General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa: who was he? How did he die and who was his wife? Death, children, history summary, photos
The General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa is one of the symbols of the fight against the mafia, considered a real hero for the Carabinieri. He was killed on 3 September 1982 in a criminal ambush where his wife and an escort agent also lost their lives. Let’s get to know it better and find out all the details.
Read also: General Dalla Chiesa, who was his wife Emanuela Setti Carraro? Age at the time of death, grave, mafia
Who was General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa?
General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa is one of the eternal symbols of the fight against the Mafia, considered a real hero for the Carabinieri. Born in Saluzzo on 27 September 1920, he was the son of a Carabinieri officer who retired in 1955 with the rank of Deputy Commander General of the Arma. This meant that Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa grew up in an environment where law, honor and love for the country were fundamental elements.
General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa / Photo: Rai.it
Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa began his military career in 1941, when he was chosen as a second lieutenant during the war in Montenegro. A year later he was assigned to the tenence of San Benedetto del Tronto.
Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa and the Second World War
It also played an important role during World War II and the Nazi occupation. The General always refused to carry out anti-partisan actions and actively collaborated, becoming responsible for clandestine radio broadcasts, which had an open channel with the forces of the American allies.
From the Church he considered the service performed during the Second World War as a fundamental experience of his entire existence. In particular he stressed the importance of resistance, which he always remembered with great honor why
I found myself at the head of gangs of patriots and responsible for entire populations.
In July 1946 he married Dora Fabbo, also descended from a family dedicated to the weapon. From the marriage three children were born: Rita Dalla Chiesa, well-known TV presenter, Nando Dalla Chiesa and Simona Maria Dalla Chiesa. In September 1949 he joined the Corps Forces Repression Banditry (CFRB) in Sicily.
A rare image of General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa with his family. In addition to him we recognize: his son Nando (left), Rita (center), his wife Dora Fabbo and Simona Maria (right) / Photo: StrettoWeb
For his business al CFRB From the Church he received a silver medal for military valor.
Command in Palermo
Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa assumed command of the Legion of Palermo in 1966, playing a leading role in what is considered the first mafia war. If on the one hand Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa was always attentive to the rigor of his barracks but also to the human side with which he helped the Sicilian citizens, his contribution and collaboration with the anti-mafia commission was really fundamental.
Fight against the mafia
It was Dalla Chiesa who introduced the files of the mafia, who had the task of emphasizing also the family and affiliation ties that were used to understand the ties between the criminals that the man was called to eradicate. In this regard, during a meeting with the anti-mafia commission in 1962 reported from the site of the carabinieri, the soldier said:
I would like to show a card, which I have prepared for my legion, for all my collaborators, dedicated to the mafia or suspected such. family, of genealogy, more than a mafia registry office.
The latter is limited to the character; the genealogy of each mafioso instead leads us to establish who married the mafia’s son, who he was related to, who was baptized, who had him as a partner in marriage.
And all this is the mafia, it is an offshoot of the mafia (…) it is much more effective to follow the mafia like this, that is, not through the usual form of the Ministry of the Interior, but closely, through the children, through the spouses of the children, through the origins , the areas from which they come, because the areas of influence also have their importance.
In 1973, after his promotion to General, Dalla Chiesa also played an important role in the fight against terrorism and the Red Brigades, especially as regards the kidnapping of the deputy prosecutor of Genoa, Mario Sossi: the difficult negotiation for the liberation of the man led From the Church to try to combat left-wing terrorism through the special unit of the judicial police. Always attentive and always upright, Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa continued to fight against the mafia in Sicily, in a region increasingly devastated by crime, where murders increased dramatically.
How General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa died
The General was always at the forefront of the struggle: this, of course, made him a target for criminals who saw in this whole man a great obstacle to their success. On the evening of September 3, 1982, while he was in the car with his second wife Emanuela Setti Carraro, Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa was joined by a commando of the Cosa Nostra. Thirty Kalashnikov bullets are fired on the body of the soldier and his wife, killing the two. Domenico Russo, an escort agent, also dies in the same attack.
Let’s summarize
In the mid-seventies, when General Dalla Chiesa was commander of the Carabinieri in Sicily, one day he received a phone call from the captain, a manager of the town of Palma di Montechiaro, who told him that he had been threatened by the local mafia boss.
From the church he immediately went to Palma di Montechiaro, took the captain by the arm and began to walk slowly with him up and down the main road. Everyone looked at them. Eventually this strange couple stopped in front of the house of the town’s Mafia boss.
The two lingered long enough to make everyone understand that the captain was not left alone.
Many years later the General said:
All I ask is that someone take me by the arm and walk with me.
This little story Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa told it one morning to the Consul of the United States who had gone to visit him at his residence as prefect in Palermo. It was the morning of September 3, 1982: that was Dalla Chiesa’s final request to get out of the loneliness that was leading him to death. He barely had time to say goodbye to the consul and to spend his last day of work in the office and then in the evening, shortly after 21, with no one holding him under his arm, he found the killers on the street who killed him, his wife Emanuela Setti Carraro and his escort agent Domenico Russo.
Let’s not forget it.
This testimony was granted by the magistrate Sebastiano Ardita, his friend.
Who was his wife
Emanuela Setti Carraro was the second wife of General Dalla Chiesa. Born in Borgosesia, a Piedmontese town in the province of Vercelli on 9 October 1950, she died together with her husband in Palermo, in the massacre of Via Carini, on 3 September 1982, at the age of just 32, only fifty-four days after their marriage.
General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa and his wife Emanuela / Photo: La Repubblica
On 10 July 1982 she married General Carlo Alberto dalla Chiesa, overcoming with determination the hesitations of her parents due to the difference of 30 years of age. The marriage was celebrated privately in the small church of Castel Ivano in Ivano-Fracena in Trentino.
On the evening of Friday 3 September 1982, at 9:15 pm Emanuela was driving her A112 with her husband at her side. The bodies of both were found riddled with bullets. The general hugged his wife as if in a desperate attempt to protect her with his body. After the bursts of Kalashnikovs against the car, the hitman got off his motorcycle, walked around the car and shot her in the head with a pistol, disfiguring her. Although she was not the first woman victim of the mafia, at that time her death aroused many reflections on the evolution of the mafia practice, which had by now abandoned the rule of honor not to kill women.
Sons
From the marriage with his first wife, Dora Fabbo, three children were born. Rita Dalla Chiesa is a well-known TV presenter, Nando Dalla Chiesa, writer and journalist, and Simona Maria Dalla Chiesa.
Rita Dalla Chiesa with her father, General Carlo Alberto / Photo: Movie Player
Nando and Rita Dalla Chiesa: two of the sons of General Carlo Alberto / Photo: La Stampa
Photo
Indelible images of three Mafia Victims: Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa, Emanuela Setti Carraro and Domenico Russo / Photo: La Reubblica
Heartbreaking, speechless image / Photo: Instagram
The 112 on which General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa and his wife Emanuela Setti Carraro traveled to the Voghera Historical Museum / Photo: Roberto Bettolini
Tomb of General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa and his wife Emanuela Setti Carraro. The spouses are buried together in the family tomb in the Villetta cemetery in Parma. / Photo: Dagospia
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