User:Jnestorius/Piedmontese campaign in the Papal States

User:Jnestorius/Saint Patrick's Batallion (Papal States)

In the aftermath of the Austro-Sardinian War of 1859, the army of the Kingdom of Sardinia came south from Piedmont to occupy the United Provinces of Central Italy. The local populace was in favour of Italian unification and the nominally independent states of Tuscany and zzz, which had previously been controlled by the Austrian Empire, held plebiscites which formally approved their annexation to the House of Savoy under Victor Emmanuel II. In adjacent parts of the Papal States there was similar zzz.

Before

• Administrative subdivisions of the Papal States from 1816 to 1871#New legations of Pius IX

Legations and delegations of 1850

Number	Legation	Delegation, Districts	Fate
1	Romagna	Bologna	United Provinces of Central Italy Nov 1859, Annexed March 1860
		Ferrara, Lugo
		Forlì, Cesena, Rimini
		Ravenna, Faenza, Imola
2	Marche	Urbino e Pesaro, Fano, Gubbio, Senigallia	Annexed Sept 1860 ?
		Macerata, Fabriano, Loreto, Recanati, San Severino
		Ancona, Jesi, Osimo
		Fermo
		Ascoli [Piceno] , Montalto
		Camerino
3	Umbria	Perugia Città di Castello, Foligno, Todi	Annexed Sep? 1860
		Spoleto, Norcia, Terni
		Rieti, Poggio Mirteto
4	Marittima e Campagna	Velletri	Annexed 1870
		Frosinone, Pontecorvo (exclave)
			Annexed Sep? 1860
		Benevento (exclave)
District of Rome	Lazio	Rome, Subiaco, Tivoli	Annexed 1870
		Viterbo
		Civitavecchia
		Orvieto	Annexed Sep? 1860

• Second Italian War of Independence#Peace

  Fear of involvement by the German states led Napoleon to seek a way out of the war, so he signed an armistice with Austria in Villafranca. Most of Lombardy, with its capital Milan (excepting only the Austrian fortresses of Mantua and Legnago and the surrounding territory), was transferred from Austria to France, which would immediately cede these territories to Sardinia. The rulers of Central Italy, who had been expelled by revolution shortly after the beginning of the war, were to be restored.

  This deal, made by Napoleon behind the backs of his Sardinian allies, led to great outrage in Sardinia-Piedmont, and Cavour himself resigned in protest. However, the terms of Villafranca were never to come into effect. Although they were reaffirmed by the final Treaty of Zürich in November, by then the agreement had become a dead letter. The central Italian states were occupied by the Piedmontese, who showed no willingness to restore the previous rulers, and the French showed no willingness to force them to abide by the terms of the treaty. The Austrians were left to look on in frustration at the French failure to carry out the terms of the treaty. While Austria had emerged triumphant after the suppression of liberal movements in 1849, its status as a great power on the European scene was now seriously challenged, and its influence in Italy severely weakened.

  The next year, in 1860, with French and British approval, the central Italian states (Duchy of Parma, Duchy of Modena, Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the Papal States) were annexed by the Kingdom of Sardinia, and France would take its deferred reward, Savoy and Nice. The last move was vehemently opposed by Italian national hero Garibaldi, a native of Nice, and directly led to Garibaldi's expedition to Sicily, which would complete the preliminary Unification of Italy.[5]

  One frequently overlooked side-effect of the war was that Prussia also mobilised 132000 men in 1859 but never joined the fighting. The weaknesses laid bare during the mobilisation caused the Prussian army to initiate military reforms,[6] which were the base for its superiority and rapid victories against Austria 1866 and France 1870/1 leading to a united Germany under Prussian dominance-[7]

• it:Armistizio di Villafranca 1859
• it:Pace di Zurigo 1859
• United Provinces of Central Italy

  • Revolution : December 8, 1859
  • Annexation : March 22, 1860

  The United Provinces of Central Italy, also known as Confederation of Central Italy or Government General of Central Italy, was a short-lived military government established by the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia. It was formed by a union of the former Grand Duchy of Tuscany, Duchy of Parma, Duchy of Modena, and the Papal Legations, after their monarchs were ousted by popular revolutions.

