Al Maly provided this photograph of his father, Joe Maly, taken when Joe was in Italy and while he was being sheltered by the Papiri family of Montefalcone.

To the best of my knowledge the writing on the back of the photo reads:

Montefalcone li 25-6-1944 (A. Piceno)

Mio dovere come patriota, lasciarvi a tutti il ricordo
Famiglia Papiri, Nello Papiri

The first line indicates the village name (Montefalcone Appennino), the date (June 25, 1944), and the province the village was a part of at the time (Ascoli Piceno). Montefalcone is today a part of the newly-formed Province of Fermo.

The next two lines translate as “My duty as a patriot,” plus something along the lines of “I’ll leave you all this record [or keepsake].”

And it is signed,
“Papiri Family, Nello Papiri”

According to Al, the first man standing on the left is a son in the Papiri family. Next to the son is Joe Maly, and beside Joe is James Guillary. The other three men in the photo were also escaped POWs. Joe and “Gilly” were both housed in Hut 4–Section 11 of Camp 59.

Al told me his dad “was one of the men who made it out through the hole in the wall and in his group one of the men was shot. They could not go back for him as they were under fire. He never talked much about the war, only little indirect statements when I was young and a little more detail as I got older and more close to him.”

After the escape, Joe fought with the Italian resistance. He eventually made it to the Polish lines.

Joe passed away in January 2000.

An article by Steve Grazier, “WWII vet finally awarded medals 60 years after serving country,” appeared in the online Cortez [Colorado] Journal on October 17. Luther Shields, now 90 years old, received his fine assortment of military service medals at a ceremony at the Vista Grande Inn in Cortez on October 6.

Earlier this year, I received from Trish Harper photocopies of a calendar booket her father possessed when he was interned at Camp 59. Charles Kenneth Simmons used the printed calendar pages to mark off the days as they passed. He used blank spaces to record notes about activities in the camp and rumors of war that reached the prisoners.

Simmons used the pages marked for “MEMORANDUM” to record names and addresses of fellow servicemen.

Altogether he recorded addresses of:

61 American servicemen
Four English servicemen
Four Scottish servicemen
One Australian serviceman
Six Italian families

I will post all of the addresses on this site as I transcribe them and confirm their accuracy as best I can (the handwriting is not always clear).

Interestingly, the summer 2008 online newsletter of the UK National Ex-Prisoner of War Association contains an article about two prisoners (Maurice Newey and David John Jenkins) from Italian Camp 54 at Fara in Sabrina who had been given copies of the same calendar book.

According to the newsletter, the six-month calendar, entitled “Christmas 1942,” was a gift of Pope Pius XII. The booklet is composed of 48 pages plus a cardboard cover. Pages 26-48 contain hymns and Christmas carols. The booklet also contains quotations of papal encouragement and a prayer by Cardinal John Henry Newman (“Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom”).

British serviceman William George Wales served in the Royal Sussex Regiment, 1st Buffs. He was captured in North Africa on December 15, 1941 and sent to the prison camp in Servigliano.

From Italy he was transferred to Germany, where he was interned at Stalag 7-A Moosburg, Stalag 11-A Altengrabow, Stalag 11-B Fallingbostel, and Commando 1011 Wolfenbüttel.

William was liberated on April 23, 1945.

Later in life he was consulted during the making of the film “Von Ryan’s Express.” He died in 1980.

This photo of Henry (at left) and Richard Kane was taken on the boardwalk in Jacksonville, FL while the brothers were on a pass during training. Henry’s son George commented, “Ironic that the photo depicts exactly what was to come several months later.” 

Memories of WW II Continue For Kane Brothers

December 23, 1986, The Sentinel, New Windsor, New York

Editors note: This is part two of a two-part feature. The first part appeared in the December 18 issue of The Sentinel.

by Linda Fehrs

Henry and Richard Kane are brothers who did many things together including joining the army in World War II. After fighting many battles, mostly in northern Africa they were captured together by the Axis powers and spent well over two years in prisoner of war camps in Europe.

After being transferred from camp to camp they had ended up in Palermo, staying there for about a year. They spent their time reading and playing games. The Red Cross sent them packages regularly, but life in the camp was not of the highest quality. The place was rampant with bedbugs and the men had body lice. The meals were sparse and the conditions less than pleasant to say the least.

One of the goals of captured soldiers in time of war is to escape. And this was what Henry and Richard Kane, along with other American soldiers, did. They managed to blow a hole in the wall of their camp and escape through some tunnels they had been digging.

The rough part was trying to get back to American lines without being recaptured—or killed. For months they walked only at night, following the North Star and the Big Dipper. They walked halfway through Italy, through the Apennines mountains.

The men tried to keep together along the way. Villagers would take them in for the night. In exchange for food and shelter, the soldiers would help with chores around the farms, such as stomping grapes. They died their prison uniforms so as not to stand out.

“From where we were,” says Henry, “we could hear the front lines.”

Along the way they were also helped by British paratroopers, who gave them each 20,000 lire. The soldiers kept only about 2,000 lire for themselves and gave the rest to the people who would help them along the way.

“If it wasn’t for the help we got,” says Richard, “there was no way we would have survived.”

Their journey took them to the city. One day, while there, an earthquake hit the town. The brothers say just about the whole town slid down the mountain, the house they were in cracked in half.

Then, six months into their travels, they were recaptured.

“We could have been turned in at any time,” says Henry, “but the people we had stayed with had been kind to us. They would even bring food up to us in the mountains.”

