| Short Summary / Description | Diary handwritten on a pocket notebook (agenda tascabile) and slips of papers on which he originally took notes on daily events before starting writing a diary. The diary begins with with maps and drawings by the author. As the author writes on the first introductory written page, on the fifth month of his captivity, he decided to keep a more formal journal and transcribe the notes he had taken on slips of paper. The diary has a red hardcover. It begins with:
Page 1: Title page (“Prigionia”) with a beautiful portrait of a sick guard behind barbed wire – all done by the author
Pages 2-3: title “Le tappe della Prigionia in Africa e Arabia and India”. It is beautiful map of East Africa, the Arabic peninsula, and India where the author sketches and chronologically lists all his relocations from the moment of his capture in Dembidollo (Ethiopia) on 6 July 1941 and detention in Gambela until 19 July 1941, his relocations through East Africa, and in the Arabic peninsula, and India, until he is taken back to Bombay and shipped to the United States via South Africa (see page 3, map 3)
List of captivity places on map 1:
Dembidollo-Gambela 6 July 1941 – 19 July 1041
Gambela-Dembidollo 19-21 July 1941
Dembidollo – Addis Ababa 21-26 July 1941
Addis Ababa 26 July 1941 – 16 August 1941
Addis Ababa – Mandera 16 – 20 August 1941
Mandera 20 August 1941 – 21 October 1941
Mandera – Berbera 21 October 1941
Berbera – Aden 22-24 October 1941
Aden-Bombay 22 October 1941 – 1st November 1941
Page 4-5, Map 2: Title “ Le tappe della prigionia America, Asia” Another beautiful world map where the author sketches all his relocations as a POW from the moment of capture in Dombidollo (Ethiopia) on 6 July 1941 to his final repatriation to Naples on 23 December 1944, from East Africa to India via Eden, to the United States via Durban (South Africa), with all the camps in the USA where he was interned, and his final trip back to Naples (Italy) via Algeria.
He inserts the following detailed list of all the camps and transit sites he passed through from Bombay (India) to Naples (Italy):
Bombay (India) – Durban (South Africa) 24 December 1942 – 4 January 1943
Durban (South Africa) 8 January 1943
Durban (South Africa) – New York 8 – 30 January 1943
New York 30 January 1943 1st February 1943
New York – Crossville (Tennessee, USA) 1st – 2 February 1943
Crossville (Tennessee, USA) 2 February 1943 – 24 August 1943
Crossville – Monticello (Arkansan, USA) 25 – 26 August 1943
Monticello (Arkansan) 26 August – 23 December 1943
Monticello (Arkansas) – Newport New[s] (Virginia) 23 – 25 December 1943 [he misspells the name of the place in Virginia, the town is Newport News with an -s- at the end)
Camp Patrick Henry (Virginia) 25 – 31 December 1943
Newport – Casablanca (Morocco) 1st – 9 January 1944
Algiers (Algeria) 23 January – 4 February 1944
Algiers (Algeria) – Naples 4 – 6 February 1944
The diary is divided into chapters based on the chronological lists under each map. The first 2 chapters cover the months and the retreat of the Italian troops between 6-22 June 1941 (Chapter 1: “Da Gimma a Dembidollo, 6-22 giugno 1941, pp. 8-46) and the days from 22 June to 5 July 1941 (Chapter 2: Dembidollo, 22 giugno-5 luglio 1941 pp. 48-75), where he includes the transcript (in French) of the official document of the “Defeat with the Honors of War” that was allowed to his battalion, drafted on 3 July 1941 (pp. 61-65), and the Iron Cross that he received from General D’Amico for his courage on the battlefield.
The diary gets only to July 1942, as Marini is in the POW Camp in Deheradun (India).
“Prigionia” is held at The Robert L. Hess Collection at the Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.
Call Number: Hess D811.V56x 1941h
|
