Escape to Rossano by Gordon Lett
In July 1942, Major Gordon Lett was taken prisoner at the fall of Tobruk. After fourteen months in the notorious prison camps at Bari and Chieti, he escaped at the Armistice of September 1943 from the camp at Veano and took to the mountains above the Cisa Pass. Rather than return to England, he founded and led an entirely non-political band of highly-successful partisans, the Battaglione Internazionale. The group fought and harassed the Brigate Nere and the Germans along the Magra valley from North of Pontremoli to La Spezia for 18 months. They were so influential to the success of the Allied advance that permanent lines of communication with the Allies were established, supplies dropped by air and, later, SAS troops sent in to assist the Brigade. 500 Allied troops escaped to safety via Rossano.In the first few months of peace, Lett became a liaison officer of No 1 Special Force, SOE and twice crossed the lines. He was the first Allied officer to enter La Spezia in April 1945, together with the partisans. He was awarded the DSO for his services and received the Medaglia Argento al valor militaire from the Italian government. Today there is still a strong bond between many of those mentioned in the book and the Lett family. This edition of the work includes a foreword by Freya Stark.
Lett's account is a fine mix of high adventure (with occasional farce), balanced with an understanding of the horrors of war, and the price the thousand or so people of the valley paid for supporting him and his partisansThis book is a valuable reminder of the part played by the people of Italy in their own liberation. - History of War Website
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781848326217 |
| ISBN 10 | 1848326211 |
| Title | Escape to Rossano |
| Author | Gordon Lett |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Hardback |
| Publisher | Pen & Sword Books Ltd |
| Year published | 2011-09-01 |
| Number of pages | 256 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |