Episode 8 - Toffee

Hello everybody and welcome back to a new episode of “Tales from the Hideout”! I, as always, am Nicola, and today we will start again from where we left in the previous episode. The Envelope Blue mission, after a disastrous beginning, was fragmented in smaller missions, after receiving a lot of pressure from the rastrellamenti made by the enemy.

In November 1944, Jim Davies, head of the mission, crossed the border and went back to the liberated part of Italy.

On the area only two missions were left, which both derived from the Envelope: Holland’s “Toffee” and Wilcockson’s “Silentia”. Today we will talk about the first one, the “Toffee”, which stayed in the area of Parma, very close to the original operational area of the Envelope Blue.

The situation was very difficult for Holland and his men: they were chased by the forces from the Axis, which wanted to keep them away from the Gothic line. The food started to become scarce, while the partisan war became brutal. In the first half of october, as you would remember, the Comando Unico (which was considered to be too static) was sent away by the enemy; for the partisans and the mission started a long and hard period of reconstruction. I don’t think we have to add more to this, so let’s start again with the tale of the Toffee mission.

The destruction of the Commando Unico from Parma, on October 17th, had harsh consequences on the military organization of the partisans. Parma’s CU was not the only one to be created, since also a new CU’s delegation was created in the East Cisa area, where Captain Holland, now commander of the Toffee mission, gave order to operate; this happened also in order to cope with an intern conflict in the partisan movement. The partisans had elected “Arta”, Giacomo Ferrari, as their commander; Parma’s CLN, instead, responded to an order by Milano’s CLNAI and nominated Colonel “Gloria” (Paolo Ceschi) as a commander, while Colonel “Mauri”, Primo Savani, as a commissioner. They decided to split the CU in two parts: a western side of the Cisa led by Arta, and a eastern side led by Gloria. Holland reports that this development resulted to be highly positive. It minimized the issues within the partisan movement and allowed the mission (in the eastern side) to have a closer contact (direct and fast), with the local CU; this solution permitted them to avoid to run for km for reunions or send messages. 

The four men of the mission were Captain Holland, Corporal Hayhurst, Hill and Michael Tyler (a former pow who ran away, a civilian, who was in the area since September 8th 1943); after Major Davies left, they got back to their operational area. Finally, after few weeks of nothing, the mission received a drop of supplies. Anyway, they were immediately chased by the German forces. On the night between November 19th and 20th, a new rastrellamento took place in the area. About 6000 or 7000 men from the Taro valley and from the Lunense crossed the Lagastrello pass, trapping the partisans who were in Mount Caio. Hill, immediately, managed to hide some supplies from the previous launches, before running away; anyway, in that moment, the Germans appeared behind a hill. Holland and Hayhurst were left behind, totally surrounded by the enemy. While the German offensive was taking place, Holland was going back to the village of Grammatica, in order to reunite with his men after visiting the Perfrara farm. Once he passed the Ticchiano pass, Holland ran into a German garrison which was watching over the path with heavy machine guns. The agent hided in the bushes and stayed there all day long, managing to escape during the night. Holland moved towards Grammatica, which in the meantime had been occupied by the Germans. Fortunately he managed to reunite with Hayhurst, who was in the neighbourhood with two muleteers, a guide and a mule. The group together decided to hide in a cave which was not known by the Germans. They spent there five days, eating bread with butter. On the sixth day, a peasant woman from Grammatica arrived, telling them that the Germans had already left the village and asking about her husband. In a mixture of pain and fear, Holland had to tell her that her husband was not with them. But in that moment, with great surprise, Holland found out that the cave was made of two different levels; in the lower one, seven citizens of Grammatica were hiding. The woman’s husband was with them. Those men were hiding since they thought that the other men upstairs were Germans. 

At this point, Holland had to complete an “ungrateful task”: he had to read the Alexander proclaim to the partisans. The text was asking them to break up the formations while waiting for better days. This resulted to be very tough for the general mood, which had been already tore down by a rastrellamento; the local partisan bands, for this reason, were quite destroyed. The heavy snow falling was not helping, since the relocations got stuck. The bands got dispersed, many partisans assumed the role of SAP. This was the situation both in December and the first half of January: the CU’s men were busy preparing the plans for February, while the Germans were chasing them with with raids. The mission could act only during the night, since the presence of the enemies was particularly heavy. The garibaldini, despite their losses, steadily reorganized and, as Holland reports, were ideologically cohesive and better organized. On the other hand, the men from GL reported many damages after this phase. The 4th GL brigade was so beaten that Viti (Bruno Bianchi, Pd’A’s représentant) decided to disband it. The brigade’s commander decided to retire from the military life and disappeared. The Pd’A was destroyed by internal fights and did not give any kind of help in this situation. Colonel Gloria, the only commander in the area, worked very hard and resulted to be the key for the re-start of the activities, as Holland reports. Many men, useless for the mission, were sent away, while about 30 thieves were hanged. The GL’s brigade was re-arranged in the “Pablo” (named after the former commander, dead in a German raid on October 17th) and in the 3rd brigade Julia. The 47th and the 12th Garibaldi experienced a frequent alternation in the command; this improved their performances. A partisan police was created, in order to better control the security. “A lot of things had been made, but there was still a lot of things left to do”, Holland wrote. The mission ensured frequent airdrops, while Holland visited the different formations, arbitrating political issues or managing the distribution of the supplies.

