Braided in Fire

LA MULATTIERA

The mulattiera or mule trail, figures large in Braided in Fire: Black GIs and Tuscan Villagers on the Gothic Line because the book centers on Sommocolonia, a tiny mountain village in the foothills of the Apennines whose mule trail was its main connection to the world outside. Prior to 1962 Sommocolonia had no road for automobiles and, although there were numerous small trails to other nearby villages, the mulattiera leading to Barga, with its population of 10,000, was by far the largest and the principle destination.

Roman legionaries laid the first stones of the steep path, and villagers have trod those same stones for centuries. Only the village store could afford to own a mule to carry up supplies, and some charcoal makers, working in the woods above the village, used mules to carry loads down to Barga. But every villager, young or old, walked it and knew all of its twists and turns.

When my husband, Bill, and I first hiked what we referred to as “the old Roman road,” we found it delightful going down but a bit arduous on the mile and a half climb back up. Barga’s elevation is 1,350′ while Sommocolonia, on it’s small mountain, is at 2,325′ so there’s a difference of nearly 1,000′. Parts of the trail are steep, especially as one approaches the village near the top

In the wartime period covered by Braided in Fire, people had vastly different experiences on the trail. My interviewee, Irma Biondi, described the nature of contadino (peasant) life in such vivid detail that I could hear the sound of the women’s wooden zoccoli (shoes) clacking on the stones of the mulattiera as they walked down every dawn, carrying heavy loads of firewood on their heads to barter at the bakery at the bottom for a few loaves of fresh baked bread.

Here’s Irma Biondi, age sixteen in 1938, returning home on a Sunday afternoon from her job as a live-in maid for a prominent Fascist family in Barga. Homesick for her village, she was especially aware of the beauty of the trail other Sommocolonians traveled without noticing their surroundings:

            Irma came to the spot where the woods were dense on her right, while to her left cultivated hills spilled all the way down to the tiled rooftops of Barga. She looked past Barga, to the other side of the Serchio Valley, where the jagged Apuane stood, high enough to deny the area milder Mediterranean weather. The extensively quarried mountains were already topped in snow. Newcomers found it hard to tell the difference between exposed white marble and snow, but Irma could pinpoint it instantly. She loved autumn, when all the complicated crevices in the mountains were revealed, and the coastal Alps appeared closer and more alive, the branching peaks like a dragon's backbone.

            She passed a field hut with VIVA IL DUCE! scrawled across its stone front in enormous white letters. Such exhortations were so ubiquitous that usually she barely noticed them. Now, so taken with the beauty around her, she wondered why, since everyone knew he was a great leader, it had to be shouted in the middle of the woods. Surrounded by chestnut trees, she smiled, noting that nearly all the thorny chestnut cases strewn about the road were empty—the villagers had been diligent in gathering up the nuts.

            Arriving at the little San Rocchino chapel, she laid her burlap sack, brought along to carry chestnuts back to her employers, on the damp stone wall and sat down on it. She said a quick Ave Maria and, then breathed in deeply. She loved this spot where she had sat so often when she accompanied her mother either to the fields or to the bakery. The chapel was too small to enter but sitting under its portico one could look through the the iron gate at the painting of of San Rocco, Sommocolonia’s patron saint and the two hanging copper lamps   It was a charming place in the woods two thirds of the way up the path -- everyone always stopped to rest and chat there before continuing on to climb the last steep bit home.

            Closing her eyes, Irma could hear the voices of women she knew well with the ever present background clicking of their knitting needles. The women made all their families’ clothing and thus were always knitting something—socks, underwear, whatever was needed.  Many were so adept at this that they could balance heavy loads of wood on their heads and continue knitting while walking down the precipitous path.

Irma could not have imagined that four years hence her mother, at age forty-eight, would be saying a quick prayer at the shrine while in labor. The eldest child in the family, Irma already had five little brothers and did not anticipate a sixth. A few Sommocolonians had been born on the trail, so Irene Biondi was lucky to make it to the Barga hospital where she gave birth to a healthy boy.

And Irma certainly couldn’t guess that six years hence, this bucolic spot would be the setting of a major firefight. At the shrine Germans turned away a platoon of African American soldiers attempting to relieve their beleaguered troops in Sommocolonia. Several of the black GIs were killed before the platoon retreated.

