A-Infos (en) Italy, FDCA, Cantiere #43 - Emilio Canzi, an Anarchist Commander in the Resistance - Mario Salvadori (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

The recent publication of a book on the private life of Emilio Canzi has 
refocused attention on an important partisan figure from the Northern 
Apennines, more specifically from the Piacenza area.[1]This is an 
interesting and certainly timely book, given the risk of oblivion that 
has long plagued many of those who courageously chose to fight for a 
truly different society, one in which there was freedom, social justice, 
solidarity, and equality. Emilio Canzi, an anarchist, was one of these.
His life, let us say without fear of overusing the term, is legendary. 
Born in Piacenza on March 14, 1893, at the end of 1913 he was 
conscripted and sent to Libya, then to the Italian-Austrian front in 
Trentino, and finally participated in the Battle of Vittorio Veneto, 
reaching the rank of sergeant major. He joined the anarchist movement 
and actively participated in the postwar protests and the anti-fascist 
struggle with the Arditi del Popolo. For this reason, he and his wife 
Vittoria Parmeggiani were forced to emigrate to France-where their 
children Bruna and Pietro were born-and there he joined the Union of 
Anarchist Communists of Italian Refugees and the Anarchist Committee for 
Political Victims in Paris, playing a central role. In September 1936, 
at the beginning of the civil war and the revolution, he traveled to 
Spain and joined the Italian "Ascaso" Column, operating in Aragon. He 
immediately took part in the Battle of Almudevar and subsequently in all 
the major battles, assuming command of a section of the Column. Canzi 
later joined the Italian anarchists who accepted the militarization of 
the militias, joining the former Durruti Column. After the events of May 
1937 in Barcelona, he decided to remain in Spain and fought in the 
International Brigades, becoming commander of a Brigade and being 
wounded. In September 1937, he returned to Paris, joined the Pro-Spain 
Anarchist Committee, and collaborated with the libertarian press. 
Following the German invasion of France, Emilio Canzi was arrested in 
January 1941 by the Nazi police, and after detention in Germany, he was 
extradited to Italy, where he was sentenced to five years' confinement 
and sent to the island of Ventotene. Following the fall of Mussolini, he 
was not released, like all the other confined anarchists, and only after 
September 8, 1943, did he manage to escape from the Renicci di Anghiari 
(AR) concentration camp; he then went to the Piacenza mountains, where 
he promoted the formation of the first partisan group in the province in 
Peli di Coli. After the group's disbandment, he continued to participate 
in conspiratorial activity but was arrested by the fascists, then 
released in May 1944 in a prisoner exchange. Having received the post of 
Commander of the Northern Italian National Liberation Committee (CLN), 
he unified the partisan formations into a single command and became 
commander of the XIII Zone, a delicate role requiring him to coordinate 
the defense against the constant raids by the German army and the 
fascists, and to maintain a balance among the various partisan 
formations, given the tensions in the Piacenza area between the 
autonomous and political groups. Following a major winter raid, which 
severely affected the partisan formations in the area, a crisis arose 
within the "Single Command" between those who supported the apolitical 
nature of the formations and those-like the PCI-who wished to work 
towards their politicization. This called into question the role of 
Emilio Canzi, who had always acted with a pluralist vision, and who was 
seen by the communists as the weak point of the Piacenza command, 
lacking an organized political force behind him (which was, however, the 
case with the anarchist partisans in Genoa, Carrara, Milan, etc.). The 
communists then attempted to seize overall command-unexpectedly 
supported by the British mission, which favored replacing him with a 
career soldier-and on April 20, 1945, they arrested Emilio and his 
associates, who were later freed by another partisan unit. Thus, Emilio 
Canzi participated as a private partisan in the fighting for the 
liberation of Piacenza and was present a few days later at the solemn 
partisan parade through the city streets.
After the war, despite strong tensions within the partisan community and 
between political parties, he was elected president of the Piacenza ANPI 
and was reinstated in his role as sole commander with the rank of 
colonel. Canzi also participated in meetings and conferences of the 
anarchist movement, and in the Carrara congress of September 1945, where 
the Italian Anarchist Federation was founded. On October 2nd, he was 
hit, under unclear circumstances, by an English military van and had his 
leg amputated, but he died of bronchopneumonia in Piacenza hospital on 
November 17th, 1945. His city paid him a grand funeral and a public 
mourning; he was buried in Peli di Coli, where he had begun his partisan 
struggle and where a monument was later dedicated to him, a popular 
destination for excursions and visits. His intense militant life, his 
image as an internationalist, non-sectarian, and pluralist man and 
partisan commander, were and remain an enduring example of anarchism 
seen as a point of reference for a broader class and liberation movement.
Note
[1]Christian Donelli, Franco Sprega, Cristiano Maggi, The Anarchist 
Commander and His Battles in the Heart of the 20th Century. Emilio 
Canzi, Life, Struggle, and Memory Through Documents and Unpublished 
Photographs, Ravizza Editore, 2025.
Sources
Claudio Silingardi, "Emilio Canzi," in Biographical Dictionary of 
Italian Anarchists, BFS Edizioni, Pisa, 2000.
Giorgio Sacchetti, "Without Borders: Thought and Action of the Anarchist 
Umberto Marzocchi (1900-1986), Zero in Conduct, Milan 2005.
Gabriele Barone, "The Anarchist Commander," Emilio Canzi's Private Album 
Reveals the Human Dimension of a Hero of the Resistance, "Il Fatto 
Quotidiano," February 18, 2026 
(https://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it/2026/02/18/emilio-canzi-comandante-anarchico-resistenza-notizie/8293428).

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