Bourbon Army

The Bourbon Army is the armed instrument through which Bourbon rule imposes its authority on Sicily, turning constitutional reversals and dynastic claims into military force. Across the novel’s political upheavals, its presence is felt not only in battles but in the control of administration, the threat of violence against civilians, and the damage left in Palermo’s streets and walls. Its defeat in 1860 marks the end of its hold on the city, but the conflict also exposes how little the promise of liberation guarantees that Sicily will govern itself.

Identity and Political Function

The Bourbon Army belongs to the wider political system that, after the kingdoms are united under Bourbon rule, places Sicily under Neapolitan control. From December 1816, state offices and customs are administered by Neapolitans, and Neapolitans command the military. Palermo has lost its power and independence; heavier taxes, trade restrictions, and new constraints deepen the economic damage. In this setting the army is more than a battlefield force: it is part of the administrative and coercive machinery through which the island’s political autonomy is withdrawn.

The novel sets this centralization against the earlier constitutional settlement. Sicilian opposition to the Bourbons gathers around the loss of the 1812 constitution and the destruction of aspirations for independence. In 1820, revolt restores the constitution and brings a Sicilian Parliament into being, but divisions among the cities make the resistance vulnerable. The Bourbon monarchy exploits those divisions and suppresses the movement in bloodshed; by November, royal rule is restored and Sicily is again under the Neapolitan government. The army’s role in the story is thus embedded in a repeated contest over who has the right to govern the island and command its resources.

From Restoration to Revolutionary Crisis

The novel also places Bourbon military power within a longer sequence of European conflict. Revolution and war unsettle the Mediterranean, while Palermo’s position as a free port draws merchants and sailors from across Europe. That commercial openness does not protect the city from political upheaval. Later, with the revival of Bourbon authority and the removal of Sicilian autonomy, the same government that claims sovereignty over the island also constrains the trade on which its cities depend.

In 1848, the renewed revolution gives the army’s authority a direct local target. The revolutionary government proclaims the Kingdom of Sicily and seeks to restore the 1812 constitution, but it has no agreed king, and its leaders face opposition from abroad as well as divisions at home. The revolutionary committee buys a large consignment of rifles from England, while the government requisitions ships and effectively forces a loan from Vincenzo Florio. Trade falls by half after the revolt begins; the Palermo, a vessel of the Sicilian Steamship Company, is taken to transport troops. These costs make the struggle more than an abstract dispute over constitutional principles: military logistics reach into private capital, shipping, and the working life of the city.

Surrender, Resistance, and Repression

As the revolution’s prospects collapse, a delegation of prominent Palermo citizens meets the Bourbon commander Carlo Filangeri, Prince of Satriano, at Caltanissetta and hands over the city’s surrender. Yet the inhabitants do not accept the decision as their own. They rise against the city guard and build barricades, refusing concessions to the Bourbons even as hunger presses on them. The government’s leaders flee, including Ruggero Settimo and Giuseppe La Masa; aristocrats retreat to their country villas and courtyards. Palermo is left starving, exhausted, disordered, and burning.

The aftermath makes the Army’s power painfully specific. In the wake of a failed uprising, young prisoners are shot in a square before their families as a warning against further resistance. Sebastiano Camarrone survives the firing squad, wounded but alive. His mother appeals to the king for a pardon, invoking the law that a survivor must be spared; instead, the soldiers shoot him in the face. The scene shows repression not as a distant policy but as violence enacted in public, against a boy and in front of those who might otherwise believe that the law could restrain the state.

The Army’s violence also marks the city’s physical fabric. By the summer of 1848, Palermo’s sea-facing walls have been shelled and broken, alleys are obstructed by the remains of barricades, and barracks such as the one at the Noviziato have been devastated. At Porta Felice, a huge canvas blocks the view of the sea from the Cassaro, preventing signals from passing between the Royal Palace and Bourbon ships offshore. Military force reshapes streets, sightlines, and buildings, making occupation legible in the ordinary spaces of urban life.

Defeat in Palermo, 1860

In 1860, the balance of force turns against the Bourbons. Garibaldi’s men approach Palermo from the mountains, joined by Sicilian peasants who had helped at the Battle of Calatafimi. The city is divided: some families barricade themselves indoors, women recite rosaries, and men wait behind shuttered windows, while young men take up rifles. On May 23, the approaching force reaches the gates; residents hear cannon and gunfire and watch dust rise from the clashes.

Four days later, the city yields after a group of attackers storms Porta Termini, its most vulnerable entrance. The Bourbon forces then shell Palermo from the sea, but the bombardment comes too late to prevent the city’s capture: after fighting in Via Maqueda, Bourbon control ends. Garibaldi’s red-shirted men and their allies move through Porta Termini and into the streets. The account’s attention to the city’s conflicting responses—welcome and suspicion, flags and concealed family jewels—keeps the victory from appearing as a simple, unanimous transition.

The Bourbon Army’s retreat is not the same as the fulfillment of Sicilian independence. After unification, Vincenzo Florio argues that Piedmont is treating Sicily as a colony and objects that the Bourbon Crown treasury has been taken north to pay for annexation. His protest recalls the earlier struggle over the island’s money, shipping, and political agency. The army’s defeat ends one form of coercive rule, while the novel leaves open the question of whether Sicily has escaped subordination or merely changed the power that directs it.