Irma’s trips home were exhilarating and joyous. African-American soldiers who traveled the same route in 1944 did so with dread and foreboding as they headed up to a front line they knew was perilously close to enemy positions.

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Rock Smith, a conscientious objector medic, was among black troops who headed up the mulattiera in the dark. Again from the book:

Although they climbed at night, an artillery shell landed near an exposed part of the path, and Rock and the others hit the ground for a minute or two before continuing. He thought, how easily platoons could be targeted in daylight, and how strange it was that the first time he was fired upon was on his father's birthday, December 1st! Rock missed his family and found it disconcerting to pick his way to the front on an ancient stone path. This was not how he'd imagined combat.           

As the path grew steeper, his thirty-pound pack grew heavier. He struggled to keep up and realized how out of shape they'd become with no physical training for so long.

Rock told me the story of his only other wartime trip on the mulattiera, this time during the day, but clearly not a pleasant walk:

Rock and three others were carrying a guy on a stretcher down to a forward aid station.  The wounded man was a two-hundred and fifty-pound sergeant, who had intentionally shot himself in the foot to escape being in a combat zone.  “He’s the only one that I knew of [who did that].  He regretted it, I know.  The guys were groaning at having to carry him and were calling him [every kind of blasphemous name]. I mean they talked about him ’til I felt sorry for him. I know he suffered from that. They really didn’t want to carry hi. But I was the medic, and I had to commandeer them to bring him down the hill.  So, they did not make that journey nicely.”

The above story does not appear in Braided in Fire because it is so uncharacteristic of the bravery I heard about often in relation to the African-American soldiers stationed in Sommocolonia. 

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Lt. John Fox had a different experience going up the mulattiera than most of the troops did. He went up quickly in a jeep. (Small American jeeps were the first motorized vehicles to arrive in Sommocolonia.) And, by all reports, Fox’s attitude in going to the front was different from many of the soldiers sent to the village. He volunteered for the 1944 Christmastime duty because he wanted the experience of being a forward observer, a position he knew he was well trained for.

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James Hamlet, who went up in late January 1945, did not feel well prepared. His entry to frontline experience was one of the few with a little humor. From the book:

“I'm supposed to follow this ass up this mountain?” 2nd Lieutenant James Hamlet asked incredulously.

His briefing officer nodded and said, “But don't worry, there’ll be an Alpino supplier with you who knows the way.”

Don't worry? Hamlet thought to himself. I'm going up to the front line!

. . . Hamlet was joining the Second Battalion of the 366th in Sommocolonia. His orientation officer told him about John Fox's heroism. What an act to follow! Was he truly expected to replace such a man? He knew he wasn’t literally replacing him because Fox was a forward observer while he was going to be a platoon leader, but he still couldn’t shake the feeling that he walking in a giant’s shoes. He wished he had more preparation than being handed the tail of a mule.

The Alpino food supplier led off, with Hamlet following the six-mule train. Since he couldn’t communicate with this green-clad Italian, his presence made Hamlet feel more isolated than if he’d been alone.

When he reached Ponte di Catagnana, Buffalo Soldiers on the slopes above the little line of houses called out, “You're gonna be sorry!”

Hazing, he thought. They could tell he was new because he was clean-shaven and his uniform immaculate. Like Fox he took pride in his appearance. He wasn't as handsome, but his square jaw and calm expression gave him a distinguished look, unusual in a young man.

When he started up the snow-covered mulattiera, he realized that the trail's surface was ice-covered stones. That's why he’d been told not to drive a jeep. The temperature was freezing. He was glad for his parka and the officer's quality sleeping pack on his back. At least his equipment was good.

The mules were laden with ammunition and food. Climbing a particularly steep area, Hamlet heard a commotion ahead. He looked up in time to see one of the mules rolling down the mountainside. The creature landed in a heap against a tree far below. The Alpino threw up his hands in despair. He pointed at the fallen mule and then shook his finger indicating that they should not try to fetch the animal, which appeared to be dead.

When they arrived in the Sommocolonia piazza, a group of GIs met them. They all looked so scruffy and scraggly that he concluded none could be an officer. Finally he saw a clean-shaven man, so Hamlet saluted him and started to speak.

“No, not me, him,” the fellow said. “I'm just the platoon messenger.”

