1 “the most important single political document”: Lorie Charlesworth and Michael Salter, “Ensuring the After-Life of the Ciano Diaries: Allen Dulles’ Provision of Nuremberg Trial Evidence,” Intelligence and National Security 21, no. 4 (2006): 568–603.
2 Irate housewives muttered words tantamount to insurrection: Paul Corner, The Fascist Party and Popular Opinion in Mussolini’s Italy (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2012), 240, passim.
3 “The pomposity and absurdity of his manner”: The Ribbentrop Memoirs, ed. Alan Bullock, trans. Oliver Watson (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1954), xv.
4 “One could not talk to Ribbentrop”: Ribbentrop Memoirs, x.
5 “revolting scoundrel”: The Ciano Diaries, 1939–1943: The Complete, Unabridged Diaries of Count Galeazzo Ciano, Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs, ed. Hugh Gibson (New York: Doubleday, 1945), 164.
6 “completely disgusted with the Germans”: Ciano Diaries, 153.
7 “set your minds at rest…France and England have accepted”: Iris Origo, A Chill in the Air: An Italian War Diary, 1939–1940 (New York: New York Review Books, 2018), quoted in Alexander Stille, “A Chill in the Air” (book review), New York Times, September 21, 2018.
8 inspired a younger and admiring Adolf Hitler: Adaam James Levin-Areddy, “Thirteen Facts About Benito Mussolini,” Mental Floss (online magazine), November 1, 2018.
9 “The Italians having heard my warlike propaganda”: Ray Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow: The Double Life of Count Galeazzo Ciano (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000), 89.
10 “I have never met such a pompous and vain imbecile”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 58.
11 “has become a nymphomaniac”: Edda Mussolini Ciano, My Truth (New York: Morrow, 1977), 86.
12 Galeazzo spoke with a high-pitched, nasal twang: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 10.
13 “I saw [Mussolini] many times”: Ciano Diaries, 278.
14 “[He] wore a great sable coat”: Ciano Diaries, 443.
15 “Hitler talks, talks, talks, talks”: Ciano Diaries, 478.
16 “Hitler looks tired”: Ciano Diaries, 478.
17 he was also “strong, determined, and talkative”: Ciano Diaries, 478.
18 “The year 1943 will perhaps be hard”: “Hitler Still Predicting Axis Victory,” Schenectady Gazette, January 1, 1943, 13.
19 “one of the outstanding RSHA operators of the war”: “Agent Security—Gambit,” November 8, 1946, Records of the Central Intelligence Agency, 608/MG-309 (Hildegard Beetz).
20 Hilde’s office tapped the phone lines: Katrin Paehler, The Third Reich’s Intelligence Services: The Career of Walter Schellenberg (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 74.
21 Helmut Löss had a reputation: Paehler, Third Reich’s Intelligence Services, 74.
22 the “big boss,” Ernst Kaltenbrünner, made Hilde’s transition: “Hildegard Beetz,” Records of the Central Intelligence Agency, item 71.
23 People now said that the Italian foreign minister was refusing: Enrico Caviglia, I Dittatori, le Guerre e il Piccolo Re: Diario 1925–1945 (Milan, Italy: Ugo Mursia Editore, 2009), 408–09, 420–22; Alberto Pirelli, Taccuini, 1922/1943, ed. Donato Barbone (Bologna, Italy: Il Mulino, 1984), 372.
24 A staunch Republican with a successful legal career: Greg Bradsher, “A Time to Act: The Beginning of the Fritz Kolbe Story, 1900–1943,” Prologue Magazine 34, no. 1, pt. 3 (Spring 2002), National Archives of the United States.
25 The Germans would not discover the existence of the OSS: Bradsher, “A Time to Act”; also Wilhelm Höttl, The Secret Front: The Story of Nazi Political Espionage (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1954), 268.
26 The intercepted telegram was a secret communication: Neal H. Petersen, From Hitler’s Doorstep: The Wartime Intelligence Reports of Allen Dulles, 1942–1945 (University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1996), 35; Paige Y. Durgin, “Framed in Death: The Historical Memory of Galeazzo Ciano,” thesis, Trinity College, 2012, 50.
27 Galeazzo Ciano, along with his exiled rival Pietro Badoglio: “Allen Dulles and the Compromise of OSS Codes in WW2,” Christos Military and Intelligence Corner (blog), May 23, 2012.
28 Galeazzo, in fact, had covertly been in contact: Francis X. Rocca, “Fascism’s Secretary of State,” The Atlantic, July 2000.
29 “What are you going to do now?”: Ciano Diaries, 579.
30 “I [chose] to be Ambassador to the Holy See”: Ciano Diaries, 579.
31 “To leave the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, where for seven years”: Ciano Diaries, 579.
32 “Galeazzo had fallen into disgrace”: Antonino Cangemi, “Vita spericolata di un dandy siciliano,” Dialoghi Mediterranei: Periodico bimestrale dell’Istituto Euroarabo di Mazara del Vallo, January 1, 2019.
33 “Yes,” Galeazzo replied: Ciano Diaries, 580.
34 In inexpensive, flimsy eight-by-ten-inch calendar notebooks: Howard McGaw Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden,” Central Intelligence Agency, Historical Review Program, September 22, 1993.
35 By July 16, Italy’s ambassadors, passing a secret message: Following the argument put forth by Emilio Gin, “Mussolini and the Fall of Fascism, 25 July 1943: A Reappraisal,” Historical Journal 61, no. 3 (September 2018): 787–806.
36 When all the roiling internal discontent was reported back to Germany: Gin, “Mussolini and the Fall of Fascism.”
37 The villa had been expropriated: Ilaria Myr, “Villa Giulia: Quando Ciano espropriò la nostra casa,” Bet Magazine Mosaico: Sito ufficiale della Comunità Ebraica di Milano, July 15, 2018.
38 He had been weighing this since 1940: Ciano Diaries, 235.
39 “The darkest places in hell are reserved for those”: The origins of this quote, more derived from Dante than translated from his work, are generally dated to World War I.
40 “In a few hours Mussolini will have me arrested”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 245.
41 “My dear Duce,” the king told him bluntly: Patricia Knight, Mussolini and Fascism (London: Routledge, 2002), 109.
42 The king, Mussolini remembered later, “was livid…he shook my hand”: Romano Mussolini, My Father Il Duce: A Memoir by Mussolini’s Son, trans. Ana Stojanovic (n.p.: Kales Press, 2006), 17–18.
