Italy at War and the Allies in the West Part 1

Italy at War and the Allies in the West.

by E. Alexander Powell.

AN ACKNOWLEDGMENT

For the a.s.sistance they have given me in the preparation of this book, and for the countless kindnesses they have shown me, I am indebted to many persons in many countries.

His Excellency Count Macchi di Cellere, Italian Amba.s.sador to the United States; Signor Giuseppe Brambilla, Counsellor of Emba.s.sy; Signor A. G. Celesia, Secretary of Emba.s.sy; his Excellency Thomas Nelson Page, American Amba.s.sador to Italy, and the members of his staff; Signor t.i.ttoni, former Italian Amba.s.sador to France; Signor de Martino, Chef du Cabinet of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; his Excellency Signor Scialoje, Minister of Education; Professor Andrea Galante, Chief of the Bureau of Propaganda; Colonel Barberiche and Captain Pirelli of the Comando Supremo, and Signor Ugo Ojetti, in charge of works of art in the war zone, all have my grateful thanks for the exceptional facilities afforded me for observation on the Italian front.

His Excellency M. Jusserand, French Amba.s.sador to the United States, General Nivelle, General Gouraud, and General Dubois; Monsieur Henri Ponsot, Chief of the Press Bureau, and Professor Georges Chinard, Chief of the Bureau of Propaganda of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Commandant Bunau-Varilla and the Marquis d'Audigne all helped to make this the most interesting and instructive of my many visits to the French front.

To General Jilinsky, commanding the Russian forces in France, and to Colonel Romanoff, his Chief of Staff, I am grateful for the courtesies extended to me while on the Russian front in Champagne.

Lord Northcliffe, who on innumerable occasions has shown himself a friend, Lord Robert Cecil, Minister of Blockade, and Sir Theodore Andrea Cook, Editor of _The Field_, put themselves to much trouble in arranging for my visit to the British front. Nor have I forgotten the kindnesses shown me by Captain C. H. Roberts and Lieutenant C. S.

Fraser, my hosts at General Headquarters.

For the many privileges extended to me during my visit to the Belgian front I take this opportunity of thanking his Excellency Baron de Broqueville, Prime Minister of Belgium; M. Emanuel Havenith, former Belgian Minister to the United States, Lieutenant-General Jacquez, commanding the third division of the Belgian Army; Capitaine-Commandant Vincotte, and Capitaine-Commandant Maurice Le Duc of the etat-Major.

To Lieutenant-Colonel Spencer Cosby, Corps of Engineers, United States Army, I owe my thanks for much of the technical information contained in Chapter V, as he generously placed at my disposal the extremely valuable material which he collected during his three years of service as American Military Attache in Paris.

James Hazen Hyde, Esq., who accompanied me on my visit to the Italian front, has, by his hospitality and kindness, placed me under obligations which I can never fully repay. I could have had no more charming or cultured travelling companion.

I also wish to acknowledge the information and suggestions I have derived from Sydney Low's admirable book, "Italy in the War"; from R.

W. Seton-Watson's "The Balkans, Italy, and the Adriatic"; from V.

Gayda's "Modern Austria"; from Dr. E. J. Dillon's "From the Triple to the Quadruple Alliance"; from Pietro Fedele's "Why Italy Is at War,"

and from E. D. Ushaw's "Railways at the Front."

And, finally, I desire to thank Howard E. Coffin, Esq., of the Advisory Board of the Council of National Defence, for his hospitality on his sea island of Sapeloe, where most of this book was written.

E. ALEXANDER POWELL.

WAs.h.i.+NGTON,

April fifteenth, 1917.

ITALY AT WAR

I

THE WAY TO THE WAR

When I told my friends that I was going to the Italian front they smiled disdainfully. "You will only be wasting your time," one of them warned me. "There isn't anything doing there," said another. And when I came back they greeted me with "You didn't see much, did you?" and "What are the Italians doing, anyway?"

