FillyofDelphi
Banned
Let us eat cake!
-Speaker Unknown, August 28th Bread Riot
The Paupers Part II: The Eve of the Palermo Revolution.
What was it about the conditions of August and September of 1866 that caused the sporadic rural violence to evolve into a proper uprisings? If one were to listen to the narrative pushed by the prominent voices on both sides in the decades following the conflict, this is a malformed question: the preceding years had already been one of a brutal military occupation under the Pica Laws brought on by virtual unanimous support for the brigandage by a rural population of deified them for their attacks on the servants of the Italian state. Most modern historians reject this moralizing narrative though, believing it to be an over-simplified fantasy pushed both by the Mezzogiorini in order to build a national mythos and Savoyard Apologists who sought both to explain the failure and justify the brutal repressive measures of their administration by lumping all their southern cousins together in a lawless, bloodthirsty mass. Less biased testimonies from peasants and soldiers who were eyewitnesses to events, however, do provide some insights as to what convinced the population to take the fateful step from passive resistance to armed revolution.
This move towards separatism was by no means guaranteed. Prior to the news of the failure of the July Campaigns, the radicals had in fact been contained and steadily being reduced. Referred to as “Mosquitos” in later literature, the criminal bands did indeed act like the insects of the tidal swamps they used as a hideout. As summer set in, they swarmed into the countryside to attack isolated military positions and merchant caravans which, while annoying and near-constant, where only harmful in truly massive numbers and as often as not resulted in many wounded if the Italian authorities swatted back. Independent bands cracked under the twin pressures to their already miserable conditions, with fewer and less profitable raids combing with a peasant population that, no matter how much praise they heaped on them and silent outrage they held towards their overlords, were warier about openly providing bread and shelter as they came under the tight surveillance of the increasingly violent Italian garrisons. Instead of risking death at the hands of either the seasonal cholera epidemic, a through military sweep, or malnutrition, these gangs decamped from the marshes to seek some paid work that would allow them to feed themselves while maintaining their arms and organization in case prospects improved. Luckily for them, the war-driven steady drop in the local availability of young men and rise in grain prices created by the months of mobilization and bulk and speculative purchases by wiley merchants and pragmatic institutions in case the conflict disrupted the fall harvests left not shortage of opportunities for just such kind of men.
Those landowners who’d sought to maintain their lucrative contracts to the crackdown on the “companies at arms” practice by either dissolving or officially registering their employees into the Italian military administration, found themselves under increasingly lopsided pressure as the remaining, ideological outlaw bands laser focused on their shipments and their protectors either dragged off to the north or assigned to politically motivated punitive measures by the Inspector-Generals. Seeing this opportunity for profit, their less scrupulous rivals sponsored these roving bands by promising safe harbor, a steady supply of food and ammunition, and legal cover in exchange for their peasants and exports being off-limits and share of any prizes. No less valuable than the increase in revenues was the goodwill this earned them from the population, who now stood as the thin line between them from extortion and abuse at the hands of a violent and frightening world. Feeding into this disruption of the distribution system was a sharp increase in the practice of hording: bakers bought up as much wheat and rye as they could store and afford to insure they had a supply into the winter, wholesalers sweeping up as much as they could to refill their warehouses on the assumption they could sell it at a huge profit once prices ballooned ever still further, and small farmers without the protection of an escort dared not risk the roads lest they be misidentifed as collaborators or smugglers and have their produce taken from them. Out in the countryside, where the grain was within arm's reach and people bought it commercially anyways, this had little effect on the quality of life. Shops in the coastal towns, in contrast, had to compete both with the military and merchant oligarchs who bid up wheat and rye to the higher prices on the mainland and could provide cash up front, forcing them to as much as triple their rates just so they could afford to restock their shelves. For wage-earners and artisans who already spent a third of their household income on food, the collapse in what little local consumer demand existed as they were separated from the rural inlands meant they could no longer afford to both stave off starvation and keep a roof over their head. As the end of August looked and the advance on the next month's rent was coming due, desperate wives and children swarming around warves and stores to beg for food as the streets were clogged with men seeking odd jobs that might allow them to scrape together the payment.
Several factors heightened the appeal of the call for a violent response being shouted by ideological briganda, Austrian agents, and some radical voices among the clergy and petty nobility in areas outside Royalist control. One of these was the growing realization that many of Piedmontese veterans had left for northern battlefields or wild goose chase in the hedgerows, replaced with former "companies at arms" of dubious displine and mercenary loyalties. Another was the arrival of the failures on those same battlefields and arrest of the Duke of Gaeta, tearing away the protective shroud of dread that man had earned the occupation through his hard fought and through pacification. The third and most immediate cause, however, was the arrival of a small fleet of cargo ships with holds full of foodstuffs on August 28th in Palermo harbor. Bought and paid for by donations by an anonymous group of "Good Christian Brothers of The Fish and Loaf Society" as alms to be distributed under the public face of Antoine de Orlean. As grandson of the last King of Sicily as and independent entity via his recently late mother and youngest son of the "Citzen-King" Louis-Phillipe, Antoine's name carried at least a small whiff of nostalgia and hope among the traditionalist population, the rumors of something relating to him coming in that day drawing a larger crowd of onlookers to the dockside than usual. When porters from the local Catholic poorhouse arrived to unload the cargo they weren't surprised to see a crowd of over 5,000 , mostly made up of young women, already assembled in hopes of getting a choice pick of the food. What they diden't expect, however, was the line of 200 armed soldiers between them and their patron's property, refusing to allow them to board the ship. Under orders to be especially wary of potential forgein meddling following the Austrian invasion and a deafening silence by Rome to her demonstrated intent to restore Papal government in the lands they occupied, the prospect of just allowing so many tons of unknown cargo into the hands of the Church to be spread through an already agitated city was unthinkable to the Inspector-General. Citing normal custom's procedure, the commander of the troops informed the mob that the contents of the ship woulden't be freed until they'd been subject to a through inspection... a process that given the shortage of manpower might take up to several days. The sight of men in a Piedmontese uniform holding back servents of the Church from feeding a starving vity from provisions that rightfully belonged to them and were right there, right now, was the final unacceptable straw for somebody
There was a threat shouted, a cobblestone thrown, a shout of pain, and blood dripping down the commander's forehead. Than a shot was fired from the civic guard...
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