Clara Petacci

{{short description|Mistress of the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini (1912–1945)}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Clara Petacci

| image = Clara Petacci.png

| alt =

| caption = Petacci in the 1930s

| birth_name =

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1912|02|28|df=y}}

| birth_place = Rome, Kingdom of Italy

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1945|04|28|1912|02|28|df=y}}

| death_place = Giulino di Mezzegra, Italian Social Republic

| death_cause = Execution by firing squad

| other_names =

| occupation =

| known_for = Mistress of Benito Mussolini

| relatives = Miriam di San Servolo (sister)
Marcello Petacci (brother)

| spouse = {{marriage|Riccardo Federici|1934|1936|end=divorced}}

| partner = Benito Mussolini (1933–1945)

}}

Clara "Claretta" Petacci ({{IPA|it|klaˈretta peˈtattʃi|lang}}; 28 February 1912 – 28 April 1945) was a mistress of the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. She was killed by Italian partisans during Mussolini's summary execution.

Early life

Daughter of Giuseppina Persichetti (1888–1962) and the physician Francesco Saverio Petacci (1883–1970), Clara Petacci was born into a privileged and religious family in Rome in 1912.{{Cite web |last=Barber |first=Tony |date=17 February 2017 |title=Claretta by RJB Bosworth — Mussolini's last lover |url=https://www.ft.com/content/7b012a32-f2d3-11e6-95ee-f14e55513608 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170218133059/https://www.ft.com/content/7b012a32-f2d3-11e6-95ee-f14e55513608 |archive-date=2017-02-18 |access-date=2021-04-02 |website=www.ft.com}}{{Cite news |last=Downing |first=Ben |date=2017-03-24 |title=In Bed With Il Duce |language=en-US |work=Wall Street Journal |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-bed-with-il-duce-1490382122 |url-access=subscription |access-date=2021-04-02 |issn=0099-9660}} Her father, a physician of the Holy Apostolic Palaces,De Felice (1981) p. 278 became a supporter of fascism. A child when Mussolini rose to power in the 1920s, Clara Petacci idolised him from an early age. After Violet Gibson attempted to assassinate the dictator in April 1926, the 14-year-old Petacci wrote to him commenting "O, Duce, why was I not with you? ... Could I not have strangled that murderous woman?"

{{Cite web |last=Thomson|first=Ian|date=25 February 2017|title=The Ben and Clara affair|url= https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-ben-and-clara-affair|url-status=live|access-date=2021-04-02 |website= www.spectator.co.uk|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200825021748/https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-ben-and-clara-affair |archive-date=2020-08-25 }}

Relationship with Mussolini

Petacci had a long-standing relationship with Mussolini while he was married to Rachele Mussolini. Petacci was 28 years younger than Mussolini.{{in lang|es}} Giuseppina Persichetti, La enamorada de Mussolini, Madrid, Ediciones Caballero Audaz, 1947. They met for the first time in April 1932 when Mussolini, driving with an aide to Ostia, overtook a car occupied by the twenty-year-old Petacci and family members. She called out, "Duce! Duce!" and when he stopped, told him that she had been writing to him since her early teens.{{cite book|first=Max|last=Gallo|page=216|title=Mussolini's Italy|date=1974 |publisher=Abelard-Schuman |isbn=0-200-72140-2}}

In 1934, Petacci married Italian Air Force officer Riccardo Federici, but she parted ways with her husband when he was sent to Tokyo as Air Attaché in 1936.{{cite book|last=Boswort|first=R.J.B.|title=Mussolini|year=2010|publisher=Bloomsbury}} Petacci then became the mistress of the fifty-three-year-old Mussolini, visiting his headquarters in the {{lang|it|Palazzo Venezia|italic=no}}, where a small apartment was reserved for her. Her infatuation with Mussolini appears to have been genuine and permanent. The affair became widely known and members of the Petacci family, notably her brother, Marcello, were able to benefit financially and professionally by influence-selling.{{cite book|first=Max|last=Gallo|pages=270–271|title=Mussolini's Italy|date=1974 |publisher=Abelard-Schuman |isbn=0-200-72140-2}}

Part of Petacci and Mussolini's correspondence has not been released on the grounds of privacy.{{in lang|it}} Giampiero Buonomo, [https://www.academia.edu/11435982/Ricerca_storiografica_e_diritto_alla_riservatezza {{lang|it|Quel carteggio tra Mussolini e la Petacci. Storici sacrificati sull’altare della privacy}}, in Diritto e giustizia, 16 luglio 2005].

Death

File:Mussolini e Petacci a Piazzale Loreto, 1945.jpg, Mussolini, Petacci, Alessandro Pavolini and Achille Starace in Piazzale Loreto, 29 April 1945]]{{See also|Death of Benito Mussolini}}

On 27 April 1945, Mussolini and Petacci were captured by partisans while traveling with a Luftwaffe convoy retreating to Germany. The German column included a number of Italian Social Republic members.Gunther Langes, Auf Wiedersehen Claretta. Il diario dell'uomo che poteva salvare Mussolini e la Petacci, a cura di Nico Pirozzi, Villaricca, Edizioni Cento Autori, 2012. {{ISBN|978-88-97121-37-4}}.

On 28 April, she and Mussolini were taken to Mezzegra and executed. One source alleges Petacci's execution was not planned and that she died throwing herself on Mussolini in a vain attempt to protect him from the bullets.Pierluigi Baima Bollone, Le ultime ore di Mussolini, Milano, Mondadori, 2005, {{ISBN|88-04-53487-7}}., pagg. 89 e succ.ve On the following day, the bodies of Mussolini and Petacci were taken to Piazzale Loreto in Milan and hung upside down in front of a petrol station. The bodies were photographed as a crowd vented their rage upon them.{{cite web |url=http://cidc.library.cornell.edu/dof/italy/captioned/hanging.htm |title=Death of the Father-Mussolini & Fascist Italy: the 'infamous' exhibit |publisher=Cornell Institute for Digital Collections |year=1999}} On the same day, Clara's brother, Marcello Petacci, was also killed in Dongo by the partisans, along with fifteen other people complicit in Mussolini's escape.

After the war, the family of Petacci began civil and criminal court cases against Walter Audisio for Petacci's unlawful killing. After a lengthy legal process, an investigating judge eventually closed the case in 1967. Audisio was acquitted of murder and embezzlement on the grounds that the actions complained of occurred as an act of war against the Germans and the fascists during a period of enemy occupation.{{cite book |last=Baima Bollone |first=Pierluigi |title=Le ultime ore di Mussolini |date=2005 |publisher=Mondadori (Italy) |isbn=88-04-53487-7 |pages=123}}

References

Sources

{{cite book|last=De Felice|first=Renzo|title=Mussolini. Il Duce. 2: Lo stato totalitario, 1936–1940|orig-year=1981|year=1996| publisher=Einaudi|location=Torino|edition=2|language=it}}