April 1945. On a quiet stretch of lakeside road, exhausted, abandoned, fleeing into the Alps as the last remnant of his empire collapses behind him, the original fascist dictator is shot dead. A young woman falls beside him, though he pleaded with her to run. Not, as it happens, his wife, but Claretta, his most devoted mistress.
That isn’t the only scandalous detail about his death. Mussolini was reportedly travelling with a case of secret documents and a fortune in gold bars. Both vanish, into the hills and into legend. What plans did he have for those, or indeed for the few thousand loyalists who had followed him out of Milan? A desperate last stand? A sharp exit? And of all the forces converging on that road – partisans, Communists, American agents, his own dwindling band of the faithful – who actually pulled the trigger?
These questions have obsessed historians and conspiracy theorists for decades. Though barely discussed in English, Mussolini’s death is Italy’s JFK assassination: a national enigma it cannot escape, a paranoid mythology that has helped to fuel a resurrected far right. In his non-fiction debut, former Sunday Times literary editor Andrew Holgate picks through a mass of contradictory clues, arriving at a conclusion that will transform how we see the end of Fascism and one of the last great unsolved mysteries of the Second World War. Death of a Dictator is a true historical whodunnit, whose subject has never stayed dead and buried for long.
That isn’t the only scandalous detail about his death. Mussolini was reportedly travelling with a case of secret documents and a fortune in gold bars. Both vanish, into the hills and into legend. What plans did he have for those, or indeed for the few thousand loyalists who had followed him out of Milan? A desperate last stand? A sharp exit? And of all the forces converging on that road – partisans, Communists, American agents, his own dwindling band of the faithful – who actually pulled the trigger?
These questions have obsessed historians and conspiracy theorists for decades. Though barely discussed in English, Mussolini’s death is Italy’s JFK assassination: a national enigma it cannot escape, a paranoid mythology that has helped to fuel a resurrected far right. In his non-fiction debut, former Sunday Times literary editor Andrew Holgate picks through a mass of contradictory clues, arriving at a conclusion that will transform how we see the end of Fascism and one of the last great unsolved mysteries of the Second World War. Death of a Dictator is a true historical whodunnit, whose subject has never stayed dead and buried for long.
Reviews
Completely fascinating - meticulously researched and the mass of evidence analysed with telling conviction. Revelatory . . . I read it in a day, utterly held
Excellent. A gripping story very well told
Holgate turns the mystery of who killed Mussolini into something much deeper - not just a gripping detective story, but a meditation on the nature of history and a fascinating insight into Fascist Italy in the dying days of the Second World War. It's a wonderful book, written with enormous care and an admirably sharp eye for detail. Once I started reading, I didn't want to stop. I loved it
Andrew Holgate sheds new light on Mussolini's assassination and provides a gripping real-life political thriller to rank with the best novels and Hollywood films
All I wanted to do, for about a week, was read this book. Compulsive
I was absolutely enthralled. Like the very best history books, Death of a Dictator takes a subject that people think they know about, then blows every one of their preconceptions out of the water