But eventually the Germans did find them and took the four soldiers and several people who had helped them into the local German headquarters near Podeo.

“They took us and put us into these small cubicles, in a dungeon,” says Richard.

“We figured we would be shot,” added Henry.

They were there about two or three weeks in separate areas. It was dark and the men could barely stand up in the cramped little spaces they were in.

Henry says the Germans thought the American soldiers were affiliated with the rebels in the area. Today they would be called terrorists, he says.

“There was seven of us all together,” says Henry, “and we had a German general court martial.”

The four American soldiers sat in trial for three days, not understanding a word of what was being said. When it was over, an interpreter told them they would be going to Germany.

The soldiers were lucky, and so was one woman who was also tried. It was discovered she had a husband fighting in Africa, and she was let go and given some money due her.

But one man was beaten severely for helping the Americans and one, even less lucky, received death by firing squad.

The soldiers were sent first to an area just outside of Florence, in northern Italy, where they would get a train to Germany.

The brothers say prisoners would be shot as they tried to escape. The bodies would sometimes fall onto the tracks, but instead of removing them the trains would just ride over them. The remains would stay on the tracks for all to see.

The Germans were anxious to get the prisoners to Germany, but the Allied forces kept bombing the tracks. Each day they would be repaired and perhaps a train would get out.

The trains were the box cars you see in photographs and films of the Holocaust. Forty-five men would be crammed into the barren car. There was no water, no toilet. If the men died, they remained with the living. The prisoners had to defecate on the floor, and because there was no room, had to stand, sit, and sleep in it.

As the train Henry and Richard were in travelled to Germany, it was bombed. The back end of the train was hit badly and all the prisoners in the rear were killed. The brothers once again, in a twist of luck, had survived.

They were taken to Stalag (camp) 17 near Munich where they stayed for one month. Their job was to repair the railroad tracks.

Every day, they say, about 500 bombers would drop 1,000 pound bombs destroying the tracks. And, every day the prisoners would go out and fix them.

“We could see them (the planes) coming, says Henry, “and we’d go for shelter. We’d come back after the bombing and all the work we had done would be gone from the bombs. We’d see the steel rails wrapped around telephone poles because of the force of the bombs.”

From Munich they were sent to Muthburgh Stalag 2B. At that camp there were prisoners of all nationalities including Russian and Arab soldiers. Each nationality was kept separate. While the Americans received packages from the Red Cross, many others received nothing. Many of the other prisoners, say the brothers, had nothing to live for, nothing to go home for, because of a feeling of disgrace. Many, they say, died in the camps because of it.

Stalag 2B was actually relatively comfortable. At times there were cigarettes and beer available to them. They had bread, and hard rolls, which they kept and were able to trade for other things. They lived in barracks and were assigned work details. Richard and Henry worked in East Prussia, cutting wood for a year. Two cords a day they cut, by handsaw.

From Jan 2 of that year, until May 2, they marched together with 1,500 fellow prisoners from the Russian front to the American front. They had to keep moving.

In May it looked to them as if the German army was retreating. Then the Spitfires came out. “We dug in,” says Richard, “we were waiting for something to happen.” They were in Russian territory, under German guard. “The guards were taking care of us,” says Henry, “making sure we were all okay.”

The two brothers say it was probably because they knew something was about to happen.

“We looked up,” says Henry, “at an aircraft coming at us, not knowing what was going to happen. He flew over us and tipped his wing at us.”

They knew then that the war was over. It was time to go home.

The German soldiers wanted desperately to come with them to America. They knew things would be bad in Europe after the war.

The former prisoners were taken to Hanover Airport and shipped to France. They spent one night in Paris before returning home.

But going home was not like coming over. They had come over in style on the Queen Mary. They went home on a freighter.

“But,” says Richard, “we knew we were headed in the right direction. We were going home.”

The freighter took them to New York Harbor, past America’s landmark of freedom, the Statue of Liberty.

“It was a beautiful sight,” says Henry, “it’s impossible to express how we felt. For two and a half years we heard no English…You can’t put into words what it was all like.”

The brothers spent two and a half years in Europe, but for them it was a lifetime. “Things change,” says Henry, “you go into the army, and war, a young boy. You grow up a lot. Nothing is ever the same. You look at the world, at your home, differently after those experiences. Your thinking is just not the same.”

After returning they were given two weeks R & R (rest and recuperation) leave in Lake Placid.

Richard came home and married the girl he had left behind. Henry got married one year later.

After getting out of the Army in Sept. 1945, Richard worked a few odd jobs before working at A & P, from which he later retired.

Henry began working at Bethlehem Steel in Pennsylvania, but then came back to the Newburgh area and worked at American Felt and Filter for awhile. Under the GI Bill he learned masonry, and worked as a mason at West Point. Now retired, Henry Kane’s work can be seen all over the area. He does work privately now, and a sample of his work can be seen at the Midway Market in New Windsor.

It’s hard for them to talk about the war, even though it’s been forty years. “Sometimes, talking about it bothers us,” says Richard, “It opens old wounds, old memories. It brings it all back. But you learn to live with it.”

This year Henry got Prisoners of War license plates for his car. Richard is still waiting.

Throughout the years they have both been members of the American Legion. Richard is the commander of the post in Montgomery (No. 5210), and Henry is the vice-commander in New Windsor post (No. 1796).

Both men have sons who served in Vietnam.

