Austro-Hungarian war cemetery Geroli

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Geroli military cemetery

The Austro-Hungarian war cemetery Geroli is a collective cemetery established during the First World War on the northern foothills of the Pasubio in the Trentino municipality of Terragnolo .

history

The military cemetery was created in the course of the Austro-Hungarian South Tyrol offensive in May 1916. After the Italian entry into the war in May 1915, the Austro-Hungarian army first cleared Monte Pasubio and the adjacent valleys of Vallarsa and Terragnolo and withdrew to positions that were easier to defend. As a result, the Italian army occupied the area. Only a year later did Austria-Hungary manage to partially recapture these areas in the course of the offensive.

The cemetery was built in the district of the same name in the municipality of Terragnolo on the orographic left side of the valley. It was the largest of several collective cemeteries that had been established by the Austro-Hungarian Army in Terragnolo between 1916 and 1918. After the spring offensive of Pasubiofront found their final resting place, but also in here mainly fallen prisoner of war who died in Russian and Romanian soldiers were buried in Geroli. The last burial in Geroli took place after the end of the war in November 1918.

In the post-war period, the bones of the Austro-Hungarian fallen soldiers were reburied from the other cemeteries scattered in the municipality and from the numerous individual graves in Geroli. The few Italian dead who were buried in Geroli, however, were transferred to their hometowns or to the Castel Dante ossuary in Rovereto . In 1931 the graves were leveled and the original wooden crosses on the graves were replaced by cement grave slabs with an enamel sign with the name of the fallen victim. Until 1947, a funeral mass was held every year on November 4th at the Geroli military cemetery, which took place in the small church of the village from 1948 and ended with a subsequent procession to the cemetery. Until 1964, a delegation from Austria with family members visited the cemetery once a year and also held a funeral mass there. In 1970 the military cemetery was closed and, at the request of the Austrian Black Cross, the skull and thigh bones of the deceased were transferred to the ossuary in Rovereto.

List of names of the fallen in the Geroli military cemetery

Only ten years later there were suggestions to reconstruct the completely demolished cemetery. Lack of money and the resistance of some landowners prevented the project from being implemented. The municipality was only able to award a corresponding project contract in 2011. The first work began a year later. During the reconstruction, the leveled concrete grave slabs along with the enamel signs were exposed again. In this way, over 300 gravestones with around 400 name tags, some of which were badly damaged, were excavated. Old memorial stones that had already been erected during the war were brought to light again. In 2014 the reconstructed Geroli military cemetery was opened to the public.

description

The cemetery area is located in the Geroli district a little above the town center on a gently sloping meadow. It is surrounded by a simple wire fence.

At the end of the First World War the cemetery consisted of two grave fields with 142 and 313 graves separated by a footpath. A wide stone staircase separates the cemetery into two grave fields with several rows of graves. After the transfer of further dead in the post-war period, the cemetery finally comprised 470 graves with 492 soldiers known by name, of which 404 were Austrians, 76 Hungarians, 9 Russians and 3 Romanians, as well as 366 unknown dead. The tombstone for the unknown is at the top of the eastern grave field.

During the reconstruction it was possible to give a name again to 534 soldiers who were once buried in Geroli. 351 remained unknown. A plaque with the names of all those buried is at the top of the cemetery. These figures include all those who were buried in Geroli, as well as those who only found their final resting place here temporarily and who were reburied at the instigation of family members or for other reasons.

Another list of names on the south-eastern edge of the cemetery commemorates the 96 soldiers from the municipality of Terragnolo who fell in the ranks of the Austro-Hungarian army on the Eastern Front in the First World War .

literature

  • Comune di Terragnolo (ed.): Il cimitero militare austro-ungarico di Geroli , Trento 2014.

Web links

Commons : Austro-Hungarian military cemetery Geroli  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Comune di Terragnolo (ed.): Il cimitero militare austro-ungarico di Geroli pp. 17-25
  2. ↑ Comune di Terragnolo (ed.): Il cimitero militare austro-ungarico di Geroli pp. 27-29
  3. ↑ Comune di Terragnolo (ed.): Il cimitero militare austro-ungarico di Geroli p. 32–34
  4. ↑ Comune di Terragnolo (ed.): Il cimitero militare austro-ungarico di Geroli p. 17
  5. ↑ Comune di Terragnolo (ed.): Il cimitero militare austro-ungarico di Geroli p. 37
  6. ↑ Comune di Terragnolo (ed.): Il cimitero militare austro-ungarico di Geroli p. 39

Coordinates: 45 ° 51 '52.4 "  N , 11 ° 10' 11.2"  E