“Transport 81”, a story from 80 years ago: 15 Sardinians in the abyss of the concentration camps

80 years have passed. There is the "banality of evil", evoked by Hannah Arendt, in the tragic story of the deportees to Germany (destination Flossenburg) in the first days of September 1944. Opponents of Nazi-fascism who end up in the SS network. It is "Transport 81" , this is how the railway convoy with 432 passengers on board falls into the abyss of the concentration camps. Among them 15 Sardinians whose stories are deservedly brought to general attention in the book "The Sardinians of Transport 81" with the subtitle "Bolzano-Flossenburg 5/7 September 1944" edited by Alberto Bocchetta. An editorial initiative that had the support of the National Association of Italian Anti-Fascist Political Persecuted People (Anppia).

In the preface Walter Falgio, teacher, researcher and president of the Sardinian Institute for the history of anti-fascism and contemporary society, writes: «The careful documentary excavation carried out with great passion by Alberto Bocchetta, nephew of the partisan Vittore (who was long witness to the Transport 81 affair, ed.), brings to light significant aspects of the gigantic action of persecution carried out by the Nazi-fascist regimes during the Second World War between 1943 and 1945, against every form of political opposition". Alberto Bocchetta himself clarifies that «Transport 81 represents an example not only of repression of opposition to Nazi-fascism but above all a withdrawal of manpower for Nazi war production». A story with many stories, of courage, coherence and pain, which cannot be forgotten.

Giovanni Pani

From Cagliari, he got on that train. He never returned from the Bergen Belsen camp. Daniela, daughter of Giovanni's brother, a librarian, has recovered the memory of her uncle, who was killed in the concentration camp by the violence he suffered. «Despite the difficulties, I managed to give a certain coherence to this story. Giovanni Pani is registered in Flossenburg with the serial number 21735 and is classified as a political prisoner. On 30 September 1944 he was transferred to the terrible Hersbruck subcamp. On 8 March 1945, ill, he was sent to Bergen Belsen where he was registered on 18 March. Bergen Belsen is the concentration camp where Anne Frank was held prisoner. The documents relating to this concentration camp were burned by the Nazis." The research was born from the desire to clarify Giovanni's fate. The duty of memory felt first of all by family members: «My work began in 2018 from the desire of my father, who reached the threshold of 90 years, to know the fate of his older brother. I found my uncle's name in the online database of deceased Italian military internees. I immediately thought that he was one of the many Sardinian soldiers imprisoned in the German concentration camps. Only after receiving the documentation from the Arolsen Archives, I discovered that he had been deported on 7 September 1944 to Flossenburg from the Bolzano concentration camp, with the so-called Transport 81". There is a paradox in this story. At the registry office of the municipality of Cagliari there is no death certificate for Giovanni Pani who is officially still a ghost.

Vittore Bocchetta

The artist Vittore Bocchetta, one of the survivors, who died in 2021 at the age of 102, recently brought to light an unjustly forgotten page of history. His nephew Alberto is the custodian of his memories: «My uncle was the last survivor of “Transport 81”. In 1998 Carla Giacomozzi, director of the Historical Archives of the Municipality of Bolzano, where the concentration camp from which the deportees passed was based, convinced him to return to the Flossenbürg and Hersbruck camps and provide his testimony, above all in schools and with his works. The person in charge of the Flossenbürg Memorial gave him a copy of the list of the 432 Italians of "Transport 81" (then confidential and very precious). Starting from that copy, which contains the personal data of the deportees, it was possible to trace the names of the Sardinians". Who are the deportees? «Nine of them were between 34 and 50 years old and had moved for some time to work in Lombardy, Liguria and Veneto. Another 5 were soldiers from the classes of 1922-1925 who, after 8 September 1943, had chosen not to join the Italian Social Republic". «The Sardinians of Transport 81 – concludes Alberto Bocchetta – were 14 plus another, Vincenzo Barbera, a sailor who had declared that he was born in Cagliari (where he lived for a long time and where his mother was born), but was in reality a native of Erice (Trapani)».

Pietro Meloni

Pietro Meloni, from Sassari, a carabiniere, also linked his destiny to "Transport 81". Granddaughter Carmen is the keeper of memories. «He had been arrested in Rho where he was serving after leaving Sardinia. With the other 431 deportees, in the Flossenburg extermination camp, he crossed the gate of the concentration camp on 7 September 1944. From that moment on he was erased as a person with dignity and a name. It becomes a serial number: 21505, sewn onto a red triangle placed on his striped jacket." The city of Rho dedicated a stumbling block to Pietro Meloni in front of his home. In San Vero Milis, with a stumbling block, inaugurated on the occasion of the day of remembrance two years ago, Cosimo Orrù, a magistrate, is remembered, also on board the train which left from Bolzano station to Flossenburg.

The other deportees

The light of memory on the other Sardinians who lived that tragic experience: Ugo Miorin from Cagliari, Antonio Pilo and Dino Col from Sassari, Luigi Murgia, born in Escalaplano, Mario Ardu, originally from Lanusei, Salvatore Becciu, Michele Carraca and Giuseppe from Ozieri Mazza, Franco Cristiani, born in Iglesias, and Pietro Zuddas, from Villacidro.