Giuseppe Garibaldi rose from modest beginnings to become one of Italy’s foremost military heroes. Born in 1807 in Nice, Garibaldi became a sailor, a merchant captain, and an officer in the Piedmont-Sardinia navy. In 1834 he fled to France after participating in an unsuccessful mutiny, fomented in part to spark a republican revolution in Piedmont-Sardinia. By 1836 Garibaldi was living in South America, where he gained fame as a revolutionary mercenary fighting in Brazil and Uruguay. Continue reading
