There were now three main political tendencies, viz. the union of north Italy under Charles Albert and an alliance with the pope and Naples, a federation of the different states under their present rulers, and a united republic of all Italy. All parties, however, were agreed in favour of war against Austria, for which the peoples forced their unwilling rulers to prepare. But the only state capable of taking the initiative was Piedmont, and the king still hesitated. Then came the news of the Five Days of Milan, which produced the wildest excitement in Turin; unless First war of Italy against Austria. the army were sent to assist the struggling Lombards at once the dynasty was in jeopardy. Cavour’s stirring articles in the Risorgimento hastened the king’s decision, and on the 23rd of March he declared war (see for the military events [Italian Wars], 1848-70). But much precious time had been lost, and even then the army was not ready. Charles Albert could dispose of 90,000 men, including some 30,000 from central Italy, but he took the field with only half his force. He might yet have cut off Radetzky on his retreat, or captured Mantua, which was only held by 300 men. But his delays lost him both chances and enabled Radetzky to receive reinforcements from Austria. The pope, unable to resist the popular demand for war, allowed his army to depart (March 23) under the command of General Durando, with instructions to act in concert with Charles Albert, and he corresponded with the grand-duke of Tuscany and the king of Naples with a view to a military alliance. But at the same time, fearing a schism in the church should he attack Catholic Austria, he forbade his troops to do more than defend the frontier, and in his Encyclical of the 29th of April stated that, as head of the church, he could not declare war, but that he was unable to prevent his subjects from following the example of other Italians. He then requested Charles Albert to take the papal troops under his command, and also wrote to the emperor of Austria asking him voluntarily to relinquish Lombardy and Venetia. Tuscany and Naples had both joined the Italian league; a Tuscan army started for Lombardy on the 30th of April, and 17,000 Neapolitans commanded by Pepe (who had returned after 28 years of exile) went to assist Durando in intercepting the Austrian reinforcements under Nugent. The Piedmontese defeated the enemy at Pastrengo (April 30), but did not profit by the victory. The Neapolitans reached Bologna on the 17th of May, but in the meantime a dispute had broken out at Naples between the king and parliament as to the nature of the royal oath; a cry of treason was raised by a group of factious youngsters, barricades were erected and street fighting ensued (May 15). On the 17th Ferdinand dissolved parliament and recalled the army. On receiving the order to return, Pepe, after hesitating for some time between his oath to the king and his desire to fight for Italy, finally resigned his commission and crossed the Po with a few thousand men, the rest of his force returning south. The effects of this were soon felt. A force of Tuscan volunteers was attacked by a superior body of Austrians at Curtatone and Montanaro and defeated after a gallant resistance on the 27th of May; Charles Albert, after wasting precious time round Peschiera, which capitulated on the 30th of May, defeated Radetzky at Goito. But the withdrawal of the Neapolitans left Durando too weak to intercept Nugent and his 30,000 men; and the latter, although harassed by the inhabitants of Venetia and repulsed at Vicenza, succeeded in joining Radetzky, who was soon further reinforced from Tirol. The whole Austrian army now turned on Vicenza, which after a brave resistance surrendered on the 10th of June. All Venetia except the capital was thus once more occupied by the Austrians. On the 23rd, 24th and 25th of July (first battle of Custozza) the Piedmontese were defeated and forced to retire on Milan with Radetzky’s superior force in pursuit. The king was the object of a hostile demonstration in Milan, and although he was ready to defend the city to the last, the town council negotiated a capitulation with Radetzky. The mob, egged on by the republicans, attacked the palace where the king was lodged, and he escaped with difficulty, returning to Piedmont with the remnants of his army. On the 6th of August Radetzky re-entered Milan, and three days later an armistice was concluded between Austria and Piedmont, the latter agreeing to evacuate Lombardy and Venetia. The offer of French assistance, made after the proclamation of the republic in the spring of 1848, had been rejected mainly because France, fearing that the creation of a strong Italian state would be a danger to her, would have demanded the cession of Nice and Savoy, which the king refused to consider.
