Chapter Four

The Revolutionary Upheaval and War of 1848–49

News of the students’ revolution in Vienna of 13 March 1848, the paralysis of Austria and the resignation of the arch-enemy of Italian nationalists, Metternich, electrified Lombardy and Venetia. On the morning of 18th March, demonstrations for reform in Milan exploded into violence as barricades mushroomed against General Radetzky’s occupying forces. The entire population of Milan, over 150,000 strong, seemed to turn against the general’s garrison of 12,000. At the end of five days of fighting, the famous ‘Cinque Giornate’, Radetzky abandoned the capital of Lombardy. The Austrians fared no better in Venice where Daniele Manin, released from prison, secured control of the arsenal and the city of canals. Under the banner of ‘Saint Mark and Italy’ the Venetians pushed the Austrians out. As the Republic was proclaimed in the Great Piazza of Venice, the people in the duchies of Parma and Modena frightened their princes into departure, and the national programme suddenly triumphed.

The Austrian decision to evacuate Milan, and their setback in Venice, served as a signal to the rest of the peninsula, setting all Italy ablaze. Few remained calm in the midst of this cataclysm as the old world fell to pieces and the rock of absolutism splintered. Turmoil rocked the Italian Tyrol, and even the Habsburg Grand Duke of Tuscany felt constrained to raise the Italian standard. In Rome, where the double-headed Austrian eagle was stripped from the Palazzo Venezia, the Council of Ministers opened enlistment for volunteers for the impending war against Austria, and in the course of a few hours, thousands enscribed. Pio Nono, personally reluctant to sanction war against Catholic Austria, looked to the courts of Sardinia, Naples and Florence to regulate the Italian movement. While the Pontiff shied from a declaration of war, there were hints that he might be drawn into the conflict by the Italian League he had long promoted.¹

Attention turned to Carlo Alberto of Piedmont who had assumed a new importance in the liberal movement by his publication of the Statuto on 4th March, and selection of Cesare Balbo as head of the first constitutional ministry, on 16th March. When General Franzini issued orders placing the Sardinian army on a war footing, word spread that the enigmatic monarch would soon redeem his pledge to champion the national cause against Austria. The Milanese counted on his support, and the very day their rebellion erupted, entreated immediate Piedmontese intervention. Carlo Alberto, weighing the advantages of victory against the dangers of making common cause with the democrats and revolutionaries of Milan, hesitated.

The King had to consider the national enthusiasm which the five days had unleashed, Piedmont’s anti-Austrian sentiments and expansionist ambitions, as well as the prospect that his inactivity might lead to the creation of a republic in Lombardy, so jeopardizing the future of the House of Savoy. The Duke of Savoy, who later succeeded his father as King Vittorio Emanuele, pressed for war, as did the editors of the newspaper Il Risorgimento. Aroused by the heroism of their neighbouring Lombards, and the prospects for the creation of a unified kingdom of northern Italy, Camillo di Cavour called upon Carlo Alberto to wage war:

The supreme hour for the monarchy of Savoy has arrived – the hour of firm decision, the time which will determine the fate of empires and people. In light of developments in Lombardy and Venetia, hesitations, doubt, delay are no longer possible; these of all policies, would be most calamitous. As men of cool judgment, accustomed to paying attention to the dictates of reason rather than the impulse of passion, we feel bound in conscience to declare, after carefully weighing our every word, that only one road is open to the nation, the government, the King. That way is war – immediately, without delay.²

On 23rd March, Carlo Alberto’s forces crossed the River Ticino into Lombardy. While Piedmont’s ambassadors sought to convince the conservative powers that the move into Lombardy was mandated by the need to preserve order and prevent the formation of a radical republic, a conflicting message was broadcast to the people of the peninsula. In his proclamation to the Lombards and Venetians, written by his minister, Federigo Sclopis di Salerano, the king promised to support their aspiration for independence. Revealing his intention of arousing the religious instincts of the peasantry, the king placed his trust in the God who had bestowed them with Pio Nono and provided Italy the opportunity to fulfil its destiny. His statement was altered to ‘L’Italia farà da se’ or ‘Italy will do it alone’, which became the national slogan in 1848.

At the end of March and early in April 1848, Italy appeared capable of achieving its national programme without foreign assistance. The Piedmontese forces, swelled by volunteers from Lombardy and Tuscany, advanced against the Austrians from the west. In Rome there was an explosion of enthusiasm for the national cause as the cry ‘Out with the Barbarians!’ resounded on its squares. The constitutional ministry of Cardinal Giacomo Antonelli decreed the formation of an army, under the Piedmontese General Giovanni Durando, permitting it to march northward. These regular forces were assisted by more than 12,000 volunteers, including two nephews of the Pope, led by Colonel Andrea Ferrari. Although Pius had not declared war against Austria, his proclamation of 30th March to the people of Italy, sounded like a prelude to a formal declaration. ‘The events of these past two months, which have succeeded and pressed on each other with such rapid change, are not the work of man’, wrote Pius. ‘Woe to him who in this agitating wind which splits and breaks to pieces cedars and oaks, does not heed the voice of the Lord!’³ Pio Nono’s words were bolstered by actions as he and the religious congregations made generous donations to the Italian cause.