The bearded officer looked like a disheveled character in a Bill Mauldin cartoon. When Hamlet saluted him, Lt. Louis Flagg said, “Christ, don't be saluting up here! The Germans shoot officers. You'd better take that lieutenant bar off your helmet too.” Hamlet did so while the men around him stripped the mule packs.

Flagg's first question was, “Where's the beer?”

“Beer?” Hamlet said. “I suppose it must've been on that mule that went sliding down the mountain.”

“You mean you didn't bring beer?”

“I brought ammunition and water and C rations.”

“Hell, man!” his superior exclaimed.

Hamlet was put in charge of a patrol to go back down that steep slope and retrieve every can of beer.

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Fast forward to the July weekend in 2,000 when the hero Lt. John Fox, who had sacrificed himself in the Sommocolonia battle of December 26, 1944 and had belatedly been recognized posthumously with the Medal of Honor in 1997, was being honored in the village, along with returning African American veterans who had fought in the area. The event coincided with Sommocolonia’s initiation of its ‘La Rocca alla Pace’ monument and Park to Peace project.  

At my recommendation, the Fox family, John’s widow Arlene, their daughter Sandra Fox and her two grown children, Morgan and Cassandra Charles, walked down the mulattiera. Upon their return, they told me that the vistas had been surprising: they would emerge from long tunnels of trees to find expansive views over the valley, views accompanied by a gloriously dramatic sky. Then, suddenly thunder and lightening accompanied the shafts of light and dark and it started to pour. Generally, it was a most unseasonably cold weekend for mid-July. Now drenched and freezing, they went on into Barga and bought heavy sweatshirts. (For their July visit, I had instructed them to bring only light summer sweaters.)

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Nine years later, on a much milder day, September 5th, 2009, I wished the Foxes were present when the mulattiera was officially named ‘Via 92 Divisione Buffalo.’ (Members of the African American 92nd Division were called ‘Buffalo Soldiers.’) The Fox family would have been a wonderful addition to the occasion.

Captain Joseph Hairston, a Buffalo Soldier veteran, had been invited to participate via the ‘Cultural Association for the 92nd Division’ of Sarzana. (Sarzana is a Ligurian city north of Barga—just east of the important port town La Spezia—which Buffalo Soldiers liberated at the very end of the war.)

Captain Hairston arrived in a train of WWII vintage US jeeps apparently filled with Buffalo Soldiers—their uniforms authentic including the Buffalo badge. It turned out it was an Italian re-enactment—except one participant was not pretending. Hairston told me later that he was astounded at the Sarzanans’ interest in playing Buffalo Soldiers. “I know reenactments of the civil war go on in the US with people dressing up in unionist and confederate uniforms—but they’re the descendants of the people who fought. This is different . . . they had details of equipment, bags and things I recognized, but had completely forgotten.”

I had not been part of planning this occasion and was out of the loop about the reenactment, so when I saw what looked like WWII American soldiers riding in jeeps just below La Rocca field, I was truly startled. Then the soldiers marched through the village! A few were black (Africans it turned out—not Americans). Until then these images had existed only in my imagination—it was the vision I’d had so much difficulty picturing at the start of researching this story.

There was a morning reception for Joseph Hairston at the Barga governmental Comune, but the highlight of the day was the ceremony when he officially christened the mulattiera. It was a moving little gathering at the start of the trail’s steep descent. There were the faux Buffalo Soldiers, Italian and American flags, a large Sommocolonia banner—and energetic eighty-seven year-old Joseph Hairston at the center of the activity.

In the 92nd Division, Hairston had been with the 371st in the 599th Field Artillery. When he came to Sommocolonia in 2009, he believed his battery had been among those that fired at Lt. John Fox when Fox heroically requested artillery fire onto his own location. But when I learned that Hairston’s outfit was near Serravezza on that date, I determined that, even if the battery was east of the town, it would have been too far for artillery fire to have reached Sommocolonia. Still, it was hardly surprising that he remembered firing a great deal that day since, after the Sommocolonia battle, enemy forces were swarming west of the Serchio River where his artillery shells could easily arrive.

Hairston later became the first black US helicopter pilot when he served in Korea—he flew dangerous missions rescuing wounded GIs. Retiring from the Army in 1960, he received a law degree and then worked for many years as an attorney for the Internal Revenue Service in Washington, DC.

