![The Valmara – Madonna di Ponte customs office around 1940.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/titelbild-8-300x225.jpg)
A story of resistance and escape
During the Second World War, numerous people attempted to flee persecution across the Italian-Swiss border into Ticino. This included Egone Gruenberger, who only managed to escape to freedom on his second attempt and after a long ordeal.
![](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/egone-grunberger-227x300.jpg)
![](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/edith-grunberger-216x300.jpg)
Portraits of Egone and Edith Gruenberger. Swiss Federal Archives
![Brissago boat landing stage, around 2000.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/brissago-300x202.jpg)
![Interrogation protocol from February 1944, which reports on the admission of Edith Gruenberger and the simultaneous rejection of the rest of the family.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/abweisung-familie-grunberger-300x160.jpg)
![The San Vittore prison in a photograph from around 1880.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/san-vittore-gefangnis-1880-300x183.jpg)
![The Binario 21 Museum shows the goods wagon in which the Jewish people were deported.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/guterwaggon-gedenkstatte-300x182.jpg)
![The underground platform 21 originally housed the post office. The wagons were loaded and brought to the surface in a lift. A “Wall of Names” now commemorates the people who were deported from there to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. The names of the few survivors are written in orange.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/gedenkstatte-300x210.jpg)
Rapid change in refugee policy
![Questionnaire answered by Egon Gruenberger after the second, successful attempt to enter Switzerland. Bellinzona, 20 February 1944.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/fragebogen-einreise-egone-212x300.jpg)
In the region between Ascona and Verbania, there is the Percorso della Speranza, which traces the events of this period, while the Insubrica Historica association offers a trek along the routes taken by refugees, partisans and deserters to reach Switzerland.