Naples, too, witnessed enthusiasm for the war of liberation. On 27th March, during the course of a public demonstration in favour of Italian independence, Ferdinando II pledged himself to the national cause. In his proclamation of 7th April to his countrymen, Ferdinando expressed his dedication to the liberation of the peninsula, committing his forces to the campaign. General Guglielmo Pepe, after twenty-seven years of exile, led a contingent of 14,000 Neapolitans to fight the Austrians. Leopoldo II of Tuscany also hastened to identify himself with the Italian crusade. Asserting that the cause of Italian independence would be decided on the plains of Lombardy, he contributed a Tuscan corps of 6,000 men.

In 1848 the diplomatic situation turned favourably towards the Italian cause. Tsar Nicholas, expected to make common cause with the Austrians, did not categorically oppose Italian autonomy, or even a Gallic extension of territory, so long as France allowed Russia a free hand in the east. The Parisian Assembly voted in favour of Italian independence, supporting a confederation of Italian states. Meanwhile Palmerston did not deem it convenient, if indeed possible, for Austria to preserve her Italian possessions to keep the French out of Italy. The creation of a liberal kingdom in northern Italy might better serve as a barrier and buffer. The English Foreign Secretary Palmerston perceived the Italian provinces not as a shield for the Habsburg Empire, but its Achilles heel.⁴

The military campaign likewise initially proceeded well for the Italians. On 26th March the vanguard of Carlo Alberto’s army entered Milan, reaching Pavia a few days later. In early April General Bava crossed the Mincio to assume control of the right bank of the river. Nonetheless, errors were made. The first allowed General Radetzky to retreat from Milan without any hindrance, enabling him to seek refuge within the quadrilateral of the fortresses of Verona, Peschiera, Mantua and Legnano. Here he found security and supplies. Still matters might have been saved if an immediate attack had been launched against Mantua, at first defended by only a small force, and therefore vulnerable to a determined invasion. Unfortunately Carlo Alberto and the Piedmontese procrastinated, allowing Radetzky to transport reinforcements. Finally political – military errors were made in keeping a large part of the Piedmontese force in reserve, discouraging the use of volunteers and converting the national movement into a religious crusade. The latter assumed the compliance of Pio Nono, who proved absolutely opposed to converting the war of liberation into a religious struggle.

Although Pio Nono sensed the end of Austrian domination in Italy, from the first he had reservations about launching an attack upon that Catholic power. Minister of a God of peace, he hesitated lighting a torch that might well set all of Italy, and Europe, ablaze. The troops which the Pope permitted to march north were commanded to defend the frontier of their state, and warned against assuming an aggressive posture. Pius confessed to those around him that he would never allow his forces to cross the frontier; he had no legitimate reason for declaring a war against Austria. The Pope’s ministers, who considered his participation in the war of national liberation crucial, believed it could be effected only through the Italian political league.

Carlo Alberto, bearing the brunt of the fighting against Austria, did not wish protracted negotiations to conclude a political league during the course of a decisive war. He invoked immediate military assistance, indicating that they could negotiate a political accord once the enemy had been beaten. The most he would concede was the conclusion of a straightforward military convention for the joint prosecution of the war, which did not satisfy Rome. Monsignor Corboli Bussi pleaded that Pius required the formation of a political league before entering a war which he was unwilling and unable to declare unilaterally. The Piedmontese, for their part, anxious to fulfil their century-old dream of extending their dominion over the entire valley of the Po, refused to tie their hands by the formation of the political union. Piedmont’s reluctance for the federal solution, which the Neapolitans readily accepted, led the Pope to suspect her motives and ambitions.⁵

In April, as the war settled into one of position, and the need to dislodge Radetzky and the Austrians from the Quadrilatral loomed large, Carlo Alberto focused on military matters to the detriment of cementing a political alliance. The Piedmontese expected that the Pope could be cajoled into the war by popular pressure, ignoring his qualms of conscience and his primary concern of protecting the ship of Saint Peter. Perhaps with this thought in mind, on 5th April the Piedmontese commander of the Papal forces, General Giovanni Durando, issued a proclamation to his troops, claiming that the Holy Father blessed their swords, which, united with those of Carlo Alberto, would exterminate the enemies of both God and their country. Such a war, Durando concluded, was not only national but Christian, giving the war cry ‘God wills it.’

When the Pope learned that Durando was leading his troops across the Po, contrary to his explicit instructions, and proclaiming him the principal author of the war, by giving it the semblance of a crusade, he was outraged. Pius determined to raise his voice to quiet the protests in Germany, avoiding the threat of a disastrous schism. In order to soothe the conscience of the Pontiff, and quiet his fears, his ministers inserted an article in the official gazette. ^‘A proclamation of April 5, to the soldiers in the field, expresses ideas and sentiments as if they emanated from the Pope’, it read. Correcting this impression, the article made clear ^‘that when the Pope wishes to make a declaration of sentiment or position, he does so for himself, never through the words of a subaltern.’⁶

