The partisan chiefs in the kingdom of Naples were brigands, pure and
simple, most of whom had either been long wanted by the police, or had
already suffered in prison for their crimes. They organised their
troops on the strict principles of brigand bands, and proposed to them
the same object: pillage. 'Lieut-General' Chiavone who had a mania for
imitating Garibaldi, was the least bad among them; unlike his
prototype, he did not like being under fire, but neither did he care
to spill innocent blood. What, however, can be said for Pilone,
'commander of His Majesty's forces' on Vesuvius; for Ninco Nanco,
Bianco dei Bianchi, Tardio, Palma; for Carusso, who cut the throats of
thirteen out of fourteen labourers and told the one left to go and
tell the tale; for the brothers La Gala, who roasted and ate a priest?
It was said that no horror committed during the Indian Mutiny was here
without a parallel.
Of respectable Neapolitans who held responsible posts under the late
_régime_ not one joined the bands, but they contained French, Austrian
and Belgian officers, and one Prussian. A nephew of Mgr. de Mérode,
the young Marquis de Trazégnies, was with Chiavone; the Carlist, Josè
Borjès, was with a scoundrel named Crocco. Borjès' case is a hard one.
He had been made to believe in the genuine character of the
insurrection and thought that he was giving his sword to an honourable
cause. The melancholy disillusion can be traced in the pages of a
note-book which he kept from day to day, and which fell into the hands
of the Italians when he was captured. The brief entries show a poetic
mind; he observes the fertile soil, deploring, only, that it is not
better cultivated; he admires the smiling valleys and the magnificent
woods whose kings of the forest show no mark of the centuries that
passed over their fresh verdure. At first Borjès was pleased with the
peasants who came to him, but as they were few, he was obliged to join
Crocco's large band, and he now began to see, with horror, what kind
of associates he had fallen amongst. He had no authority; the brigands
laughed at his rebukes; never in his life, he writes, had he come
across such thieves. Before the enemy they ran away like a flock of
sheep, but when it was safe to do so, they murdered both men and
women. In desperation, Borjès resolved to try and get to Rome, that he
might lay the whole truth before the King, but after suffering many
hardships, he was taken with a few others close to the Papal frontier
and was immediately shot. He died bravely, chanting a Spanish litany.
Borjès' journal notes the opposition of all classes, except the very
poorest and most ignorant. Was it to be believed, therefore, that this
mountain warfare, however long drawn out, could alter one iota the
course of events? If Francis II. supposed the insurrection to be the
work of a virtuous peasantry, why did he allow them to rush to their
destruction?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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