Repression and exile

For the anarchist diaspora, London was an essential landmark. Anarchists from all European countries took refuge in the United Kingdom from the late 1870s onwards and their presence grew as a result of the increase in persecution in their home countries and internationally. The anarchist movement in Italy in particular was heavily affected by governmental persecution aimed at eradicating the activities of militants.

To this end several special measures were enforced during the last decades of the nineteenth century including preventive detention, which compelled dozens of anarchists to spend many months in jail before being tried, laws restricting the anarchist press, police surveillance, curfews and, most damagingly, impositions of restrictions on freedom of movement and on the activities of individuals (ammonizione) and internal exile (domicilio coatto).

Originally, the laws concerning ammonizione and internal exile were aimed at common criminals, in particular at fighting banditry in south and central Italy immediately after unification, but they were increasingly used against anarchist Internationalists, especially after the Left came to office in 1876.

Ammonizione was an administrative procedure based solely on police statements; there was no trial and it was impossible for the accused to defend him or herself before a magistrate. People under ammonizione suffered significant restrictions on their movements and their personal freedom; punishments for violating ammonizione were severe, including long terms of imprisonment. Those suffering such supervision, and their families, were often driven to despair. As leading anarchist Armando Borghi recalled in his memoirs, the life of a man under ammonizione was that of a prisoner on bail: ‘He cannot find a job, his life is dominated by dangers and fears; he and his relatives live at the discretion of the police’.

Moreover, the Minister of the Interior could decide at any time to convert ammonizione to forced domicile and ‘on any given night, a family is awakened from their sleep, the father is taken away from his sons, the spouse from his wife, the unfortunate is taken to prison and from there to an island’.