Il Duce and His Women

by Roberto Olla

  “What do you think caused the explosion?” he asked.

  “The mortar’s barrel was overheated.”

  “Yes, perhaps it had been pulled too quickly,” the King added.

  Then, changing the subject, he said:

  “Do you remember I came to visit you six months ago when you were in the hospital in Cividale?”

  “I remember it very well – I was being kept in hospital for observation—”

  “And now,” the King interrupted, “after so many brave deeds, you’ve been wounded.”

  A short silence followed. Everyone looked at the valiant soldier who had led his men under Austrian fire the better to defeat the enemy and had fallen in the attempt, just as heroically as the soldier in the trenches who falls to a sudden enemy charge.

  The King continued.

  “The other day, at Debeli, General M. spoke very highly of you to me…”

  “I’ve always tried to do my duty, obeying orders, like any other soldier. The general has been very good to me.”

  “That’s the man, Mussolini!” the King interjected. “Try to be patient and put up with not being able to move and the pain.”

  “Thank you, Your Majesty.”

  The King rose and went to visit other wounded patients.18

  Margherita Sarfatti went to town embroidering this episode of Mussolini’s fortitude in constructing the myth of the Duce in her biography Dux. She wrote that when the surgeon’s scalpel made the first incision, Mussolini clenched his jaws and cursed through his teeth. The sight of the operating theatre seemed to energize rather than depress him. In depicting her lover’s stoical and detached reaction, Sarfatti uses a feminine analogy: “Ask a young woman, two hours after she’s given birth to her first child, to describe the pain. Her tired smile will tell you that she can hardly remember what it was like. In common parlance, the pains of childbirth are called ‘the pains soonest forgotten’: to sufferings like these it can do nothing to alleviate, nature induces a kind of stupefaction resembling indifference and a state of oblivion – which works like an anaesthetic. Experience belongs to the spirit; it is not the mechanical product of old age.”19

  While he was at the front Mussolini was elevated to the rank of corporal – not an especially remarkable promotion, but Sarfatti exalts the official reasons given for the recognition: Mussolini had shown the true fighting spirit of the Bersaglieri, had stayed cool-headed under fire, had proudly shed his blood in the battle for Trieste.

  A photograph had been published in Domenica del corriere showing the Austrian destruction of a military hospital which the magazine identified as the one where Mussolini had been taken – his presence there was justification enough for the Austrians to bombard the place. Sarfatti describes in detail the inferno of falling bombs, the cries of pain and terror, the thick clouds of smoke and the wounded bodies rolling down the stairs; she adds the picture of Mussolini, in the silent twilit aftermath of the attack, still in his bed since his wounds meant he could not be carried, surrounded by doctors, the hospital chaplain and the nurses.

  Sarfatti was a skilful verbal painter, but trying to describe what was going on in Mussolini’s private life during this period would be beyond even her capabilities. Ida Irene Dalser had made a statement to the police that she had sold her beauty salon in order to raise funds in support of Mussolini’s new undertaking, Il Popolo d’Italia. A son had been born from their relationship: Benito Albino, on 11th November 1915 in the maternity hospital in Via della Commenda in Milan. Thus the baby had been conceived in February 1915, at the time when Mussolini had become the spokesman for all those on the left who supported the campaign for Italy’s intervention in the war and the circulation of Il Popolo d’Italia was increasing daily. Ida Dalser must have had a special attraction for him. His sister Edvige wrote: “I think he liked her, because although she was older than he was and was not particularly good-looking she gave him a son. That said, what attracted my brother to certain women – that blend in their characters of insouciance and daring which I’ve tried to analyse in writing – remains a mystery to me.”20

  The day after his son was born, Mussolini was withdrawn from the intensive training course for officers and sent back to the trenches. It can certainly be assumed he had other things on his mind that day: he was under pressure and not only because he had to fight. In December 1915 he was taken to a hospital in Treviglio for suspected paratyphoid and associated jaundice; his commanding officer sent a telegram with the news to “Signora Ida Dalser Mussolini”, the mother of his son. Rachele too, as the mother of his daughter, although not yet his wife, was informed. She always tried to keep a watchful eye on Mussolini’s various mistresses; at this time she regarded his relationship with Dalser as particularly threatening, while she was less concerned about Sarfatti. In her memoirs she writes that up to 1918 she was certain that there was nothing going on between Sarfatti and Mussolini, although it’s not clear what her conviction was based on. “Nothing going on” might conceal a number of casual sexual encounters, which nevertheless Rachele chose to ignore as nothing serious.

