These Soldiers wore Bicorn hats in World War II

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The soldiers who wore bicorn hats in World War II, known as the Carabinieri Reali, were the elite of the Italian armed forces. They were not just an ordinary army unit but also served as a police force. Like many units that are part of the same organization, the Carabinieri are part of the armed forces engaged in law enforcement duties in civilian society.

In the 19th century, when the Carabinieri were formed, there were several similar units across Europe. In Spain, there was the Guardia Civil, and the Portuguese had the Guarda Real de Polícia de Lisboa. Like the Carabinieri, these were all versions of the French Gendarmerie Nationale. Napoleon’s defeat in the campaign in northeast France, which was part of the War of the Sixth Coalition, and his subsequent exile to the island of Elba in 1814 marked the beginning of the restoration period in Europe. Several kingdoms previously occupied by the army of the First French Empire were reinstalling old regimes. One such kingdom was Sardinia, the predecessor of the Kingdom of Italy. Its monarch, Vittorio Emanuele I of Savoy, returned to his throne from exile, and the first thing he wanted to do was restore order in the country. To do so, he needed a band of skillful, highly trained, and above all, loyal men, and so he formed the Corps of Carabinieri Reali on July 13, 1814. The prefix “Reali,” Italian for “royal,” designated not only belonging to the monarchical state but to the monarch personally. The Carabinieri were the king’s own unit, subordinate to him only.

In the years following the restoration, they served more as a political police force than as an actual unit for maintaining law and order. After the French had left Italian soil, the Carabinieri took over the role previously performed by the Gendarmerie. Their origins were a bit more complex, as the Italians already had a legacy of military constabulary forces before the French arrived. Because they were issued with short carbines instead of muskets, the force got their name, the Carabinieri. The carbine was an easier weapon to use on horseback and in an urban environment than a musket, which was more suited for the battlefield.

The Carabinieri, as we know them today, only became part of the army in the second half of the 19th century, after the 1848 and 1859 wars for independence and the formation of the Kingdom of Italy. During the First War of Independence, the Carabinieri actively participated in conflicts against the Austrians, serving as the king’s personal guard and protecting him on and off the battlefield. An example was at the Battle of Pastrengo on April 30th, 1848. During the battle, King Carlo Alberto of Savoy approached the front lines and compromised his own safety. If Major Alessandro Negri de Sanfratello hadn’t led a charge with three squadrons of the Carabinieri against the enemy, the king would have certainly fallen into Austrian hands. For their bravery shown in this action, the unit received a silver medal for military valor and two bronze medals for military valor.

During the Second War of Independence in 1859, the Carabinieri Corps were given a broader range of assignments, performing military police duties, protecting communication lines, and serving as intelligence officers. More importantly, they were tasked with establishing order in the newly liberated provinces where the king’s rule was yet to be properly established. Once the war ended, the Carabinieri Corps incorporated various gendarmerie units from the liberated provinces and became a special branch of the new Royal Italian Army. The new Carabinieri Corps had 13 territorial legions with over 19,000 men in its ranks. Only men of high moral values who were loyal to the royal dynasty and had no previous criminal record were recruited into the service.

After the Second War for Independence, the Carabinieri legions became responsible for establishing and maintaining law and order throughout the entire country. Newly liberated provinces were still unstable and prone to revolts. The Carabinieri quelled one such incident in Sicily in 1866. They also participated in the ultimate stage of the Risorgimento, the movement for the unification and independence of Italy in 1870, with the conquest of the city of Rome. In the meantime, they fought their first-ever foreign engagement in the Crimean War from 1853 to 1856. At the end of the century, in 1897, they were engaged for the first time in a peacekeeping mission on the island of Crete. In 1900, the Carabinieri were sent to China to serve as a police unit protecting European citizens and interests in Beijing.

