Captain Corelli's Mandolin

The captain said, "Let's go." I took a step, he raised his pistol and fired a single shot at me. The bullet went through my neck and I was thrown to the ground by the impact. That must have been the signal for the massacre, because they then opened up with machine guns and I could hear the cries of our boys calling "mamma" and "Dio."

What does Corporal Richter's diary say about the sound of machine gun fire? It

...went on continuously for two hours...you could hear the screams from afar inside the Greek houses.

Despite what the Germans thought, Pampaloni was not dead.

I never lost consciousness and felt one of the Germans take off my watch, which they had missed earlier because it was on my right hand. After about 10 minutes I heard the Germans march off, laughing and singing.

Lt. Tognato's lifeless body was on top of Pampaloni's legs. The artillery captain lay motionless, trying to survive. Richter's unit, which had not participated in the massacre, was given orders to "finish off" any survivors and throw their bodies into the sea. Some of the bodies were thrown into pits.

According to Richter, some of the Germans tried to stop the killings. After it was over, and the Italians were dead, Richter wrote:

All bear the signs of a shot to the head, so they were killed by the 98th [a German regiment] after they had surrendered.

As Richter came across an Italian artillery position, he saw a body that still breathed. Perhaps it was Captain Pampaloni?

The gunners are lying on the ground, killed by gunshots, crushed by boots. It must have happened only minutes ago. Under that pile of bloody bodies there is one that trembles and still breathes.

Pampaloni was eventually found by a Greek boy. He was saved by Greek resistance fighters, called andartes.

Although no one can really be sure, of the nearly 11,500 men and more than 500 officers of the Acqui Division, between 9,500-10,000 died in the fighting. About 5,000 were gunned down in cold blood. The story was little known outside Italy before Corelli's Mandolin and little discussed in Germany before Richter's diary was published.

Benito Mussolini, on the other hand, temporarily escaped imprisonment (thanks to a German rescue). He established a Fascist Republic in Northern Italy. But on April 28, 1945, he also met an ignominious end.