Little thoughts ...

This year we are in a small but beautiful classroom. There are four windows all facing the courtyard. Pure air and warm sun come in through the windows and therefore our classroom is healthy. There are sixteen desks, two wardrobes, two tables, an abacus, an umbrella stand.

From this classroom of the elementary school Francesco Crispi of Gorla, after 10 days, Friday October 20, 1944, for the last time, my little brother of 8 years was going out and died during the bombing; a bomb, accidentally fell, hit the school children who, still on the stairs, descended into the air-raid shelter following the alarm siren sounded at 11.15am.

It would probably be saved if, by listening to one of his companions, he ran home with him (they lived in the same house in Aristotele street, 7). No, it was his answer, the teacher said to go down to the shelter ...

Almost seventy years have passed since that October 20, 1944, but as long as I have life are tragedies that can not be forgotten.

The events that happened that day, to be told, are always the same.

I also went to school that Friday morning as usual, I attended the fifth, my teacher was called Consonni Silvio.

The morning school spent regular as all the previous, at 11.15 the small alarm sounded, the Master made us prepare to go downstairs waiting for 11.30 am when the lessons were finished, but a few minutes before that time the great alarm sounded, the doors of the school were already half open and the pupils started going out to go home. Thanks to this, my classmates saved almost everyone, because as soon as they left, they set out to reach their homes.

I, living near the school and since my parents always suggested me to go home if I was allowed to do it, I was already on the way, after all I had only to cross the bridge on the Martesana and enter the shop in Bertelli street 8; but feeling the roar of the engines instinctively I looked in the sky and saw the planes arranged in formation, I counted 36 ... in the meantime one of the local policemen who knew why they had the office right in that square (which was called Redipuglia square) called me by name, shouting out loud: "Giuliano escapes home who are bombarding".

I had the opportunity to see that from planes fell like shining dots that approached the ground, then ran to the house but the gate of the shop was closed, unable to enter, I looked for the way of the back access, I entered the No. 8 of Bertelli street but even this possibility was denied, the wooden gate that bounded the property was closed; then I moved to the second courtyard where there was a newly constructed bulletproof shelter built in the shape of a zeta, but I did not have time to put my feet on the steps of the shelter to get off the ground, more than a bombardment, it felt like an earthquake, the movement of air threw me at the bottom of the 7 or 8 steps that were there, I was a bit 'dazed but I recovered quickly, I looked for the parents, I found them with other acquaintances and I passed a bit' scare.

But people, think about my destiny, who protected me that Friday, October 20th ...

I escaped death from the bomb dropped on the school, but if I could get into my house from the back entrance I would stop looking for my parents, I would have lost precious minutes and for me it would have been the end, because of bombs on my house are two falls (one on the house and one on the courtyard).

Not to mention then what we saw at the exit of the shelter, all dazed and wrapped in a cloud of dust, but immediately there came the most tragic and alarming news: they hit the school !! The massacre has been accomplished!

A comment: the war was almost over, the objectives to be hit, if they still existed, they could get there in other ways, the still working anti-aircraft defenses that could have created problems when passing planes over our city had been destroyed; these Americans arrive on the sky of Milan for an incursion and drop hundreds of bombs from an altitude of 10,000 meters ... but what sense, when it was possible to do this operation from 1500-2000 meters perhaps this carnage would not have happened.

The inhabitants of Gorla, more or less, have all been involved: I lost three cousins under the school, my Teacher Consonni Silvio, my first Master Gazzina Norma who led me in third grade from the first grade.

Unfortunately, at that age you do not have the strength to understand the huge disaster caused by these criminals, that to get rid of a load of unused bombs that they had on board throw them so madly without thinking about the consequences.

testimony of Elsa Libanori Grandi

Fortunato's sister, survived the tragic bombing of October 20, 1944, which at that time attended the fifth grade since it was born on June 15, 1934 and Giancarlo, born May 15, 1938 who attended the first class, unfortunately deceased. I remember that tragic day like this: I was in Agnello street at a tailor's shop, to learn; I heard the alarm ring then nothing more. In the afternoon a customer came to pick up some clothes and talking to the owner told her what had happened. Knowing that I was living in Gorla, she told me that the tram for Sesto and Monza did not provide regular service because they had bombed the line and advised me to immediately move home because I would have to walk from Porta Venezia to Gorla.

When I arrived at the terminus of Porta Venezia, I heard people say that they had bombed Gorla, even hitting the elementary school. I began to weep when a lady approached me, trying to console me by telling me that the pupils had all saved themselves, maybe she was uninformed or it was a lie told not to make me worry. I began to travel the Buenos Ayres Avenue and the first stretch of Monza Avenue but when I arrived in Gorla I realized how much the truth was bitter. In front of the house I found my brother Fortunato in tears, I will always remember his wide eyes and the fact that he could not say a word.

Mum was not there because she was in front of the school. At that moment my father came back from work, he too was unaware of everything. He worked at Pirelli Bicocca that was bombed that same day. We both went to the school to look for mum. That memory of excruciating pain is still alive in my eyes. There I also found the sister of my father who was looking for his son who had also died, his name was Masiero Gianfranco, he was seven years old. I would never have believed to have to repeat the continuous massacres of innocent children, now I am a grandmother and I always wonder why even my grandchildren should still see these horrible things.

testimony of Don Angelo Majo, Archpriest of the Milan Cathedral

Despite the rapid passing of time, from that October 20, more than fifty years have passed, in my mind the memory of the aerial bombardment is still alive that in a few moments overwhelmed, with their teachers, more than two hundred elementary school children among whom my brother Giuliano, my grandmother and three little cousins. I still impressed in my mind the image of my mother who, starting on foot from Gorla, had come to the Archbishopric, where I was studying to become a priest, to bring me the tragic news of the bombing that had destroyed an entire neighborhood, reaping hundreds of victims.