If I had time I told them that Italy is holding a front which is longer than the French and British and Belgian fronts combined (trace it out on the map and you will find that it measures more than four hundred and fifty miles); that, alone among the Allies, she is doing most of her fighting on the enemy's soil; that she is fighting an army which was fourth in Europe in numbers, third in quality, and probably second in equipment; that in a single battle she lost more men than fell on both sides at Gettysburg; that she has taken 100,000 prisoners; that, to oppose the Austrian offensive in the Trentino, she mobilized a new army of half a million men, completely equipped it, and moved it to the front, all in seven days; that, were her trench lines carefully ironed out, they would extend as far as from New York to Salt Lake City; that, instead of digging these trenches, she has had to blast most of them from the solid rock; that she has mounted 8-inch guns on ice-ledges nearly two miles above sea-level, in positions to which a skilled mountaineer would find it perilous to climb; that in places the infantry has advanced by driving iron pegs and rings into the perpendicular walls of rock and swarming up the dizzy ladders thus constructed; that many of the positions can be reached only in baskets slung from sagging wires stretched across mile-deep chasms; that many of her soldiers are living like arctic explorers, in caverns of ice and snow; that on the sun-scorched floor of the Carso the bodies of the dead have frequently been found baked hard and mummified, while in the mountains they have been found stiff, too, but stiff from cold; that in the lowlands of the Isonzo the soldiers have fought in water to their waists, while the water for the armies fighting in the Trentino has had to be brought up from thousands of feet below; and, most important of all, that she has kept engaged some forty Austrian divisions (about 750,000 men)--a force sufficient to have turned the scale in favor of the Central Powers on any of the other fronts. And I have usually added: "After what I have seen over there, I feel like lifting my hat, in respect and admiration, to the next Italian that I see."

[Ill.u.s.tration: The _Teleferica_.

"Many of the Italian positions can be reached only in baskets slung from sagging wires stretched across mile-deep chasms."]

[Ill.u.s.tration: An Italian Position in the Carnia.

"Many of the Italian soldiers are living like arctic explorers, in caverns of ice and snow."]

It is no exaggeration to say that not one American in a thousand has any adequate conception of what Italy is fighting for, nor any appreciation of the splendid part she is playing in the war. This lack of knowledge, and the consequent lack of interest, is, however, primarily due to the Italians themselves. They are suspicious of foreigners. They are by nature shy. More insular than the French or English, they are only just commencing to realize the political value of our national maxim: "It pays to advertise." Though they want publicity they do not know how to get it. Instead of welcoming neutral correspondents and publicists, they have, until very recently, met them with suspicion and hinderances. What little news is permitted to filter through is coldly official, and is altogether unsuited for American consumption. The Italians are staging one of the most remarkable and inspiring performances that I have seen on any front--a performance of which they have every reason to be proud--but diffidence and conservatism have deterred them from telling the world about it.

To visit Italy in these days is no longer merely a matter of buying a ticket and boarding a train. To comply with the necessary formalities takes the better part of a week. Should you, an American, wish to travel from Paris to Rome, for example, you must first of all obtain from the American consul-general a special vise for Italy, together with a statement of the day and hour on which you intend to leave Paris, the frontier station at which you will enter Italy, and the cities which you propose visiting. The consul-general will require of you three _carte-de-visite_ size photographs. Armed with your vised pa.s.sport, you must then present yourself at the Italian Consulate where several suave but very businesslike gentlemen will subject you to a series of extremely searching questions. And you can be perfectly certain that they are in possession of enough information about you to check up your answers. Should it chance that your grandfather's name; was Schmidt, or something equally German-sounding, it is all off. The Italians, I repeat, are a suspicious folk, and they are taking no chances. Moreover, unless you are able to convince them of the imperative necessity of your visiting Italy, you do not go. Tourists and sensation seekers are not wanted in Italy in these times; the railways are needed for other purposes. If, however, you succeed in satisfying the board of examiners that you are not likely to be either a menace or a nuisance, a special pa.s.sport for the journey will be issued you. Three more photographs, please. This pa.s.sport must then be indorsed at the Prefecture of Police. (_Votre photographie s'il vous plait._) Should you neglect to obtain the police vise you will not be permitted to board the train.

Upon reaching the frontier you are ushered before a board composed of officials of the French _Service de Surete_ and the Italian _Questura_ and again subjected to a searching interrogatory. Every piece of luggage in the train is unloaded, opened, and carefully examined. It having been discovered that spies were accustomed to conceal in their compartments any papers which they might be carrying, and retrieving them after the frontier was safely pa.s.sed, the through trains have now been discontinued, pa.s.sengers and luggage, after the examination at the frontier, being sent on by another train. In addition to the French and Italian secret-service officials, there are now on duty at the various frontier stations, and likewise in Athens, Naples, and Rome, keen-eyed young officers of the "Hush-Hush Brigade," as the British Intelligence Department is disrespectfully called, whose business it is to scrutinize the thousands of British subjects--officers returning from India, Egypt, or Salonika, or from service with the Mediterranean fleet, King's messengers, diplomatic couriers--who are constantly crossing Italy on their way to or from England.

