Canzi was born in Piacenza in 1893, fought in WW1 and joined the Italian anarchist movement in the 1920s. He helped train the Arditti del Popolo (People’s Commandos) who fought against Mussolini’s Blackshirts. In exile, he agitated against fascism and fought it in the Spanish Civil War. Captured by the Germans in 1940, interned in Italy, he escaped to play a major part in the partisan struggle in his native Piacenza.