The WWII Oral History Project Archive

Today sees the release of the second of our University Records Project newly catalogued collections!

The WWII Oral History Project Archive [RefNo. U DWOH] was donated to the University Archives in February 2025. It was created by Professor Doug Thompson, formerly a lecturer and researcher in Italian Language and History at the University of Hull. The collection captures written and recorded interviews with East Riding veterans of the Italian military campaign staged during WWII. It also captures ephemeral material, contemporary to the campaign, donated by participants in the project to support a related exhibition. This material includes photocopies of veterans’ diary entries, menus for Allied forces Christmas lunches, examples of Allied military currency notes, a pencil drawing depicting soldiers in small boats under explosive fire, and a Special Order from Allied Force Headquarters dated 2 May 1945.

Pencil drawing showing different elf characters drawn by one of the project participants during WWII

The collection is a fascinating snapshot of the wartime experience of military personnel from the local region and provides a counterpoint to the extensive records of civilian life on the Homefront, which are also held at the History Centre.

Interview with the depositors

On the 28 January 2026 I met with Gillian Ania, partner of the late Professor Thompson, and Simona Rizzardi, Thompson’s friend and colleague. It was Gillian and Simona who had arranged for the collection to come to Hull History Centre. They were kind enough to let me quiz them about the WWII Oral History Project for the purposes of this blog.

What does it mean to you to have the collection accessible to researchers?

G: The motivation behind the ‘WWII Oral History Project’ was to investigate and document the experiences of veterans from the East Riding of Yorkshire who were involved in the ‘Italian Military Campaign’, the Allies’ push through Italy in the latter stages of WWII (1943-45) to liberate the country from the German occupation. The fact that the documents relating to this investigation are now publicly available for consultation means a great deal to me, and I am very grateful to the Hull History Centre which is performing such a valuable service in preserving this original material.

S: The collection was ‘dormant’ for over 35 years, and it was a shame that during that time nobody had been able to benefit from the wealth of information and material it contained. All the veterans who took part are now dead and their stories would be lost if the collection had not been made public and accessible to all.

What do you think it would have meant to Professor Thompson?

G: Professor Thompson would have been absolutely delighted to know that this material, which absorbed him for so many years in both a professional and personal capacity, has now found an ideal home, and will be preserved. The Project was carried out before I got to know Doug, but he spoke of it often, returning to the material many times with passion, and sometimes regret – regret that it wasn’t better ordered! He’d tell me about it, re-reading some of the questionnaires and listening to interviews; he’d read further about the Campaign, making notes; and he’d reorder the folders, always intending to do ‘a final sort’ of everything before he saw it placed in a suitable Archive.

S: I know that he was rightly proud of his achievement: he kept all the material collected safely in boxes, hoping that one day the right place and the right people would appear to catalogue, store and make the collection available to the public, which is exactly what the History Centre has been able to provide now. So he would be delighted to know that the collection is now in its ideal location.

What’s the most interesting thing about the collection for you?

G: I was familiar with the Project, and its scope, but the importance of its now being publicly available was really brought home to me on my recent visit to the Hull History Centre (January 2026). Claire had set out the files ready for our perusal, and Simona and I spent a couple of hours going through them – we could easily have stayed longer! – and I was fascinated anew. I particularly enjoyed reading a great many of the 60 or so questionnaires, getting an overview of the different places the servicemen had passed through, and their impressions of the Italians they had encountered – ‘strange’ or ‘hostile’ or (more often) ‘friendly’ and ‘kind’. These were years when most of the young soldiers were new to everything – not only to life in the army, but also to living (and in difficult conditions) in a foreign country. Very few had been to Italy prior to the War, and yet very many had returned since then, some affectionately retracing their steps, and others enjoying holidays there with their families. I found this very moving. It was also interesting to see what the servicemen had kept from their time in Italy – army pamphlets conveying information, instructions, rules and regulations etc, alongside souvenirs documenting the ‘lighter’ side of life (tourist brochures, concert programmes, captioned cartoons, and so on); or personal letters and poems which connected very much to ‘home’, alongside more factual accounts and diary entries.