  Ida Dalser was different, however, and it was a kind of proof that she represented a serious threat when she turned up suddenly one day at the front door when Mussolini was away in Genoa. “I thought her ugly, older than me, and wearing too much make-up. She wouldn’t tell me her name, but claimed to know all about our life together, what my husband did, and so on. I was taken aback by her audacity. She even had the impertinence to ask Edda if her father was kind to her and if he got on well with me!”21

  When told about the visit, Mussolini reacted with his usual cynicism. He freely admitted that he and Dalser had been lovers, and dismissed her by describing her as a crazy Austrian woman. There was some justification for his description: Ida Dalser had once set fire to a room in the Hotel Milano in a fit of hysteria. It was 15th November 1914, the day the first issue of Il Popolo d’Italia had come out. Seeing it on sale at the news-stands exacerbated Dalser’s fury at having been exploited and then abandoned by Mussolini. The fire was put out and the damage assessed and a police investigation was started. One day two policemen called at Rachele’s house; she was out shopping, Mussolini was away in the war, but Rachele’s mother, who was still living with them, opened the door. The two police officers announced that they had been ordered to sequester the family’s belongings. It was only when she went to the police station that Rachele understood the situation. When the policemen had asked her if she was the Signora Mussolini, she automatically said she was. Then one of the officers said in that case it was clear she was guilty, since the hotel managers had accused the Signora Mussolini of setting fire to one of their rooms. It took a while to sort things out. Rachele had to prove that she had never set foot inside the Hotel Milano. Finally, by comparing statements taken from witnesses, it became clear that the person guilty of arson was another Signora Mussolini.

  Rachele immediately realized there was no time to lose. She set off to find Mussolini. On 17th December they were officially married.

  As good socialists we decided to get married with a civil ceremony only. It was a very simple affair and took place in a room in the Treviglio hospital. Benito was in bed, recovering from paratyphoid but still unable to get up because of jaundice. He had a woollen beret pushed down on his nose and he was unshaven. He cracked jokes with the friends who had accompanied me on the journey from Milan, but it was obvious he was nervous. When the moment came for him to say “Yes”, he said it, joyfully, in a loud clear voice. When my turn came, I at first didn’t reply, pretending to be lost in thought, but watching Benito from the corner of my eye. When the presiding officer repeated his question, I remained silent. Benito had raised his head and was looking at me in amazement. At the third attempt I finally and joyfully said “Yes”. He gave a sigh of relief and sank back on the pillow as if having to wait for my reply had been too much for him.22

  There may have been other reasons, apart from Rachele’s silence before
she said “Yes”, for Mussolini’s suddenly being overcome: he was weakened with jaundice, she had told him she was pregnant again (with Vittorio, their first son) and, possibly, he had realized that he had just committed bigamy. The accusation has never been proved with documentary evidence. We know that when he was wounded during the troop exercises in February 1917, Ida Irene Dalser came to visit him in hospital and, to gain entry to the ward, showed a document proving she was his wife. Then Rachele arrived and all hell broke loose. The two women at first ignored each other, but when they realized they were both claiming to be Mussolini’s wife, they rushed up to his bed, each shouting out that she and only she had the right to stay by his bedside. “The other soldiers in the ward were highly amused. Then something in me snapped and I threw myself at her. I even managed to put my hands round her neck and started to throttle her. Benito, all bandaged up in bed like a mummy and unable to move, made vain attempts to stop us. He even threw himself down from the bed. Luckily some doctors and nurses intervened before I strangled her. She fled away while I burst into tears.”23

  Ida Dalser continued to maintain she was Mussolini’s legally recognized wife for the rest of her short unhappy life; she declared that if she had no official documents to prove it, it was because once he had become the country’s leader he had had all the evidence destroyed. One document survives in the archives: a certificate signed by the mayor of Milan testifying that the family of Benito Mussolini, on military service, was composed of “his wife Dalser, Ida and one child (male)”. This certificate gave Dalser the right to a financial support consisting in an initial payment of seven lire and seventy cents, followed by two lire forty-five cents on every following Monday.

