Umberto Nobile | Venice: I am not making this up

The Garden of the Forgotten Venetians: Pier Luigi Penzo

October 21, 2018 3 Comments

One of the most notable monuments in the Giardini — in its position, and in itself — is of Venetian aviator Pier Luigi Penzo. Like his next-door neighbor, Francesco Querini, he too was involved in Arctic exploration and met a very distressing, unexpected, undeserved, all the “un”s you want, end. Yet somehow his story lacks some crucial element that makes Querini’s so riveting. I think it’s because the real focus of attention was on someone else.

The inscription reads: ACCANTO AL MARMO DI FRANCESCO QUERINI QUI VUOLSI ONORATA E COMPIANTA L’ALA DEL VENEZIANO PIER LUIGI PENZO SORVOLATA SU L’ARTIDE CADUTO NEL RODANO NATO A VENEZIA 5 MAGGIO 1896 MORTO A VALENCE IL 29 SETTEMBRE 1928.” “Beside the marble of Francesco Querini here it is desired to be honored and lamented the wing of Venetian Pier Luigi Penzo Flown above the Arctic Fallen in the Rhone Born in Venice 5 May 1896 Died 29 September 1928.” The eagle and anchor represent his status as a Navy pilot before passing to the Air Force.

Although the words don’t exactly soar, one can admire the design of the lettering. On a more modest note, it appears that the encroachment of the shrub is eventually going to cover the words completely if someone doesn’t intervene with the pruning shears.

He looks entirely like someone who deserves a monument, though of course monuments tend to do that.

The barest outlines of his tale are that he participated in a massive rescue operation in the vicinity of the North Pole in 1928; on his flight home his plane struck some power lines near Valence, France and broke apart. It fell into the Rhone River, from which his remains were recovered two weeks later some 50 km (31 miles) downstream. I have found surprisingly little to add to that summary; Google searches mercilessly return articles about the Venetian soccer stadium, named — another sort of memorial — for him.

Therefore, and meaning no disrespect, you might be wondering why this person, who admittedly met a premature and unmerited demise, should have been given such an impressive monument. (In fact, two of them — the other is on the cemetery island of San Michele.)

I’m glad you wondered, because while the ill-fated expedition he was sent to rescue is lavishly described in numerous documents, not to mention a film (“The Red Tent,” 1969), Penzo himself seems not to have been the hero, but a team player in the grand sweep of several tragedies. I must describe these tragedies — some technical, some human, some political — in order to clarify why Penzo was literally put on a pedestal. Emotions of all sizes and sorts had been running extremely high.

The Gazzettino, then a weekly, published this portrait of the 32-year-old Penzo a few weeks after his death. He was posthumously awarded the silver medal of the Air Force.

In drastically condensed form, we pick up the tale of Italian efforts to reach the North Pole in the autumn of 1925, when Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen asked General Umberto Nobile of the Italian Royal Air Force to collaborate with him on a flight to the North Pole; Amundsen wanted to be the first to reach it by air. More to the point, he wanted to fly in a semi-rigid airship, and Nobile was already well-known as an important aeronautical engineer, pilot, and fervent proponent of dirigibles.

Nobile designed and piloted the airship Norge, accomplishing the first verified trip of any kind to reach the North Pole and likely the first verified flight from Europe to North America (Svalbard, Norway to Teller, Alaska) over the polar ice cap. This feat was known as the Amundsen-Ellsworth 1926 Transpolar Flight, so named for Lincoln Ellsworth who, with the Aero Club of Norway, financed the expedition. On May 12, 1926 at 1:30 AM GMT the North Pole was reached (though not actually touched). The flags of Norway, Italy, and the United States were dropped onto the ice and the airship proceeded to Alaska.