If only I think about it I can see again, mourned by the pain, the mothers and fathers of children buried under the rubble and small bodies of the innocent victims lined up in the old church of San Bartolomeo where the blessed Cardinal Schuster, one of the first to arrive in Gorla, in prayer , he said softly words of comfort and faith to mothers in tears. In my home in Monza Avenue 154, rendered uninhabitable, I helped my parents to save the things that the bombing had spared, taking them into two rooms in the parish house that the parish priest had placed at our disposal. We would have stayed long weeks.

When my father, miraculously escaped from a cluster of bombs hidden under a train wagon stopped at the station of Greco, arrived home, he was petrified with pain and fear and from that moment was attacked by heart crises that would have brought to the grave. Day of mourning and sorrow that marked the lives of many families and that the survivors still remember with unchanging suffering, even though they are comforted by the certainty that their children have been welcomed by God in Paradise together with the Angels.

testimony of Franca Malosio

October 20, 1944: a day I will never forget

I was 8 years old and I was in third class in the afternoon shift (we children who lived in S. Erlembardo street for reasons of space couldn't stay in the school together with the children of the neighborhood ...).

That morning we went out for a walk with the nuns who were doing after-school activities, since the weather was very nice.

We walked through the streets of the neighborhood and then stopped by the Church for a prayer.

We did not hear the first alarm siren and we all sat inside the Church.

When the second alarm went off, the nuns told us that we would go to the school shelter. But we did not have time to go out because the end of the world broke out: glass and rubble falling, chairs flying and immediately the church was filled with a thick black smoke and dust, nothing could be seen!

Frightened, we returned to the Altar and the Parish Priest, Don Paolo Locatelli, took us to the cellar under his house.

I don't remember how long we stayed there, then we finally left and we didn't know that the school had been bombed. Then an older sister of mine arrived, scared and agitated because she couldn't find me and I went home with her.

I was so scared: I saw houses collapsed in rubble, we had to be careful to walk so as not to stumble over everything that was in the street.

Even in our houses the bombs had fallen, but mine had only little damage.

When I heard about the school, I cried thinking about my classmates and the teachers I would never see again.

This is my memory and even now I can't watch a movie about war or about the Nazis or fascism.

I told all this to my grandchildren and now to the great-grandchildren too ...

testimony of Augusta Martello

I worked in a factory in Precotto (Menichini Brothers), my husband was a prisoner in Egypt. That day we heard the sirens of the great alarm and I, aware that I had two little girls at home and one at the school of Gorla, instead of going to the shelter I ran home hiding in the hedges when they bombed. There was a general escape and people said they had hit the school of Gorla and Precotto. I ran home to take the girls, one of four years and the other of seven, whom I had not sent to school because I was ill. When I reached the courtyard, I saw that my three sons were safe; Gianni, the eldest, had not gone to the school. I held them to my chest and ran to school to see if anything could be done to help others.

When I reached the place I saw that the men of the U.N.P.A., the military and the population were already present. Everyone was busy pulling out the dead, aligning them on the ground; very few were saved. In the school of Precotto the children were rescued thanks to a priest, Don Carlo Porro, who had managed to enter the shelter remained intact; in Gorla, on the other hand, the shelter had resisted but remained empty, since the children had all died on the stairs. I thanked God that my children were safe, but I thought back to those American aviators, how they could have bombed the whole area, striking the factories, but above all involving the civilian population.

testimony of Nerea Mingozzi

For several months we were displaced in Veneto, but in early October for the start of school, we returned to Milan. My brother Graziano was in fifth grade, he was ten years old, he was a studious, good, judicious boy. I remember that he was very jealous of me: woe to those who made me a spite or a joke. He said: "It's my sister". He protected me and I was proud of this. My memory of that sad morning starts at 8, I remember as if it were now: in the courtyard of the old Gorla's railing house, in Pisino street 6, there is a group of eight children playing to call each other, shouting among themselves. Festive, happy, my brother and me also join the group walking towards the school, while the mothers from the windows greet us making us the latest recommendations.

I remember the appeal in the classroom made by the teacher Contreras, a sweet lady: I was her sympathy! The memory becomes more vivid when a siren sounds, it is about 11 o'clock, the day is bright, the sky is clear and transparent. Someone says: "It's the little alarm". It is stalled, the teacher recommends calm, I had already got up from the desk; shortly after we go down the stairs. First are us of the first class, I remember the salutation of the director, when I am in front of the class of my brother, I see him and I make a tongue, he laughs and replies: "See you down at the shelter". They will be his last words.

The stairs continue to the left for the shelter, we stop to wait for the other classes. On my right there is the door open, I say to my companion: "I go home, so now it is almost noon and the school is over". Without thinking too much I pass the gate and start running, behind me someone follows me, I do not know how many. I hear a voice shouting: "Come back, tomorrow I will suspend you!"; it was the janitor who was about to close the door. Poor, he died too. I know that I ran like a hare up to Asiago street where, in front of the church, I'm reached by the air movement of one of the bombs, probably the one that hit the school. I get up on my feet but I fall again, due to the explosion of another bomb.

In the street someone manages to gather me and bring me to the shelter of my house. The mothers ask me about the school, I do not know anything, I'm stunned, I can hardly speak. I ask where my mother is and they tell me she had gone to the Turro market, I start waiting for her, feeling more calm. She, coming back from Turro, must pass on the Old Bridge, in front of the school, where a few minutes have passed since the explosion. Seeing the collapsed school, almost crazy, she screams: "My children, my children!", Trying to climb over the rubble still full of smoke and dust and a peculiar smell that I still remember.

