” If a bomb fell on the nearby Nobel (a hudge mine and gunpowder factory just beyond the Ombrone, hidden in the woods – ed.) staying in Chioccioli would have been dangerous,” she says. Fear drove many into basements or in shelters dug in the ground. They knew that war was coming closer and they had built them for that time. One of these was in via Volta, where still stands a tabernacle with a Madonna (perhaps an ex-voto). That of Norina was in the woods, dug into a hill, in what is now Via Tommaso Moro. These days there were only fields. In the centre there were “A lovely stream and a small bridge built by us. At first we only went to stay there during the day and slept by the shepherd’s in Colombaione,” she describes. “From the end of July we didn’t leave the place, not even for the night.” Sheltered by the side of a mountain, it was great against any stray cannonball of the allies on the other side of the Arno. Norina seems full of life. The anecdotes come one after another, sometimes they are sharp, sometimes vaguer. And the memories are accompanied inevitably by colours and scents. “The bread of the Germans,” she tells,” was black. Fortino, my father-in-law, took a piece of it that a group of Germans had left on a bench in the square. A very good bread soup came out of it.” There was a lot of hunger. “The bread of  the Americans on the other hand was very white,” she adds. “I don’t know what they put in there. ”

A cave for a home. Living in a shelter, not wide enough to lie down to sleep, but high enough to stand up, had certainly not been easy. The vault was covered with pine planks, but there were no doors. To get warm there was only sun. Norina’s son was the smallest: there were four other women who lived there with two men and a child. Next to them there was another shelter, “inhabited by Cincella, her daughters and many others”: more than ten people altogether. Two of them died and then there were also lice. “Sure, thinking about it now,” she ponders, “we have lived for over a month just like gypsies: no washing, sitting most of the day in a cave.”

A plane shot down. “The American reconnaissance aircraft, “The Stork”, passed every morning over Comeana,” explains Norina. “Buzzed and went slowly. And one day the Germans shot it down with the artillery in via Macia.” It fell to Artimino. “I still remember how happy the Germans were,” she pauses for a moment to help her niece to set the table. “My in-laws went with a cart and brought home a radiator of the plane. Copper and aluminium were valuable assets. One farmer took the engine.”

Tomatoes and lots of “farinata”. But what did you eat in the shelter? “Seasoned tomatoes and lots of farinatas,” Norina answers. Tomatoes grew on the near-by field: it was summer. We got the flour pounding the grain with a coffee grinder. It took almost a whole day.And to bake bread we had to go early in the morning to Santini, a farmer who lived near-by.” But they also ate sugar. “In the morning I prepared for my son Sergio a slice of bread with sugar wet in the water.” Norina doesn’t remember where they found sugar that was so difficult to get.”I had brought it from home,” she says. Luckily the ants never entered the jar. We got water from a spring of Pratesi, it was  a ten-minute walk away – right through the woods. “At the beginning they used the kitchen at her sister’s house to prepare the food. Then the risk of raids grew (especially dangerous for young people) and they made fire in the thicket, with tree leaves that became a perfect hood to prevent the column of smoke from rising too high, without the risk of being seen or bombed by the Americans.

The Return. “One day an American tank appeared to Poggio Secco. Then it’s true that the war is over, we said, and went home. “The building in Piazza Battisti, where nowadays there’s a photographer’s shop, was shot down by a cannon.” The Germans were firing from the square to the allies that hid themselves on the other side of the Arno,” says Norina. “Then they moved the cannon to the rear, lower than the street level.” The Americans retorted along the line of fire. The allies were shooting wherever there was movement. In Piazza Battisti the Germans had dug a trench in the road, in order to walk without being seen. “One day,” remembers Norina, “a lady hung out the laundry next to a hut at the “villin delle stelle”. The reconnaissance aircraft of the Americans thought it was a German camp and bombarded it. Luckily no one died. Even the shed, where we kept some household goods, a bit further from the shelter, was bombed.” Less fortunate were people in Poggio alla Malva, where there were more deaths. Even some of the houses near the church and pharmacy were destroyed, mined by the retreating Germans.” They did the same ​​in via Macia,” Norina remembers, “at the bridge to Mulino sull’Elzana and the bridge of Madonna to Nobel in via Stazione, which has never been rebuilt. “Back home Norina found other displaced people. And a bomb splinter stuck in a beam. The bike of Napolino was gone and also some sheets. “Police came to  collect complaints. For war damage there was a compensation, but some people took advantage of it.”

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