The brothers are still married to the women they wed after the war, Henry to Gertrude and Richard to Marie. Between them they have eight children. Richard and Marie have four sons; Robert, Richard, Roger, and Ronald. Henry and Gertrude have three sons and a daughter; Kevin, George, Henry, and Karen.

Henry and Richard have many things that they share, many memories, but perhaps none so great and deep as the experiences that being brothers together in time of war.

Richard and Henry Kane, 1941

Brothers Recall Wartime Memories

December 18, 1986, The Sentinel, New Windsor, New York

Editors note: This is part one of a two-part feature. The second part will appear in our next issue.

by Linda Fehrs

It was while they were working on their family’s apple farm on Drury Lane that they decided to join the Civilian Conservation Corps. Henry and Richard Kane were just young boys then and eager to help their country.

Every eligible male it seemed back then wanted to help out and the CCC was a good place to start. They earned $30 a month and sent $20 of that home.

Henry worked at a Gypsy moth camp in Peekskill, 8 hours a day, and later transferred to Albany. Richard worked as a tree climber near West Point.

They stayed with the CCC for about six months. It was run by Reserve officers and the brothers say had the same discipline as the Army.

In October of 1940, they each had made the decision to join the Army. On the 24th day of the month they signed up in New York City. After two days home it was off to Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn for six weeks basic training.

They became part of the 1st Division out of Fort Devens, Mass. and were there about a year. It was at Fort Devens they heard about the Japanese invasion of Pearl Harbor.

Henry says he was lying on a cot about one in the afternoon when he heard it on the radio. Richard was on guard duty outside a base theatre. “Dianna Durbin was playing in the movie,” he recalls.

It was Dec. 7, 1941. They served two years in the army without seeing combat. In the meantime, they put on a show of maneuvers for Winston Churchill and travelled from New England to Florida and back with the Army.

They then got notice they were going to Europe. “We went over on the Queen Mary,” said Henry. “We thought it was wonderful. We had swimming in the pool.” Richard added, “It was some ship. There was 24 hour feeding. We all had different color passes for different times. It was great,” but he laughs, “we were young and stupid.”

Five days out at sea the soldiers got a message, that Germans had made an announcement that the Queen Mary had been sunk three days before. Two days later an obviously healthy Queen Mary pulled in to Glasgow, Scotland.

From Glasgow, they travelled to Tidworth Barracks just outside of London. The brothers say they marched 25 miles a day with a full pack weighing about 70 pounds. For awhile it was back and forth between Glasgow and England. In Oct. they left Glasgow. There were 885 ships in Glasgow Harbor, waiting to go to North Africa. It took about a month for them all to assemble. Together the ships, along with a convoy from the United States invaded Africa in November.

When the ships got close to shore, the soldiers were transferred to smaller vessels bringing them closer. Harry says his landing went alright, it ended up in shallow water, but Richard wasn’t so lucky. There was no moon, it was dark and he didn’t hit the shore right, and landed in water over his head with his full pack on.

The battle consisted of four invasions and lasted two weeks. Two weeks of constant battle. Although they were in the same infantry and company, the brothers were in different platoons, so they didn’t fight side by side. But they both agree the experience is something you never forget. It was then the brothers said, you knew you were there for keeps.

Some time later they moved on to Oran, near Algiers. It was there they say that you could get shot for not knowing the password when asked.

When they were in battle they could see the enemy soldiers handcuffed to their machine guns, so as not to run from the fighting.

They were then bivouacked outside a small town that was held by the Germans. Ultimately the Americans took the town.

It was on to Tunis after that, with a quick trip to Casablanca, then back to Tunis. Richard said the convoy went to Tunis and it took about two weeks. “We went into combat and never got out of it again. Our company was being sent up to the front line.” Henry continued, “We were sent as a suicide company. We didn’t really know what was there. We were told to go up a mountain and hold it as long as we could. We were told it would be against snipers and machine guns. We went in knowing we wouldn’t come out, that we’d either be killed or captured. No one could help us.”

Richard says they fought straight through from 7 pm until 8 am trying to get the hill. He was on the top part of the hill, Henry was on the right and met with more opposition.

At 8 am Richard was captured. He says he stood there looking down the hill seeing the others being killed, not knowing if his brother was dead or alive. He didn’t know until later that day in a nearby camp that Henry was alive, when he was brought in about two hours later. Richard says his sergeant was killed. In all 75 men survived and were captured, 248 men had gone up that hill to fight. “Our captain surrendered us,” said Henry, “One he realized there was no one left to help us.”

They spent about one week in an interrogation camp in Tunis. All the while the surrounding area was being bombed by Allied Air Force. Henry said, “They bombed the buildings right next to ours. We were scared, but we had a lot of respect for the Air Force.”

“The Germans would ask us why we weren’t home vacationing in Fla,” said Richard. “They told us they knew where we had been, all about our ship movements. But they knew even then they were losing the war.”

Henry said the Germans who questioned them spoke better English than the Americans did.

Both Henry and Richard say the war then was different. It wasn’t good, but there was a mutual respect on each side. It was a controlled war, they said, with rules. It was bad, but even in the prisoner camps they were treated like soldiers.

After a week in the prisoner camp, they were transferred to a camp in Sicily where they spent one month. Many people died from sickness there, two or three each day. There was nothing to eat and the mud in which they walked was about a foot deep. Richard went down to 90 pounds. “It was one of the worst camps they were in,” he said.

After the month, they were sent to Port St. George on the Adriatic Coast and then Palermo where they stayed for a year.