Someone tries to reassure her by saying: "I saw Nerea, your children are at home". She with her heart in her throat rushes to make sure. When she sees me she asks me: "and Graziano?", I tell her not to know where he is, to have seen him in the classroom just before going down to the shelter. She takes me by the hand and together we run towards the school. When I reached the little square I saw scenes that left an indelible memory in the mind of a seven-year-old girl. A few minutes later, I remember, here are the planes returning, so much low that I can see the faces of the pilots. We find shelter in the farmhouse opposite.

We return to the school to look for my brother when I see a hand come out of the rubble, I recognize the rings of my teacher, Mrs. Contreras. I see a baby dangling hung only by the belt of the apron to a radiator, I recognize a brother's companion. Then come the trucks of the "black helmets" (those of "Muti"). They all dismiss everyone by saying: "They are all in shelter, they ask for water". Up to this point I have everything clear in my mind, then the memory becomes blurred. When evening arrived, none of us could sleep, it was the first night without my brother. In the following days I was able to see my classmates in the Monumental Cemetery, in Musocco Cemetery, in the mortuary rooms of the various hospitals. Where my parents went, I was with them.

At the end we can find the body of my brother along with other children. What hurt me so much is to have found them all lined up on the ground, all silent, you could hear only the harrowing cries of the parents. It did not seems me right, they were so noisy, cheerful, joking. Then I remember the funeral, all those crates in rough wood, not on hearses but on military trucks. I still remember the parents who kissed me, touched me, asked me why I was alive and their children were not, I did not know what to answer. It was a period of my life that I will never forget.

testimony of Lidia Moioli

That terrible day is not easy to recall, I was twelve and I was already working as a seamstress while my brother Umberto attended the first grade. We lived in Monte San Gabriele street, in a building near the school: it was enough to turn the corner and Umberto was in front of the door. It seemed like a day like the others and instead ... At 11.20 the little alarm sounded and my mother, alerted by the numerous planes flying around our neighborhood, ran to school to pick up my brother. At that moment the bombs that hit the building fell.

My mother, because of the movement of air, was thrown far away, so not coming to the door was saved. I remember how it was yesterday the chaos, the smoking rubble, the screams of mothers and fathers digging with their hands trying to do soon to free the children and then the bad news that Umberto had died with another two hundred school children. How to describe so much despair ... Unfortunately we also remained homeless that had collapsed with the school; we had nothing left and we were hosted by relatives.

After a few months the war ended, we found a new lodging and started living again. To each family involved in the massacre was given a booklet containing writings and photographs of what happened, which my parents continuously leafed through without ever resigning. One day they decided to burn it in the stove because they realized that they risked losing their mind. I would like our silent testimonies to be screaming for the deaf that even today foments tensions between peoples, forgetting how much pain has caused the war in Milan and perennial remembrance of the death of two hundred innocent victims in that tragic morning.

testimony of Giancarlo Novara

On that day of fifty-five years ago, on October 20, 1944, I, Giancarlo Novara, I was 7 years old and I attended the third grade in Gorla's school. My teacher was called Mrs. Pistone, perished in the bombing. I had known her at the beginning of the school year. I attended the first and second grade at a school in Fiesso d'Artico (Venice), where I was displaced with my mother at her grandparents. As the 8th of September of the previous year people said that the war was over, we went back to Milan.

Of that damn day the memory is still alive in me: it was like a day in late summer and several boys had skipped school to go for a swim in the Naviglio Martesana. We had windows open for the heat and in the distance, on Monza Avenue, noises of tracks could be heard as if tanks were passing by.

At 11.15 am the alarm sounded and all the teachers put us in line to take us to go down to the shelter. We were coming down the stairs when the cease-fire sounded; suddenly, without hearing any blast, we found ourselves in the darkness buried under the rubble. I felt like I had my legs behind my back and I could hear the voices of my companions calling "Mom", "Mom"... The voices with the passing of time were fading more and more. From the story of my father and my uncles I knew that to save my life was a chief fireman, Mr. Pacchetti, who lived in Tofane street, 5 and that, with a pick, knocked down the wall and found me, loading me on a ambulance and bringing me to the Hospital in Francesco Sforza street.

They put me together with the dead, and here a priest realized that I was still alive, giving me Extreme Unction. They brought me in an operating room and with steel tabs they opened my teeths that seemed to be nailed by fright, freeing my throat from a stone that choked me. I woke up after five days in the Granelli department. I had reported many scratches and a hole in the leg still visible. My father, who was among the rescuers, did not even recognize me as I was cured.

I was released from the hospital after fifteen days. The doctors and nurses of the Granelli pavilion made a collection and dressed me from head to toe. They came to pick me up at the hospital and we walked the road because Milan was destroyed. Returning home I knew that many of my friends were dead, even my cousin Luigi Biffi of six years.

Among my classmates I remember Boerchi, who was the only child of a grocer from Monza Avenue, in the district of Turro, and Rinaldo Rumi, who had recently become part of my class. From that moment another ordeal began for me: I could not bear to stay in the dark and when evening came, for several years I saw corpses on the walls, having to sleep with the light on in the bed with my parents.

Even today I can not go down to the cellar in the dark because I seem to hear the voices of my companions calling for help.

Unfortunately, these experiences have not been useful to anyone because even today in the world there are wars and massacres.

testimony of Maria Pannaccese

Like every morning, together with my sister Mafalda and my brother Antonio I went to school. In the middle of a lesson we heard the sound of the alarm announcing yet another air attack on our city. Due to a misinterpretation of those signals, instead of diverting all the occupants of the building towards the equipped shelter, the evacuation to the outside of the building was organized, so that everyone could reach their home. Since the exit of all classes was not simultaneous, while a part of the students was on the sidewalk, most of the children were still inside the building when a rain of fire began to fall from the sky, which in a moment destroyed practically everything.

Together with my sister we managed to find a shelter near a greenhouse, it was our luck. After the bombing, frightened, with the clothes in tatters and the hair standing we move towards home. But the path turned out to be full of obstacles, in every corner we saw only scenes of death: a tram stopped in the middle of the street full of corpses, a lifeless horse near a tree and many, many other gruesome visions.

When we reached our house we saw on the door of the house my mother holding in her arms two more little sisters, behind her we could see the rubble of the one that until a few minutes before was our home. As soon as he saw us he breathed a sigh of relief, but she immediately noticed the absence of our little brother Antonio. I quickly returned to the school, where I saw an indescribable show: ruins and deaths, deaths and rubble. Many men were digging, hoping to find someone still alive; even my father, just informed of what happened, contributed to that sad task and was himself to locate my brother still alive, still sitting in his desk; how hard it was to get him out of it, but how wrenching it was at the end of the work, to realize that his little heart was no longer beating.

My mother refused to recognize her child in that body; that morning he wore blue socks and suede shoes, which instead went lost under the rubble. Then followed the continuous pilgrimages to the morgue where all the bodies had been brought. My family was hosted by relatives with whom we remained until our house was once again inhabited; I remember the queues at the public kitchens with the cards in hand to get the food necessary for a minimum sustenance.

Then came the day of the funeral with the small coffins arranged on military trucks and the burial in a specially arranged camp in the nearby cemetery of Greco. Once the conflict was over, the generosity of the Milanese citizens allowed the construction of a monument with an annexed crypt-ossuary in which today the remains of those children rest, exactly in the place where the school stood: that no one should forget!

testimony of Pasquale Franco Pezzetti, the only one among the witnesses who, as a child, living in the "Crespi Morbio" Foundation, attended the afternoon shift

My name is Pezzetti Pasquale Franco and with my family we lived in S. Erlembardo street, 2, in the houses of the “Crespi Morbio” Foundation.

When we left home the morning of that day, I was 8 years old and my sister Gesurinda was 10, I was struck by the beauty of the blue sky, furrowed at high altitude by air formations, like silver.

On that day, S. Irene, our mother Irene would have celebrated her name day, at lunch, in our house, with friends from Prato Centenaro, where they lived, in Sarca Avenue.

In March 1941 the “Crespi Morbio” Foundation had assigned us a four-room apartment with services, like other large families of children: we were 9 brothers aged 19 to 2, 3 females, 6 males.

With my sister at 10.30, we walked to the nursery school of the Foundation, run by the Mantellate Sisters, who gave the children a kind of pre-school, waiting for our turn at the "Francesco Crispi" in the afternoon.

That morning, I think Sister Scolastica and another sister, they accompanied us girls and boys to the Parish Church of St. Teresa of the Child Jesus in Asiago street.

Other Mantellate Sisters managed the nursery at the girls' oratory.

Being numerous the elementary school children of Gorla, it had been decided to do 2 shifts.

We of the Foundation, from S. Erlembardo street, 2, entered the school at 1.30pm: at that time we were served a meal, before classes began at 2.30pm.

I remember the name of my teacher, Teresa Pistone Pezzotta, having memorized it easily.

We had a very dear sixteen-year-old sister named Teresa.

In the Church the morning prayers were being said, when suddenly a tremendous roar shook the whole Church and, from the high colored windows, a rain of glass fragments fell.

The terrified Sisters shouted to us: "children, run away, go home".

We still didn't know of course the terrible tragedy that was taking place about 100 meters from us: almost 200 children, with the teaching staff, were buried by the rubble of the “Francesco Crispi” school centered by a bomb.

With my sister and the other children we ran out and crossed the courtyard of the male oratory, from Pirano street we arrived on Monza Avenue.

Crossing the Avenue, I remember a dead horse, attached to his chariot and the torn and twisted rails of the Milan - Monza tram.

We entered the courtyard of the Foundation with the big gate, open on the Avenue where we met Mother Laurina of the Mantellate Sisters who shouted to us: "Gesurinda, Franchino, where are you going? Your home has also been bombed! ".

I kept saying, crying, "Mom, Mom!"

We met our mother on the street, with the last little brother, Bruno of 2 years in his arms and with the head bandaged: in helping a child of our acquaintances, among the rubble, she had been hit by a brick and medicated in the hospital in the Finzi Park, at the end of S. Erlembardo street.

Our mother was desperate: a twelve-year-old daughter, Ezia, buried in the shelter of our house from the rubble of the palace; of her husband Elia, at work at Pirelli - Bicocca with her eldest son Aldo, she did not know the fate.

Ezia was pulled out alive, and the family we were all together in the afternoon.

The house was destroyed, but we were all safe.

In the evening they took us to "Al Pulverun" under the Central Station for a meal.

Then we slept in the kindergarten of our house, on the ground, helped in the arrangement by the never forgotten Mantellate Sisters.

That tragic Friday October 20, 1944 the Gorla district, in addition to the numerous civilians, lost 200 children: two hundred new "Small Saints Innocent Martyrs".

It was a very sad day that I will always remember with clarity and so much sadness, even after 75 years.

testimony of Bianca Pirovano Bremmi

She was my dear grandmother. That morning she had come to see me, I wanted to keep her to eat with us, but she wanted to go back to her home. Unknowingly, she had an appointment: to accompany many small children from the nearby school to heaven. In the Villa Angelica where she lived, in addition to her, about twenty people died, destroying at least four families. That terrible October 20th! Fortunately, my little 8-year-old daughter, Carla, who was at school, had time to run home and saved herself.