43 What Mussolini had not anticipated: Denis Mack Smith, Italy and Its Monarchy (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989), 304.
44 If there was one person whom Badoglio despised: Melton S. Davis, Who Defends Rome? The Forty-Five Days, July 25 to September 8, 1943 (New York: Doubleday, 1972), 199.
45 The papers had been a sword over Badoglio’s head: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 249.
46 “the pederasty of the crown prince”: “Hildegard Beetz,” file dated October 26, 1943, archive file 25, Central Intelligence Agency.
47 Gossips said that, so strong was his disinclination: Robert Aldrich and Garry Wetherspoon, Who’s Who in Gay and Lesbian History (London, Routledge, 2005), 1:453.
48 “There is a tramontana not especially for us”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 174.
49 “He probably already knew that my father had been removed from power”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 192.
50 “Edda was an unusual woman”: Romano Mussolini, My Father Il Duce, 96.
51 “Stop looking at me with those Mussolini eyes”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 10.
52 she had volunteered for the Italian Red Cross: Rachele Mussolini and Albert Zarca, Mussolini: An Intimate Biography by His Widow (New York: William Morrow, 1976), 86, 188; Romano Mussolini, My Father Il Duce, 98.
53 “There was some difficulty in making her realize that the expedition”: Andrea Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” Collier’s Weekly, April 20 and April 27, 1946; these articles are generally considered pseudonymous articles written by Allen Dulles.
54 “Not yet anyhow,” she told them coolly: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” 11.
55 “[The] children understood,” Edda assured herself: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” 11.
56 Twenty years of dictatorship had ended: For a survey of context, see, for example, Joshua Arthurs, “Settling Accounts: Retribution, Emotion and Memory During the Fall of Mussolini,” Journal of Modern Italian Studies 20, no. 5 (2015), 617–39.
57 “I’m afraid,” she told Edda: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 189.
58 “Mussolini Ousted with Fascist Cabinet”: New York Times, July 26, 1943.
59 “La guerra continua”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 107.
60 “But they seemed to forget two things”: Susanna Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits (New York: Bantam Books, 1975), 106.
61 Three armed police guards escorted them home—a necessary safety measure: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 176.
62 “We haven’t the least chance of survival”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 191.
63 In the days that followed, nearly a hundred protestors were killed: Nicola Gallerano, Luigi Ganapini, and Massimo Legnani, L’Italia dei quarantacinque giorni: Studió e documenti (Milan: Istituto nazionale per la storia del movimento di liberazione, 1969), 376.
64 The couple was now under de facto house arrest: Eugen Dollmann, With Hitler and Mussolini: Memoirs of a Nazi Interpreter (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2017), n.p. (e-book).
65 Edda saw the perils at home clearly: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 26.
66 For visitors to the Ciano apartment, Susanna remarked: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 108.
67 Raimondo too was in a precarious position: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 103.
68 He surrounded himself with flatterers: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 109.
69 “I smiled to make it less terrible”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 109.
70 The Spanish ambassador in Rome had promised: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 27.
71 “I…wanted to help him”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 109.
72 “Warn Galeazzo that he should make sure not to fall into the hands of the Germans”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 178.
73 Fit and stylish, in his midforties, with blond hair: Patrick J. Gallo, For Love and Country: The Italian Resistance (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2003), 116.
74 “What followed,” Dollmann wrote: Dollmann, With Hitler and Mussolini.
75 Edda remembered it as August 21: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 193.
76 “I received a visit from a smartly dressed man”: Dollmann, With Hitler and Mussolini.
77 “Dear Dollmann,” the note read: Dollmann, With Hitler and Mussolini.
78 “You must be aware, Countess, that Count Ciano”: Dollmann, With Hitler and Mussolini.
79 “I do not know what the Führer will decide about him”: Dollmann, With Hitler and Mussolini.
80 his diary was reputed: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 29.
81 As Edda would say later that summer: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 29.
82 When Galeazzo’s old friend and copilot Ettore Muti: Paul H. Lewis, Latin Fascist Elites: The Mussolini, Franco, and Salazar Regimes (Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 2002), 46.
83 A baby-faced slender man: Richard Breitman, Norman J. W. Goda, Timothy Naftali, and Robert Wolfe, “The Nazi Peddler: Wilhelm Höttl and Allied Intelligence,” in U.S. Intelligence and the Nazis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 265–92.
84 Though only in his midthirties, he had risen quickly: “Background of Dr. Wilhelm Hoettl,” August 5, 1949, declassified 2000, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
85 “Behave normally. Pretend we are going for a walk”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 182.
86 Edda walked the short distance west: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 196; letter, Allen Dulles to Dallas S. Townshend, December 3, 1955, AWD 25X1, declassified 2003, Central Intelligence Agency.
87 The door swung open, Galeazzo threw himself inside: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
88 At the last minute, Wilhelm Höttl asked Otto Lechner: Letter, Allen Dulles to Dallas S. Townshend, December 3, 1955.
89 “The first thing we did,” Edda remembered: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 196.
90 The Germans had assured them that they would be taken: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
91 “The Führer rightly suspects that such memoirs”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 253.
92 If he had been, he would never have embarked: Dollmann, With Hitler and Mussolini.
93 They were being taken to Munich: Leyland Harrison to State Department, February 1, 1944, RG 184, entry 3207, box 103, folder 800.2, National Archives of the United States.
94 Then, of course, the family was reassured: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 28; Tompkins, A Spy in Rome (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1962), 171.
95 it had been an “error of judgment”: Mussolini and Zarca, Mussolini, 174.
96 “My God! I think they count on keeping”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 128.
97 Priebke had understood perfectly well since leaving Rome: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
98 there was a flurry of visits and messages: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 197; letter, Allen Dulles to Dallas S. Townshend, December 3, 1955.
99 “I was astonished,” Edda confided: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 197.
100 Otto Lechner observed that Ernst Kaltenbrünner: Letter, Allen Dulles to Dallas S. Townshend, December 3, 1955.
101 In June, in love, she married Captain Gerhard Beetz: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 186; “Hildegard Beetz,” June 14, 1945, United States’ classified communication to CO, SCI, Germany, from SCI Weimar, reporting on the interrogation of Hilde Beetz and the RSHA role in the death of Galeazzo Ciano, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
102 “He was tall, well-built, physically attractive”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 185.
103 eager internal discussion among Höttl and his superiors: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
104 “signaled the end of Fascism”: Romano Mussolini, My Father Il Duce, 98.
