Home thoughts of Woolwich from Italy .......... June 1919

This is the Piazza Vittorio Emanuele in Faenza in  Emilia-Romagna sometime in the early 20th century.

It is a picture I like and is also one that reminds me of Varese where some of our family live.

But what marks this picture out as special is that it belongs to Daniel Murphy who told me that 'in 1914 my father joined the Royal Artillery, RHA/RFA as a driver. 

From that time until the end of the WW1 he sat astride a horse and pulled field guns and ammunition carriages into place on the front line both in France, where he was shot and suffered shrapnel wounds, and later in Egypt and Pakistan, where he contracted malaria . 

On his way home from Cairo in June 1919 he sent this postcard to his mother in Woolwich.

It reads - "Dearest mother, expect me home in three or four days after receiving this. 

Am on my way now. Love to all at home. Your loving son Jack." (Followed by many kisses)”'

Location; Italy










Picture; Piazza Vittorio Emanuele Faenza circa 1919, courtesy of Daniel Murphy

April 25th 1945, a day of liberation and now a national holiday

I am looking at a picture posted by an Italian friend on facebook of a man in a train compartment in the rush hour.

Nothing you might think odd about that except that he has a  gun slung over his shoulder.  I missed it when I first came across the image and was drawn back by her comment and the date.

She wrote that she found “it fitting, [and] particularly laden with meaning,” because April 25th is a national holiday in Italy and marks both the end of what was left of Mussolini’s fascist state but also the end of the Nazi occupation of Italy on that day in 1945.

Signor Prigile, August 14th 1944

And so I guess the picture was a posed comment on the events of that day eighty years ago.

I would like to have used it but in the absence of copyright details for the present it will just have to sit on facebook and what ever Italian news agency issued it.

In its place there is this picture of Signor Prigile, an Italian partisan in Florence taken on August 14th 1944.

British troops had been ordered to avoid fighting the Germans in the precincts of the city of Florence but Italian Partisans, occupying the Fortress Di Basso exchanged fire with the German snipers that remained after the German forces evacuated Florence.

Now like many of my generation I was brought up on a diet of national stereo types and given the close proximity of the war the crude picture of Italians was that all they ate was  pasta and were all to ready to surrender.

It was an image much hyped by the propaganda of the war years and ignored the many brave Italians who opposed the Fascists both before and after they came to power in 1922.

It also ignored those that against their will were conscripted into the armed forces, to fight first in Abyssinia and Greece and later in North Africa and on the Eastern Front.  Nor is much said about  those who were held in Soviet prisons long after the war and those who never returned.

This I hasten to add is in no way a defence of the fascist regime which so brutally eliminated parliamentary democracy in Italy and did nothing to prevent the exploitation of working people.

Rather it is recognition that there were many Italians who opposed Mussolini and resisted as best they could.  And some who risked their lives to protect allied prisoners of war who had escaped and were  on the run from the German Army.

Corso Giacomo Matteotti on an April afternoon

And I often think of that opposition when we are in the Corso Giacomo Matteotti which is one of my favourite parts of Varese.

Here you can find posh clothes outlets, elegant cafes and wonderful food shops ranging from the expensive bakery to ordinary fruit and veg shops a fishmonger and a butcher.

It is named after the socialist MP who denounced the fascists in the Italian Parliament for election bribery in 1924 and was murdered by them just 11 days later.

So I shall be talking to our Italian family later this evening and asking them how the holiday has gone.

And no sooner had I posted this story last year, than Barbarella sent me this wonderful story of her grandmother.

"I am the grandchild of partisans. My grandmother was a “staffetta”, which translate into relay. 

Liberation Day, April, 1945

She was relaying messages amongst partisan groups who were fighting and hiding in the hills around Bologna. My grandmother was called Albertina (I gave this name as a middle name to my daughter), she used to put messages inside the metal bar handles of her bicycle, then putting the handle bit on top. 

Transporting messages between groups and risking her life. Sometimes she used to have some freshly made pasta for them, when she could afford to make it.

Memorial to the Partisan, 2018

What I woman, I am so proud of her. Passed away in 2006, at the age of 94. It is such a powerful story." of courage.

