IN ITALY AND AUSTRIA: WAR'S AFTERMATH

New Zealand Tablet, 17 July 1919, Page 28

IN ITALY AND AUSTRIA: WAR'S AFTERMATH

A NEW ZEALAND SOLDIER’S IMPRESSIONS. Writing to the Tablet from Rome, under date May 9, 1919, Mr. Frank Levin (N.Z.F.A.), of Tinakori Road, Wellington, gives an interesting account of life ; in Italy, of the people’s joy and satisfaction at the termination of the war, and of the whole-hearted hospitality extended by them to the British and colonial soldiers. Sergeant Levin was with the New Zealand Field Artillery, and prior to returning to England for demobilisation received furlough in France. " He made an extended tour of the chief French centres, including Lourdes, also the principal towns of Austria and Italy, including Milan, Genoa, Rome, Naples, Florence, Bologna, and Venice. While at Rome he had the very special privilege of being received in audience by his Holiness the Pope, and was afterwards shown over the Vatican and the adjoining interesting' and historical buildings. His intention was then to return to Paris along the Riviera, a stay, being made en route at Nice and Lourdes. The Austro-Italian battlefields, Asiago, Piave, and Carso, were also visited. From Paris, Sergeant Levin was to go to England, preparatory to leaving for the United States, and then later intended to resume his journey to New Zealand. Writing of .the plight of ruined Austria, the brutal force of the German hand was (he said) everywhere apparent. In his concluding remarks the visitor narrates Having at last penetrated well into central Austria, after the most cheerless and slow train journey that could be possibly attempted, I offered my temporary assistance to one of the many excellent Allied Red Cross Commissions— American I think it wasand then our relief train started off, its merciful purpose being to assist the distracted and hungry populace. As our train struggled on laboriously, across the great length of Austrian territory, stopping occasionally for a few hours in some of the more important towns, we realised the people’s plight more fully than ever by the pictures of poverty seen in succession, each an eloquent reminder of what these people have had to endure during the earlier periods of the war. Everything had fallen into the most horrifying disrepair, even the trains in which we travelled were entirely without windows or lighting of any kind ; poverty and hunger confronted one at every turn. Worst of all, the people seemed to have surrendered all hope, all ambition, and, lost in a miasma of inactivity and despair, appeared merely to be awaiting their destiny, whatever it might be. Comparatively speaking, the ruin of these towns was as complete as that of Northern France. The streets of each town that we visited were dirty, almost filthy, and rows of shops were shuttered and closed, whilst apathetic crowds stood idly about, and virtually no business seemed afoot. At every railway station and in the railway yards was a great quantity of rolling-stock, engines being very noticeable, but these, together with the freight and passenger cars, were, as all things else, idle, and simply left, to rot. There were a number of fair-sized towns .before we finally reached the destination where we were to hand out supplies to the people, and at each place along the route we made halts sufficiently long to find sure evidence that with little, if any, valuation, the same apathy and despair were unfortunately only too faithfully repeated. And all the more amazed, if not saddened, must even the most casual observer feel, when be meditates on such a spectacle. He realises, though slightly, what the. war has meant to such people, and pondering over the grim aftermath of totally expended energies, sorrows, and .anxieties, and, over all, the blight of,, the German military machine, their complete disillusionment regarding the whole fiendish business can bo readily understood, y y ‘.w v~ ■•,