Pietro Domenico Frattini (1 December 1821 – 19 March 1853) was a supporter of

Italian unification The unification of Italy ( it, Unità d'Italia ), also known as the ''Risorgimento'' (, ; ), was the 19th-century political and social movement that resulted in the consolidation of different states of the Italian Peninsula into a single ...

and one of the

Belfiore martyrs The Belfiore martyrs were a group of pro-independence fighters condemned to death by hanging between 1852 and 1853 during the Italian Risorgimento. They included Tito Speri and the priest Enrico Tazzoli and are named after the site where the se ...

Life

He was born in Vigo di Legnago, but moved to

Mantua Mantua ( ; it, Mantova ; Lombard language, Lombard and la, Mantua) is a city and ''comune'' in Lombardy, Italy, and capital of the Province of Mantua, province of the same name. In 2016, Mantua was designated as the Italian Capital of Culture ...

at the age of 15, and was converted to the Republican ideas of Mazzini by the

Revolutions of 1848 The Revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the Springtime of the Peoples or the Springtime of Nations, were a series of political upheavals throughout Europe starting in 1848. It remains the most widespread revolutionary wave in Europea ...

. He was one of the first people to join the Guardia Civica formed in the province. During the

First Italian War of Independence The First Italian War of Independence ( it, Prima guerra d'indipendenza italiana), part of the Italian Unification (''Risorgimento''), was fought by the Kingdom of Sardinia (Piedmont) and Italian volunteers against the Austrian Empire and other ...

he took part in the first battle of

Governolo Roncoferraro (Mantovano: ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Mantua in the Italian region of Lombardy, located about southeast of Milan and about southeast of Mantua. Roncoferraro borders the following municipalities: Bagnolo San ...

. After the battle of Novara he joined

Giuseppe Garibaldi Giuseppe Maria Garibaldi ( , ;In his native Ligurian language, he is known as ''Gioxeppe Gaibado''. In his particular Niçard dialect of Ligurian, he was known as ''Jousé'' or ''Josep''. 4 July 1807 – 2 June 1882) was an Italian general, patr ...

in his defence of the

Roman Republic The Roman Republic ( la, Res publica Romana ) was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kin ...

and was seriously injured during the clashes at the

Villa Doria Pamphilj The Villa Doria Pamphili is a seventeenth-century villa with what is today the largest landscaped public park in Rome, Italy. It is located in the quarter of Monteverde, on the ''Gianicolo'' (or the Roman Janiculum), just outside the Porta San Pan ...

. Following the

Austrian Empire The Austrian Empire (german: link=no, Kaiserthum Oesterreich, modern spelling , ) was a Central-Eastern European multinational great power from 1804 to 1867, created by proclamation out of the realms of the Habsburgs. During its existence, ...

's amnesty in October 1849, Frattini returned to Mantua and quickly joined the Mantuan Insurrectional Committee, hiding its secret press in his home and bringing supporters of unification to Mantua from other cities in Italy. He and the other Belfiore martyrs were incriminated by Luigi Castellazzo's confession, arrested on 26 October 1852 and condemned to hang for high treason. The execution took place at

Belfiore Belfiore is a comune s in the province of Verona, Veneto it, Veneto (man) it, Veneta (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes ...

on 19 March 1853, one hour before the announcement of an amnesty for

Francis Joseph I of Austria Franz Joseph I or Francis Joseph I (german: Franz Joseph Karl, hu, Ferenc József Károly, 18 August 1830 – 21 November 1916) was Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, and the other states of the Habsburg monarchy from 2 December 1848 until his ...

's birthday. The precise instructions to

Josef Radetzky Johann Josef Wenzel Anton Franz Karl, Graf Radetzky von Radetz ( en, John Joseph Wenceslaus Anthony Francis Charles, Count Radetzky of Radetz; cz, Jan Josef Václav Antonín František Karel hrabě Radecký z Radče; sl, Janez Jožef Vencelj ...

for the executions forbade him from delaying them - they had been personally set by Francis Joseph with advice from his main counsellor Karl Grünne.Alessandro Luzio, ''Francesco Giuseppe e l'Italia'', Milano, Treves, 1917, pag.6

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Frattini, Pietro People executed by hanging Italian people of the Italian unification 1821 births 1853 deaths People from Legnago