At one point, Henry said he was put in handcuffs for having a slat missing in his bed. While there each morning they received a small container or chicory. Dinner was a big kettle of water with three pieces of cheese, a few carrots, and some noodles. The soldiers would ask that the contents of the kettle be stirred up each time so that they might get a morsel.

Henry said be spent a lot of time watching the ants, which were all over. Everyone had body lice, said Henry, and the place was loaded with bedbugs.

There was not much to do, though, except read and play games. Every so often they would get Red Cross packages in accordance with the Geneva Convention.

It was from Palermo that they escaped dramatically after blowing a hole in the wall.

(Next week we will continue the escape and recapture of Henry and Richard Kane.)

Caption: Richard (left) and Henry Kane have done many things together over the years, back in the 1930’s they joined the Civilian Conservation Corps., in the 1940’s they joined the army. Shortly thereafter they were both captured by the Axis powers and spent 2½ years in and out of prison camps. They are shown above holding a news clipping of the report of their capture.

John Everett, Jr. e-mailed me last week that his sister, Sandra Everett Barnett, reminded him of another bit of information their father had shared with her, but that was not included in his written story:

“My Dad had said that food was scarce in the camp, and once more the Italian families came through for them. Apparently, a couple of near-by farmers would toss a few potatoes over the fences around the barracks at night for the soldiers. He said that it was about the only food they had sometimes.”

After escape from Camp 59 on September 14, 1943, Armie Hill and Ben Farley traveled south together and reached the British 8th Army, near Termoli, on October 15.

During this month-long journey the soldiers were assisted by a number of Italians.

In his two recorded accounts of the escape, Armie describes the help they received from the Bianchini family.

Two Bianchini addresses are recorded in his address book:

Bianchini Angela
Caserine N118
Roccafluvione
Ascoli Piceno

Bianchini Angelo
Porta Romana N18
Ascoli Piceno

Armie explained that the Bianchinis “…owned a place in the city, but this [the home in Roccafluvione] was out in the country—kind of like a hiding place or like a resort.” By contrast, Porta Romana is one of the six historical quarters of the city of Ascoli Piceno.

The addresses of two other Italian families are recorded in Armie’s address book.

I know nothing specific about Rocco DiPasquale in Roccamorice (Pescora), and Vincenzo DeThomasis in Abbateggio (Pescara). But their inclusion in the address book is evidence that they were helpful, and the addresses are a documentation of the route Armie and Ben traveled on their way south through Italy.

When my dad showed me these addresses years ago, I asked if he had written to the Italians after his return to the U.S. He said no, but he added that after the war people looked forward—and perhaps the Italians wouldn’t care to be contacted.

The Bianchini Family

Armie described the Bianchini family in detail in his 1976 account of the escape. After Armie and Ben walked through Rochafluvione and were threatened, they were befriended by a priest and a group of sympathetic locals, who saw to it that the two soldiers were protected:

“They told us to follow a boy, and the boy led us to a farm. At that farm we were kept for several days. We were told to climb a ladder into the hayloft. Then the ladder was removed and it was returned only when we were to climb down. The owners of the farm were an older couple. The boy that helped us lived there with them. Two young girls, their granddaughters, lived there also. Two years earlier the granddaughters had come from Canada to visit, but when Mussolini took control of the country he forbade anyone to enter or leave. These people were very kind. They fed us and saw to our every need.

“One day the boy told us he knew of a good place to swim. We went with him and swam naked. When we returned we found the woman crying. The Germans had been through taking men and she wondered what had happened to us.

“The Germans often came through towns and machine-gunned the streets and took by force as many men as they needed. They loaded them into trucks and took them away to work or to fight for them. We had seen them do this. At first there was crying, but when the firing began all grew perfectly still. Resistance meant death.

“The Germans were offering a 3,000 lire reward for aid in capturing an escaped prisoner—dead or alive. Immediate death was dealt to anyone who helped an escaped prisoner. We didn’t want to cause trouble for these people so we left as soon as we could. They all cried when we left. The older folks gave us 50 lire to take along, and the children gave us money, too—another 50 lire—when their grandparents weren’t around. They didn’t want the grandparents to know about it.”

Armie described the same rescue by the priest in Rochafluvione in his 1987 account of the escape:

“Children milled around us. We ran a block or so and left them behind, and then suddenly there was a priest standing right in the middle of the street. He opened his gown and he put his hands around us. He said a prayer. He talked to some of the Italians. One of the Italians could speak English, and he said that the priest wanted us to follow the children—they would lead us away and hide us.

“So we followed them and they took us up the side of a mountain. There was a nice house there and there were some people there. We were introduced us to them. They were very nice—an older grandfather and grandmother. Their daughter lived in Canada, and her children had come to Italy to visit their grandparents. Mussolini laid down a law that nobody could leave Italy. The children had to stay with their grandparents. Their mother was still in Canada.

“The grandfather got a long ladder and he told us to climb to a loft in the hay barn—which was about 20 feet high—and hide in the hay. Then he took the ladder down. The next day they put the ladder back and they gave us food. We were there for several days. They fed us, even though they didn’t have much to eat themselves. The man seemed like he was a richer Italian, and this was just his hidden camp. He owned a place in the city, but this was out in the country—kind of like a hiding place or like a resort.