  Since August 1859, the pro-Piedmontese regimes of Tuscany, Parma, Modena and the Papal Legations entered into a group of military treaties. On 7 November 1859, they elected Eugenio Emanuele di Savoia-Carignano as their regent. However, King Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy, who was allied to France which claimed a counterpart, refused to endorse the election, and sent Carlo Bon Compagni instead as the Governor General of Central Italy, who was responsible for the diplomatic and military affairs of the states.

  On 8 December 1859, Parma, Modena and the Papal Legations were incorporated into the Royal Provinces of Emilia. After plebiscites were held in March 1860, and France was granted Nice and Savoy, the territory was formally annexed to Piedmont-Sardinia.

• Treaty of Turin (1860) between France and Piedmont-Sardinia on March 24, 1860 is the instrument by which the Duchy of Savoy and the County of Nice were annexed to France.
• it:Legazione delle Romagne#I fatti del 1859-60

  In the spring of 1859 the Second Italian War of Independence was fought. The victories of the Franco-Piedmontese troops led to the withdrawal of the Austrian garrisons stationed in the Legation. Immediately a government junta was presided in Bologna, presided over by the Marquis Gioacchino Napoleone Pepoli , cousin of Napoleon III , who declared papal sovereignty decayed and ordered the cardinal legate Giuseppe Milesi Pironi Ferretti to leave the city immediately; what happened on 11 June. Two days later, the cardinal legate of Ravenna left its residence and the one of Ferrara was abandoned on the 21st. Soon afterwards the Marquis Massimo d'Azeglio arrived in Bologna from Turin as the royal commissioner of the former Legation. D'Azegliò managed the transition phase from the old to the new regime. An assembly of the Romagne was established, which on 6 September voted to annex the former Legation to the Kingdom of Sardinia.

  In Monza on September 24th, King Vittorio Emanuele II received in his summer residence the delegations of the representatives of the assemblies of Tuscany, of the Romagne, of Modena and Parma, who gave him the votes of the annexations. To all he replied that he could not recognize these deliberations, as negotiations with Austria and the other powers are still ongoing. [5]

  The king of Sardinia, Vittorio Emanuele II, had never publicly pronounced any hostile declaration to the Holy See, to which he was formally in friendship; Moreover, Casa Savoia was notoriously faithful to Catholicism. The events that occurred in the Legation therefore created a serious problem in relations with the Holy See. [6] Wanting to prevent official protests from Rome, the king sent a court chaplain, Abbot Stellardi, to the city, with the task of reporting to the pontiff that the king had been forced by Napoleon to accept the annexation of the Romagne. In response to this oral communication, Pius IX sent a letter to Vittorio Emanuele in which he wrote down everything that the abbot had reported to him. A few days later the pontiff expressed his intentions to the French ambassador: he did not consent to any separation of the Romans from the Papal State.

  On March 11-12, 1860 the plebiscites of annexation of the Romagne, the ex Ducati and Tuscany took place. A few days later the general Enrico Cialdini moved with his troops from Brescia and occupied the former Legations. [7] When things were done, Vittorio Emanuele sent a letter to the pontiff to "expose the reasons for my conduct with respectful frankness" (March 20). [8] In the missive the king of Sardinia proposed to the pope to accept the fait accompli and advanced the proposal to open negotiations between the two parties.

  The letter was delivered to Pius IX on March 28 by a Piedmontese envoy, Baron Roussy. The following day the pontiff pronounced excommunication to the king and to all the people who had cooperated in obtaining this result. [7]

• it:Plebisciti risorgimentali

During

• it:Campagna piemontese in Italia centrale

  Soldiers, I am leading you against a masnada of foreign brutes who are thirsty for gold and loath to plunder in our countries. Fight, disperse, inexorably, those who buy the hit men, and at your hands feel the wrath of a people who want their nationality and their independence. Soldiers, the adult Perugia asks for revenge and, although late, will have it. »

  ( Proclamation of General Enrico Cialdini to the soldiers of the IV Corps of the Army [1] )

  The Piedmontese countryside in central Italy took place between September and October 1860 during the largest events of the Risorgimento .

  The campaign saw the sending of a military contingent by the Kingdom of Sardinia against the Papal State and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies . The casus belli was the intervention against the repression by the pontifical army of the revolutionary movements favorable to the unification of Italy that had occurred in the first days of September in concomitance with the entry of Garibaldi to Naples.

