Italian city honours London soldier killed in struggle for its liberation
A single Second World War soldier, an operation 75 years in the past and 7,400 kilometres away, one big link between London and a city in Italy. Londoner Capt. Leonard Innes Carling is being immortalized on a plaque in the main square of Castropignano — about 230 kilometres southeast of Rome — to mark the 75th anniversary of his death during a mission to liberate the city.
The 27-year-old Carling was killed by enemy machine guns Oct. 25, 1943, while leading his company on an overnight attack against the Nazi army between Orantino and Duronia, just outside of Castropignano. While the Allies closed in, the Germans shot flares to light up the area — exposing the location of soldiers and making them easier targets.
Carling was killed in action, but the operation to free the town from German occupation was ultimately successful.
“This town was liberated by the Allies, the Canadians,” said King ’s University College history professor Robert Ventresca, whose mother was born in Castropignano the year after Carling died and whose cousin is mayor. “The connection, this global war, these two relatively small places … I thought it’s just really neat.” Carling went to school at London Central collegiate institute and Trinity College School in Port Hope. He worked at Bank of Montreal branches in London and Meaford before he enlisted and was a member of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London.
He joined the Royal Canadian Regiment in January 1940 and went overseas the following year. Carling served in England, Sicily and Italy.
At the peak of the Italian campaign — which began with the Allied invasion of Sicily and mainland Italy in 1943 — nearly 76,000 Canadians were in the Mediterranean nation. The Canadian forces suffered 2,119 fatalities, Carling among them. He is buried at the Moro River Canadian War Cemetery about 140 kilometres north of Castropignano.
After nearly two years of fighting, the German army in Italy surrendered May 2, 1945. Days later, Germany surrendered unconditionally to the Allies, ending the Second World War. Though Italy fought on the same side as the Germans in the war, many in the country place high importance on remembrance and recognizing Allied soldiers who died on Italian soil, Ventresca said. In an email, translated into English with Ventresca’s help, Castropignano Mayor Margherita Brunetti said honouring the fallen Canadian — especially on the milestone anniversary of his death — is the right thing to do.
“We felt it was our duty to honour the memory of Captain Carling who, with the ultimate sacrifice of his life, helped to contribute to the cause of freedom and democracy in Italy,” she said in an email. The city held a special ceremony, procession and church service to unveil Carling’s plaque Nov. 4, Armed Forces Day in Italy. The memorial includes a photo of Carling and the page dedicated to him in the first volume of the City of London’s Book of Remembrance.
Even 75 years on, Carling ’s story still resonates with the people in Castropignano, memorial organizer Domenico Borsella said in an email translated by Ventresca. “Civic officials and citizens felt it was a duty to honour this young man, only 27 years old, who left behind a wife and children, to die in a far-away country, in a war that was not his.”