Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Menkey's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is
Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
Speaker 1: of Curiosities. In the town of Monte Fiasconi, in central Italy,
Speaker 1: there stands a small, unassuming convent chapel. Up until it
Speaker 1: had gone relatively unnoticed. A convent chapel in a small
Speaker 1: town was nothing special. Inside it, however, was a secret,
Speaker 1: one discovered by two Italian art dealers named Alfredo Fazzoli
Speaker 1: and Romano Pelessi. Within the chapel was a life size
Speaker 1: stat you of Madonna and child. It had been carved
Speaker 1: out of wood and painted by a claimed Renaissance artist,
Speaker 1: Giovanni Pizzano. Chiseled in the sculpture was a rarity, as
Speaker 1: all of his known work was done in stone, not wood.
Speaker 1: This piece was literally a one of a kind, and
Speaker 1: word about its existence soon made it to Harold Parsons,
Speaker 1: who acquired art for the Cleveland Museum of Arts in Ohio.
Speaker 1: He was given a private viewing of the sculpture within
Speaker 1: the chapel, and quickly offered eighteen thousand dollars for it.
Speaker 1: One year later, the museum's curator announced its arrival to
Speaker 1: the public and that tests were being conducted to verify
Speaker 1: its authenticity. To the trained eye, there was no way
Speaker 1: it couldn't have been made by Pizzano. The smooth curves,
Speaker 1: the intricate details, it was all there. The museum X
Speaker 1: rayed the sculpture and saw something odd inside. Nails had
Speaker 1: been used to hold pieces of it together. But it
Speaker 1: wasn't the nails themselves that upset the museum's experts. It
Speaker 1: was how old they were. The nails were brand new.
Speaker 1: The mada A sculpture. It was shipped back to Italy
Speaker 1: deemed a fake, and in its place, the museum purchased
Speaker 1: a statue that was considerably older. It had been carved
Speaker 1: in the town of Magna, Grecia, settled by the ancient
Speaker 1: Greeks around seven fifty b C. It depicted the Greek
Speaker 1: goddess Athena, and though it cost the museum one twenty
Speaker 1: thousand dollars, its historical significance was priceless. For three years,
Speaker 1: museum visitors admired the statue, getting a firsthand look at
Speaker 1: the incredible talent of the ancient Greek virtuoso. Then in
Speaker 1: nineteen the art world ground to a halt. Like the
Speaker 1: Madonna and Child before it, the Statue of Athena had
Speaker 1: been found to be a fake. In fact, many statues
Speaker 1: and sculptures in museums everywhere had been uncovered as forgeries,
Speaker 1: and all of them had been made by one man.
Speaker 1: His name was Alco Dosina and he had been born
Speaker 1: in eighteen seventy eight in Cremona, Italy. He had studied
Speaker 1: art at an Italian trade school, learning how to copy
Speaker 1: the works of the masters even from a young age.
Speaker 1: Dosina as a talented mimic, and he didn't see school
Speaker 1: as a place to learn greatness. For that, he would
Speaker 1: need to enter the professional world. He took apprenticeships working
Speaker 1: for art restorers in his hometown as well as in Milan.
Speaker 1: He traveled from church to church throughout Italy, repairing real
Speaker 1: statues and sculptures. Then, in nineteen sixteen, Dosina joined the
Speaker 1: military to fight in World War Two. Despite the fighting,
Speaker 1: he never gave up his art. He'd even managed to
Speaker 1: find time to make a small sculpture of Madonna and
Speaker 1: Child out of terra cotta, which he took around Rome
Speaker 1: with him while on leave for the holidays. It was
Speaker 1: during this time when he met an antique dealer, Alfredo Fazzoli.
Speaker 1: Puzzoli didn't realize the little sculpture was a fake. He
Speaker 1: thought Dosana had stolen it from a church, maybe during
Speaker 1: a raid on a small town during the war. He
Speaker 1: wasn't even upset when he realized he'd paid twelve dollars
Speaker 1: for a forgery. To Fazzoli, Dosana would be his meal
Speaker 1: ticket when the war ended. He went into business with Osena,
Speaker 1: churning out modern antiques for over a decade. But Dosana
Speaker 1: claimed all along that he hadn't done it for the money.
Speaker 1: He'd seen almost none of it, except for the price
Speaker 1: he'd charged the dealers for each commission. While Fazzoli and
Speaker 1: Pelessi were raking in millions of dollars, Dosina had made
Speaker 1: a few hundred dollars per commission, enough to live on,
Speaker 1: but hardly a fortune that he deserved. It had no
Speaker 1: idea his works were being displayed in museums all around
Speaker 1: the world. Either the Metropolitan Museum of Arts in New
Speaker 1: York City conducted its own investigation after buying a bogus sculpture.
Speaker 1: Its agents eventually unmasked Dosena as the forger. They visited
Speaker 1: the artist in his studio, where he showcased his works
Speaker 1: without fear or shame in his eyes. He wasn't imitating
Speaker 1: the masters. He himself was a master, and he believed
Speaker 1: his sculptures deserved to be displayed alongside those of the greats,
Speaker 1: and they soon were. He held exhibitions of his work
Speaker 1: in France and Germany from nineteen twenty nine to nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty one. Two of his sculptures can be seen on
Speaker 1: display at the University of Pittsburgh today. Despite his wounded reputation,
Speaker 1: there is no doubt that Alceo Dossena was a talented imitator,
Speaker 1: and imitation, after all, is the sincerest form of flattery.
