The litigation Italy Yugoslavia (Trieste)

The memory of 26 October 1954, the day when the return of the Italian troops to Trieste put an end to eleven years of separation from the country, is rooted in the collective memory of the Italians.

Annexed to the Kingdom of Italy in 1918 (officially after the Treaty of Rapallo in 1920), the city of Trieste ended up in foreign hands after the armistice of 8 September 1943 and then passed under military occupation with the constitution of the Free Territory of Trieste, defined by the Treaty of Paris in 1947. Together with it, the territory was divided into two zones: A controlled by the allied army and B entrusted to the Yugoslav administration.

That 26th October 1954 was a grey day, with pouring rain and gusts of bora, and the long wait for the return to Italy had begun the night before with the people of Trieste gathering along the twenty kilometres from the city centre to Duino, where at that time was the border between zone A of the Free Territory of Trieste and Italy. On 5 October 1954, a memorandum was signed in London which had sanctioned the will of the British and Americans to entrust Italy with the control of zone A, despite protests from Yugoslavia by Tito who controlled zone B, Istria and most of Venezia Giulia.

On 6 October 1954 the governor of the "Free Territory of Trieste", Major General Thomas John Willoughby Winterton, English, and General Edmondo De Renzi met in Duino Castle to define the details of the transfer of power. Shortly after midnight on October 25th at the border post in Duino, the first Italian department that took over from the Americans arrived. At 5:30 a.m. the actual entrance began: first the column of General Mario Gianani, two battalions of Carabinieri, a company of the Guardia di Finanza and a police department. At 8:40 a.m., at the cry of "Italia, Italia" a festive crowd watched the raising of the flag on the tower of the Castle of San Giusto where the tricolour donated by President Einaudi went up, at 10:00 a.m. the passage of power took place. At 11 and 25 a.m. the cruiser Duca degli Abruzzi, the destroyers Artigliere, Granatiere and Grecale, arrived in the roadstead, and the bersaglieri of the eighth regiment entered Piazza Unità d'Italia. The chronicles tell of the whole city in the square, three hundred thousand people and tricolours everywhere. Then there were the words of the mayor, Giovanni Bartoli: "Italy has returned". The 26th October 1954 is a fundamental junction in the history of Italy, after eleven years of foreign domination the Julian capital returned under Italian jurisdiction, as a result of the "Memorandum of Understanding" signed twenty-one days earlier.

By kork75!