The Railway and Italian Evacuee

Walter G. Weisbecker reports in Camp Mail of Italian Prisoners of War & Civilian Internees in East Africa 1940-1947:

The Italian Red Cross made an early attempt of repatriation of its citizens from Africa in 1943.  Four ships were used.  ...Two steamships, Ciao Duilio and Giulio Cesare; and two motorized ships Saturnia and Vulcania.  The latter were identical 24,500 ton ships.

These four ships each made three round trips from April 2, 1942 through August 11, 1943.  They returned some 30,000 Italian women, children, elderly, invalids, and the like from East Africa to Italy.  The ships departd from Genoa and Trieste and went to various East african ports including at least one trip that went to Massawa.

Roger Whiffin of the Italian Railways Society in Great Britain reports that the woman who is now his mother-in-law was one of those evacuees.  She road from Asmara to Massawa in a train that consisted of good rolling stock at the front and rear of the train, but "anything that could just run" in between.  It was a horrendous night filled with derailments that took from 22:00 at night to 11:00 the next morning.  According to Roger, the 91 year old woman's account is very clear.

Leaving Massawa on July 1, 1943. The trip took almost two months.   One of the three ships was torpedoed by the Germans in spite of the Red Cross Markings.  His (now) brother-in-law also took the trip at almost three years of age.  Roger and his wife was born after the hostilities were over.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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