Lot 20362 – 1943 30c reply cards Rhodes-Italy-Rhodes following different routes and related to the Battle of Anzio

1943 (Dec 28) 30c on yellowish bilingual reply stationery postcards including both parts although detached, the front side addressed to Anzio, upfranked for the airmail rate with Aegean 5oc, tied by Rhodes dispatch cds’s and red German censorship markings. The Allies disembark at Anzio on 22.1.44 with the purpose of heading for taking Rome, and the Battle of Anzio (in Anzio and Nettuno) lasted until 24 May; as a result of the Battle, this item was not possible to be delivered, with the addressee being cancelled by traces of blue ink, and only on 23.9.44, almost ten months later after dispatch, the back side was struck with a cds of Nettunia (the locality at that time which englobed Anzio and Nettuno), with English blue cachets struck in Cairo (Egypt), thus following a completely different route through territories not controlled by the Axis. Some faults of no importance for this item. An extraordinary usage with high interest from both the postal and historical points of view, as the card used different routes on the outgoing and incoming legs, and Anzio was one of the key operations of the Allies in Europe in WWII.