‘Toughs and Thugs’: The Mazzini Society and Political Warfare amongst Italian POWs in India, 1941–43

Abstract

During the early days of the Second World War, the British government created a number of clandestine agencies whose mission was to undertake covert intelligence and propaganda work. One of the problems these organizations, such as SOE and the PWE, experienced was the lack of qualified linguists who could be used in the murky world of espionage, political warfare and counter-propaganda. By early 1941, unable to find large numbers of qualified people in Britain or the Empire, Whitehall – in desperation – looked towards the United States with its large Italian émigré community and the little known anti-fascist organization known as the Mazzini Society. This article is a study in failure. Using British attempts to forge a Free Italy movement between 1941 and 1943, it examines the sometimes farcical attempts by SOE, and later the PWE, in recruiting Italo-Americans for clandestine political warfare work in the fight against fascist Italy.

Notes

See Bob Moore and Kent Fedorowich, The British Empire and its Italian Prisoners of War, 1940–1947 (London, 2002) Ch.5.

Kent Fedorowich, ‘Propaganda and Political Warfare: The Foreign Office, Italian POWs and the Free Italy Movement, 1940–3’, in Bob Moore and Kent Fedorowich (eds.), Prisoners of War and their Captors in World War II (Oxford, 1996) pp.119–48.

Brooks to R.J.H. Shaw, Department EH, 11 June 1940, cited in Moore and Fedorowich, Italian Prisoners (note 1) p.106. For the origins of SOE see David Stafford, Britain and European Resistance, 1940–1945 (London, 1980) pp.10–27. The British failure to establish a propaganda machine prior to 1939 and the pre-war machinations involved in setting up a psychological warfare strategy against the Axis powers is best analyzed by Philip M. Taylor, The Projection of Britain. British Overseas Publicity and Propaganda 1919–1939 (Cambridge, 1981). He has recently updated this work in his British Propaganda in the Twentieth Century. Selling Democracy (Edinburgh, 1999) pp.114–50.

SOE Papers for Western Europe, HS 6/885, minute by Section D, 28 August 1940; Sir Frank Nelson, operational head of SOE, to AD, 9 December 1940. The National Archive, London, Public Record Office (hereafter PRO). FO 898/161

JA to D/JG, 17 June 1941. PRO. HS 6/884. For Italian internment policies see Lucio Sponza, ‘The British Government and the Internment of Italians’, in David Cesarani and Tony Kushner (eds.), The Internment of Aliens in Twentieth Century Britain (London, 1993) pp.125–46; and for the Loraine Committee's activities see John Curry, The Security Service 1908–1945. The Official History (London, 1999) pp.165–7. Sir Percy Loraine, who chaired the committee, had been a former ambassador to Italy (1939–40).

SOE War Diary, 3. PRO. HS7/58.

Martelli to P.B.B. Nichols (Foreign Office), 7 December 1940. PRO. FO898/161.

Ibid.

Martelli to Ion S. Munro, head of Ministry of Information's Italian Section, 11 April 1941. PRO. FO371/29936 R4059/G.

Memo entitled, ‘Free Italy Committee’, 17 December 1940; Halifax to Dalton, 18 December 1940 with enclosed memo on pros and cons of launching a Free Italy movement. PRO. FO898/161.

JIC(40)325, ‘General Treatment of Prisoners of War’, 18 October 1940. PRO. CAB81/98; JIC(40)63, minute 1, 25 October 1940. CAB81/87.

JIC(40)71, minutes 1 and 2, 3 December 1940. PRO. CAB81/88; JIC(40)422, Brooks to Colonel C.T. Edwards, Secretary of JIC, 17 December 1940. CAB81/99; JIC(40)73, minute 1, 24 December 1940. CAB81/88.

‘Memorandum on Anti-Fascist Propaganda in the Middle East’, by Thornhill and Miss Freya Stark, Assistant Information Officer, Ministry of Information, Aden, 15 August 1940. PRO. FO898/110.

Minute by Ismay, 11 February 1941. PRO. PREM 3/242/8.

WM19(41)12, 20 February 1941 PRO CAB65/11; WP(41)51, ‘The Formation of a Free Italian Movement in the Italian Colonies’, 6 March 1941. CAB 66/15.

Secret minutes ‘I’ and ‘II’, Dalton to Gladwyn Jebb, SOE's Chief Executive Officer, both dated 23 January 1941. PRO. HS6/903. This was reiterated by the ever-zealous Martelli several months later. See ‘The Free Italy Movement and the Raising of a Free Italian Force’, 24 March 1941. FO 371/29936/R 5642.

Dalton to Sir Robert Vansittart, Chief Diplomatic Advisor, Foreign Office, 24 August 1940. British Library of Political and Economic Science (BLPES), London School of Economics, Dr Hugh Dalton Papers, 7/3.