And this year Barbarello added a link to "Bella ciao", or "Goodbye beautiful"* which was originally an Italian protest song from the 19th century but my Wikipedia tells me "was modified  and adopted as an anthem for Italians resistance movement by the partisans who opposed fascism and the occupying German army.**


Location; Italy

Pictures; Corso Giacomo Matteotti from the collection of Andrew Simpson, Signor Prigile, August 14th, 1944. “This image was created and released by the Imperial War Museum on the IWM Non Commercial Licence. Photographs taken, or artworks created, by a member of the forces during their active service duties are covered by Crown Copyright provisions. Faithful reproductions may be reused under that licence, which is considered expired 50 years after their creation and is in the public domain, Wikipedia Commons.",  Liberation day, 1945, courtesy of Barbarello Bonvento, and war memorial to the Partisan, 2018, Intra, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

* Bella ciao, https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4CI3lhyNKfo&vidve=5727...

**Bell ciao, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bella_ciao

Celebrating the food of the Mediterranean in 1954

Now I know it is stating the obvious that today's cook books will be tomorrow's little bit of history.

After all to read an 18th century recipe of suggestions or a mid 19th century order of dinner is to step back into a different world.

Of course I am well aware that by and large these were books written for the rich and so offer only a partial picture of how we lived in the past.

That said there are plenty of insights into how the poor ate, or not ate.

My favourite is The Family Save – All, which aims to offer up a variety of cheaper foods which might well have been eaten by the poor.

So with all that in mind here are two books by Elizabeth David, written in 1950 and 1954 and republished in the 1960s.

I came across my two Penguin editions which date from 1967 in the mid '80 from Bryan the Book on Beech Road.

By then I was well aware of Elizabeth David from the works of Claudia Roden and the TV shows of Keith Floyd.

Now if you grew up in the 1950s when food was still pretty basic and the memory of rationing was still vivid these books which celebrated the colour and excitement of food from the Mediterranean must have been breathtaking.

After all talk to my parents generation and they will tell you that olive oil was what you bought from the chemists and used for a variety of medicinal purposes.

And here were "a collection of recipes made by the author when she lived in France, Italy the Greek Islands and Egypt doing her own cooking and obtaining her information at first hand."*

My copies are stained and brown at the edges but that just makes them all the more of a treat to look at.

And they contain a wonderful set of illustrations.

I wish I could ask my mother what she would have made of Insalata Di Funghi.  Now she liked her salads but I doubt that a plate of raw mushrooms with "olive oil, pepper, a little lemon juice and if you like, a scrap of garlic" would have been her first choice over tomato, cucumber and a bit of lettuce.

But that is perhaps unfair, mum was very forward thinking and given that Nana was German and some of what we ate owed a lot to that fact, I think she would have embraced it.

And I am sure if she could accompany us to Tina's parents in Italy she would fall on the roasted peppers, assorted fresh salads and fruits with the same joy that I do.

Tina's mum is from Naples and while she has lived in the north for nearly 40 years her cooking is still rooted in that southern cuisine.

Rosa and Simone briefly worked here in Britain arriving in 1960 to what we had to offer which must have been a bit of shock but they returned to Italy with a love of instant custard and jelly which is an interesting cultural swop.

Now I could have of course reflect on the causes of the fairly swift transformation in what we eat over the last five decades, but that has pretty much been done to death, so perhaps it’s just a trip down to the shops and see what nice things they have and what on our return Ms David could suggest we make.

Pictures; covers from Italian Food, 1967 and Mediterranean Food, 1967

* The Family Save – All, W. Kent & Co, London Second Edition 1861

**Mediterranean Food Elizabeth David, Penguin Second Edition 1967

Walking the streets of Naples with a comic genius ........ Totò

Now there is no escaping Totò in Naples.

He was born in one of the poorest parts of the city in 1898 and was the illegitimate son of Anna Clemente from Sicily and a Neapolitan nobleman who did not legally recognise him until 1937.

By which time Totò had become a popular entertainer who in that year made the first of 96 films, many of which we still regularly watch on Italian TV.

And he was one of those all round entertainers, performing variously as a comedian, film and stage actor as well as a poet and song writer.

But above all it was his comic genius which delighted generations of Italians and earned him the nickname of the Prince of Laughter.

