Domenico Chiocchetti was taken prisoner in North Africa and was one of several hundred Italian prisoners sent to Orkney to help erect the Churchill Barriers sealing the eastern approaches to Scapa Flow. The wet and windswept island of Lamb Holm was in stark contrast to his home in the Dolomites, but in these bleak and inauspicious surroundings Chiocchetti set about easing his homesickness by erecting an extraordinary reminder of his native land. He began work on the Italian Chapel, as it has come to be known, late in 1943, when two Nissen huts, joined end to end, were made available to the prisoners of Camp 60. Chiocchetti wrote to the people of Orkney before returning to Moena after restoring his chapel in 1960. In these three weeks I have done my best to give again to the little church that freshness which it had 16 years ago.

Source: The North Africa Journal April 29, 2019 03:56 UTC