Short as the time was, the havoc wrought was very considerable. Nearer
two than one hundred persons were injured in all. Of course the greater
number of these persons were not actually wounded, but crushed, or
stunned, or thrown down. There was no respect of persons in the use made
of their swords by the police. Three French officers of the 40th, who
were in plain clothes amongst the crowd, were cut down and severely
wounded. An Irish gentleman, the brother of the member for Fermanagh,
narrowly escaped a sabre-cut by dodging behind a pillar. The son of
Prince Piombino was pursued by a gendarme beneath the gateway of his own
palace, and only got off with his hat slit right in two. Persons were
hunted down by the soldiery even out of the Corso. One gentleman, an
Italian, was chased up the Via Condotti by a dragoon with his sword
drawn, and saved himself from a sabre-cut by taking refuge in a passage.
Some of the dragoons rode down the Via Ripetta, when they had come to the
top of the Corso, and cut down a woman who was passing by. As soon as
the Corso was cleared, the gendarmes went into the different cafes along
the street, and ordered all persons, who were found in them, to go home
at once. In one case an infirm old man, who could not make off fast
enough, had his face cut open by a sabre-blow; while the backs of the
gendarmes' swords were used plentifully to expedite the departure of the
cafe frequenters. The exact number of wounded it is of course impossible
to ascertain. Persons who received injuries were afraid to show
themselves, and still more to call attention to their injuries, for fear
of being arrested for disaffection and immured in prison. If I believed
the stories I heard on good authority and on most positive assurance, I
should put down the number of persons who died from wounds or injuries
received during the melee at from twelve to fifteen. Still, long
experience has led me to place very little reliance on any Roman story I
cannot test; and I am bound to say, I could not sift any one of these
stories to the bottom. On the other hand, this fact by no means causes
me to disbelieve that fatal injuries may have been received. The extreme
difficulty, if not impossibility, of obtaining true information on such a
point may be realized from the circumstance, that a government official
was, within my knowledge, dismissed from his post for merely visiting one
of the victims who had been wounded by the police. By all accounts, even
by that of the Papal partizans, the number of severe injuries inflicted
was very considerable; indeed it is impossible it should have been
otherwise, when one considers that along a street so crowded that the
carriages could only move at a foot's pace, the gendarmes on horse and
foot charged recklessly, cutting at every one they could reach. In my
statement, however, of the casualties, I have sought to assert, not what
I believe, but only what (as far as one can speak with certainty of what
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account