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De-Coding WW II Italian Prisoner of War Rosters Kathy Kirkpatrick 6 April 2003
On 31 March 1945, the U.S. War Department compiled a list of all the prisoners of war under their jurisdiction. In the case of Italian Prisoners of War, this included not only the complete list of all Italian POWs held around the world (including only names and POW numbers in RG 389, Entry 466, Boxes 50-51 [projected page], same for German [projected page] and Japanese POWs in Boxes 1-57 [projected pages - description of Entry 466]), but also a more detailed roster of all Italian POWs held in the continental US.
These rosters were created from an early IBM program and the printouts are currently housed at the National Archives facility called Archives II in College Park, MD in RG 389, Entry 464A, Box 1505-1507 in six volumes [projected page - Abagnale] and on CD through GenTracer (www.gentracer.com/powcd.html).
These rosters contain 8 columns: Name, PW number, grade, A/S, service command number, organization, station, and notes.
The names are nearly alphabetical, with some names added between the lines and at the tops and bottoms of pages. Some names have also been crossed out with a note stating their date of death or repatriation in the notes column [projected page – Cincotta)]. Note that his current organization was corrected to “Heaven”. This suicide [projected page – death certificate] may be related to the misguided guilt about becoming a POW that we see in all nations. Currently only about 1/3 of American Ex-POWs are receiving any compensation and only 1/3 of those are receiving 100% statutory (American Ex-Prisoners of War Organization at www.axpow.org) [projected page].
Many of the POW numbers on these rosters conform to the War Dept. description of 9 April 1943 [projected pages]. However, since many of these men had been acquired from British POW camps in Africa and elsewhere, their original numbers (assigned by the British) were still in use [projected page - Battegazzore]. While these numbers don’t give much information, they do tell the general area of capture (or processing), nationality of the prisoner (or his army), and the size of the final number gives an idea of how late in the war he was captured.
Giudo Battegazzore was captured on 31 March 1943 in Tunisia. On “9 April 1944… he was first registered as part of the 225 Italian QM Depot in San Bernardino California. Shortly after that he was then transferred to a Unit at Ogden Arsenal on 31 May 1944. On 6 Nov he was transferred to the 147th Italian QM Service Co.
I know he was sent from N.Africa to San Bernardino, CA first by ship across the Atlantic, then by train across the continental USA, presumably around March, 1944.
My father, Guido Battegazzore, the younger of 3 brothers, who was born in 1921 in Tortona (Alessandria Province, Piemonte Region), unfortunately died in 1997 back in Italy where he returned at the end of the war.
It must be remembered that the Italian soldiers, even before El-Alamein, moved by foot and were poorly equipped compared to German, British and US troops who had trucks for infantry transport. These Italian soldiers dragged cannons by hand, using them as carts to carry their equipment and (very scarce) supplies! Being incapable by choice of killing anybody, he threw away his rifle and the Mussolini army uniform during the long retreat in the desert, long before being imprisoned. He told me that he and his fellow soldiers actually pushed strongly in the retreat in N. Africa to avoid being captured by the advancing British, who were considered to be much more cruel and hard on the prisoners. In fact, he was treated humanely, and collaborated with the US authorities, When he got back home his mother was so happy, as only a mother can be who has been through a war like that with her 2 male sons in prison camps (the other, my uncle, was in a concentration camp in Nazi Germany!).
It is true that the obscure story of these boys, most of whom were good guys who never meant any harm to anybody, and who were thrown by destiny into such a hard experience, has not yet been given the due attention it deserves, compared for example to the battles or to the events occurring “back home” in Europe at the same time. Your work certainly is important, so I encourage you to keep it up. Differently from the other armies, in the Italian army in WW II, in general the officers—especially the fascist Generals—were not particularly loved by the simple soldiers (who generally were not fascists). Some of them, like Gen. Messe, following the orders of Mussolini and Hitler, after heavy losses of his troops in N. Africa and the imprisonment of the survivors, actually avoided not only his personal death or imprisonment, but occupied high posts in the Italian defense ministry after “changing sides” at he convenient moment! One last thing, which for me is important: the fact that my dad didn’t like the idea of ”fighting” in the military sense, that he didn’t seek the risk but also the protection (even the medals) he would have received if he had acted ruthlessly, perhaps even against unarmed men, that he threw the rifle away instead of using it on some other perhaps even unarmed person (in war, you are not punished if you kill unarmed innocent “enemies”), that he didn’t believe it right to kill people who just like him were sent to die, far from being cowardly is a sign of courage, a special and high form of courage (preferring even to die rather than kill somebody), which perhaps not everyone appreciates, but which I think will be vitally important for human survival in the long run. A lot of the Italian POWs were like that, so it’s worth remembering!
If you are interested in more details and/or copies of some of the documents of the period in the POW camp, I will gladly send them to you. If his story will be recorded, that will be the best possible reward for him and for me!” The grade is pretty clear (soldier, sergeant, captain, etc.), so there is no de-coding page for that information. However, there is a de-coding page for the A/S [projected pages], at least their American versions.
While we haven’t yet located a de-coding page for service command numbers (although the first number is the key, like 9th Service Command), we have located one for POW camps and hospitals [projected pages]. However, the column labeled “organ” frequently carried the number of the unit to which he was assigned instead of the camp and some entries give the four-digit number for the camp (not yet de-coded). The column labeled “station” apparently listed the unit to which he was assigned in a code also not yet de-coded [projected page – Parri].
“My Grand father (Brigadier General DINO PARRI was captured by the British forces at MARSA MATRUH (Egypt) on 8 November 1942 just after the battle of El Alamein.
At that moment he was the Deputy Commander of the Infantry Division BRESCIA deployed on the southern side of El Alamein line close to the Folgore Division.
After he was moved to India by the British, he was handed over to the USA and detained at Monticello until December 1946 when he returned to Italy. He died on 31 January 1961. That is all what I know. Can you help me to find some more information about this story?”
The final column, “notes” contains references to death or repatriation after 31 March 1945 or references to the “scheda” (questionnaire) filled out by each prisoner or counsel to watch or condemn him based on interviews with his officers, our staff, or G-2. Occasionally this column contains notes regarding a transfer back to POW status from ISU (or vice-versa).
While these gaps in our knowledge of these records is frustrating, I have an on-going correspondence with the military experts at the National Archives in College Park and we are slowly piecing the puzzle together and sharing our new knowledge.
There is a considerable amount of information in these documents, and even more can be gained by following up on it in the personnel files. In keeping with the Geneva conventions, the allies sent the personnel files of all POWs to their countries of origin (Germany, Italy, Japan). Australia had the foresight to microfilm them first and research can be done in them through the Australian Archives. The Berlin archive holding the personnel records for returned POWs is accessible for research (Dienststelle fuer die Benachrichtigung der naechsten Angehoerigen von Gefallenen der ehemaligen deutschen Wehrmacht).
Those files sent to Rome in 1955, however, are no longer at that address (Ministero della Difesa-Esecito, Direzione Generale dei Servize di commissariato e Amministrativi, Via XX Settembre #11, Roma). Fortunately, LTC Maurizio Parri (grandson of the General mentioned above) is currently employed in the offices of the Italian Joint Chiefs of Staff (at the above address) and is working to locate those records in cooperation with their national organization of former POWs (ANRP) and the Italian Army Archives (and regular letters from my clients in America and Italy whose parents and grandparents stories are included in those files). I’m hopeful that those files will be located shortly so that we can have more pieces of the stories of these men.
Kathy Kirkpatrick http://www.traces.org/ItalianPOWs.doc |