With the success of this exploit Nobile then planned another polar overflight, this time with an all-Italian crew in a dirigible named Italia. The project, however, met strong headwinds from his many enemies in the Fascist government, some of whom were also enemies of airships but huge fans of rigid aircraft. After grudgingly approving the expedition, Captain Italo Balbo, then-Secretary of State for the Air Force (later Minister of the Air Force), wished him a special bon voyage: “Let him go,” he is reported to have said, “for he cannot possibly come back to bother us anymore.”

The expedition went splendidly for a while. On May 23, 1928, after a 69-hour flight to the Siberian group of Arctic islands, the Italia began its flight to the North Pole with Nobile as both pilot and expedition leader. On May 24, the airship reached the Pole and began its homeward trip to Svalbard when it ran into a storm.

Rapidly losing altitude in the struggle against real headwinds, the next day the Italia crashed onto the pack ice fewer than 30 kilometers (18 miles) north of Nordaustlandet (astern part of Svalbard).

Of the 16 men in the crew, ten were thrown onto the ice as the gondola was smashed; without the weight of the gondola, the buoyant superstructure began to float away with six crewmen still inside it who, as they drifted skyward, threw all the supplies they could manage out onto the ice, which saved the lives of their severely injured comrades. The six were never seen again.

The disaster’s horror was intensified, if such a thing were possible, by the desperation of the month-long search for the survivors.

The men on the ice sent calls for help via a radio transceiver salvaged from the shattered gondola, but 30 days passed with no response. While a variety of the usual Arctic horrors were befalling them, an international rescue operation was seeking them — Soviet Russia, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Italy, not to mention privately owned ships which had been chartered by polar scientists and explorers. Even Roald Amundsen put aside his bad feelings toward Nobile and boarded a French seaplane to aid in the rescue efforts. The plane disappeared between Tromsø and Svalbard, and though a pontoon from the craft was later found, the bodies of Amundsen and all aboard were not.

Enter Major Pier Luigi Penzo, joining the search on June 23, 1928 in his Marina II, an SM55-Dornier Wal hydroplane. Born in Malamocco, he had enrolled in the Italian Royal Navy at the age of 20, and earned his hydroplane pilot’s license at the seaplane base at Sant’ Andrea, just across from the Lido. He distinguished himself in combat on the Piave front in World War 1, and had become one of the most requested aerial rescue pilots then active. He was also well-known to Italo Balbo — I suppose you could say he was a friend — with whom he had flown on several occasions.

The “idroscalo,” or seaplane base, at Sant’ Andrea was where Penzo earned his hydroplane pilot’s license. There was a flourishing waterborne airmail route between Torino and Trieste in the Twenties, mostly following the rivers (Ticino, Po) till reaching Venice.

In the end, the survivors’ signals were picked up by a Russian ham radio operator who alerted the search teams, and it wasn’t even Penzo who spotted them for the first time, but fellow pilot Umberto Maddalena. And the first rescue plane to land was a Swedish Air Force Fokker ski plane piloted by Lieutenant Einar Lundborg.

Nobile had prepared a detailed evacuation plan, with the most seriously wounded man (the heavily built mechanic Natale Cecioni) at the top of the list and himself as number 4. But Lundborg refused to take anyone but Nobile, who also had been injured. Lundborg argued that the plane could only take one passenger, and Cecioni was so heavy the pilot was unsure he could take off. So Nobile was airlifted to safety, a captain who, it can’t be denied, had clearly not chosen to go down with his ship (so to speak). When Nobile boarded the Italian ship that served as expedition headquarters, he was arrested.

Worse still, when Lundborg returned alone to pick up the next survivor his plane crashed on landing, and he was left on the ice with the other five.

Meanwhile, Penzo and his crew (as well as another hydroplane) undertook a series of flights over the icepack dropping supplies and instruments to the marooned men. I can’t give any details on whether he took any survivors back to base.

After 48 days on the ice, the last five men of his crew were picked up by the Soviet icebreaker Krasin.

