Giuseppe Garibaldi

Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:50 +0200

Giuseppe Garibaldi (July 4, 1807 – June 2, 1882) was an Italian patriot and soldier of the Risorgimento. He came under the influence of Giuseppe Mazzini in 1834, took part in a failed mutiny intended to provoke a republican revolution in Piedmont, and escaped to France. He lived in exile in South America (1836 – 48) and learned guerrilla warfare tactics during liberation attempts in Brazil and Uruguay. He returned to Italy in 1848 with his small band of "Red Shirts" and fought in Milan in the war of independence against Austria. After Pope Pius IX fled Rome (1848), Garibaldi for a while defended the city from the French when they attempted to reinstate papal rule. His bold retreat through central Italy made him a well-known figure. He lived in exile again until 1854, and in 1859 he led an army in another war against Austria. In 1860, with no government backing, he raised an army of about 1,000 men and attacked Sicily; by the end of his campaign, he commanded 30,000 men, with whom he seized Naples. He handed all of southern Italy over to Victor Emmanuel II and hailed him as the first king of a united Italy. With secret support from Victor Emmanuel, he led unsuccessful campaigns into the Papal States in 1862 and 1867.____Garibaldi was like a caged lion on the island of Caprera and longed day and night to liberate his land from the roaring lion in the Vatican._____Pope Pius IX was feeling more and more secure with the French garrison securing the City and Garibaldi a prisoner on the island of Caprera. In July 1870, he actually had himself declared Infallable._____When France and Prussia went to war and the French garrison had to be withdrawn, the Italians rushed into the City and the fall of the Papacy was complete._____The Italian soldier Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807-1882) was the key military figure in the creation of the kingdom of Italy. An unflagging foe of all tyranny, he devoted his life to fighting oppression.
For the greater part of his life most of the native land of Giuseppe Garibaldi was under the control of foreigners. In the north Lombardy was held by Austria, and to the south of the States of the Church the kingdom of Naples was in the hands of the stagnant feudal regime of the Bourbons. Garibaldi was the embodiment of the Italian brand of 19th-century nationalism, which was impelled by the twin desires for unity and freedom._____sources: reformation.org, answers.com.

Memorial Drawing #4 / Vladivostok

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 11:31 +0200

Diorama # 10/Communist Monument / Chelekov

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 09:53 +0200

Memorial Image / Diorama # 10/ Filip Berte (multiplex, paper) Part of final installation 'Collective Memory Mass Grave'.

Memorial Drawing #3 / Fallen Lenin

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 20:59 +0200

Battlefield of the Somme / 1916

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 11:33 +0200

The Battle of the Somme was one of the bloodiest battles in World War I and human history. The Allied forces, including troops from England, France, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa, took on the German lines in the northern part of France. The front stretched for about twelve miles in a vertical line that ran to the north and south of the River Somme, hence the battle's name. ____The commander of the British Expeditionary Forces, General Douglas Haig and French commander General Joseph Joffre agreed in February of 1916 to mount a combined offensive near the Somme River. When the Germans attacked Verdun in late February, it became apparent that the French would have to move some of their forces to support that battle and the British would provide the bulk of the forces at Somme. Thus, the purpose of the Battle of the Somme shifted from being a decisive attack on German front lines to providing a distraction for German forces from Verdun.____The battle did have one major benefit in that it forced Germany to divert forces from Verdun and call off the offensive____The opening day of the battle on 1 July 1916 saw the British Army suffer the worst one-day combat losses in its history, with nearly 60,000 casualties. The composition of the British Army, at this point a volunteer force with many battalions comprising men from specific local areas, meant these losses had a profound social impact and has given the battle a lasting cultural legacy in Britain. It also had a tremendous social impact for the Dominion of Newfoundland, as a large percentage of the men that had volunteered to serve were lost that first day. The battle is also remembered for the first use of the tank. The conduct of the battle has been a source of historical controversy, with senior officers such as General Sir Douglas Haig (commander of the British Expeditionary Force) and Henry Rawlinson (commander of Fourth Army) criticised for incurring very severe losses while failing to achieve their territorial objectives. Other historians have portrayed the Somme as a vital preliminary to the defeat of the German Army, and one which taught the British Army valuable tactical and operational lessons._____
At the end of the battle, British and French forces had penetrated a total of 6 miles (9.7 km) into German occupied territory. The British Army was three miles from Bapaume and also did not capture Le Transloy or any other French town, failing to capture many objectives. The Germans were still occupying partially entrenched positions and were not as demoralized as the British high command had anticipated._____The Battle of the Somme ended in a similar fashion to the Battle of Verdun, with minimal gains and heavy casualties over a long period of fighting. The deepest point of penetration, made by the French, was a mere 8 kilometers and the deepest for the British was only two miles. The modern consensus is that the battle was a disaster, even though it did help take German pressure off of the Verdun front. The British suffered 419,654 casualties, the French suffered 204,253 casualties and the Germans suffered 465,000 casualties. Additionally smaller countries like Canada had 24,029 casualties, Australia had 23,000 casualties, New Zealand had 7,408 casualties, and Ireland had 25,000 casualties. Adolf Hitler was one of the participants on the German side and suffered a wounded leg during the battle that kept him out of the war until March of 1917._____s British historian Gary Sheffield said, "The battle of the Somme was not a victory in itself, but without it the Entente would not have emerged victorious in 1918".