Pio Nono, caught between the dictates of his conscience, and the popular demand that he join the war of national liberation, looked to the league for deliverance. It could allow his state to participate in the war, absolving him of the responsibility of declaring or waging it. The pressing circumstances again led Pius to send Monsignor Corboli Bussi to Carlo Alberto to hasten the conclusion of the Italian league. Expressing doubts about which course to pursue, Pius found himself torn between the welfare of Italy and the needs of the Church. Meanwhile little progress was made in concluding the political league. Carlo Alberto exhorted the Pope to declare war against Austria, arguing as Durando had done, that their common aim was the independence of the patria and the triumph of their holy religion, both of which were oppressed.⁷

The Austrians sought to persuade the Pope to publicly denounce the notion that the national struggle was a religious crusade, and they found Pius sympathetic. The Pope confided that while delighted by the prospect of Carlo Alberto’s success and the expansion of his realm, he resented the abuse of his name and the Holy Faith for secular designs. To set matters straight, Pius wished to reveal the religious scruples which prevented him from entering the war, but was momentarily restrained by his ministers, who feared the political consequences. As a wave of Italian nationalism swept over the peninsula, the Pope felt the need to resist the current that would embroil him in a conflict that jeopardized the welfare of the Church.⁸

Nationalists sought to persuade Pius to join the cause. On 26th April, Monsignor Corboli Bussi warned Pius that the Austrian Ambassador’s presence in Rome and the Papal Nuncio’s in Vienna conflicted with his mission to the Piedmontese. The patriotic priest encouraged the Pope to reveal his support for the War of Italian Independence, predicting that otherwise either the Austrians or the factions would triumph. The Monsignor implored the Pope to speak on behalf of the national cause, contending that Carlo Alberto could not succeed without his benediction.

Corboli Bussi presented the Pope with a plan of action, advising him to write to the Emperor of Austria pleading for an end to the war. Should his mediation prove futile, the Pope could then reveal to the world his exhortation for peace and the reasons why he, as an Italian sovereign, could not restrain his people from taking part in the common struggle of the Italians against the Austrians. The Monsignor suggested the Pope propose the following: (1) a recognition of Italian nationality without offending German nationalism; (2) an exhortation for peace without having the Pope serve as mediator of specific transactions; (3) a clear distinction between the Pope’s role as common father of all Catholics and that of sovereign of the Papal States. Corboli Bussi predicted that if Pius restored the peace, he would be blessed by both Italians and Austrians.⁹

Terenzio Mamiani, who would soon succeed Cardinal Giacomo Antonelli as the Pope’s chief minister, recognized that Papal reluctance to declare war on Austria stemmed from the intermingling of spiritual and temporal power. Mamiani proposed to spare the conscience of the Pope by having his constitutional ministers declare war, but the Pope refused to follow his plan. Marco Minghetti, Minister of Public Works in the Pope’s Cabinet, feared for the future of Italy should His Holiness abandon the national cause.

On 19 April 1848, Pius spoke to the Tuscan representative, Scipione Bargagli, explaining his distress at the diffusion of demagogic ideas and the threat of schism among the German Catholics. He discussed the central ideas of an allocution he planned to present to the Cardinals. On 27th April he wrote to his confidant, Monsignor Corboli Bussi, of his intention of letting the world know that he could not wage war against anyone.¹⁰

Pius made his position public on 29th April in an allocution which revealed that as common father, he could not declare war, although he could not prevent his subjects from entering the conflict as volunteers. Reaction in the Papal States and Italy was immediate and negative. The conservative, anti-nationalist Cardinal Lambruschini was one of the few in the peninsula to applaud the allocution, claiming that finally Pius had spoken like a Pope. Understandably, north of the Alps the allocution was received with relief, as the Austrians scrambled to bring it to public attention.¹¹ Perhaps to counter the Austrian attempt to use the allocution to influence Italian public opinion, Pius insisted in his clarification of 1st May that his position was neither anti-nationalist nor a betrayal of the Italian cause. He repeated the denial in his letter of 8th May to Cardinal Luigi Amat, insisting that he had not condemned Italian nationalism nor branded the war unjust, and complaining that he had been misinterpreted.

The Italians understood the consequences of the Pope’s actions if they misjudged his intent. The Senate and the Council of Rome, in its special session of 3rd May, observed that the agitation which followed the allocution stemmed from the fact that all believed that the Pope, whatever his intentions, had delivered a fatal blow to the Italian cause. Constitutionalism in the Papal States was also jeopardized, as the Cabinet resigned over the war issue. The Council noted that Catholics listened reverently to the words of their spiritual leader, but they expected him to defend the temporal power. The ministers did not demand that the Pope, Nuncio of Peace, declare war upon Austria; rather they asked only that he should not stand in the way of those entrusted with temporal power.¹² To restore order, Pius accepted the liberal and pro-Italian Terenzio Mamiani’s ministry on 4 May 1848.

