Italian Prisoners of War in Pennsylvania

Allies on the Home Front, 1944–1945

Flavio G. Conti and Alan R. Perry

During World War II 51,000 Italian prisoners of war were detained in the United States. When Italy signed an armistice with the Allies in September 1943, most of these soldiers agreed to swear allegiance to the United States and to collaborate in the fight against Germany. At the Letterkenny Army Depot, located near Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, more than 1,200 Italian soldiers were detained as co-operators. They arrived in May 1944 to form the 321^st Italian Quartermaster Battalion and remained until October 1945.

As detainees, the soldiers helped to order, stock, repair, and ship military goods, munitions and equipment to the Pacific and European Theaters of war. Through such labor, they lent their collective energy to the massive home front endeavor to defeat the Axis Powers. The prisoners also helped to construct the depot itself, building roads, sidewalks, and fences, along with individual buildings such as an assembly hall, amphitheater, swimming pool, and a chapel and bell tower. The latter of these two constructions still exist, and together with the assembly hall, bear eloquent testimony to the Italian POW experience. For their work the Italian co-operators received a very modest, regular salary, and they experienced more freedom than regular POWs. In their spare time, they often had liberty to leave the post in groups that American soldiers chaperoned. Additionally, they frequently received or visited large entourages of Italian Americans from the Mid-Atlantic region who were eager to comfort their erstwhile countrymen.

The story of these Italian soldiers detained at Letterkenny has never before been told. Now, however, oral histories from surviving POWs, memoirs generously donated by family members of ex-prisoners, and the rich information newly available from archival material in Italy, aided by material found in the U.S., have made it possible to reconstruct this experience in full.
All of this historical documentation has also allowed the authors to tell fascinating individual stories from the moment when many POWs were captured to their return to Italy and beyond. More than seventy years since the end of World War II, family members of ex-POWs in both the United States and Italy still enjoy the positive legacy of this encounter.

University Press Copublishing Division / Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

Pages: 312 • Trim: 6¼ x 9⅜

978-1-61147-997-3 • Hardback • October 2016 • $111.00 • (£85.00)

978-1-61147-999-7 • Paperback • April 2019 • $47.99 • (£37.00)

978-1-61147-998-0 • eBook • October 2016 • $45.50 • (£35.00)

Series: The Fairleigh Dickinson University Press Series in Italian Studies

Subjects: History / United States / State & Local / Middle Atlantic (DC, DE, MD, NJ, NY, PA), History / Military / World War II, History / World

Italian Prisoners of War in Pennsylvania

Allies on the Home Front, 1944–1945

Hardback

Paperback

eBook

Summary

During World War II 51,000 Italian prisoners of war were detained in the United States. When Italy signed an armistice with the Allies in September 1943, most of these soldiers agreed to swear allegiance to the United States and to collaborate in the fight against Germany. At the Letterkenny Army Depot, located near Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, more than 1,200 Italian soldiers were detained as co-operators. They arrived in May 1944 to form the 321^st Italian Quartermaster Battalion and remained until October 1945.

As detainees, the soldiers helped to order, stock, repair, and ship military goods, munitions and equipment to the Pacific and European Theaters of war. Through such labor, they lent their collective energy to the massive home front endeavor to defeat the Axis Powers. The prisoners also helped to construct the depot itself, building roads, sidewalks, and fences, along with individual buildings such as an assembly hall, amphitheater, swimming pool, and a chapel and bell tower. The latter of these two constructions still exist, and together with the assembly hall, bear eloquent testimony to the Italian POW experience. For their work the Italian co-operators received a very modest, regular salary, and they experienced more freedom than regular POWs. In their spare time, they often had liberty to leave the post in groups that American soldiers chaperoned. Additionally, they frequently received or visited large entourages of Italian Americans from the Mid-Atlantic region who were eager to comfort their erstwhile countrymen.

The story of these Italian soldiers detained at Letterkenny has never before been told. Now, however, oral histories from surviving POWs, memoirs generously donated by family members of ex-prisoners, and the rich information newly available from archival material in Italy, aided by material found in the U.S., have made it possible to reconstruct this experience in full.
All of this historical documentation has also allowed the authors to tell fascinating individual stories from the moment when many POWs were captured to their return to Italy and beyond. More than seventy years since the end of World War II, family members of ex-POWs in both the United States and Italy still enjoy the positive legacy of this encounter.

Details

University Press Copublishing Division / Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

Pages: 312 • Trim: 6¼ x 9⅜

978-1-61147-997-3 • Hardback • October 2016 • $111.00 • (£85.00)

978-1-61147-999-7 • Paperback • April 2019 • $47.99 • (£37.00)

978-1-61147-998-0 • eBook • October 2016 • $45.50 • (£35.00)

Series: The Fairleigh Dickinson University Press Series in Italian Studies

Subjects: History / United States / State & Local / Middle Atlantic (DC, DE, MD, NJ, NY, PA), History / Military / World War II, History / World

Author

Flavio Giovanni Conti is an independent historian. His book I prigionieri italiani negli Stati Uniti [Italian Prisoners of War in the United States] won the prestigious “De Cia” award in 2013.

Alan R. Perry is professor of Italian Literature and chair of the Department of Italian Studies at Gettysburg College.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction
1Capture
2Arrival in the United States
3The Letterkenny Army Depot and the Italian Service Units
4American Public Opinion and the Italian POWs
5The Apostolic Delegate Amleto Cicognani’s First Visit to the Depot in October 1944
6Italian Americans, Women, and Letterkenny Co-operators
7The Treatment of Prisoners
8Letterkenny’s Chapel and Bell Tower Built by the Italian Prisoners
9Spring 1945: Brig. Gen. John M. Eager, Italian Ambassador Alberto Tarchiani Visit the Letterkenny Depot
10End of the War in Europe and the Pacific: Awaiting Repatriation
11Autumn 1945: The 321^st ISU Battalion Returns Home
12Letterkenny’s Italian Veterans and Postwar Italy
13Back in the United States as Free Citizens
14Conclusion: The Letterkenny Legacy
Appendix AList of all Letterkenny POWs
Appendix BItalian Officers Detained at Letterkenny
Appendix CList of Italian American Civilians that Helped the POWs
Appendix DU.S. Army Officers and Non-Commissioned Officers at Letterkenny that Interfaced with the POWs
Appendix EMap of the Depot

Reviews

The portrait that emerges is fascinating and remarkably positive; it's notable that Italian co-operators received a modest regular salary and more freedom than most POWs, even the liberty to leave their posts in groups chaperoned by American soldiers. Notes, appendices, and an index round out this welcome contribution to public and college library American history collections, highly recommended.
— Midwest Book Review

This...book serves as a memorial for several Italian POWs, all members of the Italian Service Unit 321st Quartermaster Battalion assigned to the Letterkenny Depot in central Pennsylvania during and after WW II. Based primarily on interviews, letters, testimonials, some background texts, and newspaper accounts from the region, it outlines life for those Italian soldiers, captured mainly in North Africa by British and US forces, who then volunteered for the Italian Service Units after Italy changed sides in September 1943. Aside from simple homesickness, the Italians had a good war. They earned money doing war work for the Americans, whereas German POWs worked in agriculture. Protected and supported by the Catholic Church and many Italian American families, many of these men remember their captivity as an introduction to friendship, democracy, and, in many cases, family. The authors point out that Letterkenny was an extraordinary POW experience, with great food and no escapes. That all the Italian POWs returned home pays homage to the US creation of the Italian Service Units. A local history, the book is a remembrance and a contribution to the historical record. Summing Up: Optional. Graduate students, faculty, specialists.
— Choice Reviews