“They were very good to us, and they wanted us to stay with them. They said they would let us know when the Americans were coming. We expected the Americans or British to come any minute, too. But then the old man bicycled to town—to the post office—and he came back very excited. He said there was a sign on the post office wall declaring that prisoners had escaped from the prisoner-of-war camp. A reward of 3,000 lire was offered to anyone who could capture or give information on the escaped prisoners—whether dead or alive.

“And he said the news was that anyone who helped the prisoners could be sentenced to death. He was pretty excited about that. Ben and I told them, ‘We don’t want to endanger your lives. You have been very kind to us. We’ll leave right away.’

“The old man said, ‘I’ll get a guide who can take you over the mountains.’

“Our guide was an Italian soldier who had either gone “over the hill,” or was just on furlough. We didn’t ask him which. He couldn’t speak much English, but he could speak a little. If we would follow him, he said, he would take us away from the village and farther from the prisoner-of-war camp. We knew that they would be searching for us close to the camp. The farther we could get away the safer we would be.

“The Italian, his wife, and the grandchildren all hated to see us go. Even the children were saying ‘Stada qua! Stada qua!’ which in Italian means, ‘Stay here. Stay here.’ They wanted us to stay, but we didn’t know when the Americans would be coming. The grandparents gave us 50 lire of Italian money. And a little later the grandchildren, who had their own savings, also gave us 50 lire. They didn’t even tell their grandparents about it. They just gave it—that was really nice of them.

“We said goodbye and thanked them as best we could. I had quite a bit of French money and American money. I may have given them some of it—I think I did—and then we left there.”

According records Armie kept in his notebook, he and Ben stayed for three full days with the Bianchini family. They arrived on Friday, September 17 and left on Tuesday, September 21.

Nazareno Lupi and his wife, whose family hid John Everett and Willis Largent for over nine months. John received this picture after the war from the Lupi family.

John Everett (with arms crossed) and two comrades.

Two weeks ago I received these photographs and the following story from John O. Everett, Jr.

He wrote, “Dad’s story is in the form of a submission he and I made to TNT years ago when they were focusing on soldiers’ stories one Memorial Day weekend. I had sat down with my Dad several times to obtain the timeline and other details for the story, and it was completed and submitted a year before he died. Although TNT did not include his story during the broadcast, I am so glad that I documented his experience so that I can provide the details to you.”

John O. Everett, Sr. passed away in 1995.

It’s a pleasure to share his story, and it’s my hope that the gratitude he wished to send to the Lupi family by way of the TNT broadcast will find it’s way to them somehow through this site.

John Everett and Willis Largent were both interned in Hut 4–Section 11—the section of men Armie Hill was assigned when he was transferred to the camp.

Here is John’s tale, which he named “The Unsung WWII Heroes of Italy: A POW’s Story.”

The Unsung WWII Heroes of Italy:
A POW’s Story

“What the hell part of the world are you from?”

I still remember this question asked of three scruffy American soldiers in June, 1944 by an officer in the South African Army near Foggia, Italy. The rags that served as our clothing were part U.S. Army issue, part Italian farmer, and our boots had more holes than leather. And yet we were happy, we were safe, and we owed our lives to an Italian family that hid four prisoners of war from the Germans for over nine months.

The history books tell us that Italy was our enemy during World War II. But you will never convince a number of POWs who owe their lives to the courage and generosity of several poor Italian families who shared when they had nothing to give.

World War II began for me when I was drafted in early 1942. I had originally volunteered for service in 1941, but was turned down due a problem with my legs. Like so many other health problems, mine was “reevaluated” when the fighting got hot and heavy in 1942.

On August 2, 1942, I shipped out of New York harbor on the Queen Mary with 17,000 other soldiers for service in North Africa. For a while, my service there as a private in the “Big Red One” (1st Infantry) was uneventful, highlighted only by the opportunity to deliver a message to General George Patton. I will never forget those pearl-handled revolvers.

However, in April, 1943, Sgt. Calvin Hannah of California and I were returning by jeep from establishing a forward command post near Kasserine Pass, North Africa. We became lost and drove right into a German machine gun nest, and were quickly surrounded by German soldiers. Having no alternative but to surrender, we were taken as prisoners of war and after two weeks were shipped to Camp P.G. 98 in Sicily. We were kept there for 28 days, and nearly starved to death. We were then shipped to Ascoli province in central Italy in May, where we were treated fairly well as POWs and even began to receive Red Cross parcels.

Our relatively secure existence as POWs came to a sudden halt in September, 1943. Italy had decided to pull out of the war, and the prison camp was behind the German lines to the South. The Italian camp officials told us to be patient, and that they would try to train us back to the American lines. However, the Allies had landed in Southern Italy, and the Germans were retreating towards Ascoli. Fearing that the Germans might simply kill all POWs as they retreated, the camp officials swung open the prison gates at 10:00 p.m. one night, gave us Red Cross parcels, wished us luck, and told approximately 1,200 prisoners that we were on our own.

This was the loneliest feeling that I ever had in my life. For a farm boy from Mississippi, this was scarier than anything I had ever faced. We only knew that the Allies were to the South, and that the Germans were to the North, South, East, and West.

Six of us grouped together and walked all night, stopping the next morning only after we had walked about 20 or 25 miles. And it was a good thing that we did not stop to rest; we learned later that a number of the POWs were captured that night when they chose to rest first before beginning their journey.

I ended up traveling with one other soldier, Willis Largent of Maryville, Tennessee. After about two weeks, we eventually walked up to a farmhouse near the small town of Force on a Sunday morning, where a young woman was working in the yard. After much discussion, we decided to approach her and ask her, in our broken Italian, if we could have some hot water for the instant coffee in our Red Cross packs. She called her father, Nazareno Lupi, who invited us in and asked us to stay and eat with them.