In December, unfortunately, Hayhurst could not operate anymore because he got the scabies. Holland, who was desperate at this point, decided to evacuate the area and move away. The mission moved in a hideout close to Torsana, in order to let Hayhurst recover from his disease and wait for better times. In this hideout there was also Captain Philipsz, a British officer, ex pow who managed to run away. Philipsz took part into the mission, covering Hayhurst’s role while he was recovering. The mission, at this point, was able to keep in touch with the bands from the Garfagnana and the Apuania.

Holland spent Christmas in Rigoso, on the mountains, hosted by Tom, a political commissionaire; there were also Michael Tyler, Paolo “il danese”, Arndt Paul Richardt Lauritzen (head of the 3rd brigade Julia) and some partisans both Russian and Italian. A multi ethnic group, which turns a light on the transnational disposition of the Resistance. At the beginning of December, there was another reason to party: Holland was informed via radio that he was promoted to Major on the area. The men from the mission reunited, together with Paolo “il danese” and Ennio Biasetti (“Condor”, commissionaire from the 3rd Julia brigade), in order to drink whiskey together and celebrate the new Major. 

January brought bad news: the Germans were approaching the Emilian Appennino. Fortunately these news resulted to be fake, but we can easily imagine the tension that was instilled in the groups. Holland got in touch with the anarchist partisans in the Lunigiana (The 4th brigade Apuana and the Borrini brigade): they were not particularly happy about the British presence. Anyway, their help was necessary in order to lock the Lagastrello pass, keeping away the Germans. For this reason, the enemies were forced to cross the Cisa, an area in which the partisans and the allied could easily attack. Three launches were managed by the anarchists, for this reason they decided to take part into the Cisa’s CU. This decision made the commanders dubious, since Holland evaluated this decision as “risky”. Anyway, despite this, he paid the dividends when the partisans attacked in April, killing about 200 enemies and capturing about 500 of them. This action resulted to be admirable at the eyes of the Allied troops.

The partisans received more supplies and the number of men grew, even though, as Holland reports, they never reached again the dimensions they had before the rastrellamento in November. The brigades could count on about 1250 men, half of them in “garibaldine” forces, 350 in the catholic brigade Julia, 300 without a specific political group and operating in the Pablo brigade (created from the ashes of the GL).

In February the airdrops tightened. In the first weeks of the month, Holland received as much drops as in the whole month in January. On February 6th Jim Davies went back to the mission. Davies was the original head of the Envelope Blue mission, who left the area in November 1944, going back on foot to the liberated side of Italy. Davies was airdropped in an area between Parma and Reggio Emilia, reached by Holland’s Toffee and Wilcockson’s SIlentia, which were very happy to see their former commander. The group from the Envelope Blue got together after five months. The agents received new orders about sabotages and the protection of industrial and energetical plants of their area. Davies moved to Modena, to the area which was assigned to him.

Holland went back to the mountains, which were safer now: they were firmly controlled by the Partisans. By the end of February, Holland writes that Mauri (CU’s commissionaire) told him to have been approached by the German command. Holland here is not clear: he writes in the report that Commander Ceschi gave him the news, but then he writes that Mauri did. This is, anyway, an excusable discrepancy. Karl Wolff, from the SS, thanks to Knight Commander Costa made an offer: he asked that the German forces would have been left alone if they avoided to destroy places, to ransack villages and execute people. Once Mauri received the proposal, he immediately ran to the Major to report it. Considered that the Lutwaffe was already almost been expelled from the north of Italy, Holland, as well as the CU and the Allied commands, suggested to refuse the proposal.

