Browse Items (629 total)

  • Tags: home front

PFilliputtiA16010115.jpg
In a town square, a figure in priest's clothes approaches a partisan who is brandishing a sub-machine gun. Two other figures in uniform are featured on the right hand side. Three Italian flags are visible on a bell tower with a clock.

Label reads…

Memoro#4729.mp3
Helga Cent-Velden (b. 1926) recounts her life in Berlin under constant threat of bombing. Describes how her father tried to locate a suitable air raid shelter for the family and especially how he ruled out the Shell House because of a canal running…

Memoro#14606.mp3
Eva Brossmer (b. 1925) remembers the incessant bombing of Berlin by the Allied and explains how she and her mother fled to Südharz trying to avoid the advancing Russians. Explains how German broadcasts did not mention their advance and how she heard…

Bombe-a-Torino_2.mp3
Lidia Barberis (b. 1934) remembers her early life in Turin and Piedmont under the constant threat of bombing. She describes her father being taken away by the SS, the daily chores and a precarious trip by horse-drawn cart. Describe the postwar period…

591.mp3
Luciana Cella Guffanti (b. 1932) describes the role played by officers of the Unione Nazionale Protezione Antiaerea during the bombings of Milan, especially when they had to persuade reluctant people to go to the shelters. She describes an occasion …

10449.mp3
Rosanna Giungi (b. 1933) describes how Pippo disrupted daily life in wartime, affecting especially those close to the Modena-Brennero and Modena-Verona railway lines. Reminisces the sight of Germany-bound trains packed with people desperately asking…

Memoro#15926.mp3
Renate Rothaler (b. 1937) recounts her wartime experiences in Gotha, where she lived with her mother and sister while her father was drafted. Mentions a bombing in spring 1944 when she watched ‘silver birds’ that soon started to drop bombs, a…

AFerrariM170116.mp3
Marino Ferrari recalls his early life as an engineer at Pavia arsenal, and later in Catanzaro and Verona. Describes his life as an Italian military internee in East Prussia, working in different lumberyards. Speaks with affection of the German…

PRivaltaA1601.jpg
Alessandra Rivalta recalls her early life, first as member of Opera Nazionale Balilla then as an undergraduate student at the faculty of humanities. Describes the start of the war, early anti-aircraft precautions and wartime life: food shortage,…

PPasiniPG1601.JPG
Paola Giorgina Pasini provides details of her early life in a family of agricultural workers and compares favourably their condition with those living in urban areas. Recalls the ominous sight of target indicators and flares, and remembers Pippo…

ABottaniP1601.jpg
Paolo Bottani recalls wartime memories of a working-class family in Milan. Describes the widespread enthusiasm for the declaration of war, followed by a relatively calm period. Mentions alarms as greeted initially with joy because classes stopped and…

AMuratoriL161130.mp3
Lucia Muratori recalls her early life in Bologna in the family of a well-off foundry owner. Stresses that she had less traumatic war experiences compared to many other people at that time, the only disturbing episode being eye-witnessing the killing…

PMaggioniF1601.jpg
Fausta Maggioni recalls memories of her wartime life in Milan. She describes a sizeable shelter reinforced with wooden props, a little bag with the few valuables she had always to bring along, as well as the many duties of her father as warden, who…

PMessaliT1601.jpg
Teresa Messali gives a brief account of her pre-war life with her large family in a farmhouse near Bergamo. She mentions Pippo; describes the pressing need to find shelter during the bombings and stresses how she frequently resorted to ditches.…

Memoro#9181.mp3
Ada Dellaferrera (b. 1928) recalls aircraft strafing the railway station and how she tried to hide next to a wall. Remembers when her mother sent her out in the blackout and the fear of the dark she has had ever since.

Memoro#5827.mp3
Luigia Colussi (b. 1925) gives a short account of her wartime life and describes how she persuaded German troops to release her father. Stresses the contrast between the attitude of adults (who prayed and were generally worried by the situation) and…

Memoro#4778.mp3
Angela Squicciarini (b. 1925) gives an account of her life in wartime when she attended school. Mentions relatives, one of whom spent many years in Russia; describes how the living conditions improved over the years and provide details about olive…

Memoro#235.mp3
Mafalda De Luca (b. 1939) recalls how her father moved to Fiume during the D’Annunzio occupation, where he met her mother. Remembers the blackout curtains at the windows and mentions underground shelters. Gives a brief account of a small bomb (or a…

Memoro#725.mp3
Carla Griva (b. 1935) describes different attitudes and various coping strategies of people inside a shelter in Turin: reciting the rosary, putting their hands over their ears to avoid listening, storytelling, and asking children to practice…

Memoro#555.mp3
Erika Gautsch (b. 1928) describes her wartime experience of being inside a shelter and the people she met there: an old sick man with his wife, who was incessantly reciting the rosary, and children clinging to their mothers. Emphasises tension and…

PRighiF1601.jpg
Ferdinando Righi recalls his early life in Monfalcone, brought up by his mother while his father served as a submariner. Describes daily life in wartime: how he used to sleep fully clothed, waiting for the air raid siren. His mother would put some…

MRadacichM[Ser'#-DoB]-170110-130001.jpg
Account of the 6 July 1944 bombing of Trieste written by a typist of the Servola ironworks. The first part of the document details the effects of the explosions and mentions some of the impact points: the ammunition dump and the oil refinery. The…

MRadacichM[Ser'#-DoB]-170110-100001.jpg
Following the destruction of a church in Trieste, the leaflet contrasts the horrors of unrestricted bombing warfare with the hypocrisy of Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt. They describe themselves as devoutly religious despite ordering the…

MRadacichM[Ser'#-DoB]-170110-19.jpg
Instructions how to deal with a new type of small incendiary the Royal Air Force started to use. Advice includes: do not use water; put all the incendiaries in a hole dug in the ground; ask the assistance of the Unione Nazionale Protezione Antiaerea…

MRadacichM[Ser'#-DoB]-170110-12.pdf
Report on the condition of a domestic shelter, with notes on the condition of items of clothing that have been stored inside.
Output Formats

atom, dc-rdf, dcmes-xml, json, omeka-xml, rss2