The interviewee is Ada Breschi, clerical worker, born in Pistoia on 22 September 1917. The interview was conducted by Claudio Rosati in Pistoia on 22 September 1983, in his house. After the 8 September 1943 armistice, Ada Breschi helped many servicemen who had deserted their barracks. She witnessed the Piazza San Lorenzo execution by firing squad. During the first bombing, she was at home with mother and sister, in the San Marco neighbourhood. When they didn’t make to Fortezza Santa Barbara shelter, they took refuge in the cellar of a nearby evangelical church. Then she spent eleven months at Cignano, as an evacuee. When the Manufacturers’ association - then headquartered in Piazza Garibaldi – moved to Capostrada she commuted there by tramway. Strafing was frequent in the Viale Adua district, probably aimed at German vehicles which tried to reach the Apennines. Bombings mostly took place between noon and one o’clock. Reminisces how her brother-in-law was almost arrested by the Germans, the strafing at Cignano, and the difficulties to source bread and flour.
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