The Pope's Army

[casimiro]

Among the military forces of the Second World War, perhaps the least known are those responsible for defending the Vatican. Few students of the war, even among those interested particularly in the Italian side of the subject, are aware that Pope Pius XII had an army, that this army was mobilized at the time of the German occupation of Rome (September 10, 1943), and that on more than one occasion this force opened fire on “hostiles” attempting to enter papal territory. I am hoping that some members of the forum may be interested in a brief overview of the wartime papal military.

During the war, the papal armed forces consisted of four units: the Swiss Guard, the Pontifical Gendarmeria, the Noble Guard, and the Palatine Guard.

Founded in 1506 the Swiss Guard was the oldest unit in the papal armed forces. It was also the most visible and best-known due to its colorful uniforms which were the delight of tourists. Entry into the Guard was restricted to Swiss Catholics who had completed an enlistment in the Swiss army. The unit had no administrative, command, or supply connections with the armed forces of Switzerland, but the guardsmen (known as “halberdiers” from the distinctive weapon they carried on ceremonial occasions) remained citizens of their home country and were subject to recall in the event of national military mobilization. Indeed, during the First World War over half the Swiss Guard had been called back to Switzerland for military service Upon the outbreak of war in 1939, the Swiss military department agreed not to recall to the national army any citizens enrolled in papal service, but it initially prohibited further recruitment so that the Guard struggled to replenish its ranks as some halberdiers completed their two-year enlistment and returned home. The prohibition was lifted in 1941 but during the war the Guard could never regain its authorized strength of 120 men. At the time of the German occupation of Rome, the unit was down to 62 officers and men.
The Swiss Guard was charged with controlling the gates to Vatican City and the entrances to the papal palace and protecting the person of the Holy Father with posts outside the papal apartments and at various places inside the palace. They also provided a protective force at Castel Gandolfo whenever the pope visited his summer residence in the hills outside Rome. The day German troops appeared at the travertine strip that marked the border between Italy and the independent Vatican City State the Swiss Guard commandant, Colonel the Baron Heinrich Pfyffer von Altishofen, received a memo from the office of the Cardinal Secretary of State stating that Pope Pius did not wish his guards to resist any attempt by the Germans to enter the Vatican. The commandant did not transmit this directive to his men and throughout the occupation he prepared his unit to fight.

The Guard’s colorful halberds and swords were not considered functional weapons, but merely part of the dress uniform just like the polished belt buckles, the gaiters, and the morion helmet. The halberdiers received no training in the use of halberds and swords as actual weapons. The functional armory consisted of 120 Mauser Model 98 rifles and a dozen Dreyse 7.65mm pistols, all of which had been acquired shortly before the First World War. In the spring of 1944, with the assistance of the Swiss ambassador in Rome, Colonel von Altishofen quietly arranged the purchase of thirty Swiss MKPS submachine guns and several thousand rounds of ammunition. In a wartime ordeal worthy of any adventure novel, a Guard officer traveled to Switzerland to take delivery of the weapons and returned with them to Rome by truck. Statements that the Swiss Guard had heavy machine guns and mortars are incorrect.

During the German occupation, the halberdiers (except for the ceremonial honor guard in the papal reception hall and the daytime picket at the main entrance to the palace) abandoned their gaily-colored uniforms in favor of the so-called “exercise” uniform consisting of blue blouse with white collar and cuffs, blue pants, black ankle boots, brown belt, and black beret. At his duty post, a guardsman carried a loaded rifle, bayonet, ninety rounds of ammo in a bandolier, and a gas mask. Each post had additional ammunition in boxes. On duty, officers and NCOs carried the Dreyse pistols. The Swiss Guard, however, did not fire a shot in anger during the war.

The Pontifical Gendarmeria was the police force of Vatican City. It was a professional unit with many of its personnel recruited from the royal carabinieri, the military police of the Italian state. Perhaps because of their links with the Italian police, the gendarmes—at least before the fall of Mussolini—were reputed to be more sympathetic to fascism than their counterparts in other units of the papal armed forces. Although authorized at the level of 156 men, the unit never reached that size during the war.

The Gendarmeria performed routine police functions—traffic and crowd control, patrol, and criminal investigations—inside Vatican City and at Castel Gandolfo and the various churches and properties in Rome which were legally Vatican territory. They backed up the Swiss Guard at Vatican gates and had posts inside St. Peter’s Basilica, the papal palace, the Vatican museums and gardens, the Vatican train station, and Vatican Radio. Before the German occupation gendarmes on routine patrol or guard duty carried Beretta pistols, but with the arrival of the Wehrmacht the police officers patrolling the grounds and walls of Vatican City also carried Mauser Model 98 rifles with two pouches of ammunition. In the spring of 1944 several of the submachine guns acquired by the Swiss Guard were transferred to the Gendarmeria.