Yesterday we sat and re watched Totòtruffa 62 in which a poor man supports his daughter’s stay at an expensive boarding school by a series of outrageous money schemes including the sale of the Trevi Fountain to a foolish businessman.

And such was his popularity that at his death there were three funeral services.

So I am not surprised at how a full half century after he died he is to be found everywhere in Naples.

We sat beside him at a small cafe where his life sized model advertised Caprese, which is a salad made from tomatoes, mozzarella and basil.

There was an exhibition devoted to him; the shops were full of Totò souvenirs, from key rings to painted plates and masks.

And in that small street devoted to all manner of nativity figures more than a few were of the man himself.

Location; Naples



Pictures; Totò in Naples, 2017 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The places I usually don’t photograph ................... nu 5 King Umberto of Italy

Now Kings and Queens I don’t usually do but we were in the big park in Varese when I can across King Umberto and I became curious.

He stands on the edge of the park facing the Town Hall and I can’t say I knew much about him but as the second King of Italy and the last to be buried in the Pantheon in Rome, it seemed a interesting piece of research.

He was born in 1844, ascended the throne in 1870 and was assassinated in 1900.

According to one source he was deeply conservative and supported the Bava-Beccaris massacre in 1898, when food riots in Milan led to the authorities using force in an effort to repress the demonstrations leading to the death of 80 demonstrators.*

He was also in favour of both the Triple Alliance with Germany and Austria Hungary and Italy’s policy of colonial expansion.

Needless to say there were more than a few who were not disposed to him and after surviving a number of assassination attempts was killed in 1900.

All of which leaves me wondering how he got the nickname the Good (il Buono).

But no doubt someone with a greater knowledge of Italian history will help me out.  Of course it might just be another example of a version of history written by the Establishment.

Well we shall see.

Location; Varese, Italy

Pictures; Umberto King of Italy, 2016 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

* Umberto I of Italy, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_I_of_Italy

The memorial to the Partisan

We are all familiar with war memorials which commemorate the many.

Usually they date from the Great War with a smaller panel for those who fought in later wars.

But here is one with a difference.

It is one man, who was not in uniform but still served his country heroically.

The memorial is a simple affair and stands beside the shore of one of the lakes in Italy.

We came across it by accident last week.

He was an Italian partisan executed by the Fascists on August 4 1944.

It is a simple memorial to a brave man, who gave his life in defence of Italy, and freedom and while it is small and unadorned is a powerful reminder of the sacrifice made by one man.












Picture; war memorial to the Partisan, 2018, Intra, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Lost in the back streets of Sorrento

Strictly speaking we hadn’t got lost. 

And even if we had there is something about wandering the back streets of Sorrento on a hot August day.

That said it was one of those days that alternated between heavy showers and spells of blistering heat.

Not that we cared over much.

Picture; Via S. Paola, Sorrento, August2001, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

A film, a song and a clash of cultures, Italy in the '50s

Rome, an alley off  the Trevi Fountain, 2011

Black and white movies, Italy in the 50s, and a Neapolitan song 

Yesterday evening we sat and watched an old black and white Italian movie from the 1950s.

Perhaps it has a lot to do with getting old.

When I was young I avoided films that were in black and white. They were drab and boring and came from a time when technology had not mastered the art of colour. They were simply, the films of my parents and grandparents.

With age comes an appreciation of the subtle way the film maker can play with light and shadow.

When you first come across Harry Lime in The Third Man it is half way through the film and we catch just a glimpse of him, half hidden in the shadows.

A man who is not what he seems to be, and who evokes different responses from different people. Friend, lover, and criminal suspect, Harry Lime plays all these parts, with a playful smile and cavalier manner but also deals in deceit and poisoned medicine. It is a dark film and the shots of post war Vienna are best seen in black and white. Here is a grim city where people are on the margin making do in rubble strewn streets.

But there is another reason why I am drawn more and more to black and white films, and it is because many were made during the years I was growing up and take me back to my childhood. Those I remember best were often the B movies like the one shot near Tower Bridge looking out on a busy River Thames which is the drab workaday river I remember full of cranes, barges and tramp steamers

Naples, 1961

And that I think was the attraction of the Italian movie. It was set in the same post war world that I grew up in. Here were funny old cars, big odd looking radios and shops which were not giant supermarkets.