Time to leave? Nobile insisted that he wanted to stay to continue the search for the six men who were swept away in the airship when it disintegrated, but was ordered back to Rome with the others. He was to discover that the Arctic catastrophe wasn’t over, because it had given his enemies their chance to eliminate him.

When he and his men arrived in Rome on July 31, they were greeted by 200,000 cheering Italians. The popular exultation at the happy ending of the agonizing drama momentarily baffled Balbo and his allies, who had been seeding the foreign and domestic press with accusations against Nobile, claiming that agreeing to be evacuated first was an obvious sign of cowardice. (Pause to wonder why, in fact, Lundborg had insisted on taking him off before everybody else.) The official inquiry gave them the chance to place the blame for the disaster entirely on his shoulders. He was accused of abandoning his men, and Balbo went so far as to call for his execution by firing squad for treason and cowardice. Instead, Nobile resigned his commission and went to the United States, returning only in 1943 when Balbo was dead.

Here is a fuller, though still concise, account of the Italia disaster.

Italians of Lino’s vintage were raised with the conviction that Umberto Nobile was a craven poltroon, but this stamp commemorating the 90th anniversary of the expedition shows the “Italia” proudly aloft.

So, as I mentioned, there were tragedies: The technical tragedy was the crash of the “Italia”; the human tragedy was the loss of life; the political tragedy, as I see it, was the destruction of Nobile’s reputation. I don’t say he was right to be evacuated first, but the fact that the attacks on him were politically motivated is revolting.

In the months between the departure of the survivors in July and his own departure in September, Penzo remained at King’s Bay to continue the search for Amundsen, as well as for the six men lost in the envelope that floated away. In these flights he didn’t use his usual hydroplane, but a Macchi 18 biplane hydro-bomber (I throw that in for any aviation fans who might be reading). Unsuccessful in both cases, he was finally ordered back to Italy.

On September 27 (Thursday) he sent a telegram to his family that he was on his way home, and his brothers left Venice for Pisa, where his plane was expected to land on Friday. But it did not.

On Sunday morning a functionary of City Hall delivered the bad news to his wife. Two of his crew had survived the crash and been saved by fishermen, but Penzo and another two crewmen drowned. His remains were interred on the cemetery island of San Michele, under a honking big monument.

The memorial to Penzo is located in the section dedicated to the military. The eagles appear to want to be artichokes.

The inscription in Latin identifies Petrus Alojsius Penzo April 6 1896 September 29 1928. Following his date of death is inscribed “E.F. VI,” for the sixth year of the Era Fascista (Fascist Era). The oak leaves above his head typically symbolize power, endurance and strength (also humble beginnings, which would certainly be apt for Malamocco); they’re often seen on military tombs.

This interesting device is easy enough to decipher: The propellers and compass rose for aviation, the bear symbolizes the Arctic, and the corpse floating on the water would represent the victim.

The other side of the monument isn’t much less impressive.

“ASSUMENT PENNAS UT AQUILAE VOLABUNT ET NON DEFICIENT.” “They shall take wings as eagles, they shall run and not be faint.” Here the famous phrase from the book of Isaiah 40:31 is attributed simply to the “prophets.”

“VIVENT MORTUI TUI + INTERFECTI TUI RESURGENT.” ‘Thy dead men shall live; thy slain men shall be raised.” (The Book of Wisdom).

But wasn’t enough; another memorial, in a more public place, was seen as desirable, and it was unveiled at an inauguration ceremony on June 1, 1932 by — of course! — Italo Balbo, then Minister of the Air Force. He had organized an international aviation conference in Rome, and added Venice to the program.

It was obviously correct for him, in his official capacity, to honor a fallen comrade, but he must have enjoyed the chance to castigate Nobile once again by glorifying a man who had lost his life in the effort, more or less, to save him. At least that’s how I interpret this extravagant conclusion to Penzo’s life.

The monument was designed by Venetian sculptor Francesco Scarpabolla (1902-1999). “Oh sure,” said Lino when I shared this information. “I knew him, he lived just down the street from me near San Vio.” We were all expecting that by now, naturally.

