Page 130 - General Giuseppe GARIBALDI - english version

128 GENERAL GIUSEPPE GARIBALDI

with an attack the vanguard of Urban advancing from Como, and retreated
taking advantage of the momentary disarray. While the head of the mass of
the enemy proceeded in two columns on the road and a smaller column was
placed on the left to take the right flank of the defence from the rear and the
right, the artillery was pounding the barricades north of Varese, in Biumo
Inferiore and Biumo Superiore. The volunteers, that had precise orders to
fire only at fifty steps, and to use bayonets, waited still, with the calm of expe-
rienced soldiers. The two Austrian columns clashed with the troops of the
Medici regiment and the smaller column was attacked and pushed back by
Cosenz’ regiment, at the same time as lieutenant colonel Medici launched a
frontal bayonet counterattack with part of his men. The twofold attack in
the front and the flank disoriented the Austrian general who, thinking that
his forces were not sufficient to take Varese, at 7 o’ clock ordered a retreat.
While Medici, preceded by few hunters on horseback, went in pursuit to
Malnate, Garibaldi , who from a hillock of Biumo Superiore, had watched
all of the enemy’s moves, when he saw the enemy retreating, sent also the
Arduino regiment in their pursuit and reached at a gallop the troops of
Medici. Around 10 o’clock, a new bloody battle started near Malnate against
the enemy’s rearguards that, with some companies and two pieces, had taken
position on the hillocks of S. Salvatore. The Bixio Battalion, preceded by the
Genoese Carabinieri, attacked with courage but was pushed back, until the
troops of Medici, encouraged by the presence of the general, followed by the
son Menotti, impetuously attacked the imperials and, at about 12, pushed
them to a definitive retreat.
The difficulties of the ground, that offered good opportunities to the
enemy’s rearguards, and most of all the news that one of its detachments was
advancing toward Varese from north-east, made them decide not to push the
operation any further.
The Imperials that had attacked Varese had little more than 4000 rifles,
supported by 8 pieces, but they had been counterattacked and pushed back
by little more than 3000 volunteers, with no guns, who in this first feat of
arms fought with such audacity that, under the eye of their leader, Urban
believed that he had been attacked and forced to retreat by 6-7000 men.
The Hunters of the Alps had lost 85 men, 22 of which dead and one taken
prisoner: among the dead was the young Ernesto Cairoli, the first of the four
Cairoli brothers who died for their homeland. The Imperials lost 105 men,
and about thirty prisoners taken by the Garibaldians.