S: Definitely the veterans’ diaries and personal testimonies. They are not only accounts of what they went through during the war, but also of their memories of living for a time (even if war-time) in a foreign country and being exposed to a different culture and people, something which some of them had never experienced before. I find them fascinating.

Photocopy of pages from a notebook kept by J. W. Hunter whilst in Italy 

There are recordings with four women in the collection who would obviously not have undertaken military service during WWII. Do you know anything of the background to this? One of the names is Mimma Rizzardi who I believe was your mother, Simona?

G: Simona may be better placed to respond here. She is indeed Mimma’s daughter, and was also directly involved with the Project, carrying out some of the interviewing, etc (alongside other colleagues in the Department of Italian at Hull). 

S: Yes, and the other one whom I interviewed with her was a distant cousin of hers (I didn’t know there were two more women). They were only teenagers when the war started, and about 20 when it ended. They were born and had grown up under the Fascist regime of Mussolini and had vivid memories of the years of the war, and especially of the days of the ‘liberation’ by the Allied forces. I hope it will soon be possible for all the interview recordings to be digitalised and made available alongside the other material in collection: I think both researchers and the general public will find them extremely interesting.

Did you know any of the other participants?

G: David Fowkes, I had once met at his home in York, in connection with his contribution, as well as to view some of his paintings. Joe (J.A.) Riley, I did not meet, but he was Doug’s father-in-law, and friend. At some point (in the late 1980s or early 1990s?) Doug, together with a long-time friend of his, took Joe back to Italy to revisit the places he’d passed through, including Florence. I recall him telling me that Joe was extremely moved to be seeing ‘his places’ again. I am familiar with the work of renowned historian, Christopher Seton-Watson, former fellow of Modern History and Politics at Oxford, author of the important tome Italy from Liberalism to Fascism, 1870-1925. 

S: Yes, David Fowkes: he was a renowned York painter who at the beginning of the war joined the Royal Artillery, was then transferred to field artillery and eventually was sent on draft to Italy, where he spent three years. He was a dear friend of mine and I invited him to take part in the project. His contribution included a journal he kept from those years, interspersed with his own drawing and sketches. Professor Thompson thought it was worth publishing and now a copy of David Fowkes’ A Gunner’s Journal, Italy 1943-1946 (Department of Italian, University of Hull, 1990) is included in the History Centre collection. It is a fascinating and poignant testimony and I encourage everyone who accesses the collection to read it.

What can you remember about the project?

S: The scale of it: all the Italian Department staff at Hull University were involved in some way (some in the interviews, others in preparing and sorting out the material for the exhibition) and the university library was heaving with people coming to see the exhibition. There was great excitement and the feeling that we were part of something important and unique.

Can you remember anything about the exhibition and what it meant to the participants?

G: In addition to what Doug told me about the Project, I also recall how thrilled he said the veterans were to be contacted and interviewed about their experiences of serving in Italy all those years ago, and for their accounts to feature centrally in an exhibition at the University.

S: I cannot remember anything specific, but I know it offered the veterans the extraordinary opportunity to meet fellow servicemen who had had similar experiences and to share precious memories of both happy and traumatic times. It certainly made them realise that what they did was remembered and appreciated and had a huge historical value.

Material donated by project participants for use in the exhibition

Final thoughts

Anyone who wishes to look at this collection may do so for free here at the Hull History Centre. A description of the records within the collection can be accessed via our online catalogue, where you can also download a PDF copy of the catalogue. Details of how to arrange a visit can be found under the ‘Visit Us’ section of our website. Please note that, due to technical requirements, we are currently unable to provide access to the audio recordings within series U DWOH/3. Should you wish to listen to a particular recording please contact archives@hull.ac.uk to discuss your needs.

Claire (Archivist, Hull University Archives)