A Vatican Lifeline '44

Book excerpt: A memoir of an Allied soldier and former POW in Rome, and the unexpected support he received from the Italian people—and from a heroic Catholic monsignor. It is a widely held belief that the Italians in the Second World War failed to win much in the way of martial glory. But the scoffers tend to overlook the fact that most Italians had little or no feeling of animosity toward the Allies—and to wage war against an enemy with whom you have no quarrel is a contradiction in terms. This contradiction is vividly portrayed in William Simpson’s dramatic account of his time in Rome after the downfall of Mussolini and Italy’s withdrawal from the war in September 1943, when thousands of Allied prisoners of war, let loose in surrendered Italy, fell prey to occupying Nazi forces. Simpson, an escaped POW, managed, after some hair-raising adventures, to find his way to Rome and soon discovered how widespread was the support of the Italians for the Allies, and how deep-seated their hatred of the Nazis. His adventures during the months before the Allies finally liberated Rome, helping to house and feed hundreds of Allied prisoners on the run, make for compulsive reading—and leave no doubt about the extraordinary bravery of the many Italians who came to their aid. But the real hero of this dramatic story is Monsignor O’Flaherty, who, with remarkable sangfroid, used the somewhat precarious neutrality of the Vatican, where he was employed, to help Simpson and his fellow fugitives.