  According to Alfredo Pieroni, who has done some careful research into the question, Mussolini “was aware that he was leaving a pregnant woman on her own without any resources. The document is not necessarily a lie told for the sake of officialdom. It is possible that soldiers were given the possibility of indicating the name of a woman who was pregnant by them and whom they had not been able to marry before being called up for military service. Whatever the significance of the document, no such certificate was ever drawn up for Rachele.”24

  We can add that Mussolini was also aware he’d taken all Dalser’s financial resources to pay for the launch of Il Popolo d’Italia. While Mussolini was away at the front, the acting editor-in-chief, Manlio Morgagni, had instructions to give five hundred lire from the newspaper’s funds every month to Rachele. There was only one solution for Ida Dalser, left to survive on two and a half lire every week: to force Mussolini into a binding agreement whereby he would provide support for their son. There were lots of letters between them she could show, but she must also have had other arguments that “clinched” the matter, since she succeeded in securing a commitment from the editor-in-chief-cum-soldier.

  On 22nd December 1916 Mussolini obtained permission to take a long period of sick leave, until 16th January. A few days before he was due to return to his regiment, on 11th January, Dalser got him to sign an official document, drawn up by a notary, Vittorio Buffoni, acknowledging Benito Albino as his son, in the offices in Via Passarella of a Milanese lawyer, Guido Gatti. The document was witnessed by Carlo Olivini from Brescia and Irma Marcosanti from Viareggio.

  Despite having to deal with this complicated situation, Mussolini was still able to use the period of sick leave to pursue other women. It was probably while he was in Milan on this occasion that he met a twenty-three-year-old woman who would go on to become one of his longer-lasting mistresses. Alice De Fonseca Pallottelli was intelligent, cultivated, beautiful, fascinating, high-spirited and, with the typical Florentine wit she had inherited from her family, amusing. She had lived in London, could speak English fluently and was called “l’inglese”. A police dossier on her stated, but only on the evidence of hearsay and anonymous letters, that her origins had been modest and that she’d started out in life employed as a chambermaid by a wealthy foreigner. In 1916 she was travelling throughout Europe with her husband, who had a well-paid job as the agent for one of the leading piano virtuosi of the period, the Russian Vladimir de Pachmann. From comparing the information we have, it is also possible that she and Mussolini met not during his period of sick leave but while he was on active service, but there’s no firm evidence either way. In 1917 Alice gave birth to a son, Virgilio, who as an adult would become one of the members of Mussolini’s inner circle, the associates he trusted most. She also had two other children, Duilio and Adua, and, according to Claretta Petacci, claimed that Mussolini was their father. Even if their relationship did begin in 1916, it remained secret and only became known after Mussolini had seized power. On 2nd April 1938 Petacci called at the elegant villa belonging to the Pallottelli family on Via Nomentana in Rome and found out Mussolini was inside and that his liaison with Alice Pallottelli was continuing. On the following day she angrily told him what she had found out and asked him to justify himself, transcribing his reply in her diary: “You must be patient with me, I won’t make you suffer any more. I’m an animal. She wrote to me asking me to help her and her husband, since he had been arrested. So I brought her 5,000 lire. Yes, it’s true, I could have sent her the money. But she’s also got two children she says are mine…” “Or her husband’s,” Petacci replies angrily. In the end, as always, he simply admits to having had intercourse with her: “It was very quick. She’s past it nowadays, you know.”25

  Some months later, the topic returns in Petacci’s diary, since Mussolini has had other meetings with this long-standing mistress. “Pallottelli has written to me saying she’s got no money, she doesn’t know what to do, and asking me for such a small sum that I think she must really be on the breadline. Her husband’s left her in bad circumstances.” Petacci wanted to eliminate all her rivals in Mussolini’s bed, starting with the longest surviving mistresses, with whom naturally he felt more at ease sexually. The lovers who could play on his affections by claiming he was the father of their children were the most threatening. Driven into a corner by Petacci, on 29th October 1938 Mussolini owns up: “Yes, it’s true. I called Pallottelli, yesterday or the other day, to find out if she was back in Rome. She told me her son Duilio was very ill, with amoebiasis. He’ll have to go into hospital. She told me he’s at school while Adua is still very pretty and is at home. I think she’s got real problems, but she didn’t want to tell me about them. She’s really at the end of her tether, the poor woman. The children are mine – it’s true.”26