That the arm of the enemy is very long, and that it is able to strike at astounding distances and in the most unexpected places, is brought sharply home to one as the train pulls out of the Genoa station. From Genoa to Pisa, a distance of a hundred miles, the railway closely hugs the Mediterranean sh.o.r.e. At night all the curtains on that side of the train must be kept closely drawn and, as an additional precaution, the white electric-light bulbs in the corridors and compartments have been replaced by violet ones. If you ask the reason for this you are usually met with evasions. But, if you persist, you learn that it is done to avoid the danger of the trains being sh.e.l.led by Austrian submarines! (Imagine, if you please, the pa.s.sengers on the New York-Boston trains being ordered to keep their windows darkened because enemy submarines have been reported off the coast.) In this war remoteness from the firing-line does not a.s.sure safety. Spezia, for example, which is a naval base of the first importance, is separated from the firing-line by the width of the Italian peninsula.

Until a few months ago its inhabitants felt as snug and safe as though they lived in Spain. Then, one night, an Austrian airman crossed the Alps, winged his way above the Lombard plain, and let loose on Spezia a rain of bombs which caused many deaths and did enormous damage.

Even the casual traveller in Italy to-day cannot fail to be struck by the prosperity which the war has brought to the great manufacturing cities of the north as contrasted with the commercial stagnation which prevails in the southern provinces of the kingdom. In the munition plants, most of which are in the north, are employed upward of half a million workers, of whom 75,000 are women. Genoa, Milan, and Turin are a-boom with industry. The great automobile factories have expanded amazingly in order to meet the demand for sh.e.l.ls, field-guns, and motor-trucks. Turin, as an officer smilingly remarked, "now consists of the Fiat factory and a few houses." The United States is not the only country to produce that strange breed known as munitions millionaires. Italy has them also--and the jewellers and champagne agents are doing a bigger business than they have ever done before.

As the train tears southward into Tuscany you begin to catch fleeting glimpses of the men who are making possible this sudden prosperity--the men who are using the motor-trucks and the sh.e.l.ls and the field-guns. _They_ don't look very prosperous or very happy.

Sometimes you see them drawn up on the platforms of wayside stations, s.h.i.+vering beneath their scanty capes in the chill of an Italian dawn.

Usually there is a background of wet-eyed women, with shawls drawn over their heads, and nearly always with babies in their arms. And on nearly every siding were standing long trains of box-cars, bedded with straw and filled with these same wiry, brown-faced little men in their rat-gray uniforms, being hurried to the fighting in the north. It reminded me of those long cattle-trains one sees in the Middle West, bound for the Chicago slaughter-houses.

Rome in war-time is about as cheerful as Coney Island in midwinter.

Empty are the enticing little shops on the Piazza di Spagna. Gone from the marble steps are the artists' models and the flower-girls. To visit the galleries of the Vatican is to stroll through an echoing marble tomb. The guards and custodians no longer welcome you for the sake of your tips, but for the sake of your company. The King, who is with the army, visits Rome only rarely; the Queen occupies a modest villa in the country; the Palace of the Quirinal has been turned into a hospital. The great ballroom, the state dining-room, the throne-room, even the Queen's sun-parlor, are now filled with white cots, hundreds and hundreds of them, each with its bandaged occupant, while in the famous gardens where Popes and Emperors and Kings have strolled, convalescent soldiers now laze in the sun or on the gravelled paths play at bowls. In giving up their home for the use of the wounded, the King and Queen have done a very generous and n.o.ble thing, and the Italian people are not going to forget it.

If Rome, which is the seat of government, shows such unmistakable signs of depression, imagine the stagnation of Florence, which has long been as dependent upon its crop of tourists as a Dakota farmer is upon his crop of wheat. The Cascine Gardens, in the old days one of the gayest promenades in Europe, are as lonely as a cemetery. At those hotels on the Lung' Arno, which remain open, the visitor can make his own terms. The Via Tornabuoni is as quiet as a street in a country town. The dealers in antiques, in souvenirs, in pictures, in marbles, have most of them put up their shutters and disappeared, to return, no doubt, in happier times.

There is in the Via Tornabuoni, midway between Giacosa's and the American Consulate, an excellent barber shop. The owner, who learned his trade in the United States, is the most skilful man with scissors and razor that I know. His customers came from half the countries of the globe.

