Description
Object description
British officer served with No 30 Commando in Italy, 1943-1944; served with No 1 Special Force, Special Operations Executive in Italy, 7/1944-5/1945
Content description
REEL 1 Background in GB, 1917-1939: family; education; employment; enlistment in British Army. Recollections of operations as officer with No 30 Commando in Italy, 1943-1944: pattern of earlier training with No 12 Commando in GB, 1940-1943; participation in landings at Salerno, 9/1943; liberation of Isle of Capri; liberation of islands in Bay of Naples; visit to Italian experimental naval station; contracting jaundice.
REEL 2 Continues: abortive plan to carry out raiding operations in Gulf of Genoa from Corsica, France, winter 1943-1944. Recollections of operations as officer with No 1 Special Force, Special Operations Executive in Italy, 7/1944-5/1945: approach made towards Squadron Leader Manfred Czerin with Special Operations Executive at Monopoli; plan for him to penetrate into Austria with Squadron Leader Manfred Czerin; his parachuting into Friuli-Venezia Giulia, 18/7/1944; receiving news of July Bomb Plot, 7/1944; leadership of partisan group; political background of Italian partisan groups.
REEL 3 Continues: terrain of area operated in; degree of knowledge of progress of war; reasons for presence of Cossacks fighting for Germans in Friuli-Venezia Giulia; successes of Cossacks against Italian Partisans; receiving news that Cossacks were interested in changing to Allied side and why they decided not to, 8/1944; why Italian Partisans assumed historically significant name of 'Osoppo'; inter-partisan rivalry; significance of drop zone for control of partisan operations.
REEL 4 Continues: German success in eliminating Partisan Republic of Carnia, autumn 1944; German installing of Cossacks in Carnia region; forcing of Italian Partisans from Carnia area into Yugoslavia, 11/1944; contract with Yugoslavian Partisans; memories of his wireless operator George Barker; problems Italian partisans had feeding 60,000 civilians in Carnia area; nature of political differences amongst partisans; presence of Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in Friuli-Venezia Giulia.
REEL 5 Continues: opinion of Squadron Leader Manfred Czerin; reasons why George Barker didn't have a wireless set; reasons for his relative lack of contact with Squadron Leader Manfred Czerin in Fruili-Venezia Giulia.