Milan riots of 1853: history and remembrance

ABSTRACT

The article recounts the revolt that took place in Milan on 6 February 1853 and investigates its presence in the official memory of the city. The main figures in the rebellion were from Milan’s working class: while the movement was fomented by Mazzini, it was carried out independently by badly organized groups of workers; unlike the ‘Cinque Giornate’ of 1848, the upper classes were not involved. Barricades were erected and Austrian soldiers were killed, but order was promptly restored by the Austrians. The occupying forces arrested hundreds of people, executed sixteen working-class men and ordered the seizure of the goods of exiles who had left Lombardy after 1848. The article looks at how the events of 1853 were treated by historiography and local commemoration from unification to the present day. It discusses the meaning of the inclusion of that failed, impracticable uprising – a divisive one, involving as it did only figures from the lower classes – in the official justification of the city’s heroism, sanctioned in 1948 when Milan was awarded the gold medal for military valour.

RIASSUNTO

L’articolo rievoca i disordini avvenuti a Milano il 6 febbraio 1853, indagandone la presenza nella memoria ufficiale cittadina. La rivolta ebbe come protagonisti i ceti popolari milanesi; il moto fu fomentato da Mazzini, ma condotto in autonomia da gruppi male organizzati di popolani; i ceti superiori non furono coinvolti, diversamente che nelle Cinque giornate del 1848. Ci furono barricate e uccisioni di soldati austriaci, ma l’ordine fu prontamente ristabilito dagli austriaci, che arrestarono centinaia di persone, giustiziarono sedici popolani e disposero il sequestro dei beni degli esuli, che avevano lasciato la Lombardia dal 1849. L’articolo ripercorre la fortuna del 1853 nella storiografia e nelle commemorazioni cittadine dall’unità ai giorni nostri, interrogandosi sul senso dell’inclusione di quella rivolta velleitaria e fallimentare, divisiva perché aveva coinvolto solo elementi del popolo minuto, tra le motivazioni ufficiali dell’eroismo della città, sancite nel 1948 dal conferimento della medaglia d’oro al valore militare a Milano.

KEYWORDS:

• Milan
• 6 February 1853
• remembering the Risorgimento
• public history

PAROLE CHIAVE:

• Milano
• 6 febbraio 1853
• memoria del Risorgimento
• public history

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

¹ Those executed on 8 February were: Cesare Faccioli (waiter), Pietro Canevari (porter), the brothers Luigi and Camillo Piazza (carpenter and typographer), Alessandro Silva (hat maker), Bonaventura Broggini (shop boy). On 10 February: Antonio Cavallotti (carpenter), Alessandro Scannini (private teacher), Benedetto Diotti (apprentice carpenter), Giuseppe Monti (apprentice carpenter), Luigi Brigatti (small-scale liquor trader). On 14 February: Gerolamo Saporiti (worker), Siro Taddei (milkman). On 17 February: Angelo Galimberti (shoemaker), Angelo Bissi (porter), Pietro Colla (blacksmith).

² The medal was awarded by a decree from the President of the Republic on 15 March 1948, after a proposal by the Ministry of Defence and the opinion of a military commission, as established by the 1932 law. My request for access to the documents of the commission of validation was not successful. The official site: https://www.quirinale.it/onorificenze/ricerca/insegna/20.

³ Images regarding 6 February made after 1861, in the Raccolta delle Stampe Adalberto Sartori, a private collection: https://raccoltastampesartori.it/la-raccolta.

⁴ The plaque reads: Tolte dall’oblio / dell’antica inonorata sepoltura / le ossa dei martiri / del 6 febbraio 1853 / in questo avello compose / memore e reverente / il popolo di Milano / addì 6 febbraio 1877, “Rescued from oblivion / of the ancient dishonourable burial / let the bones of the martyrs / of 6 February 1853 / in this tomb be laid / mindful and reverent / by the people of Milan /on this day 6 February 1877.”

⁵ The ceremony for erecting the plaque actually took place on 8 February.

⁶ Angelo Galimberti’s remains were not found in the exhumation, while Giuseppe Monti and Antonio Cavallotti had surnames identical to other prominent personalities with city streets already named after them.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Marco Soresina

Marco Soresina is a full professor of contemporary history at the University of Milan, he deals with political, economic, social and cultural history between the eighteenth and twentieth centuries. His latest publications include: Italy Before Italy: Institutions, Conflicts and Political Hopes in the Italian States, 1815–1860 (Routledge, 2018, 2 edn 2020); ‘The Housing Struggle in Milan in the 1970s: Influences and Particularities’ (The Journal of Urban History, 46, 2020); ‘White-collar Workers in Milan: c. 1880–1915’ (Social History, 46, 2021); ‘Experiences of Political Mobilization and Popular Participation in Milan’s Working-class Neighbourhoods: 1945–1967’ (Urban History, 2021); ‘Testimonies to the History of Crime: The Italian Police Memoir, 1861–2014’ (Crime, Histoire & Sociétés, 25, 2021).