We dug a trench behind the school at Picianesi to hide from the Germans. Four metres by four and one and a half metres deep, about one metre from the mule track. We covered the trench with branches and the soil we had excavated then sowed corn in the soil. You got in through a hole as wide as a man dug under the edge of the field. We hid the entrance with a bush. We covered the floor with straw, and slept in the trench for several months.

The Germans were stringing telephone wires along the country roads to allow them to communicate. One time, a donkey carrying the telephone wires and two soldiers walked over the covered trench without noticing anything. Whenever we saw Germans, our women would shout our watchword which was "Ariminete!" which is dialect for "Come back!", which is the opposite of what we had to do: get away. For a while, Vincenzo Bozzi, who had been the school teacher at Picianesi, made us stand guard at the school entrance because from there you could spot the Germans coming easier. They were always on the look out for animals to butcher; so we hid our animals in the cow sheds furthest away from the places where people lived, or else we built shelters for them in the woods, camouflaged as best we could. But quite often, the Germans found the animals and took them.

In October, the fascist mayor ordered all animals to be taken to the village and given to the Germans. Everyone was told exactly how many animals to bring because at the time it was compulsory for the farmers to inform the town council of the number of animals they owned. We obeyed the order and more than 500 animals were taken from the area between Girone and San Giovanni: calves, sheep, lambs, pigs and chickens. The Germans took them all, and a couple of the men too.

One day, after the village had been destroyed, we saw from our hideout some British soldiers making their way from Cesa through Picianesi. They were crawling, so they wouldn’t be seen by the enemy who had lookouts on the Morgia. They got to the Morgetta and then to the bottom of the Morgia, with its German guard on top. They shot him, and the other Germans withdrew in a hurry to Torricella from where they later shelled the Morgia. The British replied from guns in Piazza Roma in Gessopalena and San Sebastiano. The next morning, the Germans recaptured the Morgia. Some days later, a British patrol approached the Morgia from the direction where the Mascetta houses are. There was an engagement near the big oak tree you can still see, on the northern side of the Morgia, and five or six soldiers on either side were killed. The Germans left the Morgia for good and the British took it over. Every now and then, there would be shelling from Torricella.

In mid-December, I went with uncle Alfio to dig over some land by his barn to plant potatoes. The road goes to Pastini; you take the left fork that goes towards Colle Patacchino. It was drizzling. We went inside to have some bread and cheese. Peppe di Minco Maiuro and Vincenzo di Mirollo arrived on a cart loaded with stones which they had collected from their old house which had been destroyed. They were taking them to build a new farmhouse at Pastini. Peppe was between the oxen and the cart, Mirollo as walking behind. Mirollo shouted to uncle Alfio: "Compa’, you’ve taken shelter then!". We came out to have a chat. All of a sudden, the cart exploded, the stones flew through the air, and everything rained down on us and all around. Mirollo was blown to pieces and we never saw him again. Everything was hidden in a cloud of smoke. We were screaming and shouting: "Mamma mia! Compa’! Compa’!". The smoke cleared, but the cart and the men weren’t there any more. The oxen were still alive, with blackened backsides. Peppe had landed in an olive tree. He’d lost a leg. "Help me!" he shouted. So many people came up from the village. The British came too and they got him down, but he died almost immediately. A few days later they found Mirollo’s head in a vineyard near the Pila spring. After that, the British checked that stretch of road and they found about twenty mines. Peppe di Minco Maiuro and Mirollo had been along the road lots of times.

After a heavy snowfall, the British paid people fifty lire a day to shovel snow. Lots of men took the work. We were shovelling snow near the field where the Verre houses are now when the Germans started shelling from Torricella. Everybody tried to escape. Some people were killed: one was Minco Cavaliere, who was leading his donkey along Via Peligna. Two British soldiers were killed too, nearby where the post office is today.

By night, we were still sleeping in the trench behind the school at Picianesi. Early one morning, at the end of January, we woke up to the sound of shooting. After the shooting, we saw smoke rising from the direction of Sant’Agata. We heard shouting and we started to shout ourselves: "Fire! Fire!". Two or three of us set off to have a look. We met a young girl from Torricella who was in tears: she was badly burned and in a terrible state, but she couldn’t tell us anything. Later some other people told us what had happened. I saw that everything had been burned. They had lit bundles of sticks in the stables under a farmhouse and thereby set fire to the rooms above, which were crowded with people.

Later the British paid some men to bury the dead nearby.