  So, according to what Petacci writes in her diary, Mussolini was convinced he was the father of Alice De Fonseca Pallottelli’s children. There was no actual proof, but he tells Petacci a small detail he somehow remembers from one occasion he made love to the beautiful inglese: “I wanted to see the children that she says are mine. It’s true I remember something about Duilio: when she had her orgasm she gripped my arms tightly. A month later she told me she was pregnant. It was April, so it could be true. In any case, the poor woman now is really down-at-heel.”27

  Ida Irene Dalser, on the other hand, despite being the only woman who got Mussolini to acknowledge paternity of her son, never became one of his habitual mistresses and never enjoyed the advantages which came from belonging to the circle of the women with whom he enjoyed sexual relations. She was left burnt out by her own passion for the man. He demoted her to the status of former lover and, partly because of the war and his own financial problems, both at home and with the newspaper, failed to send her the sums they had agreed for the maintenance of their son Benito Albino.

  On 15th February 1916 he was once again far away from Milan and his giddy womanizing, on the Italian battle lines where, however, he was putting his pen to more use than his bayonet. Together with the rest of his Bersaglieri regiment he was on the march through a small Slovenian town which had been occupied by Italian forces, Caporetto – a name that would leave an indelible mark on Italian history the following year. Ida Irene Dalser employed the lawyer Bortol
o Federici to take on her case. Edvige Mussolini wrote to her brother to tell him that the documents had now been sent to the magistrates and to urge him to appoint his own lawyer to represent him. He replied to her on 16th August 1916: “My dearest Edvige, I have received your letter. I too believe that, for the time being, I need to follow my lawyer’s advice. I hope there won’t be any repeat of this: if there is we’ll need to act decisively.”28

  On 19th May 1916 the Milan magistrates had charged Mussolini with failing to fulfil the undertakings he had agreed before the notary; he was bound to pay Dalser the monthly sum of two hundred lire, even though the court denied granting her the status of “victim of moral coercion” – that, in other words, she had been seduced and abandoned. Then as now the time such conflicts took to go through the legal system was very different from that required to meet the urgent needs of the people actually affected by the problems. Ida Dalser only received the first monthly contribution from Mussolini nearly a year after the court case, as we know from a letter he wrote to his sister on 18th February 1917, in which he tells her that Dalser had been to his lawyer’s office to collect the money and to promise to stop harassing him. There then followed a period of calm, when it seemed that the mother of the Duce’s first-born son had indeed decided to leave him alone. But getting the agreed monthly sums proved increasingly difficult: a new storm loomed on the horizon.

  Chapter 10

  A Corpse in the Naviglio Canal

  After he’d delivered the morning’s mail and newspapers to the various offices, the office boy was dozing by the stove. The cleaner was dusting the desks, careful not to move a single sheet of paper as she did so. Heaps of brown files, articles and short pieces, books precariously piled up, cuttings the size of postage stamps, bundles of proofs, everything was in unchangeable, untouchable order. When she’d finished her dusting, the cleaning woman began to wipe the worn floor tiles in the long corridor with a wet cloth; the office boy just about managed to lift his feet to let her clean round the stove before getting back to enjoying the warmth and resuming his nap. As in all newspaper offices, the staff worked until late at night and didn’t start coming in until the middle of the morning. Outside the city was bustling, the school day had started an hour ago, you could hear a woman shouting from the street below. One of the journalists arrived, gave a curt greeting to the cleaner, tiptoed near the skirting to avoid dirtying the tiles she had just washed. It was warm in the office; he took off his overcoat and threw it over his chair. Warm?… He gave a sudden shout which made the office boy jump and rushed to the stove. Burning his fingers, he managed to turn it off and open it. It was full of hand grenades. Holding the wet cloth so he didn’t burn himself again, he gently lifted each grenade out one by one and placed them on the chief editor’s desk.