While the allocution precipitated a crisis in Rome, the Piedmontese, on 30th April, scored their first major success in the Battle of Pastrengo (fought near Peschiera), pushing the Austrians back to Verona. Increased pressure was placed upon Pius to join the effort, and the Pope responded by sending a letter to the Austrian Emperor on May 3, imploring him to withdraw from a struggle in which he could not win the hearts of the Lombards. He did not threaten to enter the conflict should the Austrians refuse his initiative, nor did he promise Carlo Alberto that he would join him in the campaign, as Corboli Bussi suggested. Nonetheless, the Austrians resisted the Papal peace effort. Pius’s liberal advisers urged him to allow his new ministry, under Mamiani, to declare the war the Pope could not himself initiate. Complaining that Carlo Alberto had acted unilaterally against the Austrians, the Pope did not feel committed to enter the conflict. Like other Italians, the Holy Father questioned the intentions of the Piedmontese troops who had as their war cry, ‘Sempre avanti Savoja’.

The Mamiani Ministry in Rome continued to believe that the political league was the sole means of effecting Papal participation in the war, expressing this sentiment to the first Piedmontese parliament which opened on 8th May. It was a sentiment shared by Monsignor Corboli Bussi who seconded the efforts of Mamiani, including his distinction between Pius’ actions as sovereign, and as head of the faith.¹³ Turin, however, believed the war would shortly be won with or without the Pope’s benediction. In mid-May this prospect seemed probable to the Austrians as well. Vienna considered invoking an English diplomatic effort to secure an armistice with Carlo Alberto on the basis of the renunciation of Lombardy, which had fallen, but not Venetia, which Radetzky’s forces still controlled.¹⁴ The Turin Cabinet rejected the offer, and the war continued.

At the end of May the Piedmontese won a second victory at Goito, during which the twenty-year-old Marquis Augusto Cavour, Camillo’s nephew, died on the battlefield. Michelangelo Castelli, who went to pay his condolences to the Count, found him rolling on the carpet of his room crying desperately, refusing to respond to the consolation of his friend. Later, Cavour had his nephew’s uniform, revealing the traces of his mortal wound, placed in a cabinet in his room – a constant reminder of the first war of liberation. The victory at Goito was accompanied by the fall of Peschiera, and for some the two victories signalled the end of the struggle and the liberation of northern Italy. Parma and Modena, which had fused with Piedmont in May, were joined by Lombardy in June, to be followed by Venetia in July. Camillo di Cavour, elected to the Piedmontese Chamber in the by-elections of June, considered the fusion and talk of a constituent assembly premature. Thus Cavour’s maiden parliamentary speech of 4 July 1848, on the proposed electoral law, was not well received and the aristocratic Cavour was booed from the gallery.¹⁵

In London, Palmerston applauded the efforts of the people of Italy to obtain free and constitutional governments, making it clear that the policy of Her Majesty’s Government was not to interfere in Italian developments. Vienna thought otherwise, and the Austrian minister in London complained that the entire English Cabinet had adopted the views of the Italian Revolution, and was seeking the creation of a great kingdom in northern Italy formed by Piedmont, Lombardy, Venetia, Parma and Modena, under the direction of Carlo Alberto.¹⁶

The Austrians, discouraged by events in Italy and at home, unsuccessfully sought an armistice with the Piedmontese. Radetzky, entrenched in Verona, believed that the Austrians would eventually triumph, and his optimism proved prophetic as cracks began to emerge in the Italian camp. In Naples, where the republicans attempted a coup, the army suppressed the disorders and Ferdinando reacted by revoking the constitution and closing the newly elected Chamber of Deputies. The 14,000 troops under General Pepe, poised to cross the Po and join Carlo Alberto in the war, were recalled by the king. Pepe refused to follow Ferdinando’s orders, but less than 2,000 of his men crossed the Po with him to fight the Austrians. There were also defections in the Papal ranks after the April allocution, so Durando placed his troops under Piedmontese command. The war, no longer national in scope, was reduced to a Piedmontese campaign.

The Piedmontese by themselves proved unequal to the task of liberating Italy, as reinforcements reached Radetzky, who resumed the offensive. Under these circumstances, Papal support again appeared crucial, and from Turin Gioberti urged that broader military forces be entrusted to Carlo Alberto and the Papal contingent enlarged. Above all, some word from the Pope to rouse the masses was needed to reinvigorate the Italian effort. Pius, pondering the feasibility of issuing a proclamation on the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception, proved unreceptive to the pleas from Turin. ‘Even though the desire grows for the greatness of the Italian nation and its liberation, the entire world must again know that for us war cannot be the means of achieving these objectives’, he responded on 10th July, to the urging of his Chamber for participation in the national struggle. ‘It was for us a great surprise to learn that the Council had discussed the subject,’ Pius added, ‘in spite of our public declarations, and at a time when we had assumed peace initiatives.’¹⁷

As Carlo Alberto prepared to besiege Mantua, Radetzky broke through his line in the battle of Custozza (22nd-25th July) forcing the Piedmontese to fall back first to Villafranca, and then to Milan. The outnumbered and dispirited Piedmontese, realizing they could not defend the city, sued for peace. The initial proposal for an armistice was spurned by Radetzky, to the dismay of the Austrian ministers who feared a possible French intervention. A temporary agreement was concluded early in August, providing for a suspension of fighting for three days, Piedmontese withdrawal beyond the Ticino within two days, and the Milanese who wanted to leave able to do so within twenty-four hours.