The film like so many of our own also had a charming innocence. The plot was implausible, a lot of the acting slightly dodgy, and there was a happy ending. Even so here was a vivid slice of a way of life as dead as Dixon of Dock Green or the trolley bus.

I watch fascinated as the storyline unfolds against a backdrop of Rome in the 1950s. I excitedly point to the floating bar and dance floor moored on the Tiber, and wonder if this is the same floating dance floor where Gregory Peck kissed Audrey Hepburn.

 For a while I forget the silly story line involving two best friends competing for the beautiful girl who in the end dumped them both for someone else, and try matching this Rome of fifty years ago with the one I know and love. It becomes part geography lesson and part history lesson and like Roman Holiday I lose myself in memories of Roman streets I have walked down and bars which bear have an uncanny resemblance to the ones we have been in.

Films of this period also bring alive that tension between the old and new Italy as well as the growing influence of the U.S. Smart little Italian cars and vespers compete for road space with horse and carts, and for every young man in his stylish suit there is a little old lady dressed in black. Our two young heroes dance with girls in bikinis and the music on the floating bar is a mix of traditional Neapolitan love songs and American swing.

Rome, 2011

And by one of those coincidences, Simone had been playing the classic 50s Tu vuò fà l'americano in the car as we headed back from Tuscany. It is a song written in Neapolitan, and translated runs so you want to be American. It pokes gentle fun at those Italians who act like Yankees by drinking whisky and soda, dancing to Rock ‘n Roll and smoking Camel cigarettes. But the sting is that the pretend Yankee depends on his Italian parents to give him the money, and with much fun Tina and Simone almost shout the lines

You want to dance rock and roll;
you play baseball
but the money for the camels,
who give it to you??
Mamma’s handbag!

And behind the fun is that very simple truth that someone else’s culture can be the ruin of your own for

How can those who love you understand you,
If you speak half in American?
When one talks of love under the moon,
how can you say "I love you"?

Pictures;  from the collection of Andrew Simpson

This is Rome .......... from 1960

I have never lost my fascination for Rome.

I have friends who long ago fell in love with Venice, others who keep going back to Florence and yet more who never cease talking about Paris, but for me it is Rome.

It started with an all consuming interest in Roman history and has been cemented over the years by visits to the Eternal City.

The place always amazes me and you never quite get away from that feeling that down every street there is a ruin, and around every corner a piazza.

And despite its magnificent buildings, wide avenues and frenetic pace it remains on a human scale.

Over the years I have invested in guide books, scholarly accounts of the city and picked up those free little maps full of adverts for pizzerias, car hire firms and taxis and recently I added This is Rome to the collection and it is one of my favourites.

Unlike the others it is aimed at children, was first published in 1960 and comes from a series written and illustrated by Miroslav Sasek.

Now I am a great fan of the books of Mr Sasek, partly because they are informative and written with a degree of wit but also because of the illustrations which are bold bright and imaginative.

So on one page there is a fine picture of the Pantheon with a bit of history, while on another a mix of motorbikes with the caption, “Rome is full of statues, but full of motorcycles too.  We prefer the statues, they are so much quieter.”

And it is those illustrations which do it for me.

The style is one you saw a lot of in the 1950s and 60s, which still look fresh today.

In the same series are books on Venice, London, New York, Paris and Edinburgh as well as Hong Kong San Francisco and Texas.

In time I think I will collect the lot after all if the ones on Rome and London are representative of the rest they will not only be fun to read, very informative but will provide me with some excellent pictures to look at.

Picture; Rome, 2009 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, remaining images from This is Italy, Miroslav Sasek, 1960, reprinted 2007

Tall, elegant with a hint of decay .................. abandoned in the park ......... Viareggio 2010

It was one of those indifferent mornings which made going down to the beach a less than attractive idea so with the promise of cheap bikes for hire we went along to the park.

It stretches for miles is full of tree lined avenues and is perfect for a bike ride which seemed to be what shed loads of people were doing.

But I have never learned to ride and I was not about to so while the rest of the family disappeared off into the distance I went looking for pictures.

