DE VECCHI, CESARE MARIA

(1884–1959)

   A lifelong clericomonarchist, De Vecchi drew close to Fascism and to Benito Mussolini instrumentally, that is, because he was sure the movement and the Duce could be useful to the conservative causes he supported. Physically distinctive because of his shaved head and extraordinary moustaches, he was often the butt of cruel jokes by other leading Fascists, even after he had been made Count of Val Cismon because of his World War I heroism in the battles over that valley. De Vecchi played an important role during the March on Romein October 1922. While Mussolini awaited news from Milan, De Vecchi and Dino Grandi went to the capital, where they tried to organize a coalition with nationalist leaders. De Vecchi acted as the crucial go-between in negotiations between the king and the Fascist leader during the final crisis of liberal Italy. His subsequent career as a party leader was distinctly mixed, however. His frequent gaffes as cocommander of the militia (together with Italo Balbo after August 1922) included publicly inciting squadrismo in his native Turin. He was dismissed by Mussolini in May 1923 and sent off to Somalia as governor, whence he returned only after war broke out. A member of the Fascist Grand Council, he endorsed Dino Grandi’s motion to deprive Mussolini of office in July 1943 and was subsequently condemned to death. He fled first to a monastery, then to South America, and returned to Italy 10 years later to join the neoFascist Movimento Sociale Italiano/Italian Social Movement (MSI), in which his monarchist views made him welcome to only some of the party’s adherents. He died in Rome in 1959.

   See also Quadrumvirate.