For Cooper's unhappy time as minister, see John Charmley, Duff Cooper (London, 1986) pp.141–53. For Dalton's pugnacious tenure as head of SOE see Ben Pimlott, Hugh Dalton (London, 1985) pp.299–345.

Minute by Pierson Dixon, 17 January 1941. PRO. FO371/29935 R409.

Ibid.; minute by Nichols, 9 January 1941.

Ibid. Cooper to Eden, 15 January 1941, which also included a short memorandum on the consultation between Cooper and Dalton earlier that month.

Ibid.; Eden to Cooper, 27 January 1941; minutes by Cadogan and Eden, 18 and 20 January 1941.

The Times, 10 February 1941; Minute by Sir Orme Sargent, 6 March 1941 PRO. FO 371/29935 R2707; Martelli to Munro, 11 April 1941. FO371/29936 R4059/G. For the intrigue surrounding the Free Italy committee see Lucio Sponza, Divided Loyalties. Italians in Britain during the Second World War (Berne, 2000) pp.173–81.

Moore and Fedorowich, Italian POWs (note 2) pp.107–8; Sponza, Divided Loyalties (note 23) pp.95–151; SOE War Diary, 9d. PRO. HS7/265.

In January 1942, 600,000 Italian-Americans were given enemy alien status. This ruling was overturned in October–November 1943 after Italy surrendered that September. Conversely, 400,000 Italian-Americans served in the US armed forces during the Second World War. Louis E. Keefer, Italian Prisoners of War in America 1942–1946. Captives or Allies? (Westport, 1992) pp.41–2.

Martelli to Nelson, 19 December 1940. PRO. HS6/885.

Wiley to Donovan, 8 June 1942. National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland, (hereafter NARA), Records of the Office of Strategic Services, RG 226, W.J. Donovan's OSS Records, microfilm series, M 1642, roll 70, frame 588. Wiley was a career diplomat, who, prior to his assignment to the State Department in 1940, had been the American Minister to Latvia and Estonia (1938–40).

Antonio Varsori, ‘Max Ascoli oppositore del fascismo la “Mazzini Society”’, Nowua Antologia, 2136 (1980) pp.106–24. For Sforza's role also see Antonio Varsori, ‘Sforza, La Mazzini Society e gli alleati (1940–1943)’, in Antonio Varsori (ed.), ‘L'antifascismo Italiano negli State Uniti durante la seconda guerra mondiale (Rome, 1983) pp.129–54. A heartfelt thanks to my colleagues Effie Pedaliu for pointing me in the direction of the Varsori material and Joe Dunthorn for translating these two very insightful pieces.

Wiley to Donovan, 8 June 1942. NARA, RG 226, M 1642, roll 70, frame 587. According to Roosevelt's personal representative in French North Africa, Robert D. Murphy, Churchill's assessment of Sforza, made during the negotiations surrounding the Italian surrender in 1943, was particularly brusque. To the British Prime Minister, Sforza was ‘a foolish and played-out old man, incapable of facing let alone riding the storm’. Quotation cited in J.G. Beevor, SOE. Recollections and Reflections 1940–1945 (London, 1981) p.138, and is from Robert Murphy's, Diplomat Among Warriors (New York, 1964) p.201. Alexander Cadogan did not have respect for Sforza either, calling him a ‘dud’. David Dilks (ed.), The Diaries of Sir Alexander Cadogan 1938–1945 (London, 1971) p.564, entry for 2 October 1943.

Varsori, ‘Sforza’ (note 28) p.129; Biographical notes on Mazzini Society, 18 June 1942. NARA, RG 226, Entry 92, Box 66, Folder 14.

Biographical notes on Mazzini Society, 18 June 1942. NARA, RG 226, Entry 92, Box 66, Folder 14.

Beevor, Recollections (note 29) p.137; Varsori, ‘Max Ascoli’ (note 28) p.115. For one of the first editorial forays made by Ascoli announcing the aims of the Mazzini Society see the New York Herald Tribune, 29 November 1940.

H. Gregory Thomas to Allen W. Dulles, 10 June 1942. NARA, RG 226, Entry 92, Box 66, Folder 14.

Wiley to Donovan, 8 June 1942. Ibid., M 1642, roll 70, frames 586–7.

Thomas to Dulles, 10 June 1942. Ibid., Entry 92, Box 66, Folder 14.

Varsori, ‘Max Ascoli’ (note 28) p.110; Thomas to Earl Brennan, 20 July 1942. NARA, RG 226, Entry 92, Box 103, Folder 33. For an excellent examination of the internal US dimension see J.E. Miller, ‘A Question of Loyalty: American Liberals, Propaganda, and the Italian-American Community, 1939–43’, The Maryland Historian (Spring 1978) pp.49–70. A revealing insight into Sforza's initial contacts with senior US officials and the interplay between the competing factions in America is described by the Secretary of the Interior, Harold L. Ickes in The Secret Diary of Harold L. Ickes, vol. 3 The Lowering Clouds 1939–1941 (London, 1955) pp.319–20 and 462–5, entries for 15 September 1940 and 6 April 1941.