On the night of 5th August, the Piedmontese retreated from Milan, followed by over 60,000 of its inhabitants, fearing the wrath of Radetzky, who entered the half-deserted city the next day. On 9th August, the Salasco Armistice was signed, which provided for a cessation of hostilities for six weeks, the Piedmontese evacuation of Venetia, Parma and Modena, together with their surrender of Peschiera. While the French and Russians opposed territorial changes in Italy, Britain announced that she would not interfere to help Carlo Alberto avoid the consequences of his violation of the European peace and the treaties of Vienna. Nonetheless, in mid-August Carlo Alberto secured the mediation of England and France concerning the final peace terms with Austria, refusing to negotiate directly with the Habsburg Empire.¹⁸

Following the armistice of Salasco, Italians wondered why the campaign which began so promisingly should have ended so disastrously. Nationalists and liberals, democrats and conservatives sought scapegoats, and the two men who had provided much of the initiative for change, Pio Nono and Carlo Alberto, were charged with betrayal, if not treason. Cavour’s newspaper, Il Risorgimento, now placed little trust in the ‘Liberator-Pope’, fearing that the Roman government would prove unable to move him to wage war. Garibaldi found Carlo Alberto’s conduct equally appalling. Stung by the criticism, in his proclamation of 30th August, the Piedmontese king spoke of reopening the war with Austria after the expiration of the armistice. Cavour considered such action, without French assistance, to be madness.¹⁹ Events had shown that ‘Italy could not do it alone.’

Both Piedmont and the Papal States saw the emergence of new governments in August, that of the Marquis Alfieri in Turin and that of Edoardo Fabbri in Rome. Some still hoped that Pio Nono could be persuaded to wage war, most likely through the mechanism of the political league. In August, Carlo Alberto wrote to Pius expressing his desire both for a new concordat between Piedmont and the Papacy, and a political alliance between their sovereigns. Subsequently, the Piedmontese government sent Father Antonio Rosmini to Rome to effect the league, but this patriotic priest found that Turin and Rome had different visions of the league and its mission. Pius persisted in his opposition to war against Austria, while the Piedmontese pressed for its reopening. The Pope, fearing disorders in his state, negotiated with the French to send two or three thousand troops to Rome ‘to prevent honest liberty from degenerating into licence.’²⁰

In mid-September, when Count Pellegrino Rossi became Minister of the Interior and effective head of the Papal government, prospects for the political league diminished considerably. Rossi, determined to preserve the temporal power of the Papacy, considered the war against Austria a mistake, and Papal participation impractical. At any rate, it was noted in the Risorgimento, what Italy required was not Papal military power, which was negligible, but the moral authority of the Pope to rouse the masses. Pius had already announced in his allocution that he would not declare a crusade against the Austrian oppressor, so that the promise of the league was simply an illusion.²¹

Paris and London, fearing that the reopening of the war in Italy might embroil all of Europe, urged the Piedmontese and Austrians to extend their armistice and conclude a permanent peace. Their mediation proved fruitless as the Austrians determined to preserve their rights in Italy, while the Piedmontese still nourished the hope that Lombardy, if not Venetia, could be obtained. Pushed by the radical opposition which insisted on the reopening of the war, the new Piedmontese government of General Perone, replacing that of Marquis Alfieri in October, leaned in that direction. Rosmini, still in Rome, was told to negotiate an alliance for war first, concluding the league later.²² These instructions precipitated Rosmini’s resignation and the termination of talks on the political union.

Nationalists blamed the Pope for the failure of the negotiations, but Pellegrino Rossi challenged their analysis. In the Gazetta Ufficiale of 4 November 1848, Rossi charged the Pope had been criticized for refusing to follow unquestioningly the Piedmontese proposals. Rossi reported that Turin simply wanted arms and men, but the Papal Minister stressed that Rome and Florence needed to ascertain their purpose and aim. The enlargement of Piedmont and the autonomy of Italy were not identical matters, Rossi reminded Italians. Piedmont could not drag the rest of Italy to fulfil her own dynastic aims. He found it ironic that while the Piedmontese negotiated peace, they were pressing the other Italian states for men and money to wage war. In Turin, rather than Rome, Rossi charged, duplicity prevailed.

Count Rossi’s spirited response to the accusations of the Piedmontese and determination to protect the Pope from the radicals of the war party roused the clubs in Rome, which put a price on his head. Pietro Sterbini, who presided over the Popular Club, denounced Rossi in the columns of his Contemporaneo as an enemy of the Italian cause. A revolution against his ministry erupted on 15th November, the day the Roman Chamber reopened. As Rossi walked into the Palace of the Chancellery, where the Assembly was housed, a dagger slashed his throat, and within five minutes he had bled to death. Thus opened the Roman revolution.²³

The next day’s demonstrations in Rome degenerated into violence, as an unruly crowd, led by some of the Deputies, marched upon the Pope’s residence, the Quirinal Palace, demanding the promulgation of Italian nationality and the convocation of a federal constituent assembly, while insisting on the Deputies’ right to decide the issue of participation in the war of national liberation. When the Pope refused to sanction this programme, the crowd began the siege of the Quirinal Palace, threatening to raze it to the ground, and kill all its inhabitants, apart from the Pope. In order to avert this slaughter, on 17th November, Pius accepted the Ministry demanded by ‘the people’ -albeit with considerable reservations – thus declaring himself a virtual prisoner.

