Historians have stressed that from the mid-1850s Mazzini's influence on his followers was greatly diminished. Contemporary sources and even early hagiographic histories show how the repercussions of the abortive Milanese insurrection of 1853 followed, in 1857, by the double failure of the Genoese uprising and Pisacane's Southern expedition – equally disastrous in their outcomes – had profoundly damaged Mazzini's reputation. More recent historiography has reiterated such interpretations, in both their Italian and British respects.

Salvo Mastellone has underlined how the failed insurrection in Milan kick-started a virulent campaign against Mazzini in The Times, which was echoed by other papers. John Rothney stressed how some SFI members became critical of Mazzini's anti-Piedmontese stance. David Laven underlined how the news of Pisacane's death had ‘appalled many British sympathisers with the Italian cause’, while Maura O'Connor stressed how by the end of the 1850s men and women in Britain had jumped ‘on Garibaldi's bandwagon’ – leaving ‘a handful of enthusiasts’ to fight Mazzini's corner.