“On the meadows of Tonale 94 edelweiss” by Sergio Boem:
on 27 April meeting with the author at the Risorgimento Museum, Vicenza.
Almost a warning not to forget, the mountain never stops returning artefacts but also bodies from the Great War, which marked the future of the people who fought in it. Intense pages tell of the latest, exceptional discovery of a mass grave in Valcamonica in 2019, a century and a few months after that day, 13 June 1918, of blood and ash for the Alpine troops and the Austro-Hungarian soldiers on Mount Cady.
Soldiers of the Great War Found in the Italian Alps
An Age-Old Secret Revealed
June 1918-September 2019. A century and a couple of months that those unknown bodies had been there buried all together and forgotten on Monte Cady, at the Tonale pass, in Valcamonica. The extraordinary discovery comes from the Brescia area Sergio Boem, “hunter of memories and researcher of stories” but also mountaineer and writer, fascinated in particular by the events of the Valcamonica Battalion of the V Alpini Regiment. Piqued by a note from his maternal grandfather in the Battalion’s Historical Diary, referring to a massive burial, Boem goes to the site of the bloody battle of Cima Cady and, together with his remains, brings to light a forgotten tragedy. Which he now tells through the mouth of his grandfather, Alpine officer, Ubaldo Ingravalle.
Saturday 27 April, at 10am
At the Risorgimento Museum, Sergio Boem will present his book “94 edelweiss on the meadows of Tonale” (Editrice Rendena) which, as the subtitle announces An incredible discovery, a story re-emerged from the past 1918 – The forgotten of Cima Cady, between private memories and collective memory it wants to be a tribute to all the fallen, even and above all the lesser known ones, if not even never known before. Not only in Valcamonica, not only with the friendly uniform.
A book full of emotions that have no coat of arms or colour, from shock and fear, from hope to internal torment, up to pity for the fallen enemy. In fact, those 94 edelweiss are all Austro-Hungarian… A book that is also an appeal to the institutions to recover another 82 bodies.”worthy adversaries of our grandparents – as Boem defines them – who are still waiting to come down from the front” and they deserve that “the silence of indifference does not descend on this recovery which is not yet completed”.
“The story of the journey of suffering soldiers – we read in a review – It thus becomes an opportunity to rediscover the dreams and emotions of those our ancestors and their lives in the early 1900s, but also to investigate the traces (…) of a dramatic and enormous burial that is still inviolate”.
Vicenza, 25 April 2024
Cover photo source from Sergio Boem’s Facebook profile at the site of the discovery
Federica Zanini – Press officer for Adunata Alpini 2024 Srl