After supper, Nazareno asked us to stay in their barn until it was safer to travel. We were leery of doing this, but this seemed to be a better alternative than taking off in an unknown direction for an unknown future. This poor Italian farm family, with little to eat, ended up hiding us for over nine months from the Germans.

We tried to help out with the farm as much as we could, and we ate as little as possible because there was so little to go around. They were entirely self-sufficient; they plowed the fields with an ox, had a small vineyard, and had no electricity. Wartime was especially tough on farm families; obtaining something as simple as salt was extremely difficult.

There were two families living in the house: Nazareno, his wife and three daughters, Nazareno’s widowed sister-in-law and her three daughters, and a granddaughter Ida (who we first approached asking about hot water). Ida’s father was in the Italian Army, and the family had no idea of where he was or if he was alive.

We soon received word that two other POWs were nearby at the Marcozzi farm. The were Owen Frye of Bluefield, West Virginia, and William Helmly of Savannah, Georgia. The four of us spent much of our time together, staying close to the farms and seldom venturing out. Two of the times that I decided to venture out almost ended in disaster.

On Christmas Eve, 1943, I decided to walk to Force to see if there were any other GIs in the small town. On the way, I suddenly heard a convoy coming, and the mountain road was such that I had no place to hide. I pulled the old Italian overcoat over my face and continued to walk. Sure enough, it was a German convoy. Although they looked at me briefly, they apparently decided that I was just an Italian farmer on the way to town (albeit one who was 6′3″ tall), and they continued on their journey.

The second close call occurred in early 1943. We heard a rumor that the Allies were in San Benedetto, a town on the eastern coast of Italy approximately 20 miles from Force. Three British POWs and three of us walked to the town, and just as we were about to top a small mountain overlooking the town, someone called out to us. A small group of American and British POWs appeared and told us that the town was crawling with Germans, and when we moved forward for a closer look, we saw nothing but German soldiers, vehicles, and ships. We quickly hiked the 20 miles back to the Lupi farm that night, not bothered to stop along the way.

The Allies knew that there were a number of POWs loose on the Italian countryside, and occasionally we could hear the Allied planes fly over. Owen Frye painted the letters POW on an old door, and we would put it out in the field each day. One day we learned that the Allies had airdropped packages of food, clothing and shoes over the area for all the POWs in the hills. Unfortunately, they managed to drop them right in the middle of a group of die-hard Fascists who still supported the German soldiers. Needless to say, we never received the packages.

By June, 1944, the Allies had forced the Germans into retreating farther north. Frye and I decided to once again try to make our way south and hook up with the Allies. We walked into Force and soon heard some locals shouting that jeeps were coming. We soon discovered that it was an American convoy, and for the first time we felt that our ordeal was finally over. Our joy was tempered by the officer in charge, who told us that his group was an advance detail and they could not handle us, and that we should continue to make our way south. He assured us that it was clear south of town. We were able to hitchhike with another poor Italian farm family, who let us ride on the back of their truck that was packed with everything that they owned.

Eventually, we ran into the South African Army contingent with the puzzled officer mentioned earlier. This group fed us, and we gorged ourselves to the point of becoming sick. They gave us British Army clothing and eventually put us on a train to a British camp in Foggia, Southern Italy. They turned us over to the 8th Air Force, and after a couple of weeks we were sent on a plane back to Algiers, North Africa. Finally, we were put on a ship back to the U.S., and on August 2, 1944, exactly two years after I had shipped out of New York, we arrived in Boston.

I had no idea where my family was when I returned to the States. My mother had been told that I was missing in action, and eventually was told that I was being held as a prisoner of war. I finally found my family, got married, and spent the rest of my Army service at Camp Shelby, Mississippi, near my hometown of Hattiesburg. And in a strange twist, I spent some of the time guarding German prisoners at Camp Shelby. On December 31, 1944, the local paper mistakenly listed me as being killed in action. They subsequently printed a correction the next day, noting that a “strapping young man came by the paper’s office today and informed us that he is very much alive.”

I was able to write the Lupi family a couple of times after the war, and I learned that Nazareno had died shortly after I left. (One of the letters was interpreted for me at Camp Shelby by a German prisoner.) We soon lost touch, and I have often wondered what happened to the Lupi family. Owen Fry actually returned to Force, Italy in 1983 in order to locate the family. However, as he neared the town, the memories became too much for him, and he felt that someone or something was telling him not to go any further. He returned to West Virginia without ever trying to locate the farm.

In one of the letters from the Lupi family, I learned that after the war the U.S. government had paid the family $175 for keeping each of us during the war. We had left a letter with the family shortly before we left which identified us and told of how the family had taken us in, fed us, and hid us from the Germans for over nine months.

The sum of $175 was a lot of money for a poor Italian farm family in the 1940’s, but it could not begin to compensate them for what they did for us. They did not want to be a part of that war and, like many Italians, they resented Mussolini for dragging them into battle. They had every reason to turn us away that December morning (or turn us in to the Germans), but they chose to welcome a group of scared 20-year-olds with open arms.

History will record that the Italians simply gave up the fight when the going got tough in World War II. This assessment does not do justice to the courageous families who chose to risk their own lives and futures when they could have easily chosen not to do so. In these days of worldwide communications and cable television, I hope that somewhere there are members of the Lupi family watching TNT who can hear all of us simply say “Thank you.”