105 “I had never really hated anyone”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 200.
106 Her mission was to beguile Galeazzo: Paehler, Third Reich’s Intelligence Services, 228.
107 Edda, no one’s fool, was less than thrilled: “Hildegard Beetz,” June 14, 1945.
108 Her nickname for her husband was Gallo: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 203.
109 “He had lost his self-confidence”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 186.
110 “They were asking for civilian clothes”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 113.
111 Most residents were arrested and deported: Shannon Quinn, “10 Little Known Facts About the 9 Months the Nazis Occupied Rome,” History Collection, May 29, 2018.
112 Susanna’s fiancé, Prince Raimondo: See Raimondo Lanza di Trabia, Mi toccherà ballare, ed. Ottavia Casagrande (Milano: Feltrinelli, 2014).
113 her half-American, English-speaking mother: Dan Kurzman, A Special Mission: Hitler’s Secret Plot to Seize the Vatican and Kidnap Pope Pius XII (New York: Hachette, 2007), n.p. (e-book); Jennifer Clark, Mondo Agnelli: Fiat, Chrysler, and the Power of a Dynasty (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, 2012), 68.
114 In Switzerland, despite the vast Agnelli wealth: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 122.
115 drank “boiling soup to keep ourselves warm during the night”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 122.
116 He would soon be returned to power in Italy: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
117 Edda would have to return to Rome: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 203.
118 Joseph Goebbels confided to his diary: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 189.
119 The two women set off together: Domenico Vecchioni, “Quelle due belle spie che si contendono i diari di Galeazzo Ciano: Sono Frau Beetz per i tedeschi e Christine Granville per gli alleati,” L’Indro, August 1, 2018.
120 Unfortunately, Carolina explained: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 206.
121 A few days later, the missing parts of the notebooks: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 207.
122 To this set of papers, they added a fourth loose-leaf collection: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
123 Her urgent mission accomplished: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
124 Emilio Pucci, born in 1914: Raymond Rendleman, “Thinker. Tailor. Soldier. Spy. The Kaleidoscopic Career of Emilio Pucci ’37,” Reed Magazine 93, no. 1 (March 1, 2014), n.p. (online reprint); report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945, “Edda Ciano Diaries,” item 18R, Personal Files of Allen Dulles, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
125 “After listening to her story”: Rendleman, “Thinker. Tailor. Soldier. Spy,” n.p.
126 She would need new reserves: “Hildegard Beetz,” June 14, 1945, 2.
127 Hilde reported back to her superiors: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
128 Galeazzo was surprised to receive a message on October 16: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
129 Galeazzo had insisted to his father-in-law: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
130 “The Führer alone decides”: John Gunther, Inside Europe (New York: Harper, 1940), 19.
131 “Ciao, kids, we will not see each other for a while”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 194.
132 Galeazzo went out for a brief appointment: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
133 “Should he be able, against his expectation”: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
134 “[H]e had already told me in conversation”: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
135 she had already “taken a strong liking”: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
136 “I am aware of that,” Galeazzo replied: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 210.
137 “I am determined even now to find out more”: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943. The awkward German-to-English translation in this file has been updated to conform to standard idiom.
138 along with Rachele Mussolini as a passenger: Mussolini and Zarca, Mussolini, 146.
139 “I was stunned to find that, although back in his own home”: Mussolini and Zarca, Mussolini, 146.
140 she had come to tell him: “They are safe”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 212.
141 Mario Pellegrinotti, a sympathetic prison warden: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 204.
142 Hilde later insisted that she did not “make love”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 204; “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
143 “Life is sad,” he wrote to her in a letter: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 198.
144 “She gave my husband the letters that I wrote to him”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 225.
145 For her part, Hilde explained it this way: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
146 Christine Granville—better known as Krystyna Skarbek: Vecchioni, “Quelle due belle spie,” n.p.
147 Files show that her lover, a fellow spy: Ron Nowicki, The Elusive Madame G: A Life of Christine Granville (privately printed, 2014): 218, 234–36.
148 “My father had a weakness”: Romano Mussolini, My Father Il Duce, 96.
149 The Gestapo would kill the children: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
150 Vittorio, moved by his sister’s genuine distress: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 213.
151 Edda and Emilio had arranged for two old friends: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 215; Giovanni Colli, “Confronto drammatico tra Edda e Frau Beetz: Il ‘giallo’ dei diari di Ciano,” Il Tempo, June 6, 1989.
152 They headed north to Milan: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 202.
153 They had bribed an Italian border guard: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 214.
154 “You must now forget your family name”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 202.
155 Emilio waited until morning: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 215.
156 She had another important message for her husband: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 223.
157 they turned to the only avenue either could see ahead: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 225.
158 Hilde—described by one commentator: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
159 Hilde still planned to execute her duty: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 184.
160 “We practically have two options”: Paehler, Third Reich’s Intelligence Services, 228.
161 She assured her handlers that the diaries: Paehler, Third Reich’s Intelligence Services, 228.
162 “It has been said,” Edda wrote later: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 225.
163 He asked Hilde to draft a formal memorandum: “Hildegard Beetz,” June 14, 1945.
164 Hilde described the feelings: Corinna Peniston-Bird and Emma Vickers, eds., Gender and the Second World War: Lessons of War (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 80.
165 Galeazzo put on a great show of irritation: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 204.
166 Smuggled into Galeazzo’s cell by a friendly prison guard: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 225; editorial remarks.
167 “Aside from Frau Beetz, who was acting from selfish motives”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 218; editorial remarks. See also Zenone Benini, Carcere degli Scalzi (Firenze: Ponte alle Grazie, 1994).
168 the German ambassador to Salò and the Italian-based SS: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
169 Ribbentrop, it now transpired, had been behind: Peniston-Bird and Vickers, Gender and the Second World War, 78.
170 “I approach Christmas feeling very sad”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 207.
171 “Truly I have moments in which I seem to be going mad”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 207.
172 “One man, just one man”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 206.
173 “I was never Mussolini’s accomplice in that crime”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 206.
174 “Within a few days a sham tribunal will make public”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 206.
175 Clara, moved by the plea, did what she could: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 211.
176 “I now realized,” Edda said: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 227.
177 Those who whisper that Christina Granville: Vecchioni, “Quelle due belle spie,” n.p.
178 warning her supervisors that “If [Galeazzo] is shot”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 212.
179 “I later learned,” Edda said, “that General Harster”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 227.
