Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
News

Italian Fisherman Who Saved Jews Dies at 87

A fisherman who took part in the dramatic rescue of about 30 Jews during World War II died this week.

Agostino Piazzesi, 87, was the last survivor of 15 fishermen who during the night of June 19-20, 1944 rescued the Jews, who were held by the Germans in a castle on Isola Maggiore in the middle of Lake Trasimeno in central Italy. Piazzesi rowed the Jews away from internment.

The dramatic story of the rescue came to light only a few years ago.

Using five small fishing boats, the fisherman took the Jews, who came from nearby Perugia, to a point on the lakeshore that was in the hands of the Allies; the island and the rest of the lake were under German control.

The local priest, the Rev. Ottavio Posta, organized the operation and took active part in the rescue. Last year Posta, who died in 1963, was honored as Righteous Among Nations by Yad Vashem and Piazzesi was knighted by the Italian government.

Men like Piazzesi “remain embedded in our hearts from generation to generation,” Riccardo Pacifici, the president of the Rome Jewish community, told JTA.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.