And as so often happens this one came from nowhere.

She was one of about half a dozen which were part of an event now long forgotten.

They stood in various stages of decay their wheels half hidden by the long skirts.

I only took the one but now wish I had taken the time to record the others.

All of which just leaves me to say that Viareggio is in Tuscany, with decent beeches and just about an hour from Florence but that is another story.

Location; the park, Viareggio, Tuscany

Picture; in the park in Viareggio, 2010 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Down on the Corso Garibaldi in Naples waiting for the tram

Now, if you know where to look you can find a tram in Naples.  

On the Corso Garibaldi, 2006

This one runs to the Corso Garibaldi and is one of the  three services which are routes 1, 2 and 4.

I have no idea what happened to route 3, but given that this is Naples there can be any one of a number of explanations.

The most likely is that it was lost once when the tram network was more extensive.

The good news is that trams are on the increase again in the city and that has to be good.

They first began running a service in 1875 which was two years before Rome and at present there are 11.8 km of track.

I wish we could have caught one last month when were there but next time I shall.

Near the Porta Maggiore 2010

And in the same way when we return to Rome I will board one of their green ones.

My preferred choice would be one of  these older ones, but I am guessing it will have been replaced by the new sleeker models.

Well, we shall see.

Location; Naples & Rome

Pictures; Napoli, line of trams in Corso Garibaldi. At the head of the line is Peter Witt-type tram no. 975, ©grahamec, permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 and Roma, Older tram near Porta Maggiore 2010, © Luca F, who as the copyright holder (Luca F.) of this file allows anyone to use it for any purpose, provided that the copyright holder is properly attributed.

Naples .... squeezing cars, people and lots more on to those narrow streets

Now you can never get enough of pictures of Naples and of these it is the ones showing the narrow streets where everything squeezes in every available space.

Location; Naples

Picture; Naples in 2017 from the collection of Saul Simpson 

Outside Venice ............

We were travelling back from the seaside west to Varese.

There had been a vague plan to do Venice but in high summer with young kids that was never going to happen.

Instead we stayed by the beach, and on the long way back the traffic jams pulled us up by a field.

Location;  somewhere outside Venice.

Picture; outside Venice, 2009 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Missing the tram in Milan

Now it is odd just what you can miss on a visit to Milan.

Crossing under the Porta Nuova 2013

Some of our family live just a little north of the city in Varese and we sometimes take the train to Milan, but although I see them in the distance I have never caught a Milan tram.

The service began in 1881 and now extends to 170 km with 17 urban lines and one interurban line and about half of the tram lines pass by, or terminate near Piazza del Duomo.

So given that the piazza is a favourite spot you would think we would have hopped on one but no, and I don’t think I have even got a picture.

So there you are.

Location; Milan

Picture; Trams numbers 1754 and 1582 of the ATM of Milan under the Arches of Porta Nuova, 2013,  Giorgio Stagni, who as the creator has licensed the picture under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

With Bernie and Lori from rural Oregon ...... on the island they call Bella ..... looking out on Lake Maggiore

Isola Bella on Lake Maggiore pretty much lives up to its name.

It is just 320 metres long by 400 metres wide and is divided between the Palace, its stylish gardens and a fishing village.

The guide books will tell you it took 400 years for its transformation from a small community on an empty island to a stunning place, visited by the good and great, along with the rich and not so nice, who were the movers and shakers of European society in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

In the process its very wealthy owners constructed a huge palace, laid out the gardens and made it the Beautiful Island, and there is the rub, because during the season it will be visited by countless parties of tourists, all intent on sampling that beauty.

And that can make it a very crowded island.

Not that I am against mass tourism, after all why shouldn’t such a place be available to everyone?

And I have to say that on the day we took the ferry north from Stresa, across the lake to the island, we were not overwhelmed by those who wanted to share the place with us.

True, there were boat loads of them, drawn from all the nearby countries, and some from much further afield as well as a few groups from North America, but the island accommodated us all.

Part of the reason is that as well as stretching out, the island climbs upwards in a series of narrow pathways which twist and turn and rise to the Palace itself.

Dotted along these paths are the shops some of which seem to cling precariously to their neighbours, threatening to topple over with the weight of people and tourist merchandise.

