War veterans give back booty to monks

New Zealand veterans today gave back battlefield booty looted from the Benedictine abbey of Monte Cassino during World War II, including a metal chalice and fragments of wooden sculptures.

The objects were returned during a ceremony attended by the abbot of Monte Cassino, Bernardo D’Onorio, New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark and some 60 New Zealand veterans.

Among the returned booty were a pair of plates, a copper engraving and a silk vestment once used in the abbey.

“It was beautiful to see tears in the eyes of the veterans,” said Pietro Vittorelli, a monk at Monte Cassino, after the ceremony.

The service was part of a week-long commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the battle of Monte Cassino. In the battle, Allied troops bombarded Nazi forces holed up in the ruins of the ancient monastery, which is perched on top of a mountain about 100 miles south of Rome.

Vittorelli said that the return of the objects would help the abbey create an “uninterrupted line” with its past before the wartime destruction.

“These are the small gestures of reconciliation that can cancel the brutality of war,” he said.

Vittorelli said that some of the objects would be conserved in the abbey’s museum, while others would be displayed in rooms still used by the monks.

The abbey was erected in 529 by St Benedict and was a main centre for spreading Christianity in the Middle Ages.

The fierce fighting there during World War II left thousands dead on both sides. Among the Allied dead were 436 New Zealanders, noted Erasmo Di Vito of the Cassino town council.

The battle ended on the morning of May 18, 1944, when the 2nd Polish Corps, which led the final week-long offensive, hoisted its flag over the ruins of the abbey.

Clark, speaking to reporters after meeting Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi in Rome, said that today’s ceremony had been the highlight of her week-long trip to Italy.

“The abbot had gone to enormous trouble to organise a reconciliation service. We had come with things to return from the monastery taken all those years ago, and I think he was genuinely touched by that,” said Clark.