THE HUNTERS AND THE HUNTED - Adventures of Italian Naval Forces by Cocchia, Admiral Aldo

Annapolis, 1958, Naval Institute pr, US First edition, hard bound in dust jacket, Fine/Fine condition, 6x9, 180 pages, illus. -----------------------------------------------------Admiral Cocchia's narrative begins early in the war when he was Chief of Staff at the Italian submarine base at Bordeaux. From this position he describes encounters with the British merchantmen, the Italian methods of slipping through the Straits of Gibraltar, the sinking of the cruiser Calypso, and the transformation of Italian submarines into unarmed cargo boats to take supplies to Japan.---------------------------------------------------------------The next phase deals with the Italian landings on Crete and is followed by a description of the defense of Tobruk, which culminated in the sinking of the cruiser Coventry and of the destroyers Sikh and Zulu. After describing attacks on Gibraltar and some weird happenings at the Battle of Matapan, Admiral Cocchia gives an account of the Battle of the Convoys in the Mediterranean -a battle in which the author himself played a conspicuous part in command of a squadron of destroyers.In addition, Admiral Cocchia's exciting narrative contains dramatic incidents such as the sinking of the battleship Roma by the Germans after the Italian armistice, and the attempts on Gibraltar by human torpedoes ( Was published in the UK as SUBMARINE ATTACKING ).