News from the Front: Memories of a World War
II Refugee is an audio documentary prepared for a class in Producing Historical Documentaries for Radio
with Professor Gerald Zahavi at the University of Albany while working on my
master’s degree in 2000. This production presents the viewpoints of my mother,
Maria Rose Sartorio, who lived in Nazi-occupied San Piero Patti, Sicily, during
World War II, and that of Frank Neutts, who served on the staff of Major Gen.
Fred L. Walker, U.S. 5th Army, which participated in the liberation of Sicily.
Sound clips from
the classic documentary series The World at War provide narration by Sir
Laurence Olivier and quotes from General Mark Clark that put the experiences of
the two interview subjects in the context of the larger historical events
taking place in Italy in World War II. Transcript follows below.
Transcript
The World at War — Narrator: Winston Churchill once told Stalin
the Mediterranean is the soft underbelly of the crocodile. Churchill and the
British Chiefs of staff were sure that attacking German-occupied Europe through
Italy would help shorten the war
The World at War — Gen. Mark Clark: I can see him now at his
map and his persuasive way with his pointer, pointing out the soft belly of the
Mediterranean and after we got in there, I often thought of what a tough old
gut it was, instead of the soft belly that he had led us to believe.
The World at War — Narrator: That was General Mark Clark, who
led the American 5th Army in the invasion of Italy during. World War II.
G. Jack Urso:
Sixty-plus years after it began, for most people, World War II is remembered
mostly through ubiquitous cable channel documentaries, old films airing on late
night television, or perhaps more recent Hollywood features like Schindler's List, Saving Private Ryan, and U-571.
For me, World War II has been experienced through the eyes of
family members who fought on both sides of the war. My mother, Maria Sartorio,
was raised in Sicily before and during World War II.
Maria Sartorio: I
was born January 25th, 1936, in San Piero Patti in provincial Messina in
Sicily.
G. Jack Urso: Meanwhile,
on the other side of the world, a close friend, Frank Neutts, was growing up.
Frank Neutts: I was
born on January 30, 1919, in Carbondale, Pennsylvania.
G. Jack Urso: During
the NATO air war against Serbia, along with millions of other people around the
world, I watched the long columns of the Kosovar refugees make the perilous
journey to I'll equipped relief camps. The footage brought back especially
strong memories for my mother. For her, as with many survivors of war, the
psychological effects can last a lifetime.
Maria Sartorio: It
wasn't a pretty sight. Sometimes I have nightmares of what went on. I remember one
particular time your father took us to Wildwood, New Jersey. We were at the
beach —, my first experience, good thing I had a babysitter to watch you guys —
and all at once there was a formation of the airplanes coming. Do you think I
was thinking of you guys? I just started running to the house and I kept
screaming. I was running up the street, screeching, “They're coming! They're
coming!” And the landlord says “Maria. What's the matter?”
I said, “The Germans, the Germans are coming! They're going
to kill us!”
And she literally shook me, she says, “What Germans?”
I said, “There's planes at the sea, you know, at the beach.
They’re gonna kill us!”
And she said, “Where are your kids?”
That stopped me from screeching. I forgot to the kids at the beach.
And she says, “No, it's the Coast Guard maneuvering over the
beach. They're not enemies. They are Coast Guard. They're one of us.”
I have nightmares of the airplanes going by to this day.
G. Jack Urso: While
Italy suffered under the German presence, America was preparing for the
inevitable invasion. Frank Neutts, then a young man in his early 20s, served as
a stenographer under General Walker as part of the US 5th Army that would
invade Italy at Salerno.
Frank Neutts: I was
drafted into the army and entered active service on May 5th1942. I was assigned
to the 143rd Infantry Regiment. A vacancy occurred in the Adjutant General's
Office for a stenographer. I applied for the position and got it I was
transferred to the commanding general, Major General Fred L. Walker. He was
later assigned to the Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia, as commandant. I
joined him at Fort Benning around September of 1944.
G. Jack Urso: As a young man from Carbondale, Pennsylvania,
the war presented Frank Neutts with the opportunity to serve his country and see
the world an entirely different set of expectations and experiences than for my
mother.
Frank Neutts: Yeah,
I often think of things that occurred to me in Italy that I experienced, the
places I've seen. Being in the position I was in, I was able to get into the
Vatican in places where the rank and file couldn't get, and I enjoyed all that
and I enjoyed the . . . places I've
seen, which I probably would never have seen had it not been for the war.
G. Jack Urso: In the course of his duties, the young GI
had a rare opportunity for an audience with Pope Pius XII. The wartime
pontiff's actions during the war have been the subject of ongoing debate. Many
suggest that he could have done more to speak out against Nazi war crimes.
Frank Neutts: He's
being criticized for not doing enough, but they don't realize that he did help
something like 300,000 on the QT. His hands
were tied. He couldn't — if he if he took an open stance on that, you know what
would happen? They would line up these civilians and . . . and shoot them down like . . . like cattle. I thought in my own mind, and from what I know and read, I thought
he handled it well. He was able to free a lot of those civilians.
G. Jack Urso: There had been support among the civilian
population for the fascist regimes, Frank Neutts and my mother tried to explain
their appeal.
