The Life of General Garibaldi: Translated from his private papers; with the history of his splendid exploits in Rome, Lombardy, Sicily and Naples, to the present time.Garibaldi, Giuseppe
History
The Life of General Garibaldi: Translated from his private papers; with the history of his splendid exploits in Rome, Lombardy, Sicily and Naples, to the present time.
Garibaldi, Giuseppe
Garibaldi, Giuseppe, 1807-1882
"I landed in Genoa from Boston some time in 1853, and wishing to see the
south of Italy, travelled till I came near to Viterbo, when I was
cautioned not to go to Rome; but I still persevered in my intention of
doing so, when I was arrested as not having a passport, and carried to
the Eternal City, where I was placed in the Carcere Nuova. Not satisfied
with the report I gave of myself, I was tortured for three months as
follows. My hands and arms were bound together, and then, by ropes tied
round the upper part of the arms, they were drawn back till my breast
protruded, and my bones sounded, 'crick, crick.' There was another
species of torture practised upon me, which was this: At night, whilst
sleeping, the door was secretly opened, and buckets of water were thrown
over my body. How I survived it I cannot tell; the keepers were
astonished, and said they never had such an instance; 'but you will
never get out alive,' I was told. I replied that I never expected to do
so, and prayed for the angel of death to come. The worst torture of all,
however, was the prison itself—a room into which a few rays of light
struggled from above, and the stench of which was as bad as death. For
three months I suffered thus, and then, without any reason assigned, was
taken from it and placed, always alone, in a room called 'Salon del
Preti,' a large airy room, and was well fed and well treated for
twenty-one months more. I was a prisoner of the Cardinal Secretary
Antonelli. About the middle of 1855 again, without any reason being
given, I was sent off to Naples, was placed first in the Vicaria and
afterward in San Francisco, in a small, close room, where I was detained
for four years and a half. I was questioned on several occasions, and at
last refused to answer, saying that my persecutors already knew what I
had to say, that I was unjustly and illegally confined, and nothing
could compel me to utter another word. On another occasion I was called
before Bianchini, the director of police, who interrogated me. I
appealed against my sufferings, and all the reply I received was, 'Va
bene, va bene,' from a Christian man to one suffering as I was, but my
invariable answer was, I will die first; never will I ask anything of
this government. When first I arrived here I had a little money, which
for a short time procured me better food than prison fare, and then by
degrees I sold my clothes. At last I sold my black bread to have a
little salt to sprinkle over my beans, and sometimes to procure some
incense to relieve the horrid stench of my prison. As for water for
purposes of cleanliness, it was never supplied me, and all that I could
do, was to dip one of my own rags in a jug of drinking water, and wash
some portions of my body. During the day I could repose, but at night I
was covered with black beetles, fleas, lice, and every conceivable
species of vermin. I expected death, and desired and prayed for it as a
relief, but it never came.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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