And of tourist merchandise there is a lot, from the inevitable picture t-shirts, and bottles of limoncello, to bags and bags of coloured pasta which look so authentic but will no doubt sit in a cupboard for months before being thrown out.

As is the way of these places much of the material is very expensive, and could be bought for half the price in a shop on the mainland or at home.

But as we all know buying the souvenir at the place is a must, despite the chances that it originates two continents away, made by workers who will never get the opportunity to stand in that tourist shop and buy the goods they produced.

Not, that such petty considerations, should get in the way of enjoying a place which has history, atmosphere and a presence.

Added to which there is always the opportunity to meet people, like Bernie and Lori from rural Oregon and the Swiss party who had travelled south down the lake and planned to take in all the remaining four islands, before heading off to Milan.

We met in the small restaurant with views out across the lake, swapped addresses, and talked about the beauty of the island and joked about the expensive souvenirs.

I doubt that we will stay in touch, but meeting new people is always part of the joy of holidays and at least when I think back to Isola Bella I will smile at Bernie’s story of the purple inflatable plastic aubergine he bought on a whim in Stresa, and the discussion on whether to give it as a gift to his ageing aunt in Florida.

Location; Isola Bella on Lake Maggiore





Pictures; Isola Bella, 2018 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Dolce far niente ........... The sweetness of doing nothing

Now the Italian saying Dolce far niente, which means the sweetness of doing nothing perfectly sums up those idle times, when rather than feeling guilty, you just embrace the moment. 

Better still if the sun is shining and you have taken yourself off to a cafe or bar, chosen to sit outside, sip an aperitif and watch as all around you people busy themselves.

We were in Intra on Lake Maggiore and having taken a leisurely trip on the ferry, it was our turn to look for a cafe where we could sit and do nothing.

Along the way we encountered a couple sitting on the stone steps that led down to the water, listened to a lazy and occasionally animated conversation about tiramisu and ended up at the cafe in front of the war memorial gazing out across the waters of the lake.

I suppose we could have gone looking for some historic and interesting places which no doubt would have been very educational, but instead we joined the other customers at that cafe by the memorial.

And picking up on that conversation about tiramisu we talked about the food of the south from Naples where Simone and Rosa grew up which led on to a discussion about my favourite Sicilian salad made with slices of orange and tiny bits of onion, mixed with olive oil and oregano.

There will be those who having overheard the conversation will snort and dismiss us as pretentious and not to be taken seriously.

But on reflection they are the sort who would never dream of spending time just doing nothing, and so that “sweetness” will never enter their lives and their loss will be that bigger one which is all about slow conversations that twist and turn, go off at a tangent and rarely return to the point they started.

That said, in the course of that wibbly wobbly exchange comes a few jokes, a bit of new knowledge and brings you all, that bit closer.

Added to which  the coffee will be good, the aperitifs even better, and after a suitable passing of time, there will be new things to order, and lots more to talk about..


Location; Intra, but really anywhere










Pictures; dolce far niente, Intra, 2018, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The day we went to Ascoli Piceno nu 1 ....... waiting to set the tables

Now when you are at the seaside there is not a lot you can do if it’s raining.

So instead we went inland to Ascoli Piceno and arrived with the rain.

It was still early and the owners of this restaurant had yet to set the tables.

Location; Ascoli Piceno

Picture; down a side street, 2016 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The picture postcard from a gentler time

Now long before the camera became the dominant way to reproduce an image for picture postcards, it was down to the artist to do the business.

And so here we have a painting of Giotto's bell tower in Florence.

I have no idea when the artist set about his work or when the picture post card company from Milan began reproducing it for tourists, but I do know that the tower was built between 1334 and 1359.

Now twenty-five years does seem a long time, but to be fair Giotto died in 1337 and there was that little disaster known as the Black Death.

And that is it.

I did go looking for my own pictures taken a few years ago, but alas I have misfiled them, leaving me just this picture postcard which Dad would have bought sometime in his travels working for Glenton Tours.

Location; Florence

Picture; Firenze Campanile di Giotto, date unknown from the collection of Andrew Simpson

When Scarborough became an Italian story …………

The story of the German bombardment of Scarborough in 1914 is usually just a footnote in history books.

