New Books Network Selena Daly, "Emigrant Soldiers: Mobilising Italians Abroad in the First World War" (Cambridge UP, 2025)
Oct 24, 2025
Selena Daly, a historian of modern Italy and Associate Professor at UCL, dives deep into the unique phenomenon of Italian emigrants who returned home to serve in WWI. She explores their motivations, diverse combat experiences, and the challenges they faced during demobilisation. Daly highlights the complicated reception of these soldiers in Italy and their struggles for reintegration, including pension issues and mixed public perceptions. She also sheds light on Mussolini's strategic outreach to cultivate loyalty among veterans. A fascinating discussion filled with untold stories!
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Italy's Unique Global Mobilisation
- Italy uniquely mobilised ~300,000 emigrant reservists during WWI, a global-scale phenomenon unmatched by other nations.
- This mass return reshapes how we understand the war’s global impact on diasporas and state reach.
Scale Versus Eligibility
- About 1.2 million overseas Italian men were potentially eligible but only ~300,000 returned, revealing large-scale evasion.
- Emigrant soldiers constituted 7.2% of Italy’s fighting force, a significant proportion compared with other imperial cohorts.
Motivations Were Complex
- Motivations to return varied by class, age, family ties, and length abroad rather than simple patriotism.
- Daly uses global microhistory, following four men to reveal diverse reasons and outcomes.
