PRIESTS RETURN

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXV, Issue 31, 5 January 1945, Page 4

PRIESTS RETURN

LIVED IN ITALY DURING WAR. AUCKLAND, Jan. 4. The two Auckland Roman Catholic priests who had the remarkable experience of living in Rome throughout Italy's participation in the war, and have returned to New Zealand with the latest draft of members of the Second N.Z.E.F. in the Central Mediterranean theatre, Rev. Fathers O. N. Snedden and J. Flanagan, were both former pupils of the Sacred Heart College. Fathers Snedden and Flanagan were ordained in Rome in February, 1941, after being students at the College of Propaganda for three years. When Italy entered the war they and all other British students were given the option of leaving Italy or continuing with their studies in the Vatican City. The two Aucklanders decided to remain and complete the course. Later Father Snedden became known to radio listeners in every British, country. His was the voice which for three years regularly broadcast from the Vatican City radio names of prisoners of war in Axis hands. Particularly after Greece and Crete, Father Snedden was the means by which many New Zealand families first learned that their menfolk had not been killed in the confused fighting of those two campaigns. Father Snedden continued with this work till the Allies captured Rome. In other ways, too, he was able to be of aid and comfort to prisoners and their relatives^• -

After Germany virtually assumed control of Italy, the position of Fathers Snedden and Flanagan became even more remarkable than it had been when they had to deal only with the Italians. Their duties frequently took them beyond the boundaries of the Vatican Citj', but though they were the nationals of a country at war with German v. the Germans in Rome seem to have respected punctiliously the rights of the Vatican, and the Vatican passports carried by the two Aucklanders ensured them safety from German guards and patrols.

Father Snedden is a brother of Mr N. C. Snedden, of Auckland, and Father Flanagan is the son of Police Inspector M. Flanagan and Mrs Flanagan, of Auckland.