Word: duces
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1940-1949
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...true. The late Count Ciano is shown boldly expressing his contempt for German Foreign Minister Ribbentrop and his antagonism toward Hitler. Mussolini astonished Welles by seeming inert, ponderous and static. His close-cropped hair was snow white. In repose, his face fell in rolls of flesh. When the Duce talked, he kept his eyes shut save for moments when he remembered his reputation for staring "dynamically...
...seriously. Italians do not believe in executions, least of all for political reasons, and Ciano was, after all, Mussolini's son-in-law and former Foreign Minister. But the priests came and the prisoners realized that they were to die. Ciano agreed to sign a petition to the Duce. A courier flew to Lake Garda, where Mussolini was staying. But that night he was not there, nor did he appear until late next morning, after the five had been executed...
...Grand Councilors who voted to oust the Duce last July 24 were tried for their lives. But at the trial in Verona's grim, massive Castel Vecchio, built in 1335 near Diocletian's amphitheater, only six defendants were present. The others were in hiding. The judges were all Italians; no Germans took part. Many believe that the judges had been told to go as far as they liked, since the Duce would suspend the sentences in time...
Ciano was the last to testify. He did not behave well. Ciano called it "absolutely absurd that we ... wanted to ruin the Duce, since we would be buried in the ruin." But he admitted that after the Council meeting he had gone to Marshal Badoglio, asked for a passport for himself, his wife Edda and their children. Prince Otto von Bismarck, Counselor of the German Embassy and a close friend, promised to put a plane at Ciano's disposal. Ciano was spirited into the plane, but it flew to Germany, not to Spain as he intended. Later Edda...
...Vittorio Malfatti, worked out a feasible plan for raising the sunk galleys. But it remained for Benito Mussolini to carry out the plan. By his order a Roman drainage tunnel, which led out under a mountain, was reopened. Four huge electric pumps were installed. With his own hand II Duce started the pumps (1928). A little less than three years later the water-logged galleys were raised. In 1940 Mussolini presented the venerable hulls, mounted on concrete, as a pious gift to Rome on her 2,695th birthday (April 21). On the last day of May at lovely Lake Nemi...