  The expedition was divided into two phases: the first was the Savoy army , composed of two armies (the IV and the V) led by General Manfredo Fanti , who moved towards the Papal Legations of Umbria and the Marches. Left the Romagna on 11 September, the contingent was divided into two sections: the first (the V armata) headed for Umbria , towards Foligno , passing through Città di Castello , Umbertide and Perugia (conquered on September 14 by the troops of General De Sonnaz [2] ); the other (the IV armada) invaded the Marches : the 13 division, under the command of Enrico Cialdini , followed a path close to the Apennines through Urbino , Cagli and Gubbio , while the rest of the contingent continued along the coast crossing Pesaro , Fano and Senigallia . On 18 September, the army, meeting in Jesi , clashed in Castelfidardo with the papal army of General de Lamoricière . Defeated the pontiffs, besieged and took Ancona on 29 September [3] .

  The second phase began with the invasion of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, motivated by the need to restore order following the disorders of the Expedition of the Thousand . King Vittorio Emanuele II , who arrived on October 3rd in Ancona, took command of the army and headed south. The Piedmontese army crossed the river Tronto on 12 October, the border between the Papal State and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, bypassed Civitella del Tronto , continued along the coast to the mouth of the Aterno and finally headed towards Chieti to reach, divided into more sections, Roccaraso and the passes that allowed the Abruzzi to reach the Terra di Lavoro . The objective was the Volturno plain , where the Bourbon army, barricaded among the squares of Gaeta and Capua , defended itself from the Garibaldini. The main events of this second phase were the siege of the Civitella fortress , which began on October 26 and lasted several months, and the battle of Macerone (October 20) which, although a simple skirmishing was considered due to the small forces in the field. , opened the way for the Piedmontese allowing them to take the Bourbon army behind [4] .

  The final event of the expedition was the battle of the Garigliano , fought on 29 October 1860.

• it:Assedio di Ancona (1860)
• Battle of Castelfidardo (it:Battaglia di Castelfidardo)

After

• Expedition of the Thousand: "In the meantime the Kingdom of Sardinia invaded the Papal States conquering Central Italy (Lazio excluded) through few battles such as the Battle of Castelfidardo, and entered the Kingdom of Two Sicilies joining Giuseppe Garibaldi."
• Italian unification#Defeat of the Kingdom of Naples

  Though Garibaldi had easily taken the capital, the Neapolitan army had not joined the rebellion en masse, holding firm along the Volturno River. Garibaldi's irregular bands of about 25,000 men could not drive away the king or take the fortresses of Capua and Gaeta without the help of the Sardinian army. The Sardinian army, however, could only arrive by traversing the Papal States, which extended across the entire center of the peninsula. Ignoring the political will of the Holy See, Garibaldi announced his intent to proclaim a "Kingdom of Italy" from Rome, the capital city of Pope Pius IX. Seeing this as a threat to the domain of the Catholic Church, Pius threatened excommunication for those who supported such an effort. Afraid that Garibaldi would attack Rome, Catholics worldwide sent money and volunteers for the Papal Army, which was commanded by General Louis Lamoricière, a French exile.

  The settling of the peninsular standoff now rested with Napoleon III. If he let Garibaldi have his way, Garibaldi would likely end the temporal sovereignty of the Pope and make Rome the capital of Italy. Napoleon, however, may have arranged with Cavour to let the king of Sardinia free to take possession of Naples, Umbria and the other provinces, provided that Rome and the "Patrimony of St. Peter" were left intact.[42]

  It was in this situation that a Sardinian force of two army corps, under Fanti and Cialdini, marched to the frontier of the Papal States, its objective being not Rome but Naples. The Papal troops under Lamoricière advanced against Cialdini, but were quickly defeated and besieged in the fortress of Ancona, finally surrendering on 29 September. On 9 October, Victor Emmanuel arrived and took command. There was no longer a papal army to oppose him, and the march southward proceeded unopposed.

References

Sources

• Coulombe, Charles A. (2009-11-24). The Pope's Legion: The Multinational Fighting Force that Defended the Vatican. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 9780230617568. Retrieved 29 January 2018.
• de Poli, Oscar (1868). Les soldats du pape (1860-1867) (in French) (3rd ed.). Paris.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• "Cap.VII–IX". Cronaca della guerra d'Italia del 1859 (in Italian). Vol. 3. Riete: Tipografia Tiberina. 1861. pp. 184–399.