Emidio Recchioni

Emidio Recchioni (1864-1933) was an Italian anarchist and businessman who was involved in a 1931 plot against the life of Benito Mussolini.

Gravestone of Emidio Recchioni

Born in Ravenna in 1864, Recchioni came to England in 1899 after he was implicated in a plot against Francesco Crispi, a former Italian prime minister. He subsequently bought a delicatessen frequented by a variety of writers and intellectuals, including George Orwell, Emma Goldman, and Sylvia Pankhurst.

Recchioni was monitored by British intelligence services, who suspected him of providing money and weapons to a group of potential assassins based in Rome. The rumours that Recchioni was planning the death of Mussolini began in 1929, and were passed by Ovra, the Italian secret police, to Colonel Carter of the British Special Branch. On a trip to Brussels in 1931, Recchioni was followed by a Special Branch agent. While in the city he met Angelo Sbardellotto, an Italian anarchist, who is reported to have offered to go to Rome and kill Mussolini if he could get money and weapons. Recchioni is alleged to have offered to provide both.

Sbardellotto was later arrested in Italy, after several abortive assassination attempts, and found to be carrying two bombs and a revolver. A copy of his confession, detailing meetings in Brussels and Paris, was forwarded to Special Branch. It was also accompanied by a request for Recchioni's extradition.

While the Home Office was considering this, the Daily Telegraph named Recchioni as one of those involved in the assassination plots, quoting Italian "sources". He promptly began legal proceedings against the newspaper. The Telegraph appealed to Carter for information but was told that there was none to give. Reccchioni won his case, and was awarded £1117 in damages.

Recchioni died in Paris in 1933. He is interred in Kensal Green Cemetery, West London. His son Vero Recchioni, who later called himself Vernon Richards, went on to become an editor of anarchist publications.