Southern Railway Route - Last Day of use

[Frank Schofield]

Early in November 1917, it was decided to send five British Divisions (5th, 7th, 23rd,41st and 48th) to Italy, to steady the front, after the retreat by the Italian Army after the Battle of Caporetto.
This involved a vast amount of trains, the well-established route from France to Italy was the Overland Route (Cherbourg – Taranto) via the Modane tunnel, to avoid overloading this route, only six extra trains per day were allocated, the remainder travelled by a new Southern route down to Marseilles and along the coast, via Nice to Genoa.
Up to the 31st December 1917, 715 trains were used, 442 troop trains, 102 supply trains, 102 ammunition trains, 32 ordnance trains, 24 engineer trains and 9 miscellaneous trains. (numbers ex Official History)
On 30th November 1919, this Southern (or Riviera) route was finally shut down, writing on the attached postcard of Ventimiglia Station in Italy, Sapper Francis Cobb of the Royal Engineers (Railways) states "Marseilles route finished today 30/11/19", the card was postmarked at APO S.7. (located in Marseilles). An indistinct censor Shield (CM8) is present.

Frank Schofield

[Chris Grimshaw]

Nice Card Frank.  A good find.

Chris

[Michael Dobbs]

With the text written on the postcard, what an excellent find Frank, well done.

Mike