Saturday, August 13, 2005
Italian WWII POWs Received Heartfelt Welcome in Boston in 1943 - Boston Globe
 

The ANNOTICO Report
A Lawyer in the case of cleared but stranded Chinese (15 Uighurs) detainees at Guantanamo Bay has attempted to use the WWII Italian POW's experience as a precedent .

I'm unsure of relevance of the legal argument, But this article has a lot of reference to the Italian WWII POWs in Boston in 1943. I have deleted most of the info regarding the Guantanamo detainees.


WWII tale applied to Guantanamo case
Detainees' lawyer cites Boston story
Boston Globe
By Charlie Savage,
August 12, 2005
WASHINGTON -- In 1944, months after Italy had surrendered to the Allies, life improved for Italian prisoners of war detained at Camp McKay in South Boston. They could not go home because World War II still raged, but the United States stopped treating them as POWs.
They moved out of the prison, got jobs at the port, and attended Mass at St. Leonard's Church in the North End.
Yesterday, the American government's handling of the Italian soldiers in Boston was put before a federal judge in the case of cleared but stranded Chinese detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Their Boston-based lawyer, Sabin Willett, cited the all-but-forgotten slice of Boston history to bolster his argument that the Bush administration should let his clients out of the prison.
''The situation of Italian prisoners of war during World War II is instructive," Willett told the court in a filing that was declassified yesterday. ''These former enemy combatants were given increased freedom of movement among the population.
''They held jobs and earned money. Particularly in US regions that had large Italian-American communities, liberty became the norm."...
A Justice Department lawyer has likened the Uighurs to former POWs who were not immediately repatriated at the end of World War II. But in his new filing, Willett questioned whether that analogy holds, citing the case of the Italians in Boston.
After Italy surrendered to the Allies on Sept. 3, 1943, the former POWs moved out of the stockade into better housing on Peddocks Island in Boston Harbor. They would ride the ferry to jobs at the port, for which they were paid partially in cash and partially in room and board. On their days off, they could socialize in the city in groups of 10 to 25 with an Army sergeant chaperon.
Globe archives show that this treatment was somewhat controversial at the time. A group of American veterans complained that the government was ''pampering" former enemies.
But military authorities rebuked them, saying they were trying to abide by the Geneva Conventions in the hope that American POWs would also be treated well.
Many other Bostonians embraced their presence. On June 4, the Italians were taken to St. Leonard's Church for Mass. Afterward, crowds cheered them as they were driven through the North End. At the Hatch Shell, they stopped and sang an Italian song called ''A Bouquet of Flowers," posed for pictures, played boccie, and had a picnic, the Globe reported.
''Then as now, the North End of Boston has been home to large numbers of Italian-Americans," Willett noted. The spirit of welcome among the Italian Americans was heartfelt."..
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/
washington/articles/2005/08/12/wwii
_tale_applied_to_guantanamo_case/