Usually I went to the shelter of the nearby school, that morning, having in hand the other my youngest son, I could not close the door of my house, so I gave up saving myself. Fifteen days before, one Sunday afternoon, I was with my husband in our yard and, looking in the sky, we saw a large circle of fire right above the school, was it perhaps a tragic sign?

testimony of Andreina Ravanelli

Friday October 20, 1944 was a clear, sunny autumn day, but in the heart of us children there was a sad presentiment. I remember that my mother was in her room and I with my brother Pierluigi 6 years old (since only 15 days attended the first grade) we went to her to tell her that we did not want to go to school, but she did not listen to us and arrived at the gate other children were pointing and crying. It's 11.20, the small alarm sounds, we prepare to go to the cellar, but the janitor does not find the keys to open it.

The garden of my house bordered the school garden where there was a mountain of sand leaning against the fence wall. I usually went up on the mound of sand while on the side of my garden there was a ladder resting where there were always waiting for mum and dad (during the raids did not let us go out and we escaped so). That morning they had taken the sand off and, surprised, I went back to the exit; In the short journey I met my friend Luisa De Conca to whom I said: "Luisa, come with me". She replied: "No, I'm afraid". Meanwhile, from the corridor into the atrium and I see the cellar door open (perhaps because the children were on the stairs in a row). I see my mom and I say: "Mom, come with me", and she said: "Where is Pierluigi?", "I do not know" I answered her, then she told me: "Go home, there's dad". She entered the cellar to look for my brother Pierluigi.

On the gate of our house, a few steps away, there was my father waiting for me, we crossed the garden, we entered the house (a few minutes had sounded the big alarm) and, immediately after a reconnaissance tour, the planes that they came from Sesto San Giovanni and dropped bombs all over Gorla, preserving a few houses including mine and the Church.

Even the ancient trees of Monza Avenue were uprooted and hindered the traffic of rescuers. I remember that my father made me sign the Cross and on his face I saw all the frightening and harsh reality of what was happening. Although glass and debris rained on us we left the house unharmed, a fuss choked us and a pile of rubble surrounded us. We could hear voices calling for help, there were my mother and Pierluigi, my dad then gave all the shovels and picks he had in the garden to dig. The soldiers of the U.N.P.A. they moved us away, there was a dangerous wall.

At about 14.00, the planes return, the fear and the fright are even greater, but they have only had to go down with the tickets "To the Gorla's children"; (the photo is in the newspaper they wrote immediately afterwards, I do not have it anymore, perhaps you can find it at the Committee of the Victims).*

In the afternoon my father accompanied me to Milan from my aunt and the following days began the odyssey, the search for the bodies, for the corpses in the various morgues of cemeteries. Mom found him a day or two after, Pierluigi could not be found because it was unrecognizable, all black with the head detached (as my aunt told me after two years), they recognized it by their shoes. I remember them alive because they did not let me see them.

Not a day goes by that I do not remember what happened moment by moment, it's a pain that has destroyed me and still tears my life, it's a continuous film that passes in front of my eyes. It's been over fifty years but it's a continuous present because on TV they make me relive my past.

Enough with the wars! Love prevails over hatred and selfishness because time flees fast and nothing is in our hands, not even the fistful of earth that will cover us after death; tell it to those who want to conquer the nations! I hope that in the short term the whole world will enjoy good and peace.

* It does not appear from any source that other aircrafts have returned on that day on the area; perhaps the memory of Mrs. Ravanelli of the tickets with the inscription "To the Gorla's children" in fact it is found on the publication of the special issue drawn up by Federigo Buffon in October 1944 on the Massacre of Gorla, which depicts a propaganda poster of the time where the Anglo-American bombs are supposed to have been a "gift" to the students of the school.

testimony of Zelinda Rizzoli Cacciatori

I am one of the many mothers affected in the heart that October 20 but after all these years I still remember clearly the unfolding of that terrible morning. My little Ernestina was a tantrum, she did not want to go to school because I had not prepared her black apron, as was used then. He persuaded her to go to her friend who lived in our courtyard and, holding hands, they went to school not to return.

I went to work. At 11.20 the alarm siren and immediately the bombing began. Warned that the school of Gorla had been hit, I rushed with a mad rush to the place, finding only ruins and smoking rubble; below were the children. I was digging with my hands, desperate, with other parents, but I was pitifully dismissed saying that I could not stay, that it was useless because the children of the first classes were all dead.

Stunned by pain, I walked home; under the bridge of the Martesana canal there were many adults, dead and wounded, and among them the little Lucia Avanzi, my daughter's friend, who had managed to escape home but a bomb had broken out just at that point. Her mother, who was running to school to get her, had found her in the heap, with her neck broken. That day also I lost my dear little nephew, Gerardo Rizzoli, son of my brother who lived in Tofane street, at number 3. A plaque in the courtyard recalls twenty-one of them, but all together the children were killed about two hundred. Today almost all the mothers have reached their little angels in heaven, because now more than fifty years have passed.

testimony of Maria Luisa Rumi

I think I am a witness that is not suitable for helping the historian to reconstruct the facts. Why, I have been wondering for some time, I remember so little of that October 20, 1944, while some of my school friends know how to reconstruct the event in detail? I think I wanted to forget and, unfortunately, by removing that memory, I also removed much of my childhood. Or maybe I just have little memory. As though from a distant nebula, however, I manage to bring out very few moments, but live and precise, some "scenes", as if they were separate sequences of a film.

1st scene: I'm already out of school, in the little square, at the intersection among Asiago, Aristotele and Ponte Vecchio streets. It's a wonderful sunny day, Friday October 20, 1944. There I see my brother Massimo, who attended the fifth class, while I attend the second, but I'm only 6 years old, having "jumped" the first class. A few days ago I started attending school, I do not know neither teacher nor classmates. Massimo is in a group of pupils looking upwards, at a point in the sky where some planes are passing, which unhook "something" and the boys observe them by shouting and exchanging comments. I call my brother, but he does not listen to me, then he runs towards home in front of me.

