FRANCO, GIOVANNI GIUSEPPE. - Jesuit, brother and confrere of the very well-known preacher Father Secondo, born in Turin on 26 January 1824, died in Rome on 15 January 1908. Received into the Society on 9 August 1838, he was ordained a priest in Vercelli on 4 June 1848.
The dispersal of the Jesuits, following the upheavals of that year, gave him the opportunity, as he traveled far and wide through France and Belgium, to perfect his theological training at Loranzo and his botanical training in Paris, and to build up there a solid culture in the most disparate fields. He returned to Italy in 1851, and between 1857 and 1863 he preached missions in Tuscany and made a long stay in Corsica, while his reputation as a polished and effective writer kept growing ever stronger, through appreciated narrative essays of a historical, pedagogical and moral character.
On 2 November 1863 he entered the editorial staff of La Civiltà Cattolica, to which, together with the priestly ministry, he gave the very best of himself not only through numerous articles and review pieces, but also through novels and stories, mostly drawn from historical events, including contemporary ones; gripping plots, fine analysis, instructive information, although at times prolix and digressive; Tigranate (2 vols., Rome 1883); Le vie del cuore (2 vols., Modena 1889); Le gemelle africane (2 vols., ibid. 1892); Gli spiriti delle tenebre (ibid. 1892); La sposa della Sila (ibid. 1893). Particularly noteworthy are I Crociati di S. Pietro (1868), which later appeared in three volumes (Rome 1869-70), and were also widely translated and published abroad. The work constitutes a valuable historical source for the events of October-November 1867. The author, in fact, besides making use of an abundant bibliography of every tendency, was also able to draw freely and with scrupulous objectivity on the correspondence of the pontifical government placed at his disposal by Pius IX. Moreover, at the latter's wish, F. carried out delicate assignments on the occasion of the Vatican Council and contributed to the edition of the Summa Conciliorum brevissima of the Council's secretary, Monsignor Fessler.
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Paolo Dalla Torre