Francesco Arriciati
Born in Bressana Bottarone on November 21, 1913, he moved in the 1930s to Sesto San Giovanni, where he lived with his wife Rosa Arzuffi, whom he had met at Breda and married in 1942.
He worked as a metalworker at Breda (Section III); a member of the factory's clandestine CLN (National Liberation Committee), he participated in the strikes of March 1944. He was arrested immediately after, on March 14, taken at night to the Sesto Police Headquarters, then to the San Fedele prison in Milan, and finally incarcerated at San Vittore.
From there, only a few days later, he was sent to the Umberto I barracks in Bergamo, where the transport to Germany was being organized. From Bergamo, he managed to send several notes to his wife, who was five months pregnant, in which he wrote, among other things: "Go and collect all the money owed to me by Breda. Do not be alarmed—Stay calm... endure with faith and you will see that we will have days of joy again."
Along with 561 comrades arrested throughout Northern Italy, he was deported to Mauthausen on March 17. On March 20, he was assigned the number 58675. According to his wife’s testimony, he was taken while still suffering from a back injury; he was wearing a plaster cast due to a workplace accident in which he had cracked two vertebrae. Despite this, he was sent to work at the Linz III subcamp, where steel production and a smelting slag recycling plant were active.
He died only four months later, on July 25, 1944, at 10:30 AM during an Allied bombing raid, and was cremated at Gusen. His family heard nothing more of him until October 1945.
He worked as a metalworker at Breda (Section III); a member of the factory's clandestine CLN (National Liberation Committee), he participated in the strikes of March 1944. He was arrested immediately after, on March 14, taken at night to the Sesto Police Headquarters, then to the San Fedele prison in Milan, and finally incarcerated at San Vittore.
From there, only a few days later, he was sent to the Umberto I barracks in Bergamo, where the transport to Germany was being organized. From Bergamo, he managed to send several notes to his wife, who was five months pregnant, in which he wrote, among other things: "Go and collect all the money owed to me by Breda. Do not be alarmed—Stay calm... endure with faith and you will see that we will have days of joy again."
Along with 561 comrades arrested throughout Northern Italy, he was deported to Mauthausen on March 17. On March 20, he was assigned the number 58675. According to his wife’s testimony, he was taken while still suffering from a back injury; he was wearing a plaster cast due to a workplace accident in which he had cracked two vertebrae. Despite this, he was sent to work at the Linz III subcamp, where steel production and a smelting slag recycling plant were active.
He died only four months later, on July 25, 1944, at 10:30 AM during an Allied bombing raid, and was cremated at Gusen. His family heard nothing more of him until October 1945.