2nd scene: I remember arriving in Minturno street, alone, that I run like a desperate, with the folder on the head and scream terrified: "Massimo, wait!", But he, faster and higher, arrives home before me.

3rd scene: after covering about fifty meters of the street, I enter the gate of my house and suddenly I hear a noise, as if the whole world collapsed around me, I do not have time to go down to the shelter and crouch down under a small terrace, it could almost repair me. Here is a moment of absolute emptiness in my memory.

4th scene: a grave silence has descended over the whole neighborhood, I leave the house with my father, we walk along a stretch of Minturno street. Where we go, I do not know, but I remember that everything is muffled by a colored dust suspended in the air: around only rubble.

5th scene: in the shelter under my house, my aunt Elisa is desperate and does not want to believe that while my brother and me are there alive, unharmed, her two children Aldo and Gabriella, they did not come home like us.

6th scene: I find myself, together with my brother Massimo and my twin sisters Ida and Franca, about 4 years old, on a wooden pedal van, pushed by a worker from the father's company. We are walking along Monza Avenue, covered with rubble, where it seems that life has stopped: under the large plane trees that flank the avenue, here and there, we see overturned wagons, twisted bikes, dead horses. We look around lost, but perhaps we do not fully understand what happened. I only know that our parents send us to Monza from their grandparents, where we will stay several days, until the worst is over, perhaps to avoid too painful scenes.

These are the only moments I have lived that I can say to remember with absolute clarity. All the other news that I know about that fact I learned later, over the years, from parents, relatives, documents ... But these are not my testimony and I therefore think I have to stop here, as regards the facts objective. The comments, instead, and the considerations could continue indefinitely.

testimony of Luisa Sacchi

The Beccari family was formed by my aunt Giuseppina called "Pina" and her three little girls: Wilma, Lilia and Stefania. Two attended school, the youngest was two years old. The day of the bombing my aunt went to get the two girls, even if the concierge of the Asiago street where they lived, knowing of other bombings, had told her to leave her the youngest child. Her answer was lapidary: "if we have to die, we are all together". The aunt managed to find the two girls near the school, but the explosion caused by the explosion hit them, and they all lost their lives.

My grandmother, who was waiting for her back for lunch, did not see her arrive and alarmed herself. My mum Vincenzina walked the Asiago street, but did not find them. Informed about what had happened at school, the sad pilgrimage began in all the hospitals of the city; He found them two days later, in a basement of a hospital. They were all together: 35 years, 10 years, 8 years, 2 years. Only I was alive, I was 4 years old.

This tragedy and the death of my maternal uncle of only 33 years in a German extermination camp made me realize that the war serves only a few and kills so many people who have only been guilty of living, of trampling on this land, for a short time, but just a short time. Like the little Lilia of only 2 years.

testimony of Giulio Giuseppe Sanchi

It was a beautiful day that October 20, 1944. It was a friday. I lived in a tenement with other families and this meant that when I left home to go to school I met many friends on the street, maybe too many. However, on that beautiful autumn morning, many decided to skip school and go to the lawns to play football. On the way we met Tonino Pannaccese, who was always the first when we talked about not going to school. But that morning he did not listen to me and, in spite of my insistence, he went to the school with his shoulder bag to meet his tragic destiny.

Our mothers were all at work and usually came to know about our pranks only in the late afternoon, when they returned home; most of our fathers, on the other hand, were at the front. With us lived my paternal grandmother who did the housework and took care of my little brother of only 4 years. That morning I wanted to take it with me, I loaded it on my shoulders and with the other friends we headed towards the meadows.

At around 11.20 the alarm sounded and we heard the noise of the airplanes. I looked up and saw them: they were very many. I took my brother back on my shoulders and ran towards home, along with all my friends. In an instant it was hell. I took refuge in the entrance hall of a door but I was hit by the window, collapsed due to the movement of air. I was barefoot because, not having gone to school, I had taken off my shoes so as not to ruin them. So, with all those glasses on the floor, my feet were completely cut, but I did not feel the pain at all. I began to run towards the Martesana canal to take refuge under the bridge where there were already many other people.

One of the bombs, however, fell right next to the bridge, in the dry channel, and seriously injured or killed all those who had taken refuge there. I remember hearing them complaining about the pain, asking for help. Arrived at home, with my brother always on my shoulders, I found my grandmother, when she saw us she began to cry with joy. About midday my mother got back from work, desperate because she had known that the school had been hit in the bombing. We ran to meet her, hugging and crying too. On that tragic October morning I saved myself by luck or by grace received, but lost over two hundred friends.

testimony of Ambrogina Sironi

I am Ambrogina Sironi, Ambrogio's sister, I was born in 1946. From my parents I knew that that morning for my brother would be the first day of school. He was 7 years old and would have attended the second grade. He had just returned from Valtellina, where he was displaced by an aunt. But that morning, Ambrogio did not really want to go to school! Mum had prepared him and since we lived right in front of the school at the beginning of classes had sent him alone.

Meanwhile, our father was intent on making deliveries with his horse cart. When he arrived in Turro, a man warned him that he had a baby in the hay basket under the cart. He was the little Ambrogio, determined to shake the school. Dad thought otherwise. Turned the cart and returned to Gorla accompanied my brother to school. Forever. Now he too rests in the ossuary crypt, under the monument. I have his name, the name of a little martyr!

testimony of Annamaria Smidili

In those days I was a second grade schoolgirl, luckily for me that morning I was absent because I had a high fever. I remember very well that while the bombs were breaking, the window panes shattered and fell on my bed. Terrified I ran into the courtyard where I found my sister Rina wandering half-naked: a large stone had fallen near her, fortunately without hurting her. I took her by the hand and took refuge on the porch with other people. The fever had suddenly fallen. We were alone at home because my mother was at work in the factory, my father at war and my brother at school (only after I knew he had skipped school).