180 “It is useless, nothing will come of it”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 214.
181 General Harster before his appointment to Italy: “Ex-Nazi [Wilhelm Harster] Sentenced in ‘Anne Frank’ Deaths,” New York Herald Tribune, Europe Edition, February 17, 1967.
182 “I was…obeying [Galeazzo’s] instructions”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 29.
183 One of those Gestapo men was Walter Segna: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945, XARX-27856, Central Intelligence Agency, declassified 2001.
184 The packet contained eight volumes, bound in green leather: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden”; see also Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
185 The notebooks were large but flimsy: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
186 “I began to run down the road”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 229.
187 “Each time a car passed I raised my head”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 229.
188 “Hitler had at the last moment vetoed Ciano’s liberation”: “Memorandum on Edda Ciano,” November 17, 1955, Central Intelligence Agency, declassified 2003.
189 “No intervention now can halt the course of events”: Giovanni Dolfin, Con Mussolini nella tragedia: Diario del capo della segreteria particolare del Duce, 1943–1944 (Milan: Garzanti, 1950), 188–89.
190 Kaltenbrünner’s only reply to her plaintive message: Report by Hildegard Beetz to RSHA, June 18, 1945, Verona, archive file 71, Central Intelligence Agency.
191 “She stared at me, incredulous and panic-stricken”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 234.
192 “Frau Beetz could have taken the notebooks then”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 230.
193 Far fewer self-disclosures have been known to make strangers: Arthur Aron et al., “The Experimental Generation of Interpersonal Closeness: A Procedure and Some Preliminary Findings,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 23, no. 4 (April 1997): 363–77.
194 “You are crazy to have come here”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 234.
195 “You have deceived us in the most despicable manner”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 216.
196 American spymaster Allen Dulles would later see: Peniston-Bird and Vickers, Gender and the Second World War, 80.
197 Hilde would help her: Report by Hildegard Beetz to RSHA, archive file 67, Central Intelligence Agency.
198 “I felt an obligation to repair the wrong”: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
199 Galeazzo had written in that long day: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
200 “I decided to go to Switzerland”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 230.
201 Kaltenbrünner had sent a warning telegram: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 218.
202 Lieutenant Hutting immediately set off for Ramiola: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
203 The doctors confirmed that she had asked for sleeping pills: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 218.
204 Placated by these reassurances, the SS returned to their posts: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
205 Then, taking advantage of the lull: Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945, item 18R, “Edda Ciano Diaries,” Personal Files of Allen Dulles, 8; Roman Dombrowski, Mussolini: Twilight and Fall (New York: Roy Publishers, 1956), 122–23. According to Duilio Susmel, Vita sbagliata di Galeazzo Ciano (Milan: Aldo Palazzi, 1962), 336, three booklets of the diaries, those for the years 1936, 1937, and 1938, were left at Como in the house of the Pessina family. Sources and the chronology in this complex matter, even from contemporary and firsthand sources, are not always consistent.
206 Twilight came at 5:00 P.M.: Kaltenbrünner to Ribbentrop, January 13, 1944, German Foreign Office Archives, Inland II geheim: “Geheime Reichssachen” 1944, vol. 15, box 3, fiche T-120, National Archives, Serial 712/ 262452-453.
207 “As I said goodbye to her,” Emilio remembered: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
208 “I don’t know why, but at that point I didn’t care”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 243.
209 “[H]e was astonished and annoyed to hear me say that I was Edda Ciano”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 243.
210 “[H]e conveyed, and I believe honestly,” Dulles recorded: Allen W. Dulles, The Craft of Intelligence: America’s Legendary Spy Master on the Fundamentals of Intelligence Gathering for a Free World (Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2016), 169.
211 Seeing her that day for the first time in months: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 218.
212 Galeazzo, dressed in a sports coat: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 224.
213 The trial was, as Galeazzo had written to the king: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 83.
214 There was one aspect of the trial, though, that attracted: “Re. Trial Against Minister Ciano and Others at Verona,” translation, interview with Hildegard Beetz, Berlin, February 28, 1944, file MGKW-2371-ATT, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
215 “I went into a room where two girls were sleeping”: Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945.
216 To General Harster, Edda had written: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
217 Sometime before dawn on the morning of January 10: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
218 “However, she has done well”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 218.
219 In the morning he rang for his personal secretary: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 83.
220 The fascist police chief covering the trial, Major Nicola Furlotti: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 86.
221 Zenone remembered how, after he had dried his eyes: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 244.
222 Galeazzo spoke of his love for Hilde: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
223 “To her,” Galeazzo confided to his friend, “I have entrusted”: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
224 “I became aware: my heart was beating normally”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 224.
225 Thus began, Hilde said, the “most terrible night of my life”: “Re. Trial Against Minister Ciano and Others at Verona,” February 28, 1944.
226 Later, when the Germans suspected that Zenone knew the location: “Copy of letter addressed to Countess Edda Ciano by Signor Zenone Benini,” August 16, 1944, Personal Files of Allen W. Dulles, US, NA, RG 226, entry 190C, box 11, 1.
227 “Forget about the plea for mercy”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 42.
228 “When you return among men, and this cursed war will have finished”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 42.
229 He did talk to Zenone of the diaries: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 42.
230 Sometime before six o’clock, the prison chief, Dr. Olas: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 224.
231 “The German lady again was there”: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
232 General Wolff advised him that Hitler’s instructions: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 42.
233 “A failure to execute could harm me”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 234.
234 “Yes, very much so,” the general advised him: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 234.
235 What Mussolini did not know was that the clemency: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 19.
236 “I shall not give those who wanted my death”: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 11.
237 He slowly took off his overcoat and scarf: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 234.
238 Only with the second shot did Galeazzo expire: “Re. Trial Against Minister Ciano and Others at Verona,” February 28, 1944; Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 9.
239 A German diplomat who witnessed the execution: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 236.
240 Winston Churchill later said that it had been an act: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 91.
241 Only that afternoon would he come to understand: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 236.
242 His son, Romano, remembered his father crying: Romano Mussolini, My Father Il Duce, 103.
243 An American nun who spent the war in Rome: Jane Scrivener, Inside Rome with the Germans (New York: Macmillan, 1945), 87.
244 “I was on my way to Sondrio, where I hoped I could make arrangements”: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
245 “Four machine guns were stuck against my throat”: Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945.
