Eyewitness Testimony Nello Crescentini

Crescentini Nello born in Matelica in 1922, rounded up in Matelica May 1944 When we arrived, they put us in camp 1, each in his own barrack, then in the morning to go to work, at 6 roll call, hail, snow, whatever happens, we go anyway, 7 km in the rain, the snow. Then we pierced a mountain, they made us bore it all through, inside there were all the workshops made. Inside the workshops there were all factories for the equipment. After they built the shed, the bosses put in charge of us, all those without brains, those not fit for war, were put to command us Italians. A Russian threw snow on me, I made myself a little hut like that, I stayed on top and threw the snow from underneath, lowered down; we gathered, lit a little fire, we saw the boss come up, but the Russian said “I’ll go up there.” “Yes, yes,” I said. There was a north wind, water and wind! The boss comes up, “You should be working up there,” he says to me. “Yes, yes, up there is the other comrade...” I say, a blow on the head, you fall to the ground, like animals. For 7-8 days I had a bump, I couldn’t even keep my hat on. I went to the infirmary “You didn’t want to work,” they told me... nasty bastards! Then my feet and legs swelled. At the visit they didn’t recognize me because I didn’t have a fever. There was an Italian doctor and a German one, but when the German was there, the Italian didn’t want to treat me “because if I hospitalize you – he said – and see there’s no fever, he punishes me.” One morning, I couldn’t get up, they came to visit the barracks “You’re sleeping while the others are working.” The beatings! With the bunk beds, they hit above and below... “What hurts you, what hurts you?” I showed them my whole swollen leg, like this. “Oh, you’re seriously ill!… he took me, he took me away. Then there was the mortuary room, it was always full, they took people away and threw them away. “But who knows where they’ll take me!” I cried, goodbye. Instead I hear wheels in front of the barrack, there was an Italian who worked as camp staff. “Are you the one who doesn’t want to go to work?” “Yes, I can’t take it anymore, where are you taking me? Are you taking me to be killed? If you have to kill me, kill me here.” “We’re taking you to the infirmary.” “Is it true?” “Yes, of course!” In fact, he helped me dress and put me on a little cart with 4 wheels and took me to the infirmary. He put me on a little bed and left. There was the Italian nurse, he undressed me completely, put me on a little bed, wool blankets underneath, put two straps on me, covered me with wool blankets, inside 36 light bulbs, then he turned on the current, what heat it gave you. After an hour I was all wet, as if I were in a hot bath, the blanket underneath no longer absorbed the water. I made it drip off the bed and then I dressed myself. Then we went to sleep, the beatings! To eat, beets; then cigarettes. I made friends with a family, I brought them cigarettes, the packet unopened, they gave me the card for 2 and a half kilos of bread. And now the questions How and when were you rounded up? In May, at the concentration camp in Macerata, then a train, then to Florence, it was written in Florence “VOLUNTEER COLLECTION CENTER IN GERMANY, those bastards.” What kind of work were you assigned to and how did your day go? Pick and shovel, inside the mountain, to dig the mountain. First 15 days and 15 nights. Then they didn’t do that anymore and took us here and there to work. The episode that struck you the most? The beatings on the head and legs. When were you liberated? The war ended, the Americans passed, they stayed there, we didn’t do anything anymore. They took us, took us away to Italy, put us on a train, gave us the documents, the ausweis etc. Before passing through Germany, I tore everything up so I wouldn’t smell Germany anymore. May I die. The best memory? I don’t know... the hunger...!