The Danane concentration camp was an Italian colonial prison near Mogadishu, established after Italy’s conquest of Ethiopia. It held thousands of East Africans who had resisted Italian rule, including fighters, community leaders, and civilians. Life in the camp was brutal, overcrowding, disease, lack of food and clean water, and forced labor were common, and nearly half of the prisoners are reported to have died from starvation, illness, and exhaustion.
Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia in 1935 was driven by more than colonial ambition. It was rooted in humiliation. In 1896, Ethiopian forces defeated Italy at the Battle of Adwa, one of the most important military defeats ever suffered by a European power in Africa. For decades, this loss haunted Italian political culture. When Benito Mussolini came to power, he made it a national goal to “avenge” Adwa and build a new Roman-style empire.
In 1935, Fascist Italy invaded Ethiopia using overwhelming force, including chemical weapons. By May 1936, Addis Ababa had fallen, and Ethiopia was officially annexed into a new colonial entity called Italian East Africa, alongside Eritrea and Somaliland. Marshal Rodolfo Graziani was then appointed Viceroy and given broad powers to crush resistance.
Although Italy claimed victory, real control remained weak. Ethiopian resistance fighters, known as the Arbegnoch, continued guerrilla warfare across the country. The occupation quickly turned into a campaign of repression, surveillance, mass arrests, and collective punishment.
In February 1937, tensions erupted following an attempted assassination of Viceroy Rodolfo Graziani, when two Eritrean men threw grenades at him during a public ceremony in Addis Ababa.
Graziani survived. Thousands of Ethiopians did not. What followed was the Yekatit 12 massacre, in which Italian forces killed large numbers of civilians and began a massive crackdown on anyone suspected of opposing colonial rule.
It was in this climate of fear and retaliation that Danane was transformed into a major concentration camp.
Danane concentration ocamp
Danane concentration camp was located near the town of Danane in Italian Somaliland, close to the coast and far from Ethiopia’s political centers. This location was not accidental. The Italians deliberately chose remote, unhealthy regions to isolate prisoners and make escape or public scrutiny almost impossible.
Originally used as a basic detention site, Danane was expanded after 1937 into a full-scale concentration camp. Thousands of Ethiopians, Somalis and Eritreans were transported there from Addis Ababa and other regions. These included: Resistance fighters, Intellectuals and students, Priests and monks, Local chiefs and anyone accused of “anti-Italian behavior”
Most detainees were never tried or formally charged. Many were arrested simply for being educated, influential, or politically suspicious.
Danane became part of a wider network of Italian colonial camps, including Nocra in Eritrea and several others across East Africa. The purpose was clear: remove potential leaders, terrorize the population, and break the backbone of Italian East Africa resistance.
Conditions Within the Camp
The camp was situated in a hot, swampy coastal region plagued by malaria. Most of the prisoners, drawn from Ethiopia’s highlands, were ill-prepared for such harsh conditions. Disease spread quickly, making survival a daily struggle.
Conditions inside the camp were dire. Overcrowding was severe, and shelter from the heat and rain was minimal. Food rations were small, drinking water unsafe, and medical care nearly nonexistent. Malaria, dysentery, typhoid, and dehydration were rampant. Many prisoners arrived already weakened from long forced marches, leaving physical endurance as the primary factor for survival.
At its peak, the camp held roughly 6,000 people, mostly Ethiopians, Somalians, and Eritreans who had resisted Italian rule. Accounts suggest that nearly half of the prisoners died from malnutrition, malaria, and other diseases.
Much of what is known about life in Danane comes from Eugenio Mazzucchetti, the camp commandant who later documented his experiences in a diary. He described a daily existence marked by sickness, fear, and exhaustion.
According to Mazzucchetti, many detainees lived in permanent fear and believed they would never leave the camp alive. Over time, the combination of disease, hunger, forced labor, and psychological terror turned Danane into a place of slow, silent death.
Italian records, supported by later historical research, indicate that roughly half of the camp’s inmates perished from disease, starvation, and exhaustion. Death was usually slow, quiet, and went undocumented.
Unlike Nazi concentration camps, Danane did not rely on mass executions. Instead, the camp’s lethality came from neglect. The harsh environment itself served as a weapon, slowly eroding the health and lives of those imprisoned.
In 1941, during World War II, British and Allied forces defeated Italian troops in East Africa. As they advanced, they liberated Italian camps across the region, including Danane.
Survivors were released, though many were physically broken, traumatized, or permanently ill. Some returned to Ethiopia. Others died shortly after liberation.
Despite its scale and mortality, Danane never became widely known internationally. After the war, Italy was never seriously prosecuted for its colonial crimes in Ethiopia. No major trials comparable to the Nuremberg Trials ever took place for Italian actions in Africa.
For decades, Danane remained largely absent from European historical memory. Only Ethiopian historians, survivors’ families, and a small number of scholars kept its story alive.
Today, Danane stands as one of the clearest examples of how European colonialism used concentration camps long before Nazi Germany, and how colonial violence in Africa was normalized, minimized, and largely forgotten.
Sources:
https://campifascisti.it/scheda_campo.php?id_campo=49
https://www.whlcollections.org/danane-concentration-camp/
https://campifascisti.it/file/media/Testimonianza%20Eugenio%20Mazzucchetti.pdf
