ITALIAN TRAITORS ON TRIAL

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 106, 29 January 1919, Page 5

ITALIAN TRAITORS ON TRIAL

DESTRUCTION OF THE LEONARDO DA VINCI - CONSPIRATORS IN AUSTRIAN '; PAY By TolecriDh—Press Association- -OoDyright (Rec. January 28, 8.40 p.m.) London, January 26. The "Daily Chronicle's" Milan correspondent reports that startling disclosures were made at a court-martial at Genoa for the trial of half a. dozen , persons concerned in the blowing up of tho Dreadnought Leonardo da Vinci in the roadstead at Tai-anto by a clock machine in the magazine on August 3, 191G, with the loss of 253 of the crew. Tho originator of the plot was Cavaliere Gaeta, the Austro-Hungarian Consul at Naples. It is alleged that the plotters included Arconte, the deputy chief of the torpedo defence service at Maddalena, and Vris--cuolo, secretary to the Leonardo da' Vinci's commander. - Austria entered into a definite contract with the conspirators in February, 1016, assigning half a million sterling as the price of blood, including ,£200,000 for the arch-plotter. The principal fiends Kninccl access to the. battleship .on the pretext of selling war loan bonds. Apart from the depositions of witnesses, damning evidence against the prisoners was derived from documents from An ■.Irian espionage offices in Zurich, and sold to the Italian Government. These documents are in tho handwriting of tho "notorious Dr. Mayer, head of- tlie Austro-Hungarian Spy Department in Switzerland, and contain a minute description of tho accused traitors, their .movements, and those of their accomplices who /led from justice, together with details of the moneys paid them for this and other diabolical crimes perpetrated in Italy.—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Aesn.