From the beginning of their history, the Carabinieri established their own system of ranks and uniforms. The uniform of the Carabinieri has changed during their 200 years of existence, but several components have remained unaltered. One of its features was the distinctive colors of deep blue and red. The colors were symbolic: blue denoted nobility, military valor, and patriotism, while red symbolized boldness and courage. The blue cloth made up most of the original uniform issued in 1814, the same year the Carabinieri were formed. It comprised blue pants with red sidebands and a tight blue blouse with nine large silver buttons and red-bordered tails. At first, the blouse had buttons arranged in one row but was later redesigned to have two rows of buttons, nine in each.

Foot soldiers wore a large blue coat, while cavalrymen had a large blue pilgrim cloak with a red lining. Cavalry uniforms had silver epaulets, in contrast to the light blue worn by foot soldiers. The most distinctive part of the uniform was the bicorn hat, known as the “lucerna” or “lamp,” also dyed in deep blue. The lucerna had a Carabinieri cockade, a flaming grenade with the royal monogram. On solemn occasions, hats were decorated with blue and red plumes. Interestingly, the Carabinieri wore the lucerna even in battle during both World Wars. In the field, it was worn with a grey-green cloth cover to match the standard army issue field dress. It was only the lucerna and highly polished black boots that distinguished the Carabinieri from the rest of the soldiers wearing the same field uniform. This distinction was a source of pride for the Carabinieri, even as other soldiers mocked them for the shape of their hats.

The last distinctive feature of their uniform was the white leather bandolier worn on the left shoulder and across the chest, to which an ammo pouch was attached. During World War II, bandoliers worn by troops on the front were colored grey-green and had two large ammo pouches and a sidearm holster. Early cavalry uniforms had another white belt worn on the right shoulder to which a saber was attached.

When Italy entered the First World War in 1915, the Carabinieri were the first to serve their country, assigned to major formations throughout the entire front. They were tasked with both combat roles and military police duties. The elite of the corps, the Carabinieri Guardia, guarded the royal palace in Rome and protected the king during his visits to the front. The Carabinieri served as military policemen, and apart from securing the rear lines, they were often sent to fight in the front line trenches during assaults. They were positioned behind the advancing units to prevent them from retreating and running away from battle. Those Carabinieri who fought alongside other army troops showed extraordinary bravery in combat. Their most notable engagement was during the Battle of Poggio on July 19th, 1915, in an episode of the Second Battle of Isonzo. The 2nd and 3rd battalions of the Royal Carabinieri Regiment, assigned with penetrating the enemy lines, had no more than 300 men against a numerically superior enemy entrenched in an elevated position and covering the open ground with rifles and machine guns.

On the morning of July 19th, three companies of the third battalion stormed the Austro-Hungarian positions with their bayonets fixed. Despite the heavy casualties inflicted from enemy fire, the Carabinieri reached the position right beneath the enemy trenches. Their efforts proved to have been in vain, as the Italian troops supporting them in other sectors were pushed back by the enemy. Nevertheless, the Carabinieri held their positions as long as they had the strength to do so. After the war, the bravery of the entire Carabinieri Corps was acknowledged with the gold medal for military valor on June 5th, 1920. This date became an official anniversary of the Carabinieri to celebrate the first such medal received by the corps.

The Carabinieri earned even more medals for military valor during World War II, fighting on all fronts where the Italians were deployed: Africa, Western Europe, the Balkans, and the Eastern Front. After Fascist Italy surrendered in 1943, what remained of the corps joined the side of the Italian resistance and the renewed royal army to fight the Germans, their former allies. Notably, it was the Carabinieri who arrested Benito Mussolini and held him captive at Gran Sasso until German paratroopers released him. The Carabinieri’s casualties were substantial, as in the final two years of the war, they lost 2,735 men, with another 6,500 wounded.

The end of the war marked the beginning of a new era in the history of Italy. In the 1946 referendum, the kingdom was abolished, and Italy became a republic. This was the end of the Carabinieri Reali, who were renamed the Arma dei Carabinieri. Everything else about the unit remained the same. As their heraldic motto says, the Carabinieri were faithful through the centuries. In 2000, they were separated from the army to become a separate branch of the Italian armed forces. The Carabinieri have policing powers that can be exercised at any time and in any part of the country, and they are always permitted to carry their assigned weapon as personal equipment, usually the Beretta 92 FS pistol.

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