Marino’s parents, Iginia and Luigi Palmoni (Marino genitori, Iginia e Luigi Palmoni)

This recollection of the experiences of Marino Palmoni during the long winter of 1943–44 was provided by his son Antonello Palmoni. Antonello interviewed his father for this story in May 2009.

Marino Palmoni

The story is presented here in Italian and translated into English.

First, the English translation (Tradotto in inglese):

In September 1943, my grandfather Luigi, my father Marino (10 years old), and my uncle Gino (5 years old) were plowing the field near the woods beneath the cliff, when out of the woods came a man. Although he did not speak Italian, we understood from his gestures that he was hungry.

Grandfather asked my father to return home and bring something to eat, so Marino did and returned with bread and cheese. Our family was poor and large; there were more of us at home.

While returning though the woods with the food, my father noticed there were other men hiding behind bushes and rocks. When the food was given to the one who had asked for it, the other men came from their hiding places. They divided the bread by breaking it with their hands. They broke the cheese—which was aged—against a stone.

For some time after that my father brought food to the woods. He recalls that the people he met were not always the same ones. Perhaps this was for security reasons, or perhaps they simply took turns coming to the edge of the forest.

With approach of winter, some of the men started coming to the house to eat plates of hot soup and in return to help with work in the countryside. As evening fell they took refuge in the woods, as staying in the house was too dangerous for all of us.

“Anyone who helped escaped prisoners of war from the prison camps or members of the enemy armed forces to escape or to hide was shot. Whoever reported or captured a member of the U.S. or British military received 2,000 lire, a very high reward for the time, and for a Jew it was 5,000 lire.”

As winter was coming, it was no longer possible for the men to live in the woods. Just four prisoners (Luther Shields, Louis VanSlooten, Walter _____, and another man, (my father does not remember the other two, but thinks they were British), came to live in our house. They slept in the stable on the hay. To repay our hospitality they helped by working on the land.

The men’s condition was not good. Their clothes were worn and their shoes needed a good cleaning. Marino’s grandmother Iginia gave the men civilian clothes that belonged to my grandfather and his brothers. One of our neighbors, Mr. Enzo Scagnoli, replaced the heels of their shoes with ones made of wood. He also repaired the soles.

Luther Shields was sick, and Marino’s grandmother tried to heal him and keep him warm. She put a bed for him in the house on a landing above the stairs, as there was no other place for it. He needed medicine and a doctor. The area doctor was a Fascist, but he was a good friend of my grandfather’s.

Grandfather went to find his friend the doctor and told the story. The doctor gave him medication and told not to talk to anyone, as otherwise there would have been bad consequences for him, the prisoners, and our family. Luther healed in a few days.

My father recalls that when they could not work in the fields, Louis and Luther went into the forest and gathered acorns to feed the pigs, as there was a shortage of wheat and maize. What grain they had was used to feed the family.

On rainy days, the men stayed with the family in the stable. They built wicker baskets, repaired farm equipment, and played with the children—especially with Uncle Arge (2 years old). In the evening, Marino taught the men a few words of Italian.

A few days before Christmas, Walter and the other [British] prisoner decided to leave, to go to where there was more work. Our family was large and food was scarce. Grandmother prepared food for them and wrapped it in a large piece of cloth, as they used to do in those days for the farmers who went to work in camps and did not return home for lunch. The men took the food but returned the handkerchief, saying they would not have the opportunity to return it later. Then they left.

The night between January 5 and 6 it snowed heavily. In the morning, grandfather joked that one could not go to the cavern to make wine because there was so much snow. The winery was in a cavern dug under the barn, about 50 meters from the house. Louis and Luther wrapped cotton sacks over the clothes and used arms and legs to force a passage in the snow to the winery—and they made wine.

The house with barn (Casa con granaio)

The barn, located in front of the house, had been stocked with about 2,000 quintals of wheat on order of the Fascists and local authorities. This wheat would be used as provisions for the Nazi forces.

On the night between February 1 and 2, 1944, the resistance forces raided the barn in an attempt to distribute the grain to the starving population. But, at first light of dawn the mayor and the Fascist men came firing and many were wounded or killed. Many fathers of families were caught and imprisoned for several months.

Luther and Louis, escaped that night into the woods, and took refuge with the Corradini family in the nearby village of Smerillo, about five kilometers from our home.

They returned several times to visit us and then left to rejoin the Allied forces.

In 1983, Luther returned to Italy with his wife and they came to visit us. They were with us for three days. My father and my uncle were very happy, and my grandmother was very moved. At the time I was only 16 years old, but I recall with deep emotion how Luther called my grandmother Iginia “mother.”

Iginia with Luther (Iginia con Luther), 1983

In italiano:

I ricordi di mio padre (Marino Palmoni) sul lungo inverno del 1943/1944.

Nel settembre del 1943 mio nonno Luigi, con mio padre Marino (10 anni) e mio zio Gino (5 anni), stavano arando un terreno nei pressi del bosco, sotto la rupe, quando dal bosco uscì un uomo, non parlava italiano, fece capire con i suoi gesti di aver fame.

Il nonno chiese a mio padre di tornare a casa per prendere qualcosa da mangiare, Marino, così fece e ritornò con del pane e del formaggio, la nostra famiglia era povera e numerosa, altro non c’era in casa.