Rumours trickled out of Rome that the Pope, protected only by the diplomatic corps and advised by Cardinals Soglia and Antonelli, might abandon his capital. The Austrians knew of the Pope’s intentions by 24th November.²⁴ That evening, assisted by the French, Spanish and Bavarian ambassadors, Pius fled the Papal States for Gaeta, in the Kingdom of Naples. Offered asylum by the French, Spanish and even the Piedmontese, Pius decided to remain in the Neapolitan Kingdom. From Gaeta, on 27 November 1848, he sent a letter to his subjects, explaining the chain of events that had led him to flee from his state. Vienna, which had been brought back under imperial control in November, reacted positively to the Papal pronouncement to the Roman public.²⁵

The Piedmontese and the national party were less pleased by the Pope’s flight. Cavour’s Risorgimento reported that the Pope’s behaviour exposed a problem that had long troubled Italian minds: the need for a separation of the temporal and spiritual power of Rome.²⁶ Carlo Alberto wrote Pius offering his mediation between the Holy Father and his subjects, but discouraging any attempt to impose a solution.

The Piedmontese king foresaw that military measures would only aggravate the already tense situation in the peninsula. In the light of his impending resumption of hostilities with Austria, Carlo Alberto confessed he could not send troops to assist the Pope. He cautioned Pius not to call upon the assistance of the Catholic powers, predicting it would provoke a foreign intervention detrimental to Italy, the Holy See, and even the cause of religion.²⁷

Carlo Alberto’s pleas went unheeded. Pio Nono and his Prosecretary of State, Cardinal Giacomo Antonelli, were encouraged by the Spanish-Austrian proposal to convene a congress attended by the representatives of Spain, Austria, France, Portugal, Bavaria, Sardinia, Naples and Tuscany to examine the most opportune means of restoring the Pope to Rome. Palmerston, considering the move to be an Austrian intrigue, argued that the Pope did not require a state to assure his spiritual independence. Pius disagreed. In early January the new Piedmontese Prime Minister, Gioberti, wrote to Antonelli protesting against the Spanish plan to restore the Pope to Rome. Gioberti called for a reconciliation between the Pope and his subjects.²⁸

The prospects for a reconciliation were slim. On 5 January 1849, Pius issued a virtual excommunication of those responsible for the radical ministry of mid-November, denouncing the proposal at the end of December to call a General Assembly to reorder the political structure of the Papal States. The Assembly’s arrogation of full sovereign power, and the proclamation of the Republic on 9 February 1849, infuriated the Pope, who believed he was being punished for his liberal past. He now relied on the Catholic powers, and Austria, in particular, to rescue him from the dilemma which he perceived a threat to both his political and spiritual power. Pio Nono’s appeal to the Austrians offended national sensibilities, confirming the opinion that the earlier Papal refusal to enter the war represented an act of betrayal, dooming the temporal power.

Resentment of Rome’s pro-Austrian posture proved greatest in Piedmont, which planned to reopen the war of national liberation. In preparation for the resumption of hostilities, on 18 January 1849, the Piedmontese concluded a secret agreement with the ‘sacrilegious’ Roman junta. Under its provisions, as soon as Turin declared war against Austria, its troops would be allowed to enter the Papal States to coordinate strategic actions vis-à-vis the enemy. The Roman government also promised to take part in the holy war, placing a force of 15,000 men at Carlo Alberto’s disposal. The Papal decision to appeal for the armed intervention of Austria, Spain, France and Naples against a potential ally understandably upset the Piedmontese. Gioberti sarcastically observed that his government’s peaceful mediation should have been more pleasing to the Pope of peace than the bloody recourse to arms. Likewise he would have supposed that as an Italian sovereign, the Pope would have preferred the assistance of a fellow Italian prince rather than relying upon German troops.

At the opening of parliament in February, Carlo Alberto consecrated his life and that of his sons to the well-being and independence of his country. On 12 March 1849, the king denounced the armistice with Austria. In the eight-day truce before the resumption of hostilities, while the Piedmontese forces, some 100,000 strong, sought to accustom themselves to the techniques, style and language of their new commander, the Polish General Chrzanowsky, General Radetzky secretly planned to surprise the Piedmontese by assuming the offensive. His strategy caught the Piedmontese off-guard in the Battle of Novara (23 March 1849), leading to the Austrian victory.

