Who was Willy Jervis?
Willy Jervis, aged 31, marrying Waldensian Lucilla Rochat
The Willy Jervis Refuge is an alpine shelter located remotely in the Conca del Pra (see webcam) a long glacial valley leading from Bobbio Pellice towards the high pass to France and Monte Granero.
Willy Jervis Refuge, Bobbio Pellice
Photo coutesy of Di Francofranco56 - Opera propria, Pubblico dominio, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7691887
The Conca del Pra is source of the River Pellice near Monte Granero and where research is now going on into whether Hannibal crossed the Alps in this area close to iconic mountain, Monviso. There is another refuge also named after Willy Jervis, in the nearby Gran Paradiso Park.
Conca del Pra, location of the Willy Jervis refuge
Photo courtesy of Di Francofranco56 - Opera propria, Pubblico dominio https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7693635
But who was Willy Jervis? One assumes that the name ‘Willy Jervis’ has links to America, where the name Willy seems most common today since ‘Billy’ is the normal English version. In fact, the name is ‘Jervis’ (Norman ‘Gervase’) is of English descent coming from the Jervis family, landed gentry who owned Meaford Hall in Staffordshire since the 17th century and remained in the family for 250 years. The mansion and park recently sold for £2.7m (see photos of its interior). The name of the Willy Jervis Refuge is a tribute to one of their descendants, Guglielmo Jervis (1901- 1944), an Italian resistance fighter and mountaineer awarded the Italian Gold Medal for Military Valour as a member of the fifth division of non-Marxist anti-fascist resistance group Justice and Liberty. The refuge is also in memory of all local partisans who died in World War Two.
The Waldensian valleys have a long history of championing religious freedom and resistance going back to the 13th century. They were a centre of resistance during the Second World War and the area is dotted with memorials. It is even said that resistance to Mussolini started in the Waldensian Valleys. Jews were kept safe by Waldensians in the village of Rora throughout WW2 whereas they were decimated across Piedmont. Partisans hid and met in mountain retreats and hunting lodges. In Torre Pellice, there are memorials to various deportees and those who died in the concentration camps in Torre Pellice, a memorial to the German White Rose Resistance Group, and to a young woman partisan who died in the last skirmishes of the war.
‘Willy’ was in fact the nickname for Guglielmo Jervis born on 31 December 1901 in Naples. On his paternal side he was descended from the Jervis family from Eccleshall in England, with strong links to the sea. Guglielmo graduated from Milan University in engineering in the 1920s and he first wsa manager at the Olivetti factory in Bologna, then trained Olivetti workers in Ivrea, Piedmont. Throughout the 1930s, he was active in the Waldensian communities. From 1931, he worked with Waldensian pastor John Miegge producing the magazine Valdese Youth. In 1932 he married Waldensian, Lucilla Rochat : they had three children. Guglielmo was a mountaineer in his spare time, a member of the The Italian Alpine Club and President of its section in Ivrea. Athletic and very fit, he spent many hours on Mount Granero with his brother Ernesto. When Mussolini declared Catholicism the official state religion and membership of the Fascist party was required to work as an engineer, Ernesto emigrated to the United States leaving behind Willy and the rest of the family. This decision cost Willy his life. This is the story of a believer who decides to become actively involved in the Resistance, even if he could easily remain uncommitted and a faith that right to the end proclaims: "Faith in God does not abandon me." The story is as follows:
After Italy changed sides in 1943, Willy joined the non-Marxist Resistance and several times guided, through the high Alpine routes, groups of Jews and other refugees to safety in Switzerland where he came into contact with the British Special Operations. Under suspicion, he fled Ivrea in November 1943 to take refuge in the Val Pellice, where he continued his work with Justice and Liberty - with the Anglicised ‘nom de guerre’ of ‘Willy’ . Willy organized, among other things, the first transit of weapons for the resistance on the Western Alps. On 11 March 1944 he was arrested at random while carrying incriminating documents by the SS of the Italian II Kompanie ‘Battalion Debica’ commanded by Captain Arturo Dal Dosso at Bibiana Bridge in Val Pellice. He was tortured for a long time without giving anything away. On the night of 4-5 August 1944, he was taken with four others to the beautiful square of Villar Pellice and shot by firing squad. His body was left hanging on a tree as a deterrent to the local Waldensians who as a result, redoubled their efforts to support the Allies. A message was found scratched into pocket Bible left on his body. He was posthumously awarded the Italian Gold medal for Military Bravery. His citation reads thus:
The idea that Willy died for is the same as ever for Waldensians : it is religious and human freedom and the glory of God and in support of this goal, he showed the same outstanding courage and love and knowledge of the mountains of the Waldensians down the ages. In his last letters, now published, to his wife from prison he wrote
”Faith does not abandon me and my last thoughts will be for you, my dear. I am under no illusion and I pray to God to give me strength and you, consolation. I am calm for myself - but what anguish for you. How many things I want to say. You know my love for you and the kids”.
But just how did this Jervis link with England come about? Tracing Willy’s English links leads to the Jervis family from Eccleshall and Staffordshire. Willy’s great uncle (X4 or more times) was the famous British Admiral and First Lord of the Admiralty John Jervis, Earl of St Vincent. He imposed discipline and limes on the Navy to cure scurvy. He commanded the British flagship Victory (now in dry dock in Portsmouth) and the Mediterranean Fleet before Nelson did. Various Jervis relatives colonized India and married into the aristocracy, living well-heeled lives of wealth and prestige. The Jervis link with Italy came about through Willy’s teenage great-aunt Annie Jervis who fell for a Garibaldi Freedom Fighter in England raising funds for the Italian Unification Campaign. She eloped with him to Naples with family jewels but was subsequently abandoned by her lover who took the jewels. She spent her last years, in the first decades of the 20th century, living with syphilitic blindness, in a ruined palace, in Naples. Hence Willy was born in Naples.
Willy Jervis’s widowed wife Lucilla Rochat Jervis returned to work in Florence after the War as a teacher and translator of English. Her children, Giovanni, Gladness and Paola, were supported by Adriano Olivetti who regarded their father as having died as a worker in the service of Olivetti. Their son John Jervis became one of the leading psychiatrists in Italy.
The main square of Villar Pellice where the partisans were executed is was renamed from Piazza Victor Emanuel ‘Piazza Willy Jervis’ and there is a memorial stone. The street in Ivrea where the Olivetti factory was located is called ‘Via Guglielmo Jervis’.
Jervis memorial in Piazza Jervis where he was shot.
References and acknowledgments
I am indebted to the niece and great niece of Willy Jervis in America for the story of Annie Jervis and the Earl of St Vincent via Holly Pruett’s website
Lorenzo Tibaldi’s Book for the Alpine Club
http://www.alpcub.com/willy_jervis.htm
The Letters of Willy Jervis to his wife from prison “Un filo tenace”
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