New Zealand soldiers at Trieste, 1945
What do you know?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Rennie
Frank Rennie wrote a book - Regular Soldier, in 1986, I have just seen a re-release of it, this time in soft cover.
Colonel Frank Rennie CBE, MC (9 August 1918 – 17 November 1992) was a career soldier in the New Zealand Army, holding every rank between private and colonel, and founder of the New Zealand Special Air Service.
Rennie joined 2nd Division in Italy, arriving early in 1945. He was posted to 23rd Battalion and commanded a Vickers MG platoon, seeing action in the river-crossing the 2nd Division conducted as it pushed northwards through Italy in the final months of the war in Europe. His unit finished the war near Trieste, and was involved in the stand-off with Yugoslav Partisans.
The book has a chapter about Trieste, and he relates a story about how one of the Maori Officers got about 100 miles behind the communist lines before getting picked up.
The New Zealand Division faced down the Tito communists who wanted to grab Trieste.
the germans were not allowe to surrender to the ANZAC because it was a superior agreement between the Alleys that the Germans and the Italian RSI soldiers, who fought agaist the Tito's men, should surrender to Tito's partisans. I was (4 years old) there in Opcina. Lucio Diamanti
Hi Ellen - we have a bit more here: /war/the-italian-campaign/faenza-trieste but your best bet is the official history: http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-WH2-2Ita.html Regards, Jamie Mackay.
My father was in the 13th Battalion which went into Trieste in the war and I wondered if you have some information on this battalion and where they went as we are going to Trieste next April and I really would like to see where he had been. His name was Alfred Stephen Fisher.
Many thanks Ellen Ansell
It is a great web-page,although, I would like to see a little more details. Question: Why did the soldiers of the 2nd NZ Division handed over the German soldiers of the Trieste garrison to the Tito forces? After all, the Germans insisted on the surrenduring to New Zealanders, not to Yugoslavs.
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