The Le Marie massacre.
On 25 June 1944, at the Le Marie farm, seven people were killed by men of the Reichsführer-SS. Riparbella has dedicated to them a park and a memorial stone.
On 25 June 1944 men of the Reichsführer-SS seized seven people living at the Le Marie farm: a family of sharecroppers, three evacuees from the town and one other civilian.
Accused of having given support to the partisans in the previous weeks, the hostages were shut in the cellar of the farmhouse and then machine-gunned through the window, through which several hand grenades were also thrown. The house was then set on fire and the livestock killed. The only one to survive was Giovanni Corneli , who played dead.
Not the only incident
On the same day two more people were killed at Casone; in the days that followed, one person at Belora and three at Sorbugnano, bringing the total to twelve victims in the municipal area.
The places of remembrance
In memory of these events the town has dedicated a small Parco della Memoria in Via Roma, with a monument to the victims by the sculptor Ferdinando Cerri , and a memorial stone at Podere Le Marie, on the site of the massacre.
The woods of the Giardino, not far away, still hold the wartime shelters of 1944: they are crossed by Trail no. 4 “Nature and Memory” run by the Municipality, dedicated precisely to the passing of the front.
Parco della Memoria in Via Roma, in the town. The memorial stone is at Podere Le Marie, in the northern part of the municipality.
Always accessible, in the open air.
The Municipality’s Trail no. 4 “Nature and Memory” leads to the wartime shelters in the woods of the Giardino: green trails.
Texts by the Riparbella tourist office and the portal visitriparbella.com. Trail no. 4 is described by the Municipality of Riparbella. Page updated July 2026.
