Page 105 - General Giuseppe GARIBALDI - english version

THE 1849 CAMPAIGN 103

The «Unione» regiment garrisoned the threatened stretch of walls, but
perhaps the troops were very tired from the fight they had sustained for the
past two weeks or perhaps they relied too much on the watch of their sen-
tries, they were completely taken by surprise. Around 11pm, Lieutenant
Colonel Rossi, while completing his rounds on the rampart n 6, was sudden-
ly caught by some French soldiers: his choked alarm was answered by only
one sentry: the others, after shooting some gunshots in the dark, retreated in
disorder towards Barberini house and San Cosimato, where they were easily
surrounded and overwhelmed.
Great was the consternation of Rome, when, at daybreak, it was clear that
the enemy was inside the walls; the idea of a betrayal was also rumoured.
Mazzini and General Roselli wanted to call immediately the people to the
reconquest and to launch soldiers and citizens against the walls but this time
they were opposed by that same Garibaldi who had always been inclined to
undertake any brave deed.
The general, instead of trying an exploit that he judged to be inevitably
destined to failure, expressed the opinion that the second line formed by the
ancient Aurelian walls had to be immediately reinforced; and he remained
firm in this intention also when Mazzini had the bells ring the alarm and
addressed the general with very excited words.
From the hill dominated by the Savorelli house and where in times past
stood Anco Marzio’s Arx Janiculensis, the walls that Emperor Aurelianus had
built to defend the city against the barbarian hordes pressing to finish off the
dying empire descended as far as Trastevere. Garibaldi wanted these walls to
be the last bastions for the defence of the Roman Republic; strongholds of
the new line had to be the Savorelli lodge, where Manara was with his
Bersaglieri and part of the Italian Legion, and Villa Spada, occupied by Sacchi
with another cohort of that same legion. The Merluzzo bastion, on the walls
of Urban VIII, was occupied as outpost; and the Vascello remained the very
advanced and glorious bulwark where Giacomo Medici, fearless although
surrounded by smoke and dust, stood right among the ruins. From the
esplanade in front of San Pietro in Montorio the few surviving batteries
launched their last shots.
On that same day of the 22 nd , an attack was attempted from Villa Spada
against the Barberini house, but after a raging fight in its yard and rooms, the
two companies of Medici’s legion who had succeeded in penetrating inside