Mantova to Rollo to Modena and a bit of Family History

 

Fossoli Concentration Camp. 

The weather had turned nice again and Devon and I left Mantova for Rollo. A very small community that had a fantastic B&B, and again the only game in town for dinner was pizza. 

Much of the ride to Rollo was on agricultural gravel roads that are well used. As you can see, at this point, the road is getting more remote and abit wet from all the rain. We're just a couple of km from Rollo and I say to Devon, I have a feeling this road and the bridge ahead is not going to get us over the canal. We've been there, done that, way too many times.

Sure enough the bridge was under construction and with baracades. It looks like the construction project stopped a while ago and not starting any time soon. I was able to get the fence opened and across we go.

We made it to Rollo. Having a glass of wine waiting for our pizza.

We left Rollo for Modena on Italy's Independence Day Holiday. We ride by all these buildings with no roofs and see people coming and going by an entrance. It ends up being a WW2 concentration camp that is open to the public for the Independence Day holiday. This is the Fossoli Concentration Camp.

Hopefully you can zoom in enough to read a little history of the camp. What is not on here is that it was originally built to intern British, Australian and New Zealand soldiers from North Africa. It then changed to German control and used as more of a holding ground for Jews. When Italy signed the armistice agreement to end the war the Germans declared the Jews belonged to them and they quickly transported them to the German camps.

I was speking to one of the Italian volunteers and mentioned that the Italian camp was really well built compared to Mauthuasen Camp in Germany. We had visited it on our first ever bike tour. He explained that the German camps were built of wood by the prisoners and the Italian Camps were built by contractors hired by the military. 

Inside a rebuilt building. This building would have been filled with rows of wooden bunks.

We make it to Modena and this the the Ghirlandina Tower and church. Devon and I have been in more European churches than I could ever imagine and I am not a fan of seeing another one. BUT this church is right at the top for me.

On the side of the tower is a wall of photos. These are pictures of Partisan fighters that opposed the Fascists and Nazis. They were all killed and memorialized on this wall. It is an interesting story on how it came about. People started leaving pictures of the dead partisans on tables that were from the northern part of Italy. It lasted for years and I believe the Modena mayor wanted it cleaned up and gone. Well it eventually made it to the walls.

My mother's maiden name is Ugolini. We found three Ugolini's on the wall. The third had no picture. My family has origins to northern Italy. Who knows we maybe related. 

Inside the church there is this lower area that was fun to explore.

Here is Devon in front of the famous Albinelli market. 

And again there maybe some relation to me. My grandmother's last name is Albinelli. This market was started by the efforts of Mayor Luigi Albinelli of Modena in the 1930's. My mother has told me that her mother's relation was the Mayor of Modena. No real proof but maybe.

Modena is a great place to visit if you ever get the chance.

For those of you that have been following this blog, there will be one last video post after this post. Our trip will be coming to an end.