War in Val d'Orcia

War in Val d'Orcia is a civilian Second World War memoir in diary form, set in Tuscany. The author was the Anglo-Irish writer and philanthropist Iris Origo.

Origo, with her Italian noble husband Antonio, owned and managed the estate of La Foce, comprising 57 farms on some 7000 acres (c. 2833 ha). The early parts of the book recount the events in Italy from the end of January 1943 as seen and heard from the author's locality in rural Tuscany. The account begins with the arrival of the first refugee children, sent by parents with local links, in response to the Allied bombing of the cities, particularly Genoa and Turin. Detailed information is given on the opinions and allegiances of local people and officials. "The intention, presumably of the raids was to produce panic: the immediate result was rather resentment. Partly of the kind that the Allies wished to produce, resentment against Fascism.... But there was also... a healthy, elemental reaction of resentment against those who were dropping the bombs."

The overthrow of Mussolini on 24 July 1943 was followed by a short chaotic period of "Fascist Republican" rule under the Italian Social Republic, whose actions were progressively superseded by the weight of German occupation and military reinforcements from Germany. Public desires for a separate peace were tempered by feelings of shame at the idea of capitulation. The couple's tasks were complicated by having some fifty British prisoners of war billeted on them, in addition to catering for over twenty child evacuees, many other outlawed people, partisans, and others who had fallen foul of the Fascists and/or the German occupiers at various times, and by the birth of Origo's second daughter on 9 June.

The events of those years and the feelings toward them in ordinary people are described in vivid detail. These include the deportation or arbitrary murder of the Jews of Italy.

The Allied invasion of Sicily (9 July 1943 onwards) and the Italian mainland (from 3 September 1943) affected Val d'Orcia through the Allied bombings of major cities elsewhere, the increasing partisan activities, and the reprisals made by the Republican Fascists and the occupying Germans. Many of the prisoners of war at Lac Foce set out to join the Allied forces, in a few cases successfully. They were more than replaced by new arrivals: "Indeed, our woods [round La Foce] seem likely to be thickly populated this autumn, sheltering not only Italian soldiers [evading re-enlistment], but an ever-increasing number of Allied escaped prisoners..." Allied advance was felt to be painfully slow: "The B.B.C. exhorts its listeners in England to be patient – but this is less easy for those living here, who are still enduring Allied bombings, as well as increasingly severe German and Fascist repressive measures." "Allied progress imperceptible." "Daily the B.B.C. tells of 'four miles' progress, two miles' progress'; it seems infinitesimal. The B.B.C. reports, too, with satisfaction, the results of the Moscow Conference, but here it seems very remote indeed.... Everywhere the screw is being tightened."

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