Picchi—On Palm Sunday, 1941, Fortunato Picchi sacrificed his life for the cause of freedom. A brave man, of high ideals. Until the day breaks. . . .
Thus last week, in the overcrowded obituary column of the Times, smart Londoners read with regret of the end of “Little Fortune,” the genial and popular headwaiter who for years had greeted them at banquets at the Savoy. A short, bald, smiling man, he looked not unlike Benito Mussolini. But Headwaiter Picchi’s hatred for Mussolini cost him his life.
Little Fortune was interned at war’s beginning, but he was not shipped to Canada on the ill-fated Arandora Star along with most of London’s Italian major-domos. Instead he was assigned to the backbreaking work of clearing away bomb debris. Later he volunteered for “special duties.”
His special duties included dropping in on his native Calabria last February with a squad of British parachutists. How much damage they were able to do with their grenades and machine guns, and how many were captured, are still military secrets. What happened to Little Fortune is not. He was arrested, recognized, tried as a traitor. According to the Rome radio last week, “somewhere near Rome” on Palm Sunday Little Fortune died facing the rifles of a Fascist firing squad.
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