Piazzale Loreto
Nine months apart, this ordinary city square was a Nazi execution ground and then the place where Mussolini's corpse hung upside down from a petrol station roof.
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On 10 August 1944, German occupation forces shot 15 Milanese civilians here — picked by Gestapo chief Theo Saevecke as reprisal for a partisan attack. Mussolini reportedly said afterward that the blood of Piazzale Loreto would cost him dearly. It did: on 29 April 1945, his own body and Clara Petacci's were hung from the roof of an Esso station at the corner of Corso Buenos Aires and Viale Andrea Doria — the same spot where the 1944 martyrs had been left on display.
What to look for
- The junction of Corso Buenos Aires and Viale Andrea Doria, where the Esso petrol station stood and the bodies were displayed in April 1945
- Any marker referencing the 15 civilians shot on 10 August 1944 — the square was renamed Piazza Quindici Martiri (Square of the Fifteen Martyrs) in their honour
- The metro entrance: Loreto is an interchange for lines 1 and 2, partly built underneath the square itself
Metro Loreto (lines 1 and 2) sits directly under the square and is one of Milan's main transfer stations — easy to reach from anywhere in the city.
Piazzale Loreto is one of 35 sights worth the detour in Milan, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Milan pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Milan
- San Siro — Giuseppe Meazza StadiumTwo rival clubs, one ground: the 75,817-seat arena where Milan's football fault line runs.
- Milan Cathedral (Duomo di Milano)Construction started in 1386 and the final details were finished in 1965 — the city couldn't stop adding to it.
- La ScalaThe gallery gods who booed tenor Roberto Alagna off stage mid-Aida in 2006 still haunt the loggione — the cheapest seats in opera's most feared house.
- Santa Maria delle GrazieThe wall Leonardo painted on was sand-bagged against Allied bombs in 1943 — and held.
- Sforza CastleLeonardo da Vinci painted the ceiling here. Bramante did the walls down the hall.
- Galleria Vittorio Emanuele IIThe direct ancestor of every enclosed shopping mall on earth — and there is still a worn hole in the floor where Milanese spin a heel for luck.