Minute by Martelli, 7 June 1941. FO371/29947 R6065.

Attlee to Canberra, circular D102, 28 February 1941; Bruce to Fadden, 3 March 1941. National Archives of Australia (Canberra), NAA, Commonwealth Record Series (CRS), A981/1, ITA 9.

Massey to King, 12 February 1941; Department of Mines and Resources memo. initialled RNM, 19 February 1941; Norman Robertson, Under-Secretary of State for External Affairs, to RCMP Commissioner S.T. Wood, 20 February 1941. National Archives of Canada (NAC), RG 76, vol.467, f.710220. Robertson later wrote to Wood commenting that Coit had been disappointed with the response for recruits in the United States. This had not surprised Robertson, who thought the response by the anti-fascist Italians in the United States had been rather ‘meagre and guarded’. Robertson to Wood, 24 March 1941. NAC, N.A. Robertson Papers, MG 30 E163, vol.14, file 160.

‘Articles of Incorporation of Mazzini Society’, included in letter sent by an ex-internee, Paolo Sonnino, to W. Ashley Wynes, Department of External Affairs, 4 September 1942. NAA, CRS A 981/1, ITA 9. Sonnino was an Italian Jew who had fled Italy only to be interned by the Australians when Italy entered the war. He was released in August 1941. A year later he suggested to Canberra that a Free Italy movement be undertaken in Australia, but he was told by W.R. Hodgson, Secretary, Department of External Affairs that it was best not to press the matter. Ibid., Hodgson to Sonnino, 29 October 1942. His tribunal case files can be found in NAA, CRS A 367/1, items C54839 and C18000/265.

Department of Mines and Resources memo. initialled RNM, 19 February 1941. NAC, RG 76, vol.467, f.710220; Mr Logie (probably Ministry of Information) to Philip Broad (Ministry of Economic Warfare), 11 February 1941; J to CD and A/D1, 18 March 1941; ‘Italian Volunteers from USA’, 23 April 1941; memo entitled, ‘American Recruits’, 30 April 1941, which describes arrival and processing of party. PRO. HS 6/886; Report on the Italo-American party submitted to Air Commodore P.R.C. Groves, Political Warfare Executive, by Lieutenant A. Trower, Royal Artillery, 4 February 1943. PRO. FO939/372.

Tarchiani profile. PRO. HS6/886; SOE War Diary, 19. HS7/265.

Member profiles. PRO. HS 6/886.

‘Italian Volunteers from USA’, 22 April 1941; D/JG to Nelson, 6 June 1941. Ibid.

AD/A to M, 22 April 1941. Ibid.

Ibid.

Ibid.

D/JG to Nelson, 6 June 1941; AD to Jebb, 5 December 1941; JA to A/D1, 10 December 1941. Ibid.; SOE War Diary, 21, 24–6 and 29. PRO. HS7/265. For an insight into one of the Isle of Man facilities see Oliver Hoare (ed.), Camp 020. MI5 and the Nazi Spies: The Official History of MI5's Wartime Interrogation Unit (London, 2000).

Jebb to Dalton, 12 August 1941. BLPES, Dalton Papers, 18/2.

SOE War Diary, 31. PRO. HS7/265.

Extracts from history of Italian section war diary written by CD, 15 October 1941. PRO. HS7/58. For an insider's view on the SOE muddle in the Middle East see Bickham Sweet-Escott, Baker Street Irregular (London, 1965) pp.70–99; William Mackenzie, The Secret History of SOE: The Special Operations Executive 1940–1945 (London, 2000) pp.167–90.

CD to D/JG, 5 June 1941 PRO. HS6/886; SOE War Diary, 31. HS7/265; Secret cypher from Dalton to Wavell, 18 July 1941. FO898/111.

Oliver Harvey, Director, Enemy and Enemy-Occupied Countries Division, Ministry of Information, to Nichols, 16 April 1941; minute by Nichols, 19 April 1941. PRO. FO371/29936 R4081.

Ibid.

Meeting at the Foreign Office with SOE officials to discuss the raising of a Free Italian force among Italian POWs, 25 June 1941. PRO. HS6/886; Brooks to Sargent, 30 June 1941. FO898/111; SOE War Diary, 56. HS7/265; Alfred Stirling, External Affairs Officer, London, to Hodgson, 8 October 1941. NAA, CRS A981/1, ITA 9.

Meeting at the Foreign Office with SOE officials, PRO. HS6/886; SOE war diary, 56. PRO. HS7/265.

