Someone said of him that he was “the luckiest man in the world” and in fact how can you define someone who escaped the guillotine, yellow fever and the Little Big Horn massacre?.
Count Carlo Camillo di Rudio from Belluno (August 26, 1832 – November 1, 1910) was only 13 years old when, with his brother, he entered the Austrian military college of San Luca in Milan. Three years later, during the riots of 1848, he abandoned his uniform and fought for Venice under the command of Pier Fortunato Calvi and alongside Felice Orsini. The following year he enlisted in Garibaldi’s troops engaged in the defense of the Roman Republic where he met Mazzini and Garibaldi. Arrested by the French, he managed to escape by embarking for New York. But it was evidently not yet the time to reach the United States because fate decided otherwise. Following a storm, the ship had to take refuge in Cartagena, from where he, disguised as a priest, reached first Marseille, then Paris. Intercepted and condemned by Napoleon III's police, he managed to escape and pass himself off as an English citizen, thus taking refuge in Switzerland. But even here he was stopped and expelled, finally managing to reach London, where Giuseppe Mazzini found him temporary accommodation as a gardener. And it was here that he married fifteen-year-old Eliza Booth.
In January 1858 he was in Paris with Felice Orsini and the other conspirators to attempt the life of Napoleon III. After the failure of the enterprise, he was arrested and condemned to the guillotine. At the last moment, thanks to the intercession of his young wife with Queen Victoria, the death sentence was commuted to harsh imprisonment in Cayenne, the Devil's Island. But even here he did not give up. Having escaped an epidemic of yellow fever that caused 600 deaths among prisoners, after a year, on the second attempt, with a group of prisoners he managed to escape and reach British Guiana in an adventurous way. In February 1864 he finally landed in New York where he changed his name to Charles C. DeRudio and began a new life. We find him enlisted in the Northern ranks where, after an initial distrust, he was much appreciated so much that with the rank of second lieutenant he landed in the legendary 7th Cavalry of Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer. He was present at the Little Bighorn massacre, the tragic 25th June 1876, but luck was once again on his side because Custer, who did not have much sympathy for him, had diverted him to the unit of Major Marcus Reno who managed to partially save himself. He remained hidden in the vegetation for two days before rejoining his companions. He ended up before a court martial on charges of desertion, but was completely exonerated and remained in the 7th Cavalry until 1896.
Transferred to other duties, he was assigned to the lands of the Northwest where in 1877 he participated in the Indian wars that ended with the pursuit of Chief Joseph (the native Nez Percé) who had managed to keep the American army in check with his few warriors and his desperate escape to Canada. At the age of 64, Di Rudio retired with the rank of Major of the Reserve. In 1908, he revealed a sensational piece of news to journalists who interviewed him on the fiftieth anniversary of the Paris attack (many historians remain skeptical also because of some details he recounted that are not confirmed): one of the three attackers who launched devices against Napoleon III was none other than Francesco Crispi. Carlo Camillo Di Rudio died in Los Angeles on November 1, 1910 from a heart problem, attended by his three daughters, his wife Eliza and his firstborn Hercules. He was buried in the National Cemetery in San Francisco where today there is a tombstone with a simple inscription: Charles C. DeRudio, Major, 7th Cavalry – November 1, 1910. His incredible story was reconstructed by the Italian-American Cesare Marino in the book “Dal Piave al Little Big Horn” (Tarantola, Belluno, 2010).
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