"But they are all gone now," he told me sadly. "Some are fighting, some have been killed, the others have gone back to their homes until the war is over. Three years ago I had as nice a little business as a man could ask for. To-day I do not make enough to pay my rent. But it doesn't make much difference, for next month my cla.s.s is called to the colors, and in the spring my son, who will then be eighteen, will also have to go."

No, they're not very enthusiastic over the war in Florence. But you can't blame them, can you?

In none of the great cities known and loved by Americans has the war wrought such startling changes as in Venice. Because it is a naval base of the first importance, because it is almost within sight of the Austrian coast, and therefore within easy striking distance of Trieste, Fiume, and Pola, and because throughout Venetia Austrian spies abound, Venice is a closed city. It reminded me of a beautiful playhouse which had been closed for an indefinite period: the fire-curtain lowered, the linen covers drawn over the seats, the carpets rolled up, the scenery stored away, the great stage empty and desolate. Gone are the lights, the music, the merriment which made Venice one of the happiest and most care free of cities. Because of the frequent air raids--Venice has been attacked from the sky nearly a hundred times since the war began--the city is put to bed promptly at nightfall. To show a light from a door or window after dark is to invite a domiciliary visit from the police and, quite possibly, arrest on the charge of attempting to communicate with the enemy. The illumination of the streets is confined to small candle-power lights in blue or purple bulbs, the weakened rays being visible for only a short distance. To stroll at night in the darkened streets is to risk falling into a ca.n.a.l, while the use of an electric torch would almost certainly result in arrest as a spy. The ghastly effect produced by the purple lights, the utter blackness of the ca.n.a.ls, the deathly silence, broken only by the sound of water lapping the walls of the empty palazzos, combine to give the city a peculiarly weird and sepulchral appearance.

Of the great hotels which line the Ca.n.a.le Grande, only the Danieli remains open. Over the others fly the Red Cross flags, and in their windows and on their terraces lounge wounded soldiers. The smoking-room of the Danieli, where so many generations of travelling Americans have chatted over their coffee and cigars, has been converted into a _rifugio_, in which the guests can find shelter in case of an air attack. A bomb-proof ceiling has been made of two layers of steel rails, laid crosswise, and ramparts of sand-bags have been built against the walls. On the doors of the bedrooms are posted notices urging the guests, when hostile aircraft are reported, to make directly for the _rifugio_, and remain there until the raid is over.

In other cities in the war zone the inhabitants take to their cellars during aerial attacks, but in Venice there are no cellars, and the buildings are, for the most part, too old and poorly built to afford safety from bombs. To provide adequate protection for the population, particularly in the poorer and more congested districts of the city, has, therefore, proved a serious problem for the authorities. Owing to its situation, Venice is extremely vulnerable to air attacks, for the Austrian seaplanes, operating from Trieste or Pola, can glide across the Adriatic under cover of darkness, and are over the city before their presence is discovered. Before the anti-aircraft guns can get their range, or the Italian airmen can rise and engage them, they have dropped their bombs and fled. Although, generally speaking, the loss of life resulting from these aerial forays is surprising small, they are occasionally very serious affairs. During an air raid on Padua, which occurred a few days before I was there, a bomb exploded in the midst of a crowd of terrified townspeople who were struggling to gain entrance to a _rifugio_. In that affair 153 men, women, and children lost their lives.

The admiral in command of Venice showed me a map of the city, which, with the exception of a large rectangle, was thickly sprinkled with small red dots. There must have been several hundred of them.

"These dots," he explained, "indicate where Austrian bombs have fallen."

"This part of the city seems to have been peculiarly fortunate," I remarked, placing my finger on the white square.

"That," said he, "is the a.r.s.enal. For obvious reasons we do not reveal whether any bombs have fallen there."

Considering the frequency with which Venice has been attacked from the air, its churches, of which there are an extraordinary number, have escaped with comparatively little damage. Only four, in fact, have suffered seriously. Of these, the church of Santa Maria Formosa has sustained the greatest damage, its magnificent interior, with the celebrated decorations by Palma Vecchio, having been transformed through the agency of an Austrian bomb, into a heap of stone and plaster. Another bomb chose as its target the great dome of the church of San Pietro di Castello, which stands on the island of San Pietro, opposite the a.r.s.enal. On the Grand Ca.n.a.l, close by the railway-station, is the Chiesa degli Scalzi, whose ceiling by Tiepolo, one of the master's greatest works, has suffered irreparable injury. Santi Giovanni e Paolo, next to St. Mark's the most famous church in Venice, has also been shattered by a bomb.