On the night of 9 May 1862, a group of 150 brigands, shouting “Long live Francis II”, entered the village of Fontechiari (at the time Schiavi), kidnapping the mayor's wife and freeing her only in exchange for jewellery.
During the assault, they set fire to several houses, including that of the mayor, the Captain of the National Guard, the tax collector, the pharmacy and the coffee shop, destroying everything that had to do with the Risorgimento.
This was the last attack by Wrench before his death on 28 June 1862 in Trisulti. The Piedmontese arrested six men accused of being brigands, but they were almost all acquitted as the population testified in their favour.
For many years, this episode had been forgotten until, twenty years ago, a chronicle of the assault written by a priest was found in the library of Maestro Remo De Carolis. Later, a complete documentation of the event was discovered in the municipal historical archive.
The history of that era has only been reconstructed through the documentation of the victors, but we now have a large amount of unpublished documents that represent a neutral source and give us an insight into the life and moods of our people at the time, who saw nothing positive in National Unity and had the same attitude of “mistrust” that we have towards the European Union today.
The effect on our region was devastating, beginning with it the great emigration, the end of which is still unseen.