Frank Neutts: Mussolini was admired in a lot in Italy before
the war. He did a lot for the Italians, but once he became part of the Axis
Pact with Hitler, he lost all good that he did. They [the Italians] had no use
for him. They considered him a puppet of Hitler, and that was it. It’s too bad,
he spoiled everything he ever did for them.
Maria Sartorio: Well,
there’s a good side of Mussolini, and there's a bad side of Mussolini. We were
very poor, and he did a lot of good till the war broke out and I, I don’t know,
he went crazy himself.
G. Jack Urso: During
the war, members of my extended family served in the American, Italian, and
German armies. My Italian grandfather discovered he had a German half-brother
by accident when he received someone else's mail while both were interned at an
American POW camp.
Maria Sartorio: So, he went back . . . this was while he was in prison [the Allied POW camp], and the
guy [the Allied officer] looked it up. He says that, “We have two Sartorios
here,” so he called the other guy. My father says, my name is Mario Sebastiano
Sartorio,” and he says, “My name is Sebastiano Sartorio.”
So, my father, he says, “Well, you're German.” And he [the
German soldier] says, “Yeah, you're an Italian.” He [her father] asked him, “Who
was your father?” and he said, “We are brothers!”
And this is how my father found out that there were twelve
brothers!
G. Jack Urso: While
researching my family history, I discovered my grandfather, despite his
experience in the war, or perhaps because of it, was a life-long admirer of
Adolf Hitler.
Maria Sartorio: Even
here in America, he kept saying the greatest speaker was Hitler, how he shook
the world when he made that big speech in the square or in the balcony, he
would get right in the middle of the living room floor here in America and he
put his hand and he start shouting, going through the motions of how Hitler
made that kind of speech. He [her father] was terrifying. I’d say, “My God, he
was a maniac. What’s happening?” I would run. I would go upstairs and just stay
in my bedroom [and say], “My God, he's going crazy.”
G. Jack Urso: Despite
the Hollywood movies that seem to portray all Sicilians as peasants, my
mother's family in fact was well off. They own two large homes and three farms.
However, German foraging and theft robbed them and other Sicilians of their
food. As a result, 1943 to 1945 were years of starvation.
Maria Sartorio: The
Germans took everything that we had, and I remember one particular time, we
were fourteen families and we had two loaves of bread and the bread was stale. You
know what my mother did? She got a big, a big bowl of water. We had to boil the
water, that's why the water was hot, and she got the two loaves she would cut
into slices, and then the slices into strips and pass out to everybody and this
bowl was full of warm water [crying] and we dunked our bread in the hot water. and
put in our mouth and, and we that's the only way we could swallow the bread.
G. Jack Urso: Anything about what the Germans did that
still stands out in your mind?
Maria Sartorio: Well,
I think that there were cowards. You know, we never looked in the face [of the]
Germans because we were scared, we never knew what they looked like, all except
they were mean, you know, and we never looked at them.
World at War — Narrator:
Sicily, as agreed at Casablanca, covers the next item on the agenda. Only two
months after the German collapse in Tunisia, the British and Americans began
landing troops on Sicilian beaches.
G. Jack Urso: The
Germans retreated from Sicily in such a hurry that they left behind mines and
munitions that fell into innocent, unsuspecting hands.
Maria Sartorio: When
the Germans left, we went to where the Germans were camping and left all this
equipment — dark bread laying around, ammunition — we didn’t know as kids what these things were, but a lot of kids got
blown up. Even . . . if we walk around that camp, there were mines in the
ground. Us kids didn’t know. I was always the last one in line. I wanted to go,
I wanted to see the excitement, but I was scared and a lot of my friends just “Psst!”
[Maria Sartorio makes a sound to indicate that some of her friends were blown
by the leftover munitions and mines].
G. Jack Urso: As
the US Army occupied Italy, Italian American GIs were often called upon to help
the local population even when loyalties were still divided.
Frank Neutts: We
were occupying the mayor of the town's villa there in San Prisco. This is right
outside of Naples. His wife was a very
staunch Catholic. He was a Hitler sympathizer. He was a Nazi, through and
through. So, she wanted to have a mission at the church there. So, two guys
came to me and asked if I couldn't get a transportation to take them to this
place up in [unintelligible] up in the mountain, this monastery, and bring a
missionary down, which I did. She was so thrilled and pleased they couldn't do
enough for me.
G. Jack Urso: If
the Nazi presence brought fear and intimidation, then the arrival of the Allies
certainly generated relief and gratitude.
Maria Sartorio: Americans,
they were there were our friends . . . they were our angels.
Frank Neutts: They
greeted us with open arms and they were very good to the GIs. They couldn't do
enough for us. They were relieved to be out from under the German presence
there and they were so thrilled at their newfound freedom that they couldn't do
enough for us.
G. Jack Urso: World
War II as an epic, almost mythical quality about it that seems to grow as years
go by and the participants begin to pass away. As a reporter, someone who uses
words for a living, I am reminded that the destruction of World War II began
not with the shot, but with the word.
[Ends with a segment of Adolf Hitler giving a speech before an
applauding audience.]
