ITLIANS IN AUSTRALIA

Evening Star, Issue 19408, 17 November 1926, Page 10

ITLIANS IN AUSTRALIA

IM . ■ " ' 1 GATHERING OF FASCISTS With great enthusiasm members of the Italian Fascism© and the Italian community in'Melbourne recently celebrated the anniversary of the armistice between Italy and Austria on November 4, 1918, and the birth of the Fascismo movement on October 28, 1922, when Mussolini marched on Rome and was appointed Prime Minister by King Victor Emanuel 111. ■' As guests of the Royal Italian ConsulGeneral for Australasia (Commendatore E. Grossardi) and Donna Grossardi, fifty black-shirted Fascists figured in a picturesque ceremony on the tennis court at Chonmel, Lisson Grove, Hawthorne, when the Fascismo flag, after consecration, was handed, as »' gift of Donna Grossardi, to the Fascists. Members from other States attended. A remarkable scene was that in which Count Di San • Marzanb,- the -recentlyappointed Consul for, Italy in Brisbane, who, like Commendatore Grossardi and Cavalicre Marso Carosi. Vice-Consul for Italy in Sydney, wore the black shirts of the order, called upon the Fascists present to kneel' during 'one minute’s silence in commemoration of the Italian dead in the Great- War, and of 3,000 Fascists who perished in the post-war conflicts against Bolshevism and Communism. The Fascismo salute: given with.an upraised. right arm in the-manner of ■'the 1 old Roman . greeting, war- accorded' to the Consular , rcpresanfatives on their entrance by the Fascisti guard of honor, and was spontaneously evoked with ringing cheers at the mention of Mussolini’s name during a wonderfully ..impassioned, address by Father Di Frahceso. : ’ Before the consecration of the colors Count Di San Marzaho, who left Rome onlv- a: few weeks ago, brought a personal -.message of greeting to the Melbourne Fascismo from Signor Mussolini. ; 1