246 The Gestapo men threw him into the back of the car: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
247 “I stiffened to receive the blow, but it didn’t come”: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
248 “few minutes after Count Ciano had been shot”: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
249 “[W]hat struck me,” Emilio said later of the colonel: “Pucci Story,” Exhibit E, ECDAR, Personal Files of Allen W. Dulles, US, NA, RG 226, entry 190C, box 11.
250 The colonel and his chief interrogator: Major S. H. Shergold, “First Detailed Report on Five PW from SIPO und SD Aussenkommando Milan,” CSDIC/CMF/SD 13, June 4, 1945, Central Intelligence Agency, declassified 2001; “German Intelligence Officers: Walter Rauff,” Security Services Archives, National Archives of the United Kingdom, KV 2/1970.
251 “The worst thing,” Emilio remembered later: Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945.
252 “Is it alright?” Emilio asked, giggling: Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945.
253 “I felt as if my bones were going to split and a cold sweat ran down my back”: Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945.
254 “I thought of the clear nights in Africa”: Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945.
255 By day’s end, when Emilio was returned to his cell: “The RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” interrogation of [Hilde] Burkhardt Beetz, June 16, 1945, SCI Detachment Weimar, Central Intelligence Agency.
256 “I tried to slash the veins in my neck”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 35.
257 She “said that she didn’t care what I did”: Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, May 24, 1945.
258 Finally, Emilio agreed that he would pass to Edda the message: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 35.
259 But on the morning of January 14 she was allowed: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 248.
260 The man—likely Franco Bellia: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden,” 35.
261 “Come, let’s go for a walk,” she told them: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden,” 35.
262 Despite the bitter cold, the children walked with her to the top of a hill: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 241.
263 “Papa is dead,” she said simply: Mussolini Ciano, My Truth, 248.
264 Her brother remembered later that “she shouted with an incredible force”: Fabrizio Ciano, Quando il nonno fece fucilare papa (Milan: A. Mondadori, 1991), 97ff.; “La famiglia Pini è partita da Lugano, accompagnata dall’ispettore Camponovo, col treno ascendente delle 16.53,” Rapporto, Bellinzona, 18 gennaio 1944, firmato Imperatori, in AFB, E 4320 (B) 1991/243 Bd. 97a, quoted in Renata Broggini, La “famiglia Mussolini”: I colloqui di Edda Ciano con lo psichiatra svizzero Repond, 1944–1945, 338, n. 9.
265 Fabrizio said of his grandfather’s role in the execution: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 240.
266 The next week, on January 18, Edda and the children: Broggini, La “famiglia Mussolini,” 338. The family assumed various pseudonyms, including Santos and Pini.
267 “The day came when Galeazzo was tried”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 125.
268 “As long as his tomb remained in Verona”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 238.
269 “I loved Galeazzo, Countess. And I still love him”: “Fascismo: È morta Frau Beetz, la spia che doveva rubare i diari di Ciano,” obituary, March 31, 2010.
270 Two days later Emilio Pucci, alive but in bad shape: “The RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” June 16, 1945.
271 He landed ashore on January 19, at four o’clock in the morning: Rendleman, “Thinker. Tailor. Soldier. Spy.” There is a discrepancy in dates, and I follow Hilde Beetz’s interrogation notes as the more reliable source material.
272 Hilde checked into the Hotel Alder, a lake-view villa: “Vetting of Hilde Beetz,” AB 16, Berlin to AB 17, Saint Amzon, May 24, 1946, LBX-317, Hildegard Beetz, vol. 1, 0136, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
273 “We have learned from a source”: Neal H. Petersen, ed., From Hitler’s Doorstep: The Wartime Intelligence Reports of Allen Dulles, 1942–1945 (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania State Press, 2010), 202.
274 “News of Edda’s arrival has now been received”: Petersen, From Hitler’s Doorstep, 202.
275 “steps [were] taken to intern Countess Ciano”: Journal de Geneve, January 30, 1944; clipping is included in Central Intelligence Agency Archives, US, NA, RG 184, box 103, folder 800.2.
276 “From her eyes ran a river of tears”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 240.
277 When an inspector came to interview the children: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 243.
278 The police gave up and let the boy stay: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 243.
279 Edda was desperately broke and, depressed: Broggini, La “famiglia Mussolini,” 339.
280 Edda’s correspondence was very much under surveillance: Broggini, La “famiglia Mussolini,” 339.
281 “My dear lady,” the letter reads: Unidentified correspondence, January 31, 1944, taken from Hilde Beetz and placed in her OSS intelligence file, item NWC-001899, Central Intelligence Agency Archives, declassified 2005.
282 On January 27, Hilde made contact in Switzerland with a British intelligence agent: Second Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, June 20, 1945, 42; “The RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” June 16, 1945; Special Interrogation Report: Frau Hildegard Beetz, July 9, 1945, from SCI Detachment, United States Forces European Theater, to Chief CBI, United States Forces European Theater, AIC 166, declassified 2001.
283 Officially, Garston was the vice consul in Lugano: “Doctor Lancelot Cyril Brewster Garston,” list identification G10, case reference Gb Eyh270, Hitler’s “Black Book,” Forces War Records.
284 She forwarded to German intelligence all her communications: Hildegard Beetz to Wilhelm Höttl, Como, Cernobbio, March 30, 1944, archive file 51, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
285 This message instructed the runner to “[i]nform Felicitas”: “Hildegard Beetz,” October 26, 1943.
286 Mussolini, wanting to persuade Edda: “The RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” June 16, 1945.
287 He had balding hair and wore thick, round glasses: Lieutenant Stewart French, “Hildegard Beetz, nee Burkhardt, SD Executive and Agent,” interview, to CIB, G-2, 12th Army Group, June 18, 1945.
288 I was friends with [Benito Mussolini’s] children: Renzo Allegri, “Nel racconto di un sacerdote, una pagina di storia sconosciuta riguardante Edda Ciano e suo padre Benito Mussolini,” March 11, 2011.
289 General Harster assigned his second-in-command, Walter Segna: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
290 Höttl warned her to think of her reputation as an agent: “use this chance, you, who rule over all men”: Wilhelm Höttl to Hildegard Beetz,” Vienna, February 15, 1944, archive file 45, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
291 Susanna was living with her sister Clara: “Subject: The Zimmer Notebooks,” memorandum from AB to AB 52, JRX-3748, August 21, 1946, ref. LBX-495, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
292 “Would I try to get a permit to come and see him?”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 124.
293 “I saw a woman walking toward me”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 93.
