In 1943-44, amidst the horrors of war, Assisi had another time of true glory. While the Allies had just landed in Sicily, Assisi was occupied by German troops. There, three men worked together to do something constructive rather than destructive:
Bishop Giuseppe Nicolini, the German commander, a medical doctor, Col. Valentin Müller and Don Aldo Brunacci.
Divided by the war, they remained nevertheless united by their Christian faith and its mandate of unconditional love. They obtained that Assisi be made a hospital city, a city for medical care, not for military confrontation; a city for healing, not for fighting. The anthology highlights the heroic efforts of Nicolini and Brunacci by which many Jewish refugees survived, correcting the distorted historical account of the book and film “Assisi Underground.”
→ Don Aldo was right, by André Cirino OFM
→ Col. Valentin Mueller MD, 1891 – 1951
→ Jewish Lives Saved in Assisi
→ More on the historical facts
→ Presentations at the Award Ceremony for Col. Valentin Müller, St. Bonaventure University 2005
→ Assisi in World War II: Colonel Doctor Valentin Müller (Cord 1992)