“Despite the fact that the municipal council room is dominated by the marble bust of Edgardo Fogli and that in Piazza Vincenzino Folegatti in front of the municipality there is the tombstone of Edgardo Fogli and Vincenzino Folegatti, the current administration of Comacchio forgets about the partisan with a medal of gold for military valor massacred by the Nazi-fascists and of the twenty-one-year-old silver medal partisan who died on the eve of the Liberation”. The council group leader of La Città Futura-M5S Sandra Carli Ballola highlighted the lack and illustrated her comments on the brief summary of the history of Comacchio, presented to the city councilors in the Commission of 19 April, in preparation for next Monday’s Council . Findings which, as Carli Ballola reports, led the municipal administration to review the historical text and to postpone the relevant resolution to a next municipal council. “With this brief narrative – explains the councilor – the mayor intends to present the request for the granting of the title of city which is attributed by the President of the Republic to municipalities famous for their memories, historical monuments and current importance. But those skimpy little pages demonstrate a lack of knowledge of the city in its fundamental elements and its constituent processes and of its illustrious and generous citizens”.
As highlighted by Carli Ballola, “the historical gaps found were not few, starting from the lack of precision in outlining the modern and contemporary history of Comacchio, a fundamental center at European level for eel fishing”, and on the “tribute of men given in all phases of the Risorgimento (starting with Gaetano Bonnet)”. But among the various aspects, what absolutely cannot be missing, according to Carli Ballola, are references to “the shining figure of Edgardo Fogli, political anti-fascist, who chose to remain in Comacchio leading the double life of local patriots and maintaining relations with the partisan groups from the valleys: on 18 January 1945 he was arrested together with Giuseppe Ghirardelli and Giovanni Farinelli, tortured atrociously and killed on 29 January 1945” and the young Vincenzino Folegatti, coming from an anti-fascist family, who “on 8 September was in La Spezia embarked on a destroyer and like many other young people, he returns home and makes the partisan choice, participating in the actions of the 28th Garibaldi brigade commanded by Arrigo Boldrini, he dies on the eve of the Liberation, on 18 April 1945, jumping on a mine in a valley hill”.
Valerio Franzoni
