Whether rightly or wrongly, the Yugoslavs had formed their opinion of
the Italian sailors, an opinion which dated from the time of Tegetthoff
and had not undergone much modification by the incidents of this War.
They remembered what had happened when they cruised outside Italian
ports; they knew very probably that the British had on more than one
occasion to break through the boom outside Taranto harbour, and they may
have read[8] of the experience of some French ladies who came to the
Albanian coast on the _Citta di Bari_ towards the end of 1915 with 2000
kilos of milk, clothing and medical supplies for the Serbian children
who had struggled across the mountains. These ladies write that after
the torpedoing of the _Brindisi_ their own crew ran up and down without
appearing to see them; the crew had life-belts, those of the ladies were
taken away. Ultimately they succeeded in having themselves put ashore,
and the _Citta di Bari_ fled in the night without landing the stores.
And in Albania, the ladies say, one witnessed the "stoic endurance of
the noble Serbian race, of which every day brought us more examples. In
that procession of ghosts and of the dying there was no imploring look,
there was no hand stretched out to beg." ... The Yugoslavs may have
known what happened to Lieutenant (now Captain) Binnos de Pombara of the
French navy. This officer, in command of the _Fourche_, had been
escorting the _Citta di Messina_ and, observing that she was torpedoed,
had sent to her, perhaps a little imprudently, all his life-boats and
belts. A few minutes later, when he was himself torpedoed, the Italians
did not see him; anyhow they made for the shore. De Pombara encouraged
his men by causing them to sing the Marseillaise and so forth; they
were in the water, clinging to the wreckage, for several hours, until
another boat came past. The next day at Brindisi, when he met the
captain of the _Citta di Messina_, this gentleman once more did not see
him; but the French Government, although de Pombara was a very young
man, created him an officer of the Legion of Honour.