Benito Mussolini Mussolini was rescued from captivity in the Gran Sasso raid by German paratroopers and "Waffen-SS" commandos led by Major Otto-Harald Mors. Adolf Hitler, after meeting with the rescued former dictator, then put Mussolini in charge of a puppet regime in northern Italy, the Italian Social Republic (, RSI), informally known as the "Salò Republic". In late April 1945, in the wake of near total defeat, Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci attempted to flee to Switzerland, but both were captured by Italian communist partisans and summarily executed by firing squad on 28 April 1945 near Lake Como. His body was
The Man Who Lived at the Ritz The Man Who Lived at the Ritz The Man Who Lived at the Ritz is a 1982 novel by A. E. Hotchner. It is the story of American painter Philip Weber, who lives at the Hôtel Ritz Paris during the German Occupation, and his friendships with notables such as Hermann Göring and Coco Chanel. The novel was adapted into a 1988 television miniseries starring Perry King. Anatole Broyard wrote for "The New York Times", "Toward the end ... the book turns into a thriller as well as a legitimate novel and a quasi-documentary portrait of Paris. Yet there's something about