Bombing of Treviso in World War II
Bombing of Treviso | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Part of Strategic bombing during World War II | |||||||
Palazzo dei Trecento after the bombing | |||||||
| |||||||
Belligerents | |||||||
USAAF |
Italian Social Republic Germany | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
1 B-17 bomber | 1,470 civilians |
The
History
Treviso, a town of 60,000 inhabitants located in the Veneto region, thirty kilometres north of Venice, was in a strategically important position for railway communications in northeastern Italy, and was therefore bombed several times by the Allied air forces.
The first, and most devastating, raid took place on 7 April 1944. 159
Out of 4,600 buildings, 700 were destroyed, 1,100 heavily damaged and 1,962 slightly damaged.[1] A large part of the medieval parts of the city centre were destroyed; the medieval Palazzo dei Trecento, distant only 700 meters from the objective, was partly destroyed. Between 1,000 and 1,600 civilians were killed, including 123 children. According to the records of the municipality, 1,600 inhabitants of Treviso were killed by air raids during the war, of whom 1,470 died in the raid of 7 April 1944; some 30,000 were left homeless.[2] This makes the 7 April 1944 raid on Treviso the second deadliest air raid suffered by an Italian city during the war, after the 19 July 1943 raid on Rome that killed between 1,600 and 3,200 people.
The attackers lost one B-17, shot down by
As the bombing occurred on
Further raids
A further twelve air raids (both by the
Giuseppe Berto's novel The Sky is Red and the film with the same name are set during the bombing of Treviso and its aftermath, and ruined buildings of the town were used as set for the movie.
Notes
- ^ Enciclopedia Treccani
- ^ La mostra Treviso il 7 aprile 1944
- ^ Camillo Pavan, A difesa dell'aeroporto di Treviso. Le contraeree di Canizzano e Sant'Angelo sul Sile (1944-1945), 2008, Treviso, p. 45