Italian

The Museo della Memoria: Sicilia 1943 (Memorial Museum: Sicily 1943) in Modica presents the history of the Allied Landings in Sicily beginning July 10, 1943, and the course of the subsequent fighting in Sicily. The museum employs a large collection of physical artifacts – weapons and equipment, military uniforms, vehicles, etc. – in addition to period documents and photographs to document the course of the Sicily campaign and present the perspectives and identities of different participants, including the people of Sicily. 

The Archivio della Resistenza e della Memoria (Archives of Resistance and Memory) in Barletta is an ongoing archival project, cataloguing and making available to the public wartime records of the city’s experience during the Second World War. Specific areas of publicized documentation include resistance to German and fascist occupation from 1943-45, records of local military and civilian executions and unmarked graves, and testimonies from local witnesses and survivors of the Holocaust.    

The Museo della Battaglia di Ortona (Battle of Ortona Museum) presents the history of the Battle of Ortona (December 20-28, 1943) between the German 1st Parachute Division and the Canadian 1st Infantry Division and 1st Canadian Armoured Brigade. Part of the Allied advance northwards, Ortona was fiercely defended and house-to-house fighting occurred. A Canadian victory after eight days of combat resulted in steep casualties: more than 800 German, and approximately 2000 Canadian. 

The Museo Historiale di Cassino (Cassino Historical Museum) presents the Second World War-era history of Cassino. The city is particularly significant for the long and bloody Battle of Monte Cassino (January 1944 to May 1944), in which approximately 55 000 Allied soldiers lost their lives (against 20 000 German casualties) to achieve a breakthrough in the advance towards Rome.

The Museo Storico della Liberazione di Roma (Museum of the Liberation of Rome) presents the history of the German invasion and occupation of Rome in September 1943 following the Italian-Allied Armistice, the impacts on the city’s population, subsequent resistance, and the Liberation of Rome in June 1944.

The Museo Storico della Linea Gotica (Gothic Line Museum) in Casinina is a museum and documentation center which presents the history of the German line of fortifications along the northern Apennine Mountains known as the Gothic Line, and the Allied attacks and advances on these positions in 1944 and 1945 including the nearby Battle of Rimini in September 1944. The museum is located along the former site of the Gothic Line, including the preserved remains of a German bunker and a Park of Memory built upon the site of a former German minefield.

The Museo della Liberazione di Ancona (Ancona Liberation Museum) in Offagna presents the history of local resistance to German and fascist occupation from 1943-45 in the form of period artifacts as well as a collection of more than 15 000 physical and digitized photographs. Originally a travelling photograph exhibit, a permanent museum for the collection was established in Offagna in 2006; this recognised the town’s wartime significance as the site of the Battle of Monte Crescia, crucial in the capture of Ancona and its port.

The Museo della Resistenza Goffredo Baldelli (Goffredo Baldelli Resistance Museum) in Falconara Marittima presents the history of local resistance to German and fascist occupation from 1943-45 and the Liberation of Falconara in July 1945. The museum displays the weapons and equipment belonging to partisans active in the Apennine Mountains, and photographs documenting the liberation.

The museum was inaugurated in 2002, and in 2012 was named for Falconara-native partisan Goffredo Baldelli.    

The Museo della Risiera di San Sabba (San Sabba Rice Mill Museum) is a national monument and museum: a former rice mill and factory in Trieste, which German occupation authorities employed as a detention and concentration camp from 1943-45.