10 Facts About Walter Audisio

Walter Audisio was born in Alessandria, in the north-western Piedmont region of Italy, in a family of modest economic conditions.

Walter Audisio rose to the top of his class in school and found his first employment in a factory making Borsalino hats before working as an accountant.

Walter Audisio was sentenced to five years of internal exile on the island of Ponza, where he managed to keep contacts with other Communist exiles and to deepen his studies on political and military topics.

Walter Audisio was then given the military command for the Mantua area and parts of the Po Valley, where he was in charge of about one thousand partisans and liaisoned directed with the general command of Resistance units, the Corpo Volontari della Liberta.

Walter Audisio carried out the execution of Mussolini, his mistress, and a number of high-ranking Fascists the following day in Giulino di Mezzegra, along with fellow partisan officers Aldo Lampredi and Michele Moretti.

Walter Audisio always claimed to have been the one who shot the dictator, something supported by a private report written by Lampredi as well.

Walter Audisio was re-elected in 1953 and 1958, and to the Senate in 1963.

Walter Audisio was active as a member of the National Association of Italian Partisans and the National Association of Antifascist Italian Victims of Political Persecution.

Walter Audisio died of a heart attack in 1973, aged 64.

Walter Audisio is played by Franco Nero in the 1974 movie Last Days of Mussolini.