Pieta Military Cemetery

Cemetery Details

Location Triq Id-Duluri, Pieta, South Eastern Region, Malta
Co‑ordinates N35.89043, E14.49549
Description

LOCATION INFORMATION
The Cemetery is located in Triq id-Duluri (Our Lady of Sorrows Street), 2 kilometres south-west of Valletta on the road to Sliema. On the edge of the Gwardamanga district, the entrance is on Triq II-Principessa Melita, leading to Triq Tal-Pieta and Msida Sea Front and Creek. Please note that there are several "Our Lady of Sorrows" streets in Malta. Visitors are advised to refer to the google map directions via the link provided to avoid confusion.

HISTORY INFORMATION
From the spring of 1915, the hospitals and convalescent depots established on the islands of Malta and Gozo dealt with over 135,000 sick and wounded, chiefly from the campaigns in Gallipoli and Salonika, although increased submarine activity in the Mediterranean meant that fewer hospital ships were sent to the island from May 1917.

During the Second World War, Malta's position in the Mediterranean was of enormous Allied strategic importance. Heavily fortified, the island was never invaded, but was subjected to continual bombardment and blockade between Italy's entry into the war in June 1940 and the Axis defeat at El Alamein in November 1942. At the height of Axis attempts to break Malta's resistance in April 1942, the island and her people were awarded the George Cross by King George VI.

Malta's defence relied upon a combined operation in which the contributions made by the three branches of the armed forces and Merchant Navy were equally crucial. Although heavily pressed in defence, offensive raids launched from the island by air and sea had a crippling effect on the Axis lines of communication with North Africa, and played a vital part in the eventual Allied success there.

There are 1,303 Commonwealth casualties of the First World War buried or commemorated at Pieta Military Cemetery, including 20 Indian servicemen who were cremated at Lazaretto Cemetery. Second World War burials number 166. The Commission also cares for 772 non-war graves in the cemetery and 15 war graves of other nationalities.

NOTE: The earth is shallow on Malta and during both wars, many joint or collective burials were made as graves had to be cut into the underlying rock. During the Second World War, such work was particularly hazardous because of air raids. Most of these graves are marked by recumbent markers on which several inscriptions could be carved, and for the sake of uniformity, the same type of marker was used for single graves.

 

 

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Names

Showing 8 people of interest from cemetery

THURLOW, Stanley Stevenson

Service number 159
Trooper
1st Light Horse Regiment
AIF WW1

HUGHES, Frank

Service number 212
Private
10th Infantry Battalion
AIF WW1
Born 11 Jun 1888

MANUEL, William George

Service number 1821
Gunner
3rd Field Artillery Brigade
AIF WW1
Born Aug 1895

COOK, Alfred Edward

Service number OFFICER
Major
9th Light Horse Regiment
AIF WW1
Born 4 Apr 1870

CROWTHER, Arthur

Service number 732
Lance Corporal
22nd Infantry Battalion
AIF WW1
Born May 1888

RILEY, Robert Edward

Service number 946
Private
26th Infantry Battalion
AIF WW1
Born 9 Oct 1894

TAYLOR, Leonard Stevenson

Service number 1287
Private
18th Infantry Battalion
AIF WW1
Born 1892

CUBBIN, Robert

Service number 1017
Private
9th Infantry Battalion
AIF WW1

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