Q: Before the Government set up the Victory Kitchen you had already taken some steps to help the people of Senglea who were completely cut off from the rest of the island.

      A: The day after Mussolini’s speech when all hell broke loose, I was approached by Mr Guzeppi Iles also a resident of Senglea. He was a bachelor and a member of the Domus of Senglea. He said: ‘Archpriest what are we going to do. I am unemployed and I am ready to help’. I answered: ‘What can we do Guz?’ He answered : ‘What if we start by trying to take care of our local people?’ So together Guzeppi Iles and I started this Victory Kitchen. He used to buy vegetables and other foodstuff, cook them and we distribute them to the remaining residents of Senglea. That’s how the Victory Kitchen started and we were copied later on. At first I had some help from some teachers but they were transferred elsewhere by the Government. I asked that they will leave me some of them and the Government left two teachers so that we continue with our scheme. We continued our fruitful work and the Government used to pay us back the expenses we made. We did not receive any other help of compensation. I used to give Guze Iles from what God provided us and even he was never compensated for his endeavour.

      Q: The isolation of Senglea was further accentuated later on when after more horrendous air attacks you were left without electricity and water services.

      A: The attack on HMS Illustrious was the start of our most difficult time because up to than we were all under control. Yes I can confirm that we were on our own and our city was nearly empty.

      Q: You were also responsible for the parish of Zabbar.

      A: Yes but that was later on. When the air attacks on Cottonera started a new Parish priest for Zabbar was appointed but he did not have the time to take the official possession of his post. So he wrote a letter to the Ecclesiastical Authorities asking them whether he could return to his former parish until he could take up his post and so Zabbar remained without a Parish priest. The Vice Parish priest of Zabbar had evacuated to Qrendi and so I was put in charge of the parishes of Senglea and Zabbar.

      Q: Let us now go to April 1942. How did you feel when you had no water or electricity services?

      A: The air attacks were so heavy that all our services were cut off. We had no water so we opened the church well as a temporary measure. I had a small well but the water was contaminated. We were without water for a long period of time. Once in April 1942 we had an air raid which lasted for over twenty four hours from the evening, all through the night and day and throughout the following night. In the morning I was utterly exhausted and told my helpers that I was going to rest and come and say Mass at 7.00 in the morning. I started Mass but suddenly we were again under attack and we all had to go down to the shelters waiting for the raid to stop so that I could continue to say Mass. In the meantime I was approached by Dr Carmelo Jaccarini who told me to go with him to the area of St Philip Church because there were some persons who were injured by fallen debris. We found bombed buildings with people buried underneath. We tried to get them out. We managed to pull out some of them, many were already dead and others remained handicapped even up to the present day. On another day there was another horrible incident. A shelter leading from the marina and which passed beneath St Joseph Street caved in. The German bombs used to be chained together and these cluster bombs caused more damage than single bombs. In this shelter we found a woman who had the lower part of her body pinned down by a huge rock. We could not pull her off and she died because of the injuries she suffered all the time screaming because of the sufferings she was going through. I managed to administer the Sacrament of the Sick to this woman and gave her absolution. The shelter was in complete darkness and there were many people screaming and crying. After this episode I was called at the Dockyard and could see that the anti blast wall was complexly destroyed and the Dressing Station full of dead and injured persons.