Meanwhile, the republic had been proclaimed in Venice; but on the 7th of July the assembly declared in favour of fusion with Piedmont, and Manin, who had been elected president, resigned his powers to the royal commissioners. Daniele Manin and Venice. Soon after Custozza, however, the Austrians blockaded the city on the land side. In Rome the pope’s authority weakened day by day, and disorder increased. The Austrian attempt to occupy Bologna was repulsed by the citizens, but unfortunately this success was followed by anarchy and murder, and Farini only with difficulty restored a semblance of order. The Mamiani ministry having failed to achieve anything, Pius summoned Pellegrino Rossi, a learned lawyer who had long been exiled in France, to form a cabinet. On the 15th of November he was assassinated, and as no one was punished for this crime the insolence of the disorderly elements increased, and shots were exchanged with the Swiss Guard. The terrified pope fled in disguise to Gaeta (November 25), and when parliament requested him to return he refused even to receive the deputation. This meant a complete rupture; on the 5th of February 1849 a constituent assembly was summoned, and on the 9th it voted the downfall of the temporal Proclamation of the Roman Republic. power and proclaimed the republic. Mazzini hurried to Rome to see his dream realized, and was chosen head of the Triumvirate. On the 18th Pius invited the armed intervention of France, Austria, Naples and Spain to restore his authority. In Tuscany the government drifted from the moderates to the extreme democrats; the Ridolfi ministry was succeeded after Custozza by that of Ricasoli, and the latter by that of Capponi. The lower classes provoked disorders, which were very serious at Leghorn, and were only quelled by Guerrazzi’s energy. Capponi resigned in October 1848, and Leopold reluctantly consented to a democratic ministry led by Guerrazzi and Montanelli, the former a very ambitious and unscrupulous man, the latter honest but fantastic. Following the Roman example, a constituent assembly was demanded to vote on union with Rome and eventually with the rest of Italy. The grand-duke, fearing an excommunication from the pope, refused the request, and left Florence for Siena and S. Stefano; on the 8th of February 1849 the republic was proclaimed, and on the 21st, at the pressing request of the pope and the king of Naples, Leopold went to Gaeta.
Ferdinand did not openly break his constitutional promises until Sicily was reconquered. His troops had captured Messina after a bombardment which earned him the sobriquet of “King Bomba”; Catania and Syracuse fell soon after, hideous atrocities being everywhere committed with his sanction. He now prorogued parliament, adopted stringent measures against the Liberals, and retired to Gaeta, the haven of refuge for deposed despots.
But so long as Piedmont was not completely crushed none of the princes dared to take decisive measures against their subjects; in spite of Custozza, Charles Albert still had an army, and Austria, with revolutions in Vienna, Hungary and Bohemia on her hands, could not intervene. In Piedmont the Pinelli-Revel ministry, which had continued the negotiations for an alliance with Leopold and the pope, resigned as it could not count on a parliamentary majority, and in December the returned exile Gioberti formed a new ministry. His proposal to reinstate Leopold and the pope with Piedmontese arms, so as to avoid Austrian intervention, was rejected by both potentates, and met with opposition even in Piedmont, which would thereby have forfeited its prestige throughout Italy. Austrian mediation was now imminent, as the Vienna revolution had been crushed, and the new emperor, Francis Joseph, refused to consider any settlement other than on the basis of the treaties of 1815. But Charles Albert renews the war. Charles Albert, who, whatever his faults, had a generous nature, was determined that so long as he had an army in being he could not abandon the Lombards and the Venetians, whom he had encouraged in their resistance, without one more effort, though he knew full well that he was staking all on a desperate chance. On the 12th of March 1849, he denounced the armistice, and, owing to the want of confidence in Piedmontese strategy after 1848, gave the chief command to the Polish General Chrzanowski. His forces amounted to 80,000 men, including a Lombard corps and some Roman, Tuscan and other volunteers. But the discipline and moral of the army were shaken and its organization faulty. General Ramorino, disobeying his instructions, failed to prevent a corps of Austrians under Lieut. Field-Marshal d’Aspre from seizing Mortara, a fault for which he was afterwards court-martialled and shot, and after some preliminary fighting Radetzky won the decisive battle of Novara (March 23) which broke up the Piedmontese army. The king, who had sought death in vain all day, had to ask terms of Radetzky; the latter demanded Accession of Victor Emmanuel II. a slice of Piedmont and the heir to the throne (Victor Emmanuel) as a hostage, without a reservation for the consent of parliament. Charles Albert, realizing his own failure and thinking that his son might obtain better terms, abdicated and departed at once for Portugal, where he died in a monastery a few months later. Victor Emmanuel went in person to treat with Radetzky on the 24th of March. The Field-Marshal received him most courteously and offered not only to waive the demand for a part of Piedmontese territory, but to enlarge the kingdom, on condition that the constitution should be abolished and the blue Piedmontese flag substituted for the tricolor. But the young king was determined to abide by his father’s oath, and had therefore to agree to an Austrian occupation of the territory between the Po, the Ticino and the Sesia, and of half the citadel of Alessandria, until peace should be concluded, the evacuation of all districts occupied by his troops outside Piedmont, the dissolution of his corps of Lombard, Polish and Hungarian volunteers and the withdrawal of his fleet from the Adriatic.
Novara set Austria free to reinstate the Italian despots. Ferdinand at once re-established autocracy in Naples; though the struggle in Sicily did not end until May, when Palermo, after a splendid resistance, capitulated. In Tuscany disorder continued, and although Guerrazzi, who had been appointed dictator, saved the country from complete anarchy, a large part of the population, especially among the peasantry, was still loyal to the grand-duke. After Novara the chief question was how to avoid an Austrian occupation, and owing to the prevailing confusion the town council of Florence took matters into its own hands and declared the grand-duke reinstated, but on a constitutional basis and without foreign help (April 12). Leopold accepted as regards the constitution, but said nothing about foreign intervention. Count Serristori, the grand-ducal commissioner, arrived in Florence on the 4th of May 1849; the national guard was disbanded; and on the 25th, the Austrians under d’Aspre entered Florence.
