MUSSOLI'S BODY TAKEN TO MORGUE

Auckland Star, Volume LXXVI, Issue 101, 1 May 1945, Page 6

MUSSOLI'S BODY TAKEN TO MORGUE

BURIAL IN MILAN

Arrest Reported Of Wife And Two Children

N.Z. Press Association—Copyright Rec. 11 a.m. LONDON, April 30. Mussolini's body and that of his mistress, Clara Petacci, were taken to the morgue last night, stated the British United Press correspondent in Milan. Mussolini would be buried in the Milan cemetery '"wherever there was a place for him," according to a Partisan leader. The body lay on a patch of bare earth all last night while Italians milled round, spitting and kicking. Finally the crowd tied a wire around the ankles of both bodies and hung them head down from the rafters of a burned-out petrol station.

The Milan correspondent of the Associated Press in a later message, says the bodies of Mussolini, Clara Petacci and others were buried today without funeral services after three surgeons had performed autopsies.

The Italian Press wastes no sympathy on Mussolini's ignominious end. Count Sforza, Italian Ambassador to France, writing in the newspaper Giornale di Mattino, says: "We cannot lose time over such a rascal. He was too much of a traitor and professional liar." Swiss radio stated that Mussolini's wife and' his two youngest children have been arrested at Como.

"I saw the bodies of Mussolini and others lying in the Piazza Loreto, Milan, while 25,000 hysterical people fought for a chance to kick him or spit on him," states the Milan correspondent of the Daily Express. "The bodies had been thrown from a lorry on a patch of grass and they lay as they fell. Across Mussolini's legs was the body of his mistress. Clara Petacci.

"Mussolini In death looked very small, thin and waxlike. There was still an arrogant look about his pinched face. He wore Fascist uniform, but so many people had mangled the body that it was impossible to recognise the colour of the uniform. The whole square, which is larger than London's Trafalgar Square, was crammed with humanity, screaming, shouting and fighting."

The Times correspondent states that the partisan Commander-in-Chief, General Cadorna, described these incidents in themselves as regrettable. Nevertheless, •in this case, he considered the execution of Mussolini a good thing since popular indignation against the Fascists demanded some satisfaction, and the risk of a protracted trial, such as had been held in Rome, was thus avoided.

Recognised in Motor Cap The Associated Press correspondent in Como sends a story by an eye-witness who says that as a car rolled along the main road near Lake Como two commissars of the Communist Brigade recognised Mussolini and forced the car to halt. They arrested Mussolini and he was taken to Como prison, where he was held for some hours during a dispute regarding his custody. The Rome commissioners for sanctions against Fascists demanded that he should be brought before the High Court of .Justice according to regular procedure. On the other hand, the Liberation Committee of Milan urged his immediate transfer to Milan for .iudgment by the people's" tribunal. The partisans, however, with the Dure m their hands, renounced judicial procedure and went directly to the final aei.

An eye-witness said that Mussolini was shot with his back to the firing squad. The bodies of Mussolini and the others who were shot at the same time were transported to Milan in 20 lorries during the night.

The Daily Express correspondent, describing the scenes in the Piazza Loreto, Milan, says that partisans who had helped to free the city from which Mussolini began his march against Rome in 1922, fired bullets into his body with expressions of fiendish hate on their faces. When the bodies reached.Milan they were thrown on the spot where 14 partisans were massacred by Fascists only last year. Now the exdictator's body was exposed there while citizens of suffering Milan heaped the vilest insult upon him. "Nine armed Communist partisans, who were under orders to protect me," continues the correspondent, "cleared enough space for me to look down at the battered, bruised and blood-stained body of the once-proud dictator. There were no ropes around the dead, and I was swept irresistibly forward and thrown on Mussolini's body. "Partisans were firing into the air and bullets were falling around. I do not know if anyone was killed by them, but I saw dozens of people fainting and being trampled on. Firemen were called out to play hoses on the mob so I could take photographs. The crowds were drenched and the bodies soaked too."

Milan radio says that Mussolini's Minister of State and commander of the Republican National Guard, Lieutenant-General Renato Ricci, has committed suicide.

Others who have been arrested include Giovanni Preziosi, Mussolini's chief Jew-baiter, also Basile. described as a former Minister of the Interior, who was caught trying to escape with 30,000,000 lire in gold. Rome radio reports that 3000 Fascists have been arrested.