That said it will still be marked every year in the town, as well as on the blog,  and has become of special interest to David Harrop who has been collecting memorabilia on the event.*

My Wikipedia tells me that “The Raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby on 16 December 1914 was an attack by the Imperial German Navy on the British ports of Scarborough, Hartlepool, West Hartlepool and Whitby. 

The bombardments caused hundreds of civilian casualties and resulted in public outrage in Britain against the German Navy for the raid and the Royal Navy for failing to prevent it”.**

And that brings me to this small newspaper clipping which is undated and is really just a photograph.

But what singles it out as a little different from the news coverage of the attack is that it comes from an Italian newspaper.

The caption, “Case di Scarborough danneggiate dal bombardaento” which translates as “Scarborough houses damaged by bombing” is the give away and begs some questions.

These include, was there an accompanying story and just when was it published?

At this stage Italy was still neutral and did not enter the war on the side of the Allies until the May of 1915.

So it would be interesting to explore what the Italian media and the general public made of the bombardment, particularly because at the time Italy was part of the Triple Alliance with Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire and might have been expected to have joined them in the August of 1914 in the war against Britain, France and Russia.

I will in the fullness of time go looking at contemporary Italian newspapers, and follow up on what the historians have to say, leaving Mr. Harrop who acquired the picture the job of finding out the date and the source of the image.

Meanwhile I will finish by looking at the photograph in detail.

As ever the photographer managed to hoover up a few passers by who look back with a mix of curiosity and amusement at being captured on film, while the net curtains billow out of the window.

Location; Scarborough and Italy

Picture; “Case di Scarborough danneggiate dal bombardaento”, date unknown, from the collection of David Harrop

*The bombardment of Scarborough, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/The%20Scarborough%20Bombardment

**Raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raid_on_Scarborough,_Hartlepool_and_Whitby

Stories from Naples in the spring of 1944

I am reading Naples '44* and it is one of those delightful moments when history and my fascination for Italy collide.

It’s 1944 and Norman Lewis is a British intelligence officer with the allied armies in Italy.

He landed at Salerno in September 1943 with the American 5th Army and the book chronicles a year of his life in the city of Naples.

It is a closely observed description of life after the war has moved on leaving an aftermath of broken buildings, a desperate lack of food and a breakdown of the usual conventions of morality.

So on a journey to Afragola he saw “hundreds if not thousands of Italians mostly women and children in the fields all along the roadside driven by their hunger to search for edible plants ... they had left their homes in Naples at daybreak, and had to walk for between two and three hours to reach the spot where I found them.”

But there are those vivid little pictures of Neapolitan life which I suspect had been lived out before and after his visit including the family who lived opposite his office and who “carried out a table and stood it in the street close to their doorway.  This was briskly covered with a green cloth with tassels.  Chairs were placed round it in an exact distance and on it were placed photographs, a vase of artificial flowers, a small cage containing a gold finch, several ornate little glasses, which were polished from time to time as the day passed by to remove the dust.”

And around that table they carried on the daily routines of life, from domestic chores to grooming the children, washing and eating.  There were other tables out further along the street and people called out to each other, while a man with “tiny twisted legs was carried out by his friends and propped up in a comfortable position against the wall.”

It is a scene of street life which my parents in law knew well.  Simone and Rosa were born in Naples just before Italy entered the war in 1940 and grew up in the harsh years of that war and the equally hard years afterwards.

Not that this is any rosy nostalgic account of a simple but good way of life.  For many in Naples life was a struggle lived out against a backdrop of poverty which the war made that bit more difficult and led many down darker and more brutal ways of survival.

All of this along with the horror and confusion of the fighting falls out of this book.

But so often it is the carefully observed little scenes that that draw you in, like the “two lean, hip swinging American soldiers, sharing a bottle of wine [who] passed down the street, and the two girls at the table [who] looked up and followed them with their eyes until they turned the corner and disappeared from sight.”

Location; Naples, Italy

*Naples '44, An Intelligence Officer in the Italian Labyrinth, Norman Lewis, 2002, Eland Publishing Ltd, http://www.travelbooks.co.uk/

Picture; from the front cover, designed by Robert Dalrymple