On the 28th of July Leopold returned to his capital, and while that event was welcomed by a part of the people, the fact that he had come under Austrian protection ended by destroying all loyalty to the dynasty, and consequently contributed not a little to Italian unity.
In Rome the triumvirate decided to defend the republic to the last. The city was quieter and more orderly than it had ever been before, for Mazzini and Ciceruacchio successfully Garibaldi. opposed all class warfare; and in April the defenders received a priceless addition to their strength in the person of Garibaldi, who, on the outbreak of the revolution in 1848, had returned with a few of his followers from his exile in South America, and in April 1849 entered Rome with some 500 men to fight for the republic. At this time France, as a counterpoise to Austrian intervention in other parts of Italy, decided to restore the pope, regardless of the fact that this France and the Roman Republic. action would necessitate the crushing of a sister republic. As yet, however, no such intention was publicly avowed. On the 25th of April General Oudinot landed with 8000 men at Civitavecchia, and on the 30th attempted to capture Rome by surprise, but was completely defeated by Garibaldi, who might have driven the French into the sea, had Mazzini allowed him to leave the city. The French republican government, in order to gain time for reinforcements to arrive, sent Ferdinand de Lesseps to pretend to treat with Mazzini, the envoy himself not being a party to this deception. Mazzini refused to allow the French into the city, but while the negotiations were being dragged on Oudinot’s force was increased to 35,000 men. At the same time an Austrian army was marching through the Legations, and Neapolitan and Spanish troops were advancing from the south. The Roman army (20,000 men) was commanded by General Rosselli, and included, besides Garibaldi’s red-shirted legionaries, volunteers from all parts of Italy, mostly very young men, many of them wealthy and of noble family. The Neapolitans were ignominiously beaten in May and retired to the frontier; on the 1st of June Oudinot declared that he would attack Rome on the 4th, but by beginning operations on the 3rd, when no attack was expected, he captured an important position in the Pamphili gardens.
In spite of this success, however, it was not until the end of the month, and after desperate fighting, that the French penetrated within the walls and the defence ceased (June 29). The Assembly, which had continued in session, was dispersed by the French troops on the 2nd of July, but Mazzini escaped a week later. Garibaldi quitted the city, followed by 4000 of his men, and attempted to join the defenders of Venice. In spite of the fact that he was pursued by the armies of four Powers, he succeeded in reaching San Marino; but his force melted away and, after hiding in the marshes of Ravenna, he fled across the peninsula, assisted by nobles, peasants and priests, to the Tuscan coast, whence he reached Piedmont and eventually America, to await a new call to fight for Italy (see [Garibaldi]).
After a heroic defence, conducted by Giuseppe Martinengo, Brescia was recaptured in April by the Austrians under Lieut. Field-Marshal von Haynau, the atrocities which followed earning for Haynau the name of “The Reduction of Venice by Austria. Hyena of Brescia.” In May they seized Bologna, and Ancona in June, restoring order in those towns by the same methods as at Brescia. Venice alone still held out; after Novara the Piedmontese commissioners withdrew and Manin again took charge of the government. The assembly voted: “Venice resists the Austrians at all costs,” and the citizens and soldiers, strengthened by the arrival of volunteers from all parts of Italy, including Pepe, who was given the chief command of the defenders, showed the most splendid devotion in their hopeless task. By the end of May the city was blockaded by land and sea, and in July the bombardment began. On the 24th the city, reduced by famine, capitulated on favourable terms. Manin, Pepe and a few others were excluded from the amnesty and went into exile.
Thus were despotism and foreign predominance re-established throughout Italy save in Piedmont. Yet the “terrible year” was by no means all loss. The Italian cause had been crushed, but revolution and war had strengthened the feeling of unity, for Neapolitans had fought for Venice, Lombards for Rome, Piedmontese for all Italy. Piedmont was shown to possess the qualities necessary to constitute the nucleus of a great nation. It was now evident that the federal idea was impossible, for none of the princes except Victor Emmanuel could be trusted, and that unity and freedom could not be achieved under a republic, for nothing could be done without the Piedmontese army, which was royalist to the core. All reasonable men were now convinced that the question of the ultimate form of the Italian government was secondary, and that the national efforts should be concentrated on the task of expelling the Austrians; the form of government could be decided afterwards. Liberals were by no means inclined to despair of accomplishing this task; for hatred of the foreigners, and of the despots restored by their bayonets, had been deepened by the humiliations and cruelties suffered during the war into a passion common to all Italy.