294 “Are you Suni Agnelli?”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 93.
295 She said simply, “My name is Hilde B.”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 93.
296 “I got him a vial of potassium cyanide”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 93.
297 “Galeazzo told me about you”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 127.
298 “You must help me”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 127.
299 After a moment of silence, Susanna said simply: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 127.
300 “Get me a vial of real cyanide”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 127.
301 “But why don’t you ask the Swiss for asylum?”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 127.
302 “My husband is a general on the Russian front”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 236.
303 Susanna here could not be as encouraging: “Subject: RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” from L. E. de Neufville, SCI, to CO, SCI, Germany, July 19, 1945, Central Intelligence Agency Archives, declassified 2006.
304 “Your husband died with calm”: “Letter Written by Frau B, with Pucci, with Purpose of Sending [Similar] Information to Edda,” n.d., Central Intelligence Agency Archives, declassified 2001.
305 “My dear friend,” Hilde wrote: Letter from Hildegard Beetz, February 25, 1944, item 46, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
306 his “feeling of gratitude for his safety was rapidly changing”: “The RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” June 16, 1945.
307 Emilio mentioned this to the priest in passing: “Subject: AMT VI Agents in Italy,” diary of Frau Hildegard Beetz, August 12, 1945, XX8602, declassified 2001.
308 “Edda was in Ingenbohl, in the Heiliger Kreuz convent”: Allegri, “Nel racconto di un sacerdote.”
309 She would be given a brief extension, until March 20: Hildegard Beetz, letter to [Mr.] Höttl, December 4, 1943, with handwritten note, item 30, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
310 Father Pancino had ongoing access to Edda: Hildegard Beetz, letter to Wilhelm Höttl, Como, Cernobbio, March 30, 1944, item 51, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
311 On the other hand, her bosses considered: Hildegard Beetz, letter to Wilhelm Höttl, German consulate, Lugano, March 3, 1944, item 48, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
312 In one of their communications in December 1943: Hildegard Beetz, letter to Wilhelm Höttl, German consulate, Lugano, March 3, 1944.
313 Her accuser had wanted the mission for himself: Wilhelm Höttl to Hildegard Beetz, Vienna, February 15, 1944.
314 Kaltenbrünner was confident the accusations were false: Peniston-Bird and Vickers, Gender and the Second World War, 73.
315 Her new assignment, though, took her right back: “The RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” June 16, 1945.
316 “[M]y mission,” Father Pancino remembered: Allegri, “Nel racconto di un sacerdote.”
317 “Edda Ciano was in possession of the famous diaries”: Allegri, “Nel racconto di un sacerdote.”
318 “Once, Edda and I, to escape the German spies”: Allegri, “Nel racconto di un sacerdote.”
319 Edda passed to the priest at least some of the original manuscripts: French, “Hildegard Beetz, nee Burkhardt, SD Executive and Agent,” June 18, 1945.
320 “Only those who had pronounced a password”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 244.
321 “It was then Edda who picked up the Diaries”: Allegri, “Nel racconto di un sacerdote.”
322 He hinted that maybe he should sit down with Edda and Hilde together: [Hildegard Beetz], report to Dr. Hügel, Cernobio, June 7, 1944, item 53, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
323 Then, as good luck would have it: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
324 Hilde’s intelligence briefings had assured Wilhelm Höttl: Hildegard Beetz, letter to Wilhelm Höttl, German consulate, Lugano, March 3, 1944; Hildegard Beetz, letter to Wilhelm Höttl, Como, Cernobbio, March 30, 1944.
325 He was transferred to an assignment in Budapest and replaced: “Final Interrogation Report of SS Stubaf Klaus Hugel,” June 12–13, 1945, XARZ-18937, Central Intelligence Agency Archives; Hildegard Beetz, letter to Dr. Hügel, Como, Cernobbio, June 7, 1944.
326 Hilde confessed that she took pains to make it all “look difficult”: “The RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” June 16, 1945.
327 the feint was to send Radice in alone: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
328 The papers remained safely hidden in the electrical power plant: [Hildegard Beetz], report to Dr. Hügel, Cernobio, June, 28, 1944.
329 Dr. Elvezio Melocchi promptly turned over the manuscripts: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
330 “Why should I suffer torture to protect the papers”: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
331 “In trying to protect the papers,” American intelligence reports: Special Interrogation Report, Frau Hildegard Beetz, Chief CIB, United States Forces European Theater, to SCI Detachment, United States Forces European Theater, July 9, 1945, X-106, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
332 Hilde was to hand-deliver the papers to Zossen: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
333 the Pessina family could be forgiven for having burned them: Walter Segna, Interrogation Report, May 13, 1945.
334 From late June or early July until August 24: “The RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” June 16, 1945.
335 Each afternoon, when her translation progress was completed: “Subject: RSHA and Edda Ciano in Switzerland,” July 19, 1945.
336 “Interested parties are deliberately holding back the publication”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 41.
337 “the Diaries…appear to be the most important single political document”: Charlesworth and Salter, “Ensuring the After-Life of the Ciano Diaries,” 568.
338 The American ambassador, Alexander Kirk: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 43.
339 “Benini is convinced that, as a life-long friend of Ciano”: Charlesworth and Salter, “Ensuring the After-Life of the Ciano Diaries,” 578.
340 “I was in the Verona prison from the 30th November”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 43.
341 “I spent the last tragic night…with him”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 43.
342 Sometime in July, just before the news story broke: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 244.
343 The decision to move Edda to the Malévoz Psychiatric Hospital: “Andre Repond, Psychiatrist, Headed World Health Unit,” obituary, New York Times, March 15, 1973, 46.
344 The next day, there would be intelligence concerns: Letter from Hildegard Beetz, February 25, 1944, item 46.
345 whose wife, it was said, spied for the Americans: Interview, Jacqueline de Chollet, 2020.
346 someone who “said atrocious things at which people trembled”: Agnelli, We Always Wore Sailor Suits, 107.
347 Frances and her daughters also spent long afternoons: Interview, Jacqueline de Chollet, 2020.
348 To Frances’s considerable ire, Marie Thérèse, the Countess de Monléon: Private manuscript, courtesy Jacqueline de Chollet, 2021.
349 Accompanying the countess was her thirty-one-year-old daughter: Interview, Jacqueline de Chollet, 2020; the de Chollet marriage ended in divorce in 1950, and Louis remarried in 1952, according to his daughter.