Nell’avvicinarsi al bosco per consegnare il cibo, mio padre si accorse che altri uomini erano nascosti dietro ai cespugli ed alle rocce, consegnato il cibo alla persona che era venuto a chiederlo poco tempo prima, gli altri uomini uscirono dai loro nascondigli, divisero il pane spezzandolo con le mani, mentre il formaggio che era molto stagionato venne spezzato contro una pietra.

Per qualche tempo, mio padre, continuò a portare qualcosa da mangiare nel bosco, ricorda che le persone che vi incontrava non erano sempre le stesse, forse per motivi di sicurezza, loro si davano il cambio, o semplicemente cambiavano zona nel bosco.

Con l’avvicinarsi dell’ inverno, qualcuno cominciò a venire in casa, per mangiare un piatto di minestra calda e ricambiare con il loro aiuto nei lavori in campagna, ma la sera tornavano a rifugiarsi nel bosco, farli rimanere in casa era troppo pericoloso, sia per loro che per noi.

“Chiunque prestava aiuto ai prigionieri di guerra evasi dai campi di prigionia o alle forze armate nemiche per facilitarne la fuga o l’occultamento della loro presenza, veniva fucilato.
Chi segnalava e faceva catturare un militare inglese o americano, riceveva una ricompensa molto elevata per quel tempo, che ammontava a Lire 2.000, per un ebreo a Lire 5.000.”

L’inverno stava arrivando, le condizioni meteo non permettevano più di vivere nel bosco, così quattro prigionieri (Luther Shields, Louis VanSlooten, Walter …………., ed un altro uomo, (mio padre non ricorda altro degli ultimi due, pensa che fossero inglesi), vennero a vivere nella nostra casa, dormivano nella stalla, in mezzo al fieno, e per ricambiare la nostra ospitalità, si davano molto da fare aiutandoci nei lavori di campagna.

Le loro condizioni non erano delle migliori, i loro vestiti erano logori e le loro scarpe avevano il fondo bucato, la nonna Iginia, diede loro dei vestiti civili di mio nonno e dei suoi fratelli, un nostro vicino di casa, il Sig. Enzo Scagnoli, costruì con il legno degli zoccoli e li sostituì alle suole delle loro scarpe.

Luther Shields era ammalato, la nonna, cercò di curarlo e di tenerlo al caldo, fece mettere un letto in casa, in un pianerottolo sopra alle scale (non c’era altro posto), servivano le medicine, serviva un dottore, il dottore del paese era fascista, ma era anche un buon amico di mio nonno.

Il nonno andò a trovare il suo amico dottore, raccontò la storia, il dottore gli diede le medicine e si raccomandò di non parlarne con nessuno, altrimenti ci sarebbero state delle brutte conseguenze sia per lui, sia per i prigionieri e per la nostra famiglia, Luther guarì in pochi giorni.

Mio padre ricorda che quando non si poteva lavorare nei campi, Louis e Luther andavano nel bosco e raccoglievano le ghiande per darle da mangiare ai maiali, in quanto il grano e il mais non c’erano e comunque servivano per l’alimentazione della famiglia.

Nelle giornate di pioggia, stavano con noi nella stalla, si costruivano cesti in vimini, si riparavano gli attrezzi agricoli e giocavano con i bambini, soprattutto con lo zio Argeo (2 anni), la sera, Marino insegnava loro qualche parola di italiano.

Pochi giorni prima di Natale, Walter e l’altro prigioniero, decisero di partire, non c’era più lavoro, la famiglia era numerosa, il cibo scarseggiava, la nonna preparò per loro del cibo e lo avvolse in un grande fazzoletto di stoffa, come si usava fare in quei tempi per i contadini che andando a lavorare nei campi non facevano ritorno a casa per pranzo, ma loro, presero il cibo e restituirono il fazzoletto, dicendo che non avrebbero avuto occasione in seguito per restituircelo e partirono.

La notte tra il 5 ed il 6 di gennaio nevicò molto, la mattina, il nonno, scherzando, disse che non si poteva andare in cantina a prendere il vino perché c’era tanta neve, la cantina era situata in una grotta scavata sotto il granaio a circa 50 metri di fronte alla casa, Luther e Louis si avvolsero dei sacchi di cotone sopra i vestiti, a forza di braccia e gambe aprirono un varco tra la neve fino alla cantina e presero il vino.

L’edificio situato davanti alla casa, il granaio, era stato requisito dai fascisti e dalle autorità locali, vi erano stati immagazzinati circa 2.000 quintali di grano che dovevano servire per il vettovagliamento delle forze nazifasciste.

La notte tra il 1° ed il 2 di febbraio del 1944, le forze della resistenza, assaltarono il granaio, cercando di distribuire il grano alla popolazione affamata, ma alle prime luci dell’alba, il podestà con gli uomini delle autorità fasciste arrivarono sparando, non ci furono morti ne feriti, ma molti padri di famiglia vennero catturati ed imprigionati per molti mesi.

Luther e Louis, quella notte scapparono per i boschi, e si rifugiarono presso la famiglia Corradini, nel vicino paese di Smerillo, a circa 5 km. da casa nostra.

Essi, tornarono molte volte a farci visita, poi partirono per ricongiungersi con le forze alleate.

Nel 1983, Luther e sua moglie sono tornati in Italia e sono venuti a farci visita, sono stati con noi tre giorni, mio padre e mio zio erano felicissimi, mia nonna era molto commossa, ed io, che avevo 16 anni, ricordo con profonda commozione che Luther chiamava (mamma) mia nonna Igini.