After the unification of Italy in 1860 and the arrival in 1902 of a railroad line to Avezzano that linked Roccasecca with the larger world, emigration to the industrial north and farther abroad became more practical. But the agricultural life of Roccasecca remained unbroken until World War II. The war was a tragic episode: Roccasecca was chosen, due to its rail station and railroad bridge across the Melfa, as the headquarters for the German XIV Panzer Corps under General Fridolin von Senger und Etterlin, with the consequence of repeated Allied bombing, which heavily damaged the commune's population and culminated in a ferocious attack on the rail station.