The Macedonian campaign

by Luigi Villari

PREFATORY NOTE

The operations of the Allied forces, and in particular those of the Italian contingent in Macedonia, are less well known than those of almost any other of the many campaigns into which the World War is subdivided. There have already been several published accounts of it in English and French, but these works have dealt almost exclusively with the action of the British or French contingent, and are mostly of a polemical or journalistic character; very little has been written about the other Allied forces, or about the campaign as a whole. Owing to the position which I held for two years as Italian liaison officer with the various Allied Commands in the East, I have been able to collect a good deal of unpublished material on the subject, and I felt that it might be useful to give a consecutive account of these events, correcting many inaccuracies which have been spread about. The book was written originally in Italian, and dealt in particular detail with the operations of the Italian expeditionary force. In the present English edition I have omitted certain details concerning the Italian force, which were of less interest for a non-Italian public, while I have added some further material of a general character, which I only obtained since the Italian edition was written.

The published authoritative and reliable sources for the history of the Macedonian campaign are very few. A bibliography is appended. Besides my own notes and recollections of the events, set down day by day, and the records of various conversations which I had with the chief actors in the Balkan war drama, I must acknowledge the valuable assistance afforded to me by various Italian and foreign officers and officials. My especial thanks are due to the following:

General Petitti di Roreto, for information on the events of the early period of the campaign;

General Ernesto Mombelli, who supplied me with a great deal of useful information and advice on the latter period;

Colonel Vitale, under whom I worked for some time, and who first instructed me in the duties of a liaison officer;

Colonel Fenoglietto, who kindly provided a part of the photographs reproduced in the book;

Commendatore Fracassetti, director of the Museo del Risorgimento in Rome, who kindly placed a large number of photographs at my disposal, authorizing me to make use of them;

Captain Harold Goad, British liaison officer with the Italian force from soon after its landing at Salonica until it was broken up in the summer of 1919, who supplied me with many details concerning the topography of the Italian area of the Macedonian front, which he knew stone by stone, and his notes and recollections of many political and military episodes. Few men have done such admirable and disinterested work in favour of good relations between Britain and Italy, both during and after the war, as this officer, who was most deservedly decorated with the Italian silver medal for valour in the field.

L. V.