Thanks to the growth of the restocks, there was an explosion of partisan forces, which were almost duplicated by the beginning of March; the CU had more than 3000 men. The sabotage also increased, the partisans started to attack the enemies more frequently, catching also more prisoners. The Allied troops were now close to the area, while Germans and fascists were starting to retreat. By the beginning of April things were going way fast. The CU reunited all the brigades into two divisions, the Ottavio Ricci and the Monte Orsaro, putting them as garrisons at the passes in the Appennini. On April 6th, the long waited message arrived: “There are races at the racecourse tomorrow!”; it was the signal for the general insurrection. On the 14th there was the start of the battle in order to free Parma. The following days were characterized by chaotic activities. The mission moved to the hills close to Parma, in order to follow the situation from a closer point of view and communicate more easily with the CU, the Comando di Piazza, the CLN and the Comando Alleato. The battle was not easy for Parma since the Germans didn’t want to surrender to the partisans; at the same time, the partisans (for a matter of principle) wanted to free Parma before the arrival of the Allied. It was a way to demonstrate that they were seriously battling. In the meantime, on April 24th the last field battle of the Italian campaign started: the one known as the Fornovo pocket, at south-west of Parma. Few German divisions while retiring ran into a road, which was towards the Po river, closed by partisan forces; they tried the barging. The partisans managed to slow down the Germans until the arrival of the Allied forces, the Força Expedicionària Brasileira. The Brazilians locked the enemy in their grip, forcing them to surrender on April 30th. The partisans entered Parma between the 25th and the 26th of April. Paolo “il danese”, head of the 3rd brigade Julia, was the first to enter in the city at the dawn of the 26th. As Holland reports, Paolo was the chosen one since he had a very balanced personality, which would have been a strong point when facing all the different political formations. Few hours later, the other formations and the Toffee reached him. The battle of Parma was just considered to be finished when the 28th some nazi-fascists snipers hiding on the roofs started to create panic, but they were finally sent away.

Anyway, the city looked good and the hydro electrical plans had been protected once again. A semi-normal situation had been restored soon and the Toffee was immediately replaced by the AMG in his functions. As always, the AMG didn’t do a good job. Michael Tyler, a former pow who joined the mission, was very clear about it: “despite I didn’t spend much time with the AMG, I didn’t have a good opinion about them. They looked like they didn’t understand the CU and the partisans, they weren’t able to manage the problems which, inevitably, they met on their way, due to lack of understanding. They didn’t have an enterprising spirit and they weren’t appreciated nor by the partisans nor by the civilians”.

This is how our trip around Parma, with the Envelope Blue and the Toffee, ends. Naturally, in the area there is also the “Silentia” mission by Wilcockson, then taken by Davies (former commander of the Envelope Blue, retired in Italy on January 1945). Anyway, at the moment, the Silentia papers are not available, since I had been recording these episodes during the Coronavirus pandemic; obviously, I didn’t have the chance to go to the archives in order to complete this triptych of the missions. These missions had a very unfortunate beginning: for example, with the operation organized by Johnston which led to the airdrop of the Envelope, which had been immediately rastrellata, breaking into Holland’s Toffee and Wilcockson’s Silentia.

Anyway, we have at least an idea of what happened in the Parma area, which were the problems and the solutions chosen. Once again, the patterns are always the same: the lack of supplies, the constant threat by the enemy, the frustration of not being able to respond to the attacks. Once again, political life is not taken principally into account, also in an area as Parma, where the rivalries between the bands were particularly hot. In both of the reports by Holland and by Davies, they seem like they don’t care too much about it. Holland reports that he tried to restore the balance among the bands: numerically, the non communist bands and the garibaldine were at an even point. Anyway, he didn’t look like someone who struggled a lot to reach this goal, nor he looked like he had a totally negative opinion about the communists. It is evident on his CU’s report. Holland has a very good opinion about Colonel Ceschi (Gloria), a demo christian. He says that thanks to Ceschi the partisans became a true military force, reaching a good level of organization. Anyway, he has a good opinion also about Savanni (Mauri), communist, political commissaire of the CU. Holland describes him as a good orator (he was a lawyer). He was an “idealist with an enormous practical sense”, “a fine orator with a persuasive personality”. He had been able to stop and make the opponents silent, about the reforms that Ceschi wanted to improve; he did that only using the “logical power of his discourses”.

More than being preoccupied for the communists, Holland was worried for Parma’s and Italy’s future administration. He writes: “Parma is waiting. The first fierce reaction to a useless army, to the Carabinieri coming from the south, to the total absence of a purge of the fascists; it is all finished, but all the eyes are on the north. Parma is waiting for Bonomi to leave, for the CLNAI properly represented by a new government set in Milan. Anyway, Parma is tired and its inhabitants are not extremists”. The idea of the “northern wind” is frequently used to display these feelings linked with the will of re-start, to definitely send away the fascists from Italy. As we well know, few of these things really happened. 

It is strange for a British officer to understand this feeling properly. Once again, we have to underline the level of closeness between the partisans and the British officers. They shared the same privations, the same joys and, frequently, the same death. This is even more true for the Toffee, which still has the record for being the one which operated more in the long term. Holland has the record for being the long-lived commander, while Hayhurst the radio operator who worked longer behind the enemy’s lines. It is no surprising that this mission has one of the more accurate descriptions available.

I hope you liked this episode, as always I’ll wait for you next week for a new story. This time we’ll go northern, in Veneto, to follow the path walked by one of the most famous agents: Major Wilkinson, “Freccia”, and his mission with an evocative name: “Ruina”.