But the best monument to Penzo, to my way of thinking, isn’t either one of the statues, nor even the soccer stadium (sorry). It’s the elementary school at Malamocco, which bears his name. Latin quotations and oak leaves are all very well, but the school is dedicated to a local boy, and it’s there that his name will truly be kept alive.

I will trek down to Malamocco one of these days and make some photographs of the school. Meanwhile, here is map evidence that it exists.

Venetian History

The Garden of the Forgotten Venetians: Francesco Querini

August 20, 2018 2 Comments

Count Francesco Querini, lieutenant of the Italian Navy, scientific researcher, and doomed explorer. Querini is one of two Venetians fatally involved in Arctic exploration; a few decades later Pier Luigi Penzo also didn’t make it home (his story will be coming later). The statue is by Achille Tamburlini, inaugurated November 20, 1905.

Francesco Querini isn’t exactly forgotten, even if the inscription on his monument has become totally illegible, but the casual passerby has no way of identifying him. He’s hard to miss, though, considering that his statue has a front-row seat in the Gardens, and he makes quite an impression — in Venice one certainly doesn’t expect to see a man in Arctic gear with his huskies, staring at the horizon.

No, he did not bring the serum to Nome. I suppose he could have, but he had been dead for 24 years by then. Oh wait — we don’t actually know when he died. We only know when he was last seen: March 23, 1900. So basically he’s famous not for what he did, but for what he didn’t do: Make it home safe from the North Pole.

Querini was born on December 16, 1867, a member of the San Silvestro branch of one of Venice’s most illustrious and ancient families; he was also a decorated naval officer, and a scientist. He spoke English, French and German perfectly, and he was up to speed in Latin, though it probably wasn’t something he often needed in conversation. He was prepared for many things in life, but he wanted more than what even the most eventful naval career could offer.

He looks better as a human than as a statue. Writing home from his foreign stations — Somalia, Eritrea, Zanzibar, Crete — he signed his letters with the affectionate nickname “Checco” (KEH-ko). It’s very depressing to be known to history as a victim, because look at him. He was ready for more.

In 1899 Prince Luigi Amedeo of Savoia-Aosta, duke of the Abruzzi, organized an expedition to the North Pole, and asked Querini to join; his responsibilities were to be the collection of minerals and acting as the right-hand man of Captain Umberto Cagni (KAN-yee) for the scientific observations.

This may not sound like anything impressive today, but theirs was the latest in an already long series of efforts to certifiably reach the North Pole. It had become something of an international competition.

The immediately preceding attempt had been Nansen and Johansen in April 1895, who reached latitude 86°14′ North on skis before they turned back. Each expedition was getting closer to the goal, and the duke, already famous for his extreme adventures, was determined to be the one to get there.

The group of 21 members departed from Archangel on July 12, 1899 aboard the revised whaling ship “Stella Polare,” and in the course of the expedition various members suffered the usual Arctic horrors, from frostbite to amputations to their eyes freezing shut. On March 11, 1900, after the long winter in the ship preparing for the assault, and a failed first start, it was off for the Pole.

Ten men were divided into three sections. The duke had to stay in camp due to slow recovery from the aforementioned amputation (of two frozen fingers). Cagni had three men, Cavalli Molinelli had two men, and Querini had two men. I don’t know how the 104 sled dogs and ten sleds were apportioned.

The temperature dropped to -53 degrees C (-63 F) but worse than the cold were the ridges. Colliding ice floes often create ridges, and progress was much slower than the men had anticipated (four kilometers in 12 hours, or 33 meters/100 feet per hour, or a little more than one foot per minute). Supplies began to dwindle, and after 12 days of struggle forward it was clear that there wouldn’t be enough food for everybody to reach the Pole and return.

