Giuseppe Castrucci, Italian Consul General in Salonika, Greece, 1943

Giuseppe Castrucci replaced Consul General Zamboni at the consulate in Salonika, Greece, in 1943.  Castrucci played a key role in saving 350 Saloniki Jews by placing them on an Italian military train that took them out of Salonika into the Italian neutral zone.  To save Jews, he gave the broadest possible interpretation to the term "Italian subject."  He issued 550 certificates of Italian nationality to Greek Jews who were clearly not of Italian origin.  Castrucci liberally issued these to Jews who were subject to deportation or were already in deportation camps.  Castrucci's certificates enabled many Jews to be released from the transit camps and given over to Italian authority.  They were then taken to Athens for their protection.  "Consul Castrucci issued certificates of Italian nationality to Jewish women who were married to Greek husbands, and to their children who were described as minors, though they were often over 21 and sometimes over 30...and often certificates of Italian nationality were issued to Jews whose only claim to them was that the Gestapo was looking for them...The Nazis realized what the Consul was doing, but did not contest his signature and affixed their stamp to his certified list" (Poliakov & Sabille, pp. 156-157).  The German authorities in Salonika tried to stop Castrucci from issuing these naturalization papers.