Speaker 1: Dead Men tell no tales. It was a common pirate
Speaker 1: saying that meant that a dead man couldn't give away
Speaker 1: any secrets. But one man found floating off the coast
Speaker 1: of Spain during World War two had a wild story
Speaker 1: to tell. It would alter the course of the war
Speaker 1: and turn the tide against the Germans at a crucial time.
Speaker 1: His name was Major William Martin and he was an
Speaker 1: officer with the British Royal Marines. In late April of
Speaker 1: nineteen forty three, Major Martin and his briefcase were discovered
Speaker 1: drifting in the ocean by Spanish fishermen. The men took
Speaker 1: the body to the nearby town of Hueva, where authorities
Speaker 1: performed an investigation. Inside the briefcase, they found diplomatic cables
Speaker 1: between Martin and British like Consul Francis Hasselden, who also
Speaker 1: happened to reside in town, and he could identify the corpse.
Speaker 1: After a quick autopsy, which described the cause of death
Speaker 1: as drowning, Major Martin was buried in a local cemetery
Speaker 1: with honors. In early May. The Spanish Navy held onto
Speaker 1: the briefcase, though, which should have meant that it was
Speaker 1: secure from the enemy. However, as it was being transported
Speaker 1: to Madrid, German sympathizers got their hands on it just
Speaker 1: long enough to snap a few pictures of what was inside,
Speaker 1: including the encrypted cables. They sent the photos to a
Speaker 1: top agent within the German intelligence agency, and that agent
Speaker 1: passed them onto the head of his agency, who stepped
Speaker 1: in and insisted the Spanish turnover what they had. They
Speaker 1: agreed to give up the documents, but not before getting
Speaker 1: to look at them. First. They extracted the damp and
Speaker 1: letters from their envelopes, dried them, and then took their
Speaker 1: own photographs. The letters were then placed in salt water
Speaker 1: overnight and slid back into their envelopes so it didn't
Speaker 1: look like anything had been tampered with. The Spanish sent
Speaker 1: what information they had on to the Germans, while the
Speaker 1: documents themselves were sent back to Hasselden. The British vice
Speaker 1: consul had no idea The enemy knew their plans and
Speaker 1: were preparing to defend themselves from an Allied invasion, an
Speaker 1: invasion that would march through Greece into the Balkans and
Speaker 1: overtake German forces there. That July, the Germans acted quickly.
Speaker 1: Adolf Hitler an Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini met to
Speaker 1: discuss next steps. Hitler insisted that his first Panzer division
Speaker 1: defend Greece, while tens of thousands of German troops were
Speaker 1: pulled out of Sicily and planted in Sardinia. On July
Speaker 1: tenth of ninety three, Hitler's forces waited for the Allies
Speaker 1: to arrive in Greece, and they waited and waited until
Speaker 1: one hundred sixty thousand Allied troops finally showed up, but
Speaker 1: not in Greece, in Sicily, over four hundred miles away.
Speaker 1: The German soldiers there were now sorely outnumbered. The Allied plot,
Speaker 1: known as Operation Mincemeat, had been a trick. There had
Speaker 1: never been a Major William Martin nor any encrypted cables.
Speaker 1: The man found off the coast of Spain had been
Speaker 1: a homeless man from Wales who had sadly died from
Speaker 1: eating rat poison, but his body would go on to
Speaker 1: help win the war against the Germans in a critical way.
Speaker 1: His preserve corps was taken aboard the h M mess Seraph,
Speaker 1: a British sub along with a briefcase full of fabricated documents.
Speaker 1: There were the letters, of course, which outlined the military plans,
Speaker 1: but he also carried a photograph of a woman purported
Speaker 1: to be his fiancee, bank documents and a receipt for
Speaker 1: an engagement ring, all of which had been included to
Speaker 1: add authenticity to the invented persona, and it had worked.
Speaker 1: The submarine then surfaced off the coast of Spain and
Speaker 1: lowered the body into the water, and everything played out
Speaker 1: exactly as the British had hoped. The deceptive information leaked
Speaker 1: its way to the Germans, who pulled troops out of Sicily,
Speaker 1: leaving it wide open for attack. As a result, the
Speaker 1: Allies retook Sicily from the Germans and Mussolini was stripped
Speaker 1: of his power. A new Italian government took his place,
Speaker 1: which negotiated a surrender with the Allies. An evil empire crumbled,
Speaker 1: all thanks to one man who never existed in the
Speaker 1: first place. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of
Speaker 1: the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or learn more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast
Speaker 1: dot com. The show was created by me Aaron Manky
Speaker 1: in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make another award
Speaker 1: winning show called Lore, which is a podcast, book series,
Speaker 1: and television show, and you can learn all about it
Speaker 1: over at the World of Lore dot com. And until
Speaker 1: next time, stay curious.