The Independence Wars and the Kingdom of Italy

Many Vicentines participated in Garibaldi's campaigns. The first display case is entirely dedicated to the figures of the "Vicentini dei Mille" [Vicentini of the Thousand], Antonio Radovich and Domenico Cariolato. The events of 1860 culminated in the solemn proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy by the first Italian Parliament, convened in Turin on March 21, 1861. When, 18 years after the strenuous resistance of 1848, the third Austrian rule ended after the Third War of Independence, Vicenza gave its important contribution to the success, with the results of the popular plebiscite of October 21, 1866 to the annexation of Veneto to the Kingdom of Italy.

The king's visit to Vicenza on November 17, 1866 to award the gold medal for military valor, a month after the annexation of the Venetian provinces to the Kingdom of Italy, actually represented the finalization of an earlier proposal by Sebastiano Tecchio, an exile and member of the Subalpine Parliament in Turin, which had been aimed since 1849 at rewarding the defenders of Vicenza on June 10, 1848. The official ceremony took place in the crowded Piazza dei Signori. The event, depicted in a painting commissioned from Domenico Petterlin by King Victor Emmanuel II himself, shows the King awarding the City of Vicenza's flag a gold medal for military valor. The award's motivation encapsulates the strength and sacrifice of a city in one of the highest and most glorious moments in its thousand-year history: “For the strenuous defense undertaken by its citizens against the impetuous enemy in May and June 1848.”

Orsola Faccioli Licata. Folla acclamante il Re Vittorio Emanuele II in Piazza dell'Isola (ora Piazza Matteotti) il 17 novembre 1866. Olio su tela, 1869

Domenico Petterlin Vittorio Emanuele II nell'atto di decorare con lamedaglia d'oro al Valor Militare, per i fatti del 1848,la bandiera della città. Vicenza 18 novembre 1866. Olio su tela, 1870.