Misurata (Italian Libya province) (Italian: Provincia di Misurata) was a province of Italian Libya created in 1937 by Italian fascist authorities. It had the official name: "Commissariato Generale Provinciale di Misurata" and lasted until 1943, during World War II.
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Misurata Province was located in northern Italian Libya, between the Tripoli Province and the Benghazi Province. Its administrative center was the small city of Misrata on the Mediterranean coast.
It was divided in three sections (called "Circondari" in Italian):
The population in the 1939 Census was of nearly 225,000 inhabitants, most of which were Arabs and Berbers. The Italians were nearly 10,000 and were concentrated in Misurata, Hun and some newly created villages [1] for Italian colonists (like "Gioda", "Crispi", "Littoriano", "Corradini", etc..[2])
Most of the population was Muslim, but there was a growing community of catholics due to the Italian colonists immigration[3]. Additionally there were nearly one thousand Jews in Misurata[4].
The province from 1939 was considered officially part of the Kingdom of Italy, and had the same laws. It was one of the four new Italian provinces of the so called Quarta Sponda ("Fourth Shore" in english) of Mussolini's Greater Italia. Indeed on 9 January 1939, the colony of Italian Libya was incorporated into "metropolitan Italy" and thereafter considered an integral part of the Italian state (the French, in 1848, had incorporated French Algeria in the same manner).
In the coast of the province was built in 1937-1938 a section of the Litoranea Balbia, a road that went from Tripoli and Tunisia's frontier to the border of Egypt.
The car tag for the Italian province of Misrata was MU. [5]
In August 1941 the Italians started to build a new 1040 km railway (with a 1435 mm. gauge, like the one used in Egypt and Tunisia) between Tripoli and Benghazi, but the war (with the defeat of the Italian Army) stopped the construction the next year. The project was stopped in the fall of 1942, leaving many infrastructures like stations and connection roads already done in the "Provincia di Misurata": the railway Tripoli-Benghazi had ready 18 km while another 7 km were nearly done; furthermore there were 378 km with only the rail basements ready.[6]
In the province of Misurata, thousands of Italians (called "ventimilli") moved to live in 1938 and 1939 and founded some agricultural villages (Gioda, Crispi, Littoriano, Corradini, etc..)[7]
According to the 1939 Italian Census of Libya[8], these were the main population data:
| CITY' | INHABITANTS | ITALIANS | NOTES |
|---|---|---|---|
| Littoriano | 150 pop. | 150 | Italian colonists village, now abandoned |
| Corradini | 420 pop. | 420 | Italian colonist village, built in 1939 |
| Homs | 35,316 pop. | 1,156 | Italians nearly 3% |
| Misrata | 46,321 pop. | 1,472 | Italians 3% |
| Gioda | 1,550 pop. | 1,550 | Italian colonists village, built in 1939 |
| Taworgha | 5,174 pop. | - | village populated mostly by Blacks and a few Berbers |
| Sirte | 15,014 pop. | 303 | Italians 2% |
| Nofaliya | 3,459 pop. | 35 | Italians nearly 1% |
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