Inside Rome With The Germans (Paperback)

INSIDE ROME WITH THE GERMANS By JANE SCRIVENER. FOREWORD By CARLTON J. H. HAYES Late American Ambassador to Spain How fortunate that among the very few Americans who re mained in Rome throughout the war there was an alert and talented lady who had a literary flair and kept a diary She writes under the pseudonym of Jane Scrivener, but this, as I shall presently explain, is the only pseudo thing about it. It is an eyewitness account, as authentic as it is vivid. As background, one may recall that Mussolini and his Fascists, in concert with Hitler, had plunged Italy into war against France and Great Britain in June, 1940, and against the United States in December, 1941. By the spring of 1943 Italy was over whelmed by misfortunes at home and abroad. Axis rout in North Africa was being followed by Allied invasion of Sicily, while within Italy the masses of the population were suffering intensely and Mussolini had become a mere puppet of the Ger mans who already occupied and terrorized the country. Jane Scrivener was an old friend of my wife and myself, and while we were in Spain we received letters from her giving us lively impressions of what was transpiring in Rome. She described with special vigor the Allied air attack of July 19, 1943 the efficacious bombing of railway yards and freight station, the wrecking of a populous workingmans quarter, the ripping up of a cemetery, the demolishing of the famous did basilica of St. Lawrence-Outside-the-Walk She conveyed a sense of the thrill of horror that immediately ran througfc the city, of the increasing tension of the ensuing hot July days, and of the historic character of the tea-hour session of the Fascist Council on July 24th and the Kingsannouncement two days later that Mussolini had been dismissed and Marshal Badoglio vii was prime minister. Of the scene on this day, she wrote The joy of the Italians on being rid of Fascism gives Rome a carnival air. Torn fragments of Mussolinis portraits lie like snow on the pavements. People laugh and talk in the streets as they have not done for years. Perfect strangers greet and congratulate one another. Now we can say what we like, with no fear of spies they joyously exclaim. Fascist emblems are hacked from public buildings to the accompaniment of cheers and applause. The city is covered with posters Ewiva il Re Evviva Bado glio Evviva la liberta Rome, in her long history, has never known quite such a day. Forty-five days passed, and on September 8, 1943, Marshal Badoglio concluded the armistice with the Allies. But this did not mean the delivery of Rome. Quite the opposite. It was the Germans and not the Italians who were in effective military control of the city, and the Germans had no intention of sur rendering it or treating it as an open city. Nor were the Allies in any position then, or for a long time afterwards, to liberate Rome. For months their offensive bogged down many miles south. It was not until June 5, 1944, after a lapse of nine frightful months, that Jane Scrivener saw in Rome the first Allied soldiers four American boys in a jeep and knew that at long last the Eternal City was free and secure. It is the day-to-day events of those nine months from the Armistice of September, 1943, to the Allied arrival in June, 1944, which the diary, now published, records...