Brooks to Sargent, 30 June 1941. PRO. FO898/111.

SOE War Diary, 94–5. PRO. HS7/265.

Draft instructions to Mazzini team, 5 and 8 July 1941. PRO. HS6/886; draft telegram, 9 January 1942. HS6/887; SOE War Diary, 56. HS7/265; Minute by Martelli, 7 December 1941. FO939/373.

Secret cypher from Dalton to Wavell, 18 July 1941. PRO. FO898/111.

Fedorowich, ‘Propaganda and Political Warfare’ (note 2) pp.119–48. A very useful insight into the internecine warfare in Whitehall over control of propaganda operations can be found in Michael Stenton, Radio London and Resistance in Occupied Europe: British Political Warfare 1939–1943 (Oxford, 2000) pp.22–40.

Dalton to Jebb, 13 August 1941. PRO. HS3/195; Dalton to Wavell, 5 January 1941; Rex Leeper, head of SO1, to Dalton, 5 December 1940. HS3/189.

Boyall to Munro, 14 January 1942. PRO. WO208/3039.

Ibid.; minute by Major D. Talbot-Rice, General Staff (India), 24 February 1942.

Ibid. Cawthorn to DMI, London, 21 January 1942.

L.S. Amery, Secretary of State for India, to Marquess of Linlithgow, Viceroy of India, 18 November 1941. PRO. HS6/886; War Office to C-in-C India, 13 November 1941. PRO. FO939/373.

Report by Tarchiani, 27 December 1941. PRO. WO208/3039.

Ibid.

Ibid.; Boyall to Munro, 14 January 1942.

PWE written report no. 1 by Munro, 27 November 1941. PRO. FO898/111.

Tarchiani to his father, 27 December 1941. PRO. WO208/3039.

Unsigned draft memo, 16 January 1942. PRO. HS6/887.

Tarchiani to his father, 27 December 1941; translation of Galgani to Tarchiani's father, 16 September 1941 in Boyall's report to Munro, 14 January 1942. PRO. WO208/3039.

Wavell to War Office, 8 November 1941. PRO. FO898/111; SOE to New York, cypher no. 2932, 13 November 1941. HS6/886.

Tarchiani to his father, 27 December 1941; Stevens to Munro, 8 January 1942. PRO. WO208/3039. David Garnett, The Secret History of PWE. The Political Warfare Executive 1939–1945 (London, 2002) p.138, incorrectly states that these men were never sent into the POW camps. But he was correct when he stated: ‘Had they been allowed in Ps/W camps they would probably have been lynched’.

Unsigned memo, 14 January 1942. PRO. HS6/887.

Stevens to Groves, 4 March 1942. PRO. FO898/112.

Addenda to Stevens's report on Boyall's party sent to Munro, 23 November 1941, dated 27 November 1941. PRO. WO208/3039.

Flight Lieutenant H.G. Crawshaw, PWE, to Martelli, 20 December 1941. PRO. HS6/886.

Unsigned draft memo entitled, ‘Points for Mazzini Society’, 10 January 1942. PRO. HS6/887.

Trower report, 4 February 1943; C-in-C India to War Office, cypher from Thornhill, 31 March 1943; copies of telegrams from Colonel A.C. Johnston, Thornhill's replacement as head of PWE mission in India, sent to War Office via C-in-C India, 3 and 16 May 1943. PRO. FO939/372.

SO London report, no.754, 12 January 1943, and no.965, 8 February 1943; copy of cypher telegram sent to New York by Tarchiani, 15 April 1942. PRO. HS6/887; personnel statement on Mazzini mission, n.d. (probably mid-1942) HS6/894; SOE War Diary, 87–8. HS7/265; Trower report, 4 February 1943. FO939/372. The SOE assessment of Forlani makes interesting reading. A widower, Forlani had spent most of his time in the hotel and restaurant business. ‘In spite of his age [he] has shown that he is courageous, cheerful and sincerely eager to learn. Should be a useful man given the right job’. How wrong they were! Forlani profile. HS6/886.

SOE War Diary, 253–4. PRO. HS7/265; Groves to H.C. Bowen, Ministry of Information, 21 February 1944. FO939/372.

Fedorowich, ‘Propaganda and Political Warfare’ (note 2) p.57.

War Office to D.F. Howard, Foreign Office, 1 December 1942. PRO. WO208/841.

PWE mission progress report, 28 April 1943; Groves to Brooks, 22 May 1943. PRO. FO939/363.

Groves to Sir Robert Bruce Lockhart, Deputy Under-Secretary of State in charge of PWE, 8 April 1943. PRO. FO939/373.

Martelli to Stevens, 7 December 1941; Stevens to Leeper, 8 December 1941. PRO. FO939/373; Garnett, Secret History (note 75) pp.138–9.

Trower report, 4 February 1943. PRO. FO939/372.