On March 23, 1900 Cagni ordered Querini and his men to turn back toward base, and shortly thereafter Cavalli also headed back. Cavalli made it, after 24 days of trekking, and Cagni also made it after a harrowing two solid months (subtracting dogs and abandoning equipment along the way). But Querini and his two intrepid companions, Felice Ollier (a mountain guide from the Val d’Aosta, 30 years old) and first macchinista* Enrico Alfredo Stokken (Norwegian, 24 years old, who had asked to be taken along), were never seen again.

Picture this, but without land on the horizon. (NOAA)

Cagni’s four-man squad had reached latitude 86°34′ on 25 April — Saint Mark’s day! — setting a new record by beating Nansen’s result by 35 to 40 km (22 to 25 miles), stopping at about 382 km/237 miles short of the Pole. I’d like the fact to sink in that an Italian team established a polar record that stood until May 12, 1926, when Amundsen and another Italian, Umberto Nobile, verifiably attained the Pole. More about them in the next installment.

Naturally the whole expedition was aghast at Querini’s disappearance. The duke organized a search party that went east for 12 days. But by August 16 the group decided they finally had to depart, and the “Stella Polare” weighed anchor from its harbor on Prince Rudolf Island. They left abundant provisions of every kind, as well as eight dogs (and food for same), plus a small boat, and shaped their course for Norway.

The route of Cagni’s team; “April 25” is marked at the topmost point.

Does it seem strange that somebody could just disappear? It’s strange that it didn’t happen more often, up there surrounded by several million square kilometers of empty white.

They were walking on ice, which tends to form in ridges, “small ‘mountain ranges’ that form on top of the ice…that can easily be two meters/six feet or higher,” states the National Snow and Ice Data Center. “Ridges create significant obstacles to anyone trying to traverse the ice. One usually encounters 4 or 5 pressure ridges per kilometer, but the number may rise to 30 per kilometer in places.”

One of many formations of pressure ridges in Arctic ice. Not what you want to see on your way home. (Liquid Adventuring)

Furthermore, the ice is floating. Setting aside the dread danger of “leads,” or water breaking open between the stretches of ice, the men were trudging across floes that were subject to four forces: “Wind drag, water drag (current), Coriolis force (a force resulting from the earth’s rotation, which acts at right angles to the velocity vector of the ice …), and lateral forces resulting from the pressure of the surrounding ice floes,” as explained in “The Physics of Ice.” ” The earth is rotating from west to east. If the forces of wind and current move the floe to the south… the floe tends to lag, and acts as if a force were pushing it westward.” The motion of the ice was one reason Cagni’s team took two months to make it back, as whole days were lost as the men walked forward on ice which was moving backward.

As Querini’s fate was reluctantly accepted, the memorials began to appear.

In November of 1900, the Italian Geographic Society awarded its silver medal to “the Hero fallen in one of the most arduous battles of science.” Dramatic as their race to the Pole was, the men were also pursuing important research, among which were the exact determination of the oceanic circulation, the location of the magnetic pole and its influence, light phenomena in the polar night, the thermal economy of the atmosphere and the Arctic seas, the formation and drift of the ice, the force of gravity, and measuring the depression of the planet toward the North Pole.

Early in 1901, the city of Venice advertised a large reward to anyone able to give news of the men. On May 22, 1901, Count Filippo Grimani, mayor of Venice, bestowed on Querini’s father, Nunzio, a gold medal as a token of “the city’s sentiment toward the memory of his son.”

On May 16, 1901, Count Piero Foscari met with 20 dissatisfied members of the Royal Rowing Society Bucintoro and founded a new rowing club named in honor of his lost friend: the Royal Rowing Society Francesco Querini.

The rowing club founded in Querini’s honor still holds forth on the Fondamente Nuove, a few steps from the hospital. “Canottieri” refers to those who row in the English style, a sport known as “canottaggio,” which was then something of an aristocratic undertaking. It was certainly distinct from rowing in the Venetian way, which everybody did. In the early 1900s the only rowing club was the Canottieri Bucintoro, followed decades later by the Canottieri Diadora, Canottieri Giudecca, Canottieri Mestre, and Canottieri Cannaregio.

