Prefettura di Mantova. Ufficio di Gabinetto
- Mantua Prefecture. Cabinet's Office
Extent and Medium
300 folders
Creator(s)
Archival History
This subfonds contains acts of the Cabinet’s Office of Mantua Prefecture, covering a wide spectrum of different issues. It has been deposited in Mantua State Archive in four different times after Worl War II. On December 21st, 1943, the Chief of the Cabinet’s Office of the Mantua Prefecture, Antonio Orlando, decided to destroy all the acts of the Cabinet’s Office of Mantua Prefecture that had been produced before the year 1941, claiming these acts were not “necessary” - except some documents that he did not destroy, including those “of the Jews” (declaration made by himself and kept in this same subfonds, folder n° 1). None of these documents issued before 1941 and allegedly saved by the destruction by the same Orlando have ever been found out.
Scope and Content
In folder n° 15 there are several files named “Razza ebraica” (Jewish race), concerning Mantua and its province, with: a list of the houses owned by Jews, with the names of the people living inside them or “occupying” them; a list of the Jews hidden or irrecoverable in November 26th, 1943; a request by the Militärkommandant in Brescia to obtain quickly a full list with the names of the Jews; a copy of the newspaper “Welt-Dienst”, in Italian, with anti-Jewish propaganda (January 1944); documents of the “Ispettorato Generale per la Razza” (Racial General Inspectorship); requests to Mantua Prefecture made by several Italian firms to obtain a list with the names of the resident Jews, in order to find out whether one or more shares of the same firms was/were owned by Jews; memorandums of the “Ministero dell’Interno” (Home Secretary, May 1944) with practical explanations of the decrees issued by Mussolini in January, 1944, about Jewish belongings’ confiscation; racial controls, made to verify one’s “aryanity”, especially in case of mixed marriages, baptisms, foreign spouse or Jewish grandparents; a complete census of the Jews, including “discriminated” ones (in a positive sense: “discriminated” from persecution, because of special merits), Jews evacuated from Milan and mixed ones, regularly updated since June, 1941 to November, 1943 (with the indication of weddings, dead, births, relocations and new acquisitions among Jewish ranks). In folder n° 77 there is the number of Mantua civilians (particularly, political and racial persecuted ones) who died in the “German camps”, after a request made in July, 1952 by Home Secretary. Folder n° 136 contains a file with requests made by several people for acquiring Italian citizenship, including Bianca Massarani, a Jewish woman who lost it before World War II for marrying a Hungarian subject (her name is also in the fonds EGELI, see it). Folder n° 189 contains a file with a circular letter of Home Secretary dated September 8th, 1960, with formal recommendation not to use the expression “of Jewish race” or “formerly known as of Jewish race” when referring to people of Jewish origin in official documents, making use of their racial files only to give them the benefits they deserved because of the persecution they suffered (according to the Italian law n° 96, issued in March 10th, 1955). Folders n° 220 and 288 contain the acts of three women who in 1961 asked for an official recognition of their status as racial persecuted: Clara Coen, Matilde Coen and Anita Duranti.
Finding Aids
Papery inventories n° 183, 183 ter, 183 quater, 183 quinquies, available only in the State Archive of Mantua.
Archivist Note
Description made by Samuela Marconcini
Rules and Conventions
EHRI Guidelines for Description v.1.0