Guglielmo Pepe

Republic of San Marco National liberation and anti-colonial movements 1783–1855 → Died in exile

Neapolitan general who defied his king's recall in 1848 and went on to command the defence of the Republic of San Marco in Venice

Born at Squillace in Calabria in 1783, he joined the Neapolitan Republic in 1799, was captured and exiled to France, and after serving in Napoleon's army returned in 1813 as a general to help reorganise the Neapolitan army. He organised the Carbonari into a national militia, became inspector-general of the army after the revolution of 1820, and in March 1821 attacked the Austrians at Rieti, where his raw levies were repulsed. He then spent years in exile in England and France, writing political pamphlets. In 1848 he returned to Naples and was given command of the Neapolitan army that was to fight Austria alongside Piedmont, but when the king recalled him at Bologna he resigned and crossed the Po with 2,000 volunteers. He took command of the army defending Venice alongside Manin, was excluded from the amnesty when the city surrendered, went back into exile and died in Turin in 1855.