The following day , the German army began moving in on Rome , and that night the King and Badoglio fled the city for Pescara and then to Bari , leaving a leadership vacuum . The Royal Italian Army , although outnumbering the German soldiers three to one , was leaderless , poorly equipped , and in chaos . After a failed resistance at the Pyramid of Cestius by remaining loyalist soldiers , carabinieri ( including a school of cadets ) , and civilians , the Germans occupied Rome . They announced the imposition of German military law with summary execution for violators . Three days later ( on 12 September ) , Nazi commandos tracked down and rescued Mussolini from his hidden prison in the Gran Sasso and set him up in the puppet regime of the so-called " Republic of Salò " in Northern Italy . In October they rounded up and deported the Jews of Rome for extermination at Auschwitz and also made numerous mass roundups of non-Jewish male civilians for forced labor . Meanwhile , General Mark Clark 's Fifth Army in Salerno suffered severe setbacks , and General Eisenhower and other Allied leaders began concentrating their attention on the imminent invasion of France , temporarily neglecting Italy
rounded up and deported the Jews of Rome
Raid of the Ghetto of Rome
Ardeatine massacre