He was helped by the 'Service'  to get from the Veneto to Switzerland.  They supplied him with a false identity card, shown below, and arranged his  transfer. (Courtesy of his daughter, Mrs. Rose Durrant)

Here is his 'Formulario'.

The Fondo Bacciagaluppi contains an account of an identical  journey, made  in February 1944

The departure takes place in the morning from the Padua station and the group is made up of six British escapers, escorted by three guides, one of whom was sent from Milan with updated information about the situation. Those escapers who did not have them were given a coat, a hat, a pair of shoes and a scarf; each was provided with food for the trip, false identity documents made out in an Italian name, an Italian newspaper to read (or pretend to read) while travelling and a train ticket.

The group, split up so as not to attract attention, alights with one of the guides into a very crowded carriage in the centre of the train; one of the other two guides travels at the front and the other at the back. A stopping train was chosen. When the components of the fascist military check the train, which is inevitable on routes of some length, the precautions taken will allow the guides placed at each end of the train to warn the escapers placed in the centre of the approaching control, which is known from experience to proceed from one of the two ends: there is therefore a good chance that there will be time for them to get off the train at the next stop and alight in the part where the control has already passed. In the event that this is not possible, false documents will be shown, hoping that the soldiers do not ask questions.

The journey, which normally lasts three or four hours, is prolonged, due to long stops for air alarms, transhipments for damage to the line and other causes, until late in the evening, beyond the hour of curfew. The group alights at Milan station, and given that it cannot leave, prepares to spend the night there; it is not prudent to go to the waiting rooms, which are illuminated and controlled, and the Milanese guide, who has foreseen the eventuality, knows what to do.

The group is taken to a stationary train waiting for the departure, which will take place in a few hours; a few minutes before departure it is transferred to another train, then to a third one, until the curfew ends; after having made a telephone call to the Milan telephone exchange, where by agreement a Service agent receives the calls, the guides are able to  lead the group out of the station towards the collection point. This is a pre-arranged apartment where the escapers join another group from another area and where they will remain until the time of departure, in the late afternoon; here they can rest and refresh themselves.

In the meantime, the local agent has made sure that the route reserved for the area (the escapers have come from Area IV, the Veneto) is free: it is that of the upper Lake Como, via Dervio, Cremia, and Cavargna.

At the appointed time, after being provided with a ticket again for Dervio, Dorio or subsequent stations (as they are all secondary stations where few passengers normally alight, it is prudent to give them tickets for different destinations), the escapers are accompanied to the train. On the train, the procedures already followed on the journey from Padua to Milan are repeated and the group descends at Dervio station, under cover of darkness, after two and a half hours of rail travel via Lecco.

The escapers leave the station a few at a time; one of the guides has a blue pocket torch, an identification signal: he is approached by the local agent, also equipped with a blue torch, and passwords are exchanged. The group then follows the local agent to the landing stage to await the boat that will ferry them to the opposite shore of the lake, to Cremia. The Milan guides arrange for the escapers to fill in the forms, they give the last instructions and, after the boarding has taken place they stay overnight in situ, and return to Milan the following morning, taking with them some of the coats and hats returned at the border by former escapers and reusable for future expeditions. Meanwhile, the escapers, escorted by the local agent, make the crossing by boat and are taken over by the Cremia guides; after a short stop at that centre to refresh and equip themselves suitably for the forthcoming mountain crossing, they set off with the border guides towards the Cavargna valley.

The route, rather tiring on deep snow for inadequately equipped and untrained men, is undertaken rather slowly, and the guides often need to assist the less capable; however the crossing is uneventful and after about eight hours of walking the group reaches S. Bortolo, in Val Cavargna, where they stop at the house of one of the guides. The following night the journey is resumed and after about four hours they reach the border: here the escapers return as much as possible of the equipment they have borrowed (taking into account the physical state of the articles in their possession), hand over to the guide the forms they have filled in and reach the Swiss customs post a few hundred metres away. The guides return to Cremia, where they will prepare for the next expedition, after one or two days.

This, except for the variations due to the different locations, the means of transport, the