Lot 20360 – 1943 (Oct-Nov) Group of seven items, Italian resistance in Leros and Samos

1943 (Oct-Nov) Group of seven items on exhibition pages, featuring the resistance of the Italian troops against the Germans in Leros and Samos (from the Armistice until Nov. 1943). This lot includes the earliest (1.10) and the latest date (11.11) recorded of the mails from Leros and Samos carried through the P.M.62. The British presence in the Dodecanese commenced in Leros -and surprisingly already in 1943- where they disembarked on 16.9 to support the Italians against the Germans; apart from the first dispatch of Italian mail which was carried by a British submarine which left Leros on 28.9.43 (see lot 20436), the later mails were sent as opened correspondence through the P.M. 62 in Samos, then carried by British means to destinations in Italy only under the control of the Allies. As the small contingent of British in the Dodecanese were defeated on 12.11.43, this mail only was only functioning for one month and a half, and the latest dispatch is dated 11.11. This material is of great scarcity.