Original Item: Only One Available. This excellent condition fez features a gold fascist wheat symbol to the front which has retained most of its original color. The side of the cap has what appears to be a rank insignia for a Captain.

The interior is lined with a lovely cream colored satin, though it is worn and torn. The leather sweatband is in wonderful condition but the manufacturer marking is no longer legible.

The condition is excellent and shows little to no signs of any wear.

Comes more than ready for display!

1st CC.NN. Division "23 Marzo"
The 1st CC.NN. Division "23 Marzo" was an Italian CC.NN. (Blackshirts militia) division raised on 23 April 1935 for the Second Italo-Ethiopian War against Ethiopia. The name "23 Marzo" ("March 23rd") was chosen to commemorate the founding date of the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento on 23 March 1919. The division took part in the Italian invasion of Egypt and was destroyed during the Battle of Bardia in January 1941.

The division was reformed in Chieti in 1939 and sent with three other CC.NN. divisions to Italian Libya. The division took part in the invasion of Egypt in September 1940, reaching Sidi Barrani in Egypt by October. On 1 December 1940 the division was at Bardia, where it was surrounded with other Italian units by British forces during Operation Compass. After a short siege the division was destroyed during the Battle of Bardia on 3-5 January 1941.

The Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nacionale (MVSN, "Voluntary Militia for National Security''), commonly called the Blackshirts (Italian: camicie nere, CCNN) or squadristi, was originally the paramilitary wing of the National Fascist Party and, after 1923, an all-volunteer militia of the Kingdom of Italy. Its members were distinguished by their black uniforms (modeled on those of the Arditi, Italy's elite troops of World War I) and their loyalty to Benito Mussolini, the Duce (leader) of Fascism, to whom they swore an oath. The founders of the paramilitary groups were nationalist intellectuals, former army officers and young landowners opposing peasants' and country laborers' unions. Their methods became harsher as Mussolini's power grew, and they used violence and intimidation against Mussolini's opponents. In 1943 the MVSN was integrated into the Italian armed forces.

History of the black shirts:
Blackshirt, Italian Camicia Nera, plural Camicie Nere, member of any of the armed squads of Italian Fascists under Benito Mussolini, who wore black shirts as part of their uniform.

The first squads - each of which was called Squadre d’Azione (Action Squad) - were organized in March 1919 to destroy the political and economic organizations of socialists.

By the end of 1920 the Blackshirts were attacking and destroying the organizations not only of socialists but also of communists, republicans, Catholics, trade unionists, and those in cooperatives, and hundreds of people were killed as the Fascist squads expanded in number. A Fascist convention in Naples on October 24, 1922, provided the pretext for the contingent of armed Blackshirts from all over the country for the famous March on Rome that put Mussolini into power.

Early the next year, on February 1, 1923, the private Blackshirts were officially transformed into a national militia, the Voluntary Fascist Militia for National Security. The black shirt was worn not only by these military Fascists but also by other Fascists and their sympathizers, especially on patriotic occasions. With the fall of Mussolini in 1943, however, the black shirt and the Blackshirts fell into disgrace.