Following Novara, Carlo Alberto sought terms from the Austrians. General Hess, chiding the Sardinian king for his lack of good faith, responded that the Piedmontese would have to permit the Austrians to occupy a considerable portion of their territory and transmit the Crown Prince to them as their hostage. Recognizing the Austrian animus towards himself, Carlo Alberto abdicated in favour of his son, Vittorio Emanuele. The next day, 24th March, the young king met with General Radetzky, who granted to the son the armistice denied his father. Radetzky’s conditions for peace called for Piedmont’s return to its borders of 1815, the recall of its fleet from the Adriatic, the disbanding of the Lombard Legions, and the abandonment of all claims to the duchies of Parma and Modena. Piedmont was to admit an Austrian force into the city of Alessandria and, finally, to pay an indemnity for the cost of the war.²⁹

The Princess Melanie, Metternich’s third wife, complained that the terms were too lenient. Radetzky had promised to dictate peace terms in Turin, but had broken that promise after the abdication of Carlo Alberto to help the new King, Vittorio Emanuele. The Princess considered the General’s leniency a mistake, doubting that the son would behave any better than the father. The Piedmontese as well as the Austrians considered the peace a temporary solution. Even the moderate Cesare Balbo noted that under the circumstances the Piedmontese could not conclude a definitive peace with the Austrians, only a truce that would last ten years. His prediction proved prophetic. Cavour shared Balbo’s sentiment, noting that they would learn from their errors and do better next time.³⁰

Massimo D’Azeglio, who became the Piedmontese Prime Minister in May 1849, recognized that the country needed at least a decade of preparation to resume the conflict with Austria. His sensible approach was not appreciated by the Chamber selected in the third general elections held in July 1849, in which the most liberal elements carried the day. The new parliament, which named the radical Marquis Pareto president, proved reluctant to approve the peace treaty concluded between Piedmont and Austria at the end of July. This created problems for Vittorio Emanuele, who had sworn allegiance to the Albertine Constitution at the end of March, and wished to govern constitutionally. However, he steadfastly refused to renew the war at that time, noting that the internal and European situation were not propitious.

At the Conference of Gaeta, which opened in March, the Catholic powers of Spain, Austria, Naples and France agreed on the need for joint action to restore the Pope to Rome. Meanwhile, the Austrians, having defeated the Piedmontese at Novara, opened the path to central Italy. Fearing a massive Habsburg intrusion into the peninsula, the National Assembly in France, at the end of March, passed an order of the day supporting a French intervention in Italy. However, Paris coordinated its actions with Vienna as the Second Republic sought the recognition of Austria. An arrangement was made assuring Vienna that Paris would not intervene in Lombardy or the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, and in return Austria recognized the French Republic. Regarding Italy, the Austrians permitted a French intervention in Rome, while Austrian forces secured the Legations. Tuscan affairs were to be left in Austrian hands. Since France and Austria agreed to return to the territorial settlement of 1815, prospects for its unilateral revision by the Piedmontese were not promising.

As Habsburg forces marched inexorably towards Rome, a French expedition landed in Civitavecchia in April, and Spanish and Neapolitan forces marched from Gaeta towards Terracina, the debate continued in the Piedmontese parliament about the prospect of renewing the war. In June Rome fell, despite the valour of Garibaldi and the leadership of Mazzini. In August, Venice, plagued by famine and cholera, and weakened by heavy bombardment, capitulated. Under the circumstances, Cavour’s Risorgimento considered the Chamber’s refusal to approve the peace, and the prospect of an immediate renewal of the war, a grave threat to the existence of constitutional Piedmont.³¹ Massimo D’Azeglio shared his concern, persuading the king to dissolve the Chamber and issue a statement urging his subjects to select a moderate replacement.

On 20 November 1849, the same day that he dissolved the Chamber elected in July, Vittorio Emanuele issued a proclamation from the royal château of Moncalieri calling upon his subjects to choose responsible deputies in the forthcoming elections for the new house. The need for peace was pressed. Although the ‘Proclamation of Moncalieri’ was an extraordinary – some claimed an extraconstitutional – measure, it was in many ways a necessary step to preserve the peace and the constitutional system of Piedmont. It proved effective, for in the elections of December 1849 the D’Azeglio Ministry, which favoured an immediate acceptance of the peace, was vindicated. On 9 January 1850, the new Chamber quickly approved the treaty with Austria by a vote of 112 to seventeen, with seven abstentions. Shortly afterwards the Senate approved the treaty by a vote of fifty to five. The First Italian War of Independence had finally ended. Some immediately began planning for the second.

Notes

1. Mémoires, documents et écrits divers laissés par le prince de Metternich, ed. Prince Richard Metternich with the papers arranged and classified by M.A. de Klinkowstroem (Paris: Plon, 1880–84), II pp. 544–5; Pier Silverio Leicht, ‘Memorie di Michele Leicht’, Rassegna Storica del Risorgimento, anno XXII (July 1935), II, 83.

2. Il Risorgimento, 23 March 1848.

3. Il Risorgimento, 7 April 1848.

4. Luigi Carlo Farini, Lo Stato Romano dall’ anno 1815 al 1850 (3rd edn, Florence: Felice Le Monnier, 1853), II, pp. 22, 27, 31; Alois Simon, ‘Palmerston et les États Pontificaux en 1849’, Rassegna Storia de Risorgimento, anno XLIII (July-September 1956), III, 539–44.

5. Narration of events of 16th November and considerations leading Pius IX to abandon Rome, Archivio Segreto del Vaticano, Archivio Particolare Pio IX, Stato Pontificio, no. 19; Marco Minghetti, Miei Ricordi (3rd edn. Turin: Roux, 1888), I, pp. 363–4; Farini, II, pp. 28, 52–3; Luigi Rodelli, La Republica Romana del 1849 (Pisa: Domus Mazziniana, 1955), pp. 64–65.

