<P> In the Quadrilateral General Radetsky and his men were plotting a counterattack in order to regain their lost ground . However, they were interrupted by Charles Albert of Sardinia, the King of Sardinia, who had by then taken the forefront of the attack, and had launched an attack against the Quadrilateral . Charles charged the fortress from all sides aided by 25,000 reinforcements, who came in assistance of their fellow citizens . While journeying to the fortress preparing for the attack, Charles garnered the support of princes of other states . His fellow princes responded by sending reinforcements to his aid: Leopold II, Grand Duke of Tuscany sent 8,000, Pope Pius contributed 10,000, and Ferdinand II sent 16,050 men on the advice of general Guglielmo Pepe . They attacked the fortresses and on 3 May 1848 succeeded in winning the battle of Goito and capturing the fortress of Peschiera . </P> <P> At that point, Pope Pius IX became nervous about defeating the Austrian empire and withdrew his troops, citing that he could not endorse a war between two Catholic nations . King Ferdinand of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies also called his soldiers back and retired his troops . However, some of them did not comply with the order and continued on under the guidance of Generals Pepe, Durando and Giovanni . A year later, Charles launched another attack, but, due to the lack of troops, he was defeated in the Battle of Novara . </P> <P> Despite the fact that Pius had abandoned the war against the Austrians, many of his people had still fought alongside Charles Albert . The people of Rome rebelled against Pius' government and assassinated Pellegrino Rossi, Pius' minister . Pope Pius IX then fled to the fortress of Gaeta, under the protection of King Ferdinand II . In February 1849, he was joined by Leopold II, Grand Duke of Tuscany who had to flee from there because of another insurrection . Piedmont was also lost to the Austrians in 1849 and Charles Albert had to abdicate leaving his son, Victor Emanuel II, to rule . </P> <P> In Rome, the authority that did take over passed popular legislation to eliminate burdensome taxes and give work to the unemployed . Giuseppe Garibaldi and Giuseppe Mazzini came to build a "Rome of the People," and the short - lived Roman Republic was proclaimed . The Republic succeeded in inspiring the people to build an independent Italian nation . It also attempted to improve economically the lives of the underserved by giving some of the Church's large landholdings and giving it to poor peasants . It also made prison and insane asylum reforms, gave freedom to the press, provided secular education, but shied away from the "Right to Work", having seen this fail in France . </P>

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