350 Frances’s daughter Jacqueline put it simply: “most of the visitors…were affiliated in some way”: Private manuscript, courtesy Jacqueline de Chollet, 2021.
351 The guest book at Le Guintzet recorded the comings and goings: Le Guintzet, “Guest Book,” courtesy Jacqueline de Chollet.
352 Allen Dulles later said of Carl Jung: Christopher Dickey, “The Shrink as Secret Agent: Jung, Hitler, and the OSS,” Daily Beast, October 22, 2018; “Remembering Jung,” Kairos Film Foundation, 2016; Deirdre Bair, Jung: A Biography (Boston: Back Bay Books, 2004), 493, quoted in Gord Barentsen, “Romantic Metasubjectivity: Rethinking the Romantic Subject Through Schelling and Jung,” doctoral thesis (ref. 4784), Western University, 2017, x, n. 2.
353 Her “great friend” Virginia Agnelli: Interview, Jacqueline de Chollet, April 2020.
354 Gerald Mayer, Allen Dulles’s close associate: Quibble, “Alias George Wood,” Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
355 Clara was the wife of the German-born Prince Tassillo von Furstenberg: “Subject: The Zimmer Notebooks,” June 28, 1946.
356 move Edda to “a house or apartment somewhere in French Switzerland”: “Edda Ciano: Una Agnelli l’aiuto a ‘sopravvivere’ in Svizzera,” n.d., n.p.
357 The clinic director, Dr. Repond, recognizing Edda’s “deep depression”: “Edda Ciano: Una Agnelli l’aiuto a ‘sopravvivere’ in Svizzera,” n.d., n.p.
358 “We should very much like to have this diary”: Charlesworth and Salter, “Ensuring the After-Life of the Ciano Diaries.”
359 The Ciano Diaries seemed very likely to include smoking-gun war-crimes evidence: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
360 Cordelia was quickly recruited first by the military intelligence department: “Intelligence Officer Did Fieldwork for OSS and CIA, Cordelia Dodson Hood ’36, MA ’41,” obituary, Reed Magazine, December 2011.
361 Cordelia contacted Emilio: Second Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, June 20, 1944, 45; Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 248.
362 “‘Americans who had been living privately in Switzerland for various reasons’”: Jennifer Hoover, “Secrets in Switzerland: Allen W. Dulles’ Impact as OSS Station Chief in Bern on Developments of World War II & U.S. Dominance in Post-War Europe,” thesis (ref. 240), William and Mary, 2009, 18.
363 Gasoline, like nearly everything else, was strictly rationed: “Switzerland’s Economic Dependence During World War II,” History of Switzerland (website), 2004.
364 “On Thursday I went to see my new found friend Edda”: Letters to Frances de Chollet from others, Frances de Chollet Collection, MC292, Public Policy Papers, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library; the author gratefully acknowledges the permission of Jacqueline de Chollet to quote from these materials.
365 “Again Thursday and I have been to see my friend Edda”: Letters to Frances de Chollet from others, Frances de Chollet Collection, Princeton University.
366 “She is of the opinion that Hitler will kill himself”: Letters to Frances de Chollet from others, Frances de Chollet Collection, Princeton University.
367 “She is bored to tears…refus[es] to eat the food”: Letters to Frances de Chollet from others, Frances de Chollet Collection, Princeton University.
368 “I adore her because she never complains”: Letters to Frances de Chollet from others, Frances de Chollet Collection, Princeton University.
369 “I gave her some help and told her as her business manager”: Letters to Frances de Chollet from others, Frances de Chollet Collection, Princeton University.
370 St. Nicholas would alight from the donkey at the cathedral: Dimitri Kas, “The unmissable St Nicholas’ festival in Fribourg, Switzerland,” House of Switzerland (website), Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, 2019.
371 The diaries she had carried with her were bulky: R. J. B. Bosworth, Claretta: Mussolini’s Last Lover (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017), 18.
372 Paul Ghali was in his late thirties: James H. Walters, Scoop: How the Ciano Diary Was Smuggled from Rome to Chicago Where It Made Worldwide News. An Historical Adventure (privately printed, 2006), 103.
373 Paul had been a foreign correspondent: “Paul Ghali, Wrote for Chicago News,” obituary, New York Times, June 4, 1970, 37.
374 Most important, he was already working with Allen Dulles: Walters, Scoop, 106.
375 Paul Ghali recounted his version of the hunt for the Ciano Diaries: Walters, Scoop, 109.
376 “my blonde friend from Fribourg”: Walters, Scoop, 108.
377 “Mr. Dulles enlisted the services of a few people”: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden,” citing interview with Allen Dulles, January 17, 1966; “Intelligence Officer Did Fieldwork for OSS and CIA: Cordelia Dodson Hood ’36, MA ’41,” obituary, Reed Magazine.
378 To this list, Allen Dulles later added two other names: Charlesworth and Salter, “Ensuring the After-Life of the Ciano Diaries.”
379 She ferried multiple messages back and forth: Walters, Scoop, 113.
380 “Pucci wishes to see you. He will come this afternoon”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 248.
381 “The day before the papers had printed the news of my alleged marriage”: Second Report, Emilio Pucci to Allen Dulles, June 20, 1944.
382 “I was startled by Pucci’s offer”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 248.
383 “I would intervene with Dulles only on the condition that Edda agreed to sell”: Walters, Scoop, 135.
384 They “told me that they were in touch with Edda”: Charlesworth and Salter, “Ensuring the After-Life of the Ciano Diaries.”
385 He’d tapped a thirty-three-year-old spy for the OSS named Tracy Barnes: Evan Thomas, The Very Best Men. Four Who Dared: The Early Years of the CIA (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995), n.p. (e-book).
386 One of his colleagues described him as “tall and blond”: Thomas, The Very Best Men, n.p.
387 “We all called him the Golden Boy”: Thomas, The Very Best Men, n.p.
388 He had already earned a Silver Star: Thomas, The Very Best Men, n.p.
389 Hitler’s “ideas were not quite natural where women were concerned”: Frances de Chollet, notes of meetings with Edda Ciano, 1945, Frances de Chollet Collection, MC292, Public Policy Papers, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.
390 “I had the impression that, despite her rupture with her father, she remained a Fascist”: Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 248.
391 “even if I…have to die, I want first to avenge Galeazzo”: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
392 Allen Dulles wasn’t sure whether it had ever made its way back: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 43.
393 “If she has not already received it”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 43.
394 “Edda is a psychopathic case”: Thomas, The Very Best Men, n.p.