The club’s magnificent “disdotona” is the only 18-oar gondola in the city.

Refusing to abandon all hope, even after frequent questioning of whaling crews brought no information, the duke sent a ship to Franz Josef Land in the summer of 1901, commanded by the father of machinist Stokken. They too returned with no news whatever.

In May of 1903, the Italian Navy sent the family a medal honoring all the members of the expedition.

On October 12, 1903, the city council of Venice unanimously approved the commissioning of a monument to Querini (the famous statue), to which the duke of the Abruzzi contributed 10,000 lire (this was only slightly more than the annual salary of an upper-echelon civil servant). It also voted to establish a scholarship in Querini’s honor for the sons of Venetian seamen or military officers applying to the Naval Academy at Livorno.

The invisible inscription reads: A FRANCESCO QUERINI / DALLA PIU’ ARDITA SPEDIZIONE AL POLO ARTICO / ATTESO INVANO IL RITORNO / LUIGI DI SAVOJA DUCA DEGLI ABRUZZI / CHE L’AUDACE IMPRESA LIETA DI NUOVI TRIONFI / IDEO’ E CON ALTRI GENEROSI COMPI’ / VENEZIA / CUI E’ VANTO E DOLORE IL SACRIFICIO DI TANTO FIGLIO / MCMV “To Francesco Querini / of the most daring expedition to the North Pole / His return awaited in vain / Luigi of Savoia duke of the Abruzzi / who conceived and with other generous persons accomplished the most audacious undertaking happy with new triumphs / Venice / of which the sacrifice of such a son is the boast and grief / 1905.”

It is reported that a further phrase was incised — if it was on the pedestal, it also has disappeared — to honor Querini’s comrades. It said “A PERENNE MEMORIA / SI SCRIVONO QUI I NOMI / DEGLI ALTRI DUE COMPAGNI PERITI NELLA SPEDIZIONE / ENRICO ALFREDO STOKKEN 1 MACCHINISTA / FELICE OLLIER GUIDA.” “In perpetual memory / are written here the names / of the other two companions who perished in the expedition / Enrico Alfredo Stokken first macchinista / Felice Ollier guide.”

For the record, there is a monument to Felice Ollier in Courmayeur in the Val d’Aosta, also offered by the duke. I have yet to locate any mention of a memorial to Enrico Alfredo Stokken.

One doesn’t want to imagine Querini’s last days, or at what point he and his companions realized it was over, or when it actually was over for the last of them. Did they starve? Freeze? Drown? Were they killed by polar bears? It seems as if they simply evaporated, and I, for one, profoundly wish that could have been true.

Querini’s home on Piscina San Samuele. A plaque was placed over the side door in 1904. At least this way the family didn’t have to look straight at it every day.

This plaque was added in 1904 (translated by me): FRANCESCO QUERINI / MOVED FROM HERE / TO ATTEMPT THE UNEXPLORED PATHS OF THE ARCTIC / BUT HE DID NOT RETURN WITH THE VICTORIOUS ONES / THE ICE OF THE POLE /CLOSED IN ETERNAL SECRECY / YOUTH COURAGE AND HOPES / ALMOST AS IF TO REMIND US / THAT NO HUMAN ENTERPRISE IS GLORIOUS / IF NOT GROWN / IN SACRIFICE AND IN PAIN The Society of M.S. among the personnel of the Veneta Laguna Society.” M.S. stands for “mutuo soccorso” (mutual aid), and the Veneta Laguna Society was a precursor of ACTV, the current public transport company.

On a steamship, the macchinista was responsible for operating the machinery in the engine room in response to the captain’s orders from the bridge. Before automated controls, when the man at the wheel would call an order (“full steam ahead,” for example), the macchinista did whatever was necessary to whatever machines were required for the maneuver.