"Somme. The whole history of the world cannot contain a more ghastly word." - Friedrich Steinbrecher (German officer)_____
Sources: freeinfosociety.com, wikipedia

Memorial Drawing #2 / Armenian Deportation March / 1915

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 12:28 +0200

Memorial Drawing #1 / Petrograd / Leningrad / Moscow

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 14:03 +0200

Diorama # 9/Trans-Siberian Railway

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 12:54 +0200

Memorial Image / Diorama # 8/ Filip Berte (multiplex, cardboard, paper, acrylic) Part of final installation 'Collective Memory Mass Grave'. ___The Trans-Siberian Railway is stretching just shy of ten thousand kilometres across the vast expanse of Russia from Moscow to the Pacific port of Vladivostok. It took 25 years (1891-1916) to build the railroad.

Memorial Image #28 Battle of the Pancyprian Gymnasium / 1956

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 11:31 +0200

PAINTING / Filip Berte (Acrylic on paper). Memorial Image after an image of students of the Pancyprian Gymnasium in Nicosia, who battle security forces with stones and bottles. When the EOKA campaign began the majority of the Greek Cypriots genuinely thought that the manifest destiny of Cyprus was to be part of Greece. This was especially true for EOKA leadership and its members. (EOKA or Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston,or Greek for 'National Organisation of Cypriot Struggle' was a Greek Cypriot nationalist military resistance organisation that fought for the end of British rule of the island, for self-determination and for union with Greece (enosis).)_____
A Greco-centric education system for decades had inculcated Greek consciousness into the minds of Greek Cypriot students._____The Pancyprian Gymnasium is the oldest Secondary School and the first educational institution in Cyprus. It was founded in 1812, on a site across the Archbishopric, by the national martyr Archbishop of Cyprus Kyprianos, and was first named "Hellenic School". At the time, Cyprus constituted part of the ottoman Empire, and the church played an important role in the education of the enslaved Greek population.____Many of its pupils and graduates have voluntarily participated in the Liberation Movement of the Greek Nation, particularly in the Cyprus Liberation Struggle (1955-1959) against the British Colonialism. A number of them were killed in action during these struggles.

source: britains-smallwars.com, philatelism.com

Memorial Image #31 Cyprus Independence / 1960

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 10:10 +0200

PAINTING / Filip Berte (Acrylic on paper). Memorial Image after an image of the inauguration of Cypriot independence on August 16, 1960. For the first time the new Cypriot flag in Nicosia is raised. ____Cyprus gains its independence from Britain after almost a century of rule by the British empire--and centuries of rule by previous empires. Britain had unilaterally annexed the island in 1904.____For four years before independence, Cyprus, an island of some 500,000 people at the time, was torn by war involving Greece, Turkey and Britain. The death toll reached 502.___A fanfare of military trumpets and a 21-gun salute fired by 42 Field Regiment, Royal Artillery, heralded the start of a new day in Cyprus, one of the hottest of the year. As the sound of the last shot echoed across Nicosia, the independent Republic of Cyprus was born and the Union Flag was slowly lowered above Government House.___sources: middleeast.about.com, britains-smallwars.com