6. Gazzetta Ufficale, 10 April 1848; Minghetti, I, pp. 366–7.

7. Pius IX to Carlo Alberto, 7 April 1848 and Carlo Alberto to Pius IX, 18 April 1848, Archivio Segreto del Vaticano, Archivio Particolare Pio IX, Sovrani, Sardegna, no. 1.

8. Giovanni Maioli (ed.), Pio IX da Vescovo a Pontifice. Lettere al Card. Luigi Amat, agosto 1839-luglio 1848 (Modena: Società Tipografico Modenese, 1943), pp. 117–18.

9. Monsignor Corboli Bussi to Pius IX, 26 April 1848 and 27 April 1848, ASV, Archivio Particolare Pio IX, Sovrani, Stato Pontificio, no. 33.

10. Luigi Rava (ed.), Epistolario di Luigi Carlo Farini (Bologna: Zanichelli, 1911), II, p. 216; Giacomo Martina, Pio IX e Leopoldo II (Rome: Pontifica Università Gregoriana, 1967), p. 113; Pius IX to Corboli Bussi, 27 April 1848, ASV, Archivio Particolare Pio IX, Sovrani, Stato Pontificio, no. 33.

11. Great Britain, British and Foreign State Papers, XXXVII (1848–49), 1062–5; Carlo Minocci, Pietro Sterbini e la Rivoluzione Romana (1846–1849) (Naples: Edizioni La Diana, 1967), p. 75; Angelo Filipuzzi (ed.), Le relazioni diplomatiche fra L’Austria e il regno di Sardegna e la guerra del 1848–49, Vol. I: 24 marzo 1848–11 aprile 1849 (Rome: Istituto storico italiano per la storia moderna e contemporanea, 1961), pp. 40–1, 94.

12. Farini, II, p. 108; Maioli, p. 118; BFSP, XXXVII (1848–49), 1071–1072; Antonio Monti, Pio IX nel Risorgimento Italiano con documenti inediti (Bari: Laterza, 1928), p. 101.

13. Monsignor Corboli Bussi to Pius IX, 22 May 1848, ASV, Archivio Particolare Pio IX, Sovrani, Stato Pontificio, no. 33.

14. Filipuzzi, I, pp. 99–104.

15. Guiseppe Massari, Il Conte di Cavour. Ricordi biografici (Turin: Botta, 1873), pp. 35–6; Luigi Chiala (ed.), Il Conte di Cavour. Ricordi di Michelangelo Castelli (Turin: Roux e Favale, 1886), p. 27; Il Risorgimento, 20 June 1848.

16. Mémoires … Metternich, VIII, p. 450.

17. ‘Riposta della Santità di Nostro Signore Papa Pio IX all’ indirizzo del Consiglio dei Deputati’, Il Risorgimento, 17 July 1848.

18. Filipuzzi, I, pp. 205–7, 213, 222–3, 234.

19. Il Risorgimento, 31 August 1848; Chiala, Ricordi di Michelangelo Castelli, p. 127.

20. Carlo Alberto to Pius IX, 10 August 1848, ASV, Archivio Particolare Pio IX, Sovrani, Sardegna, no. 15; Pius IX to Foreign Minister, ASV, Archivio Particolare Pio IX, Francia, Particolari, no. 3.

21. ‘Del probabile ordinamento di una Lega Politica Italiana’, Il Risorgimento, 11 September 1848.

22. Filipuzzi, I, p. 244; William Lochart (ed.), Life of Antonio Rosmini Serbati (London: Kegan Paul, Trench e Co., 1886), I, p. 352.

23. Farini, II, 344–8; Il Risorgimento, 21 November 1848; Il Contemporaneo, 12 November 1848.

24. Narration of events of 16th November, ASV, Archivio Particolare Pio IX, Stato Pontificio, no. 19; Filipuzzi, I, p. 345.

25. ‘Pius Papa IX. Ai Suoi dilettisimi sudditi’, 27 November 1848, Atti del Sommo Pontefice Pio IX Felicemente Regnante. Parte seconda … (Rome: Tipografia delle Belle Arti, 1857), I, p. 252; Archbishop of Cartaginia to Cardinal Giacomo Antonelli, 28 December 1848, ASV, Segreteria di Stato Esteri, Corrispondenza da Gaeta e Portici, 1848–1850, Rubrica 247, sottofasccoli 85–6.

26. Il Risorgimento, 30 November 1848.

27. Carlo Alberto to Pius IX, 24 December 1848, ASV, AP Pio IX, Sardegna, Sovrani, no. 17.

28. Gioberti to Antonelli, 12 January 1849, ASV, Segreteria di Stato Esteri, Corrispondenza da Gaeta e Portiei, Rubrica 165, fascicolo 23.

29. Farini, III, 265–6; Edgar Quinet, La question romaine devant l’histoire, 1848 à 1867 (Paris: Armand Le Chevlier, 1868), pp. 55–7; Filipuzzi, I, pp. 411–12, 423–6; 442–3.

30. Mémoires … Metternich, VIII, p. 49; Massari, Il Conte di Cavour, pp. 45, 47.

31. Filipuzzi, II, 441–2; Il Risorgimento, 23 July 1849.