The Italians of Crimea. The forgotten genocide

It starts with great success by the University Ca 'Foscari of Venice, last January, the photo exhibition "The Italians of Crimea. The forgotten genocide" is now a stop in Turin, at the Biblioteca civica Centrale. An intense storytelling through images, the dramatic story of the Italians of Crimea, a small community decimated by mass deportation in the Gulag of Kazakhstan, in 1942.
Arrived on the shores of the Black Sea during the nineteenth century Italians, almost all of Puglia and largely concentrated in the town of Kerch, inserted themselves perfectly in the local fabric and indeed, in a few decades, gave birth to the largest foreign community thriving and respected, able to establish itself in all areas of economic life, from trade to agriculture, activities related to fishing craft, from small businesses to the professions. With the October Revolution and the collectivization, all their possessions were seized. Then, in the thirties, came the famine and then, in '37 -'38, the Great Terror of Stalin's purges, with summary trials and sentences to death or forced labor. Some families managed to leave the country and to reach Trieste.
For those who remained, however, on January 29 1942 was the catastrophe: the mere fact of being Italian, the approximately 2,000 compatriots of Kerch were rounded up from house to house and deported en masse in the Gulag, in retaliation against the invasion of the Soviet Union by dell'Armir. A full-scale ethnic cleansing, ignored by history books. In a few years the Italian community of Crimea was almost completely wiped out by the cold, hunger, disease, the shootings, the inhumane prison conditions and forced labor. After the war, the silent return to Kerch a hundred survivors, who had to start from scratch: no home, no money, no job, afraid to speak Italian and branded as traitors.
A story of pain but also of great dignity and hope, a strong bond and a deep love for Italy never failed, as evidenced by the attachment of the survivors to the language and traditions of their ancestors.
The proceeds of the catalog will be donated to charity, the Association CERKIO

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