The first journalist of the Kingdom of Italy to land in Trieste, redeemed by the destroyer Audace on 3 November 1918, Rino Alessi (former director of the “Giornale del mattino” of Bologna) volunteered in the engineers at the outbreak of war in 1915, sending a series of articles from the front to “Il Secolo” of Milan, directed by Giuseppe Pontremoli. At the suggestion of General Porro Della Bicocca, deputy chief of staff under Cadorna, Alessi was called in April 1916 to the press office accredited to the Supreme Command. While his letters continued to appear in the “Secolo”, the “Messaggero” of Rome and the “Giornale del mattino” of Bologna, from April 1916 to the end of the war he began a confidential correspondence with the director Pontremoli, in which he provided information not known to the public on many aspects of the battles of the Isonzo and Caporetto, on the Supreme Command and on internal controversies.

These letters, which span from October 1916 to May 1918, were first published in 1966, helping to shed new light on one of the most arduous phases of the Great War. Even today, more than a century after they were written, the collection of letters is an exceptional source of analysis for the Great War, especially because it allows us to get to know the Supreme Command of the Italian Army up close, and to understand its strengths and weaknesses, tactics and concerns also with respect to public opinion, long kept in the dark about many elements.

From Isonzo to Piave bears witness to a painful and crucial page of history, thanks to the elegant pen and critical eye of a master of Italian journalism. In this renewed edition, the letters are enriched by a photographic apparatus largely unpublished.

Rino Alessi, From Isonzo to Piave. Clandestine Letters of a War Correspondent, preface by Elvio Guagnini, Leg, Gorizia 2018, 333 pp.