I still live in that old house in Tofane street, 5 where, at the entrance of the first courtyard, a marble plaque made by the father of a girl who died in the school disaster, Luigia Scotti, remembers all the twenty small innocent victims. I spend every day in front of that tombstone and I think about our playmates, the pain of their families and the fact that our two names could be engraved with theirs. I know with certainty that no building, except the school of Gorla, has suffered such a large number of children dead in a single day.

testimony of Giovanni Smidili

I lived in Tofane street, 5, I was in the fourth grade, my sister Annamaria was in second grade; I remember these events with clarity, our mother before going to work ordered my sister to stay at home because she was feverish, along with my other sister Rina of 4 years. I, with my friends Giulio, Lillino and Bruno, I went to school and, I can not explain the reason, once we arrived at the door we decided not to enter; maybe because it was a wonderful day and we wanted to play football.

We saw the janitor who was near the shops of Monza Avenue and, to hide us, we went down the slope and walked to the lawn, crossing the canal that was dry at that time of year. I remember bringing my folder back home and changing my shoes so that my mother, when she came home from work, noticed how I had spent the morning. As we played happily in the meadow, we saw the planes flying in the blue sky, I remember the alarm siren and, while the bombs fell over the neighborhood, hitting the school, the sound of the siren of the ceased alarm.

We were terrified, I do not remember what my companions did, I ran home and took shelter in a shop where, however, I remained very little because the rubble fell; I went back to the street and hid myself in a space formed between a street lamp and a wall near the Naviglio bridge, near my house. I stood in that corner until the end of the explosions and when all the dust settled, I saw only dead and wounded in front of me; I immediately rushed home worried about my sister's safety.

Meanwhile, my mother also left the job fearing to find me dead in school, but a woman warned her that she had seen me in the street after the bombing, but that was not able to cheer her on my terms because I had purple lips from terror. When I got home I noticed some superficial wounds and a small sliver in one leg. Unfortunately I never knew how many of my class were saved.

testimony of Giuditta Trentarossi Sala

Beautiful and warm October day, a date that, until God will keep me on this earth, I will never forget. I was 7 years old, I lived in Monza Avenue, 185 and I attended the second grade at the school "Francesco Crispi"; in Redipuglia Square, in Gorla, even if only a few days, as we were displaced in Brianza and precisely in Montevecchia. "Now," said Mum, "the war is over, there are no more dangers". I was happy to see my companions again: Graziella, Maria Luisa, Anna, Fanny, Marisa and others.

Like every morning my father made me cross the already busy Monza Avenue, in those years there were neither traffic lights nor pedestrian crossings, and I went quietly and happy at school with the folder and inkwell with ink (that the school did not supply). "Remember to go out if the alarm sounds, I agree with your teacher to come and get you", my father told me that morning, before leaving me to go to his daily job.

The morning proceeded quietly until about 11 o'clock, when we began to hear the sirens sound: "It's the alarm, no, it's the cease-fire ... it's the little one, it's not the big one", and so the teacher, after having ascertained that it was the big alarm, having spoken from the window with a policeman (who had their offices on the square), put us in line and accompanied us going down the stairs to the shelter and to the exit door, me and some others, like Graziella.

I left the school from a side door, then I turned right to walk the Fratelli Pozzi street that led to Monza Avenue. Halfway, in front of the Bonomelli house (it was the name of the owners), a lady, perhaps the guardian of the building at number 4, dragged me into the entrance hall because the bombs began to fall. Besides the roar of the planes that shone in the clear sky, even today, after fifty-five years, I have fixed in my mind the black image of my ink that I threw against the white tiles of the porter's lodge, because I had to cover my head with the folder, because all the windows fell, and in the ears the screams of this lady shouted: "My oil, my oil"; since the cylindrical cast-iron stove, with various concentric rings, which served not only to heat but also to cook, was overturned: it was 11.25 on Friday, she was frying the fish: the lean nutrition was scrupulously observed, as the Catholic religion indicated! After the noise caused not only by the airplanes, but also by the screams of each of us, I went out into the yard to go home, but I was swallowed by an enormous dust in the middle of which we could not see anything.

I did not know how to orientate and so I took the wrong direction, returning to school rather than going to Monza Avenue, when suddenly I found myself on the edge of a great chasm in which I almost fell, it was the hole caused by the fall of the school; at that moment I realized I was in a wrong direction and ran away in the opposite direction. Finally I arrived, the road seemed endless even if the distance was only a hundred meters, on Monza Avenue but, unfortunately, I saw my house destroyed and my father wandered over a pile of rubble in front of the inflated shutters of our store (a bar) in which the mother was trapped, unlike my dad and my sister had not managed to go down to the shelter. I shouted: "Daddy, Daddy I'm here", but he did not hear me and did not notice me because he was all busy trying to save my mother.

Monza Avenue was a tangle of torn tram wires, fallen plants, and debris from the various destroyed houses. Suddenly a gentleman, called "the hunter" because he often went hunting, had recognized me and took me to the baker in front of my house, at number 142 of the avenue, immediately going to warn my father that I was there, safe. Little by little all the people came out of the shelters, including my sister Lina who joined me with our mother and father. All together then we walked along the Naviglio to go to the house of Aunt Antonietta, mother's sister, who lived in Crescenzago in Padova street, 210, because we had no longer available our house. The father later returned to Monza Avenue to try to help the firemen to rescue some people who were stuck: who on the land (the stairs had fallen), some people in the houses, and to see if he could save something of our furniture .

