N.A.R.A. (U.S.)

National Archives and Records Administration

I forget exactly when it was that I first heard about the Allied Screening Commission, but it must have been something being discussed by the Monte San Martino Trust in one of their Newsletters. One such Article entitled “The Allied Screening Commission Index Cards” appeared in 2023 to whet my appetite and certainly by this next 2024 Article entitled “NARA glories unfold” I was put firmly in the driving seat and I needed to get into gear.

Before I delve into my subsequent research, carried out once this project was underway, it’s helpful to expand on some of the hard work undertaken by the Monte San Martino Trust, and to explain a little about NARA and why their involvement in digitising the records of the Allied Screening Commission (ASC) is so important, and this is best done by this extract from the 2024 Article referred to above:-

“As a brief reminder, the American National Archives (NARA) hold up to 1.5 million documents produced during the investigations of the Allied Screening Commission (ASC), tasked to reward Italians who had sheltered Allied escapers after the Armistice in September 1943. Aside from the fascinating administrative documents, there are close to 80,000 files each relating to an individual whose assistance ranged from providing a few meals to hiding the ragged young men who turned up at their door for up to 18 months.

These files contain many personal testimonies from both the escapers and their saviours, the content of which can be extraordinarily emotional, especially for the prisoners’ descendants when coming across a letter urging the ASC to hurry up with a monetary compensation, or their Italian counterparts discovering the shaky signature of their Italian forebear (many of whom were functionally illiterate).

It has been a long-term goal of the Trust to persuade NARA to make these far more accessible, something that has now been achieved with the initiation of a digitisation project for the whole archive, which the Trust is part-funding at the cost of £250,000. The trustees consider that this is justified by the huge historical significance of the source material.

The Trust is now receiving reports almost weekly from researchers, both Italian and other nationalities, who are making wonderful discoveries, often after a hopeless search of many years’ duration.”

So, when Nick Young and Anne Copley posted videos of their trip to the offices of NARA in Washington D.C. I decided I needed to give it a go. But where do you start? My first guess was to search on Google for {n.a.r.a. allied screening commission} which takes you to this incredibly overwhelming front page:-

My first attempt typing in {willis} into the Search Archives.gov Search Box brings up 4,398 search results! Hmmm… what else can I try? It was then that I remembered the photo and diary of my mother’s I had come across with my eldest brother (see Don Nino Rolleri) so I typed in {don nino rolleri}

OK so “no results found”. But why is that Search National Archives Catalog highlighted in red or is it purple? So I Click on the link and try again.

To Be Continued – see NARA 1