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In memory of:

Lance Sergeant Nick Donofrio

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Military service

Service number: E/4735
Age: 25
Rank: Lance Sergeant
Force: Army
Unit/Regiment: Royal 22nd Regiment, R.C.I.C.
Birth: November 5, 1918 Venice, Alberta
Enlistment: November 16, 1939 Alberta
Death: December 29, 1943 Near Torrella, Italy

Burial/memorial information

MORO RIVER CANADIAN WAR CEMETERY
Grave reference: X. A. 12.
Additional information
His name is sometimes spelled D'Onofrio. Son of Vincenzo (alias James) Donofrio, of Villamagna, Chieti, Abruzzo, Italy, and Elisabeth Tremblay, of the Cree Nation of Lac La Biche, Alberta. Husband of Barbara Lucy Bain of Edinburgh, Scotland. Father of William Vincent Forbes Donofrio, born in Edinburgh.

He embarked for Great Britain on December 9, 1939, and landed in Greenock, Scotland, on the 18th. He married on April 14, 1942, in Newington, Edinburgh, Scotland. After several promotions and demotions, he returned to sea on June 15, 1943, to take part in Operation Husky, the Allied landing in Sicily on July 10. On September 10 of the same year, he set foot on the Italian mainland. On October 31, he was slightly wounded in combat in his left hand, then on November 12 in his right hand. He was killed in action on December 29, 1943, near the Fortore and Biferno rivers in the Torrella sector. He was buried on the 4th near the chapel in Ortona. After the war, his body was exhumed and reburied in the British Empire Cemetery in Ortona. He had served 1,505 days, including 1,481 overseas.

Related media

Second World War (1939 – 1945)

In the Books of Remembrance

Commemorated on:

Page 154 of the Second World War Book of Remembrance.
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MORO RIVER CANADIAN WAR CEMETERY Italy

By the winter of 1943, the German armies in Italy were defending a line stretching from the Tyrrhenian Sea north of Naples, to the Adriatic Sea south of Ortona. The Allies prepared to break through this line to capture Rome. For its part, the 1st Canadian Infantry Division was to cross the Moro River and take Ortona. In January 1944 the Canadian Corps selected this site, intending that it would contain the graves of those who died during the Ortona battle and in the fighting in the weeks before and after it. Today, there are 1,615 graves in the cemetery, of which over 50 are unidentified and 1,375 are Canadian.

The Moro River Canadian War Cemetery lies in the locality of San Donato in the Commune of Ortona, Province of Chieti, and is sited on high ground near the sea just east of the main Adriatic coast road (SS16). The cemetery can be reached from Rome on the autostrada A25 (Rome-Pescara) by branching on the autostrada A14 and leaving it at Ortona. The approach road to the cemetery from the main road passes under an arch forming part of the little church of San Donato. The cemetery is permanently open and may be visited anytime.

For more information, visit Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

 

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