395 the strategy also created a new complication: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
396 Ultimately, the State Department would agree—off the record—to backstop the payment: Private manuscript, courtesy Jacqueline de Chollet, 2021.
397 “when your ‘important friend’ comes I should like to talk with him”: Edda Ciano letter to Frances de Chollet, Frances de Chollet Collection, MC292, Public Policy Papers, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.
398 Newspapers reported openly after the war: “Drue Heinz, Philanthropist and Paris Review Editor, Dies at 103,” obituary, Seattle Times, April 5, 2018.
399 “Dear Frances,” Edda wrote on December 30, “I was just wondering”: Edda Ciano letter to Frances de Chollet, Frances de Chollet Collection.
400 “Believe best line to take that Edda should desire”: Petersen, From Hitler’s Doorstep, 422.
401 When lunch was over, Edda asked if she and Dulles could speak alone: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 46.
402 For an hour they talked, and Dulles wrote later: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
403 “I frankly admit she behaved with a good deal of dignity”: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
404 According to Father Guido Pancino, who claimed to already: Allegri, “Nel racconto di un sacerdote.”
405 “I am no fool, or dumb, and I can help a lot”: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.; Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
406 “Another thing, the rest. The complement of the diaries are still in Italy”: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 48.
407 “You mention the American lady, Mme. De Chollet”: Walters, Scoop, 139.
408 “For God’s sake tell Paul to be very careful”: Edda Ciano letter to Frances de Chollet, Frances de Chollet Collection.
409 The Swiss press reported—accurately or not: Wolfgang Achtner, “Edda Ciano,” The Independent, obituary, October 23, 2011.
410 When Allen Dulles was fully apprised of Emilio’s role: Durgin, “Framed in Death,” 54.
411 The charges would be crimes against the peace: Robert D. Bush, “An Investigation into the Trial of a Nazi War Criminal: Joachim von Ribbentrop at Nuremberg, Germany, 1945–1946,” thesis, University of Richmond, 1963, 18.
412 “Dulles,” he wrote, “has maintained an OSS post in Switzerland”: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
413 “I am not a criminal of war (how could I be?)”: Niccoletti, “The Decline and Fall of Edda Ciano,” n.p.
414 “[A]n American girl married to a Swiss named Mrs. Frances Cholet”: Allen Dulles letter to Charles G. Cheston, April 11, 1945, RG226, National Archives of the United States.
415 “She is now applying through the Consulate for an amendment to her passport”: Allen Dulles letter to Charles G. Cheston, April 11, 1945.
416 “That,” Jacqueline says, “was my mother”: Interview, Jacqueline de Chollet, 2021.
417 Harster, ultimately implicated in the murder of more than one hundred thousand Jews: Richard Breitman, “Records of the Central Intelligence Agency (RG 263),” Interagency Working Group, National Archives of the United States, April 2001.
418 she was inevitably asked about her role in obtaining for the Germans: “Beetz, Hildegard, nee Burkhardt,” interrogation notes, July 30, 1945, XX8382, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
419 “My youth, too, was buried in his grave”: Ciano Diaries, 206, 257, 386, 524.
420 She “preserved copies of diary entries”: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
421 “Frau Beetz,” Lieutenant French noted, “now discloses”: Memorandum, on Hilde Beetz, from Spearhead, Amzon, to Hitor, Weimar, June 18, 1945, OSS 1366, Central Intelligence Agency Archives, declassified 2001.
422 “[B]ecause of the extremely delicate…project she is undertaking”: “Subject: Gambit’s Lebenslauf and Analysis by AB 16,” June 5, 1946, LBX-347, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
423 She was assigned, under cover as a secretary: “Project Proposal for CIB: GAMBIT,” July 13, 1946, LBX-435, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
424 “Our control over her is complete”: “Project Proposal for CIB: GAMBIT,” July 13, 1946, LBX-435, Central Intelligence Agency Archives.
425 “penetration agent,” tasked with “aiding current and prospective”: “CIA and Nazi War Crim. and Col.,” working draft, chapter 3, “Persons from All Spheres of Influence (U),” Central Intelligence Agency Archives, 42; Moseley, Mussolini’s Shadow, 264.
426 “is probably better acquainted with the history of our organization”: “CIA and Nazi War Crim.,” 46.
427 According to one of her biographers: Judy Bachrach, “La Vita Agnelli,” Vanity Fair, April 2001.
428 “I miss our talks and mysterious rendez-vous”: Edda Ciano letter to Frances de Chollet, Frances de Chollet Collection, MC292, Public Policy Papers, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.
429 “Frances dear, how is life? Did you succeed in getting away from Switzerland”: Edda Ciano letter to Frances de Chollet, Frances de Chollet Collection.
430 “she looked like a wounded small swallow”: Livia Perricone, “Una rondine ferita dalle ali infrante: Edda Ciano e il comunista,” Lipari, February 23, 2015; see also Marcello Sorgi, Edda Ciano e il comunista: L’inconfessabile passione della figlia del duce (Milano: Bur, 2011).
431 “Come and live with me,” she wrote in passionate letters: Eliza Apperly, “Letters Show Mussolini Daughter’s Love for Communist,” Reuters (Rome), April 17, 2009.
432 “I am sure that Allen Dulles’s sudden death”: Letters to Frances de Chollet from others, Frances de Chollet Collection, MC292, Public Policy Papers, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.
433 “There is in every true woman’s heart a spark”: Jacqueline de Chollet, personal correspondence, October 2021; the quote is from Washington Irving’s The Sketch Book (1819).
434 What did Frances think when she read in October: The diaries were submitted as Document 2987-PS (Exhibit U.S.A.-166), Trial of the Major War Criminals before the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, November 14, 1945; see English edition, Trial of the Major War Criminals Before the International Military Tribunal, October 1, 1946, 31:434–38 and January 8, 1946, 4:567–68; Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
435 “moments remain to make me thankful that we were so lucky”: Letter from Frances de Chollet to Rosalie Harvie-Watt, Frances de Chollet Collection, Public Policy Papers, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.
436 “These diaries are unquestionably, incomparably”: Smyth, “The Papers: Rose Garden.”
437 In the village of Erte: Piergiorgio Grizzo, “Il segreto di Don Pancino era un diario perduto di Galeazzo Ciano?,” Vanilla Magazine, n.d.
438 He asked the boy to hide that box “in a small ravine”: Grizzo, “Il segreto di Don Pancino era un diario perduto.”