When the end of hostilities in Italy were announced on 2 May 1945, the Brazilian Expeditionary Force (FEB) had concluded an unlikely military path. A couple of years prior, the Portuguese phrase “Mais provável uma cobra fumar um cachimbo, do que a FEB ir para a frente da luta” meaning it's more likely for a snake to smoke a pipe than for the FEB to go the front and fight. Jokingly summarised Brazil’s lack of urgency to aid the Allied war effort.
From September 1944, the snake was smoking. The FEB was critical in capturing key German defensive positions along the Gothic Line, and played a notable role in the wider Italian campaign that pushed the Axis out of the Italian peninsula. However, the military achievements of the FEB have largely been relegated to the footnotes of history, with many unaware that Brazil even deployed troops to fight in the war.
Dr Vinicius de Carvalho, Reader in Brazilian and Latin American Studies and Dr Eleonora Natale, Lecturer in International History and Grand Strategy, have endeavoured to sustain and grow their memory. “In the Footsteps of Brazilian Soldiers in WW2” has become an annually organised trip for King’s students focusing on Latin America.
The annual trip gives students a first hand of the Soldier’s experience and highlights the reality of war from the perspective of locals, alongside the importance of their campaign. Through visits to key battlegrounds, museums, and monuments along the FEB’s route in and around the Gothic Line in Northern Italy, the immersive journey follows the triumphs and tribulations of the Brazilian soldiers.
The 2024 excursion involved four students from the War Studies Department BA3 module ‘Security and International Relations in Latin America’. The lecture addressed the history of the FEB and its ongoing legacy, delving into the historical context and the remnants that can still be identified 80 years on.
Landing in Pisa, we spent the first day engaging with staff and students from the University of Pisa, where a series of intriguing lectures were presented, ranging from an overview of Italy’s role in WW2 to the experiences and depictions of the war through Brazilian art and music. We then spent the afternoon speaking and dining with linguistics students from the university and accompanied them on a brief tour, highlighting Pisa’s importance during the Italian campaign.
On our second day we left the city and headed along the route that the soldiers took towards the Apennines, the spine of the Gothic Line. We met up with our guide Mario Pereira, son of an FEB veteran, who gave an unparalleled and deeply personal recollection of the local importance and history. We hiked to the top of a German hilltop fortification, where the constructed defences were still visible, and visited several bunkers that were carved into the hillsides, giving a great introduction to the challenges the oncoming Brazilian’s faced.
Following a stay in the serene mountain village of San Mommè, our basecamp for most of the trip, we again set out in the footsteps of the soldiers. We first hiked Monte Castello, site of the bloodiest battle the FEB participated in. After visiting a local museum that had a wide array of historic artifacts, we had the pleasure of talking to a local who experienced the war as a child and created a memorial to remember the deaths of two Brazilian and two German soldiers at the same place where is home is located.
We concluded the trip by making our way down the mountains to the town of Pistoia. We first Visited a 14th century fort which served as a WW2 field hospital staffed by 73 Brazilian female nurses. To finish our journey, we visited the Brazilian war cemetery, a memorial for 463 fallen soldiers, and had the chance to listen to another local’s childhood experience of sheltering some Brazilian soldiers as they made their way up the Italian peninsula.
Our trip covered many important sites and events, but there were key overarching takeaways. Listening to the local’s recollections, standing in the remnants of the bunkers, and overlooking the valleys of the Apennines collectively made the pictures and information on the lecture slides tangible.
It was fitting that the most serene and soothing place we visited was the memorial at the foot of Monte Castello. The windswept wildflower fields at a site that represented sacrifice and death embodied the wider triumph of the FEB over the German occupiers, the forces of good transpiring over evil.
Whilst the reasoning for deployment of the FEB has largely been considered a political manoeuvre, the soldiers have their own legacy. Walking in their footsteps creates an unmistakable picture of a brave sacrifice for a country and people thousands of miles away from their homeland. The commemoration in this region remembers the horror and suffering but also the humanity of war. An important perspective maintained physically through memorials and psychologically through stories and memories. Hopefully the unlikely history of the snake that smoked with valour and gallantry in the Apennines attains its warranted spot as an unskippable chapter of WW2 history.