Established in 1801 as a mounted bodyguard for the pope, the Noble Guard was, perhaps, the most exclusive military unit in Europe. Potential recruits had to prove a title of nobility extending back at least 100 years and possess an independent income (not based upon trade or commerce) sufficient to maintain a lifestyle appropriate to their noble station. The unit was also distinguished by the fact that all personnel held officer rank. The guardsmen received no pay for their service, although they did receive a generous allowance for the purchase and maintenance of their elaborate uniforms which with their crested helms, cloaks, sabers, and thigh boots recalled the costume of a Napoleonic cavalryman.

Long before the Second World War the Noble Guard had abandoned their horses and the attributes of a serious military unit. The members lived at home and contributed a few hours a week of their time to honor guard duties at the Vatican. Their role had become almost entirely ceremonial as they provided a highly decorative element to papal ceremonies, flanking the papal throne at formal affairs or presenting swords during the reception of foreign dignitaries. They received no training, although many of the guardsmen had served in the regular Italian army, particularly in such elite units as the Granatieri di Sardegna.

In 1943 the Noble Guard mustered only thirty-two men, although after September 10 several new recruits joined the unit including some who, as officers in Italian army units, had fought the Germans at the Porta San Paolo. With the Germans at the edge of St. Peter’s Square, the Noble Guard rediscovered its original mission of guarding the Holy Father. All guardsmen were ordered into the Vatican full-time. A Noble Guard now shadowed Pope Pius during his daily walk in the Vatican gardens and every night two guardsmen, armed with Beretta Model 1934 pistols, occupied an anteroom to the pope’s private apartments.

The Palatine Guard was the largest unit in the small papal army. Established in 1850 as a citizen’s militia to defend Rome at a time when the pope still ruled the Papal States, a broad swath of territory across central Italy, the Palatines, like their counterparts in the Noble Guard, were part-time, unpaid volunteers who performed purely ceremonial duties inside the Vatican. They received no training beyond practice in marching, keeping a line, and presenting rifles at public ceremonies, although (again as with the Nobles) many of the Palatines were veterans of the Italian army.

Although organized as a battalion of 500 men, the Palatine Guard had only about 300 members when the Wehrmacht entered Rome. This number quickly proved insufficient for the requirements of the German occupation—requirements that far exceeded occasional ceremonies in St. Peter’s Square. The Palatines were now directed to support the Gendarmeria by establishing guard post and patrols inside Vatican City. Additionally, the unit was ordered to provide detachments for round-the-clock protection of Castel Gandolfo and various churches and Vatican properties across Rome. Fearing that the Germans would blockade Vatican City and prevent guardsmen from traveling to and from their homes in Rome, the Palatine commander ordered 150 of his men into the Vatican and turned a large room in the Vatican museums into a makeshift barracks and mess.
To fulfill its new mission, the Palatine Guard launched a massive recruitment effort, increasing its strength to almost 2000 men, a number that seriously strained the command and supply resources of the unit. The normal uniform of plumed shakos, dark tunics, striped trousers, fancy epaulettes, and white gloves gave way to a more functional (and easily manufactured) “field uniform” consisting of a grey coveralls, crimson berets, and black cloaks. The guard armory contained some 700 Carcano Model 1891 rifles, but this number fell far short of the requirements of the enlarged corps. Remarkably, the Vatican storage rooms still held several hundred Remington Model 1868 rifles which had been standard issue in the old papal army before the incorporation of the Papal States into the Kingdom of Italy in 1870. These antique, single-shot, rifles were more suited to a museum than an operational military unit, but they were immediately drafted into service by the desperate Palatines. These Remingtons may have been the oldest weapons in active service in an official military unit during the Second World War.

Though looked down upon as useless amateurs by the “professionals” in the Swiss Guard and the Gendarmeria, the Palatines were the only unit of the papal armed forces to use their weapons. On several occasions during the German occupation, Palatines on duty at Vatican properties in Rome, some of which sheltered refugees and anti-fascists, opened fire with rifles and hand grenades on hostile groups attempting to enter the properties. By April 1944 such incursions were so common that Palatine detachments were issued extra ammunition and grenades. Extra munitions were of little use to the Palatine detachment at Castel Gandolfo when, over several days in February 1944, bombs from Allied aircraft attacking German positions on the neighboring hills fell on the papal summer villa, collapsing or damaging buildings and killing or wounding more than a hundred civilians who had sought refuge on the pope’s land.

Over the course of the war the papal armed forces suffered only three casualties. During an armed incursion by fascist police at the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls, a Vatican property that sheltered several Jews, a Palatine Guard was arrested and later executed by the Germans. The second fatality was Sub-lieutenant the Duke Leopoldo Torlonia, a Noble Guard, who, while off-duty, was arrested by the Germans for aiding escaped Allied POWs and who died while in German custody. The third casualty was a Palatine Guard who was wounded during the bombing of Castel Gandolfo.

[jwsleser]

Thank you for this quite interesting bit of history.

Pista! Jeff