Gaggero, Andrea

Born Apr. 4, 1916, in the province of Genoa. Italian public figure.

In 1940, after graduating from the ecclesiastical seminary and the institute of Oratory, Gaggero became a priest. During World War II (1939-45) he participated in the Resistance; from 1944 to 1945 he was a prisoner in the Bolzano concentration camp (northern Italy) and later in Mauthausen (Austria). After his release in 1945, Gaggero returned to Genoa, where he joined the Movement of the Supporters of Peace. In 1950 he became a member of the International Council of Peace and was elected to the presidium of the Italian peace movement. In May 1953, Gaggero was defrocked for “serious insubordination to the orders of the church leaders.” He was awarded the International Lenin Prize for Strengthening Peace Among Peoples (1953).