There was a great chaos, everything stopped, everything was broken, who screamed, who ran, you did not understand anything, said Dad on his return to his aunt's house. In the meantime he also met Uncle Germano, mother's brother, who, hearing the news of the great disaster that had happened in Gorla, rushed to personally verify the situation and ascertain whether we were still alive. Meanwhile, my sister Teresa, the eldest, who was at work at the Montecatini in Donegani square on the corner of Turati street, hearing that in Gorla there had been a disaster, the school hit, many houses destroyed and many victims, she was convinced she could not find life anymore none of his family and she did not want to go back. Aunt Antonietta, to whom she had called, had to struggle hard to convince her that all of us, thanks God, were all safe. She then sent her to pick up one of her acquaintances and we all reunited.

After a few days from Crescenzago we went to Gorla to attend the funeral, which was nothing but a sequence of trucks on which were placed next to each other the white coffins of the two hundred children who fell under the school, "Innocent Victims" and "Small Martyrs", from which the new elementary school of Gorla took its name. It's the last image I have of my schoolmates, who will certainly be flown in the sky as "Angels".

I really hope that the testimony of a child of many years ago who, like many others, has always said no to violence and war during the continuation of her life, can serve something.

testimony of Pietro Luigi Volpin

I was born after the war, what I know is thanks to the stories of my parents. My family had already been hit and lived, like other unfortunates, in an old house near the Greco railway yard; my mother was pregnant and imminent at birth. Everyone remember that day as a wonderful day: blue sky and warm sun. My sister Rina, a diligent schoolgirl, used to go to school willingly; because of her sweet character she is remembered with so much affection by one of her classmate, a survivor.

At about 11.20 a bomb dropped by an allied plane hit the school and caused the tragedy that we all know. The news came almost immediately to the district of Greco. My parents ran in despair and learned that their daughter was among the little ones buried in the dungeons; my father joined the other parents to dig with his hands to try to free the children from the rubble. When he found her, he realized that she was burnt, probably in the immediate vicinity of the explosion. The work of recognition was atrocious.

After ten days my mother gave birth to a child who was given the name of Rina, the unfortunate sister. My mother, in the following times, always reproached herself for not having heard that morning, inside herself, the presentiment or the desire not to send her to school to die.

testimony of Francesca Annovazzi Smidili

For me, a six-year-old girl, that day was almost special, only time later becoming aware that I would understand what tragedy took place on October 20, 1944, a few steps from my house.

testimony of Gianni Banfi

We also report some thoughts of Graziella Ghisalberti on her other friends who today, unfortunately, can no longer speak

I want to talk about my little friends: Bice Benzi was like a little sister to me, she was six years old and previous summer we went to the sea with Mrs. Ferrari, aunt of Dr. Boveri. We were a few little girls, very scary of the water; in the evening we fell asleep holding hands. I also remember his father who, when he came back from work, took us into the meadows to play. Oscar Fontana was a dear eight-year-old boy, together with him we played in the yard with the carpenter's cart. His brother Ezio, older than us, was a fifth grade and saved himself; he often argued with him. He disappeared in the summer of 2001, from the hospital asked to see me again, and together we remembered the time spent playing and when I too was throwing the stones. Together with my little cousin Edoardo there were the children of the building. I remember fondly Aldo and Gabriella Rumi, old friends, Luisa De Conca, a little older than us (she was ten years old), she was very reserved. Mariolino Piazza of six years lived in the same house. His father was a soldier, but he was home sick and soon he too died. Among my classmates I remember Graziella Orlandi, the teacher called her "eyes of coal", Rina Volpin was a shy child, one day she came to school with a pink dress because the apron was not dry. I also remember the Balucci sisters, who have just returned from Egypt.

I add a final thought to Annamaria Redaelli who was six years old on the day of the bombing; managed to escape leaving the shelter alive under the school, was by the hand to Annamaria Pioltelli who asked "Do you resist? I do not! " her mother died under the bombs while she was running to school to rescue her. Annamaria reached her mother on the day of her 60th birthday. Even Angela Locardi managed to come out alive from the school shelter, her story can be found among these testimonies. Since July 2001 it is no longer among us.

The testimonies above are of surviving children, parents or relatives who lived mainly on Monza Avenue or in the surrounding streets and who attended the morning shift leaving the school at 11.30.

As already explained in the description of how the facts took place (page "That autumn morning", section "On the ground"), at midday the second round began, the afternoon session, mainly composed of children living in the houses of the Crespi Morbio Foundation where many families lived (those with at least 5 children) that before the lessons used the school meals at the expense of the Municipality considering their precarious economic conditions.

At the time of the air raid they were therefore not in school, and it is for this reason that there are no testimonies of attempts to save themselves by fleeing home; but it does not mean that the palaces where they lived have remained unscathed from the destruction caused by the bombs, on the contrary, there were numerous people who lost their lives in that building complex.

As proof of this, the Crespi Morbio family, after having rebuilt the damaged buildings, had a marble plaque on the façade with the names of those who had died in their home in those buildings on that tragic Friday in October.

Headstone placed at the entrance of the Crespi Morbio Foundation to remember the dead residents in those buildings in the bombing of October 20, 1944

The bomber teams had divided the targets to hit, one of these were the Breda factories on the border with Sesto San Giovanni; the 451st group to which the mission had been entrusted, as we have already seen, completely wronged the route ending up in the Gorla district, but from one of the tail aircraft (probably due to a chance) a bomb fell the same in the vicinity of the Breda, more precisely in Chiese street where it hit a passerby, Emma Manservisi, killing her. We thought it was right to remember her in our pages even if she lost her life about two kilometers away from the school of Gorla and we know nothing about her, as a victim of the blind violence of the allies in that morning and oblivion in all the years to follow (if it were not for the ritual crown of laurels every Anniversary of Liberation).

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