Joe Hairston shared several poignant experiences with me, but he didn’t tell me that he’d helped in a major way with Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1963 March on Washington. I read the following later online at: http://wamu.org/programs/metro_connection/13/06/28first_black_army_helicopter_pilot_recalls_discrimination_in_military_and_dc

Like many, Hairston worried that if the March turned violent, it would be a major setback to the civil rights movement. To help prevent that, he drew on his Army experience. “My suggestion was to organize like a military unit. Platoons, companies, battalions, regiment. That day fifty years ago, Hairston was there, with a radio, ready in case any trouble should arise. "During that March, I was on top of the Lincoln Memorial. Now, King is making the speech, if the camera had panned up, you would have seen me at the top."

It was a great honor for Sommocolonia that such a man gave the mulattiera its name. The name given, ‘Via 92 Divisione Buffalo’ was definitely meant to include those who fought in Sommocolonia, troops of the 366th Infantry Regiment. During the war, Italians called 366th men ‘Buffalo’ along with all the black American soldiers. Even in 2009, few Italians realized that 366th soldiers were not Buffalo Soldiers and were not part of the 92nd Division, but were instead troops attached to the 92nd. Yet it was all men of the 366th who fought in Sommocolonia and more than half of the seventy-five 366th soldiers stationed in the village on December 26th, 1944, died there that day. In naming the trail, the intention was to honor these soldiers along with members of the 92nd Division who had also often been stationed in the village and also traveled la mulattiera.

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Today the trail looks like just a hiker’s delight. And indeed, it is a beautiful, invigorating walk, but it is also a repository of village history.

Click on the images below to view larger versions of the September 5, 2009 events naming the mulattiera and re-enacting the battle of Sommocolonia.

How is the mulattiera used today? 

For many years there have been races up the trail for those in shape for cross-country running. I don’t know the fastest running time clocked, but walking up takes at least forty-five minutes (more often an hour) to arrive at the village.

Every September first, Don Stefano Serafini, the priest of the Barga catedral, leads a religious procession up the mulattiera from the Catagnana church (near the bottom of the trail) to the Sommocolonia church at the top.

April 25th, 2019, was the eighth consecutive year that the Italian liberation day was celebrated by many in the Barga area with a communal walk up the mulattiera to Sommocolonia. Once there, people buy lunch made by villagers in order to fundraise for La Rocca alla Pace monument and museum dedicated to peace. Everyone spends the afternoon picnicking and listening to live music on the La Rocca park site.

Throughout the year many hikers enjoy the trail. Some come intentionally to learn about Sommocolonia’s WWII history, others discover a bit about it upon arrival.

What is my own most memorable time on the mulattiera?

Bill and I had just arrived back to our house in Sommocolonia after a long absence. We threw open the windows and were greeted by the acrobatics of the rondini who nest in the village’s eaves, including ours. It seemed these amazing seasonal visitors had co-ordinated their return with our own. (Many call the rondini ‘swallows’ but the birds in Sommocolonia are ‘swifts’ with forked tails.) It was a beautiful day and Bill suggested we walk down the “old Roman road.”

The walk was idyllic. We marveled at all our favorite places, including the familiar archetypal stone farmhouse whose beauty in its Tuscan proportions and simplicity always gave us pleasure. We passed our good friends’ house where we’d spent so many pleasurable evenings. We followed the stones on down following their curving route.

But suddenly something was very wrong. A car motor was idling directly behind us, destroying our quiet revery. How dare they! We were truly angry at the driver. (In truth, bumpy as it is, cars are allowed to navigate the lower end of the mulattiera.) Finally we stepped aside to let the annoying vehicle pass, only instead of speeding up, it slowed while passing us. Then it stopped momentarily and the beaming driver gazed at us making the sign of the cross. Then he was gone.

Stunned, Bill looked at me and finally said, “We were just blessed.” Then we realized who it was. It was the handicapped man we had passed so often on a country Barga street when we had first come to the area and had rented a farmhouse outside of Barga. He had crutches and limped along with his lame leg. We always greeted one another but never had a real conversation, although we’d heard he was quite a scholar. Now some years later, we’d learned that, at an advanced age, he had realized his life-long ambition to become a priest: He was Don Lucchesi.

We took in the fact that we had been blessed. Although neither Bill nor I belong to any organized religion, we were deeply touched. We realized that not only had we been blessed by the newly ordained priest, but on the deepest level, we had been blessed by this extraordinarily beautiful place which had become our place.

 Solace Wales