Several issues ago (in Vol. 2 No. 4) the question was raised were the Italian machine gun armed motorcycles in Spain Bersaglieri? I thought that all the photos of Italian motorcyclists in Spain I've ever seen didn't show the famed Bersaglieri feathers on the helmet, so I guessed they were common infantrymen.

Alas, I was probably wrong. Recently I was invited for dinner by a friend of mine, whose father was a Bersaglieri officer who served in Spain and during World War Two. My friend showed me a few photos of his father, both in Greece and in Spain, proudly astride his motorcycle and without any feathers on the helmet. When I asked why, my friend commented that the feathers were both very expensive and very delicate, and would have lasted no more than 10 miles on a fast motorcycle ride. So nobody with any sense was carrying them on the helmets (except when some reporter was around!). All very obvious, now that I've been told.

Moreover, my friend say that the Bersaglieri were the only 'combat' troops trained in m/c driving in the Italian army. So even when not actually part of a Bersaglieri formation (in Greece his father was in a Corps MG Bn), all the MG m/c units were formed by Bersaglieri personnel.

Some time ago there was a discussion about Italian Cavalry units in Spain. Now the same friend of above is a very expert collector of military medals, and he did show me a nicely enamelled commemorative medal, called in a collectors' catalogue as "Gruppo Squadroni del C.T.V." (Squadron Group - the Italian name for a Cavalry Bn - of the Volunteer Troops Corps - the name of the Italian expeditionary force in Spain). The medal shows two crossed lances with Bright Blue pennants, the Falangist "Yoke and Arrows" in Red, a deliciously bad-taste white skull, a huge relief metal fasces and the embossed names of a dozen battles. I guess hat it had been really made for an Italian unit in Spain (and not for a Nationalist Spanish one) for the following reasons:

1) No sense to use a Fasces for a Spanish unit.
2) The Bright Blue pennants are typical of the Italian cavalry. I do not know the colour of the Spanish ones, but, if my Napoleonic recollections are corrects, I guess it should be Red.
3) The medal have the producer marking of A.Boeri, a small firm active in Italy during those times and specialised in Military Post Cards. Boeri sometimes did sold medals with his marking, that were actually produced by my grandfather's firm (the F.M.Lorioli F.lli). Now the Lorioli F.lli made tons of medals directly for the Spanish Nationalist government during the SCW (it was then the largest medal producer in Italy), but I 'suppose' it is extremely unlikely that any unit of the Spanish army would have been able to trace such a small firm as A.Boeri, while it is perfectly possible that an Italian Cavalry officer could have done so.

So I guess that there is a strong possibility that there was an Italian Bn - strength (at least on paper!) unit in Spain as part of the CTV.