Description

A rare work from an underground Partisan press, celebrating the success of the Partisans in the Soča Valley region, with an appendix illustrating a day in a clandestine printing shop.

This work produced by an underground Partisan press was made during the ‘Period of Competition’ in Slovenian Partisan printing, in 1944. The text includes various articles on the great success that the Partisans enjoyed in various battles in the Soča (Isonzo) Valley region, which straddles the modern Slovenia-Italy border. Articles in the second part of the book are dedicated to fallen soldiers and important battles. The list at the end gives information on destroyed and confiscated ammunition.

The 8 page booklet, which is tipped into the present work, is written by ‘Andrej’ and ‘Tone’ (Partisan noms de guerre), the work’s editors, and explains the circumstances of its production. Interestingly, it notes that Tone’s underground printing operation was literally underground, buried in the side of a mountain.

The book was designed by the press ‘Tone’ and produced in the underground press ‘Slovenija’ in Zakriž, deep in the woods near Idrija, Slovenia. The press was one of the few Partisan operations that employed a modern electric press. The ‘Slovenija’ press was spread over several small huts in the woods and still survives to this day, as a museum. In the early 1945, the press ‘Slovenija’ was attacked by the Germans and several authors and printers were killed.

A facsimile edition was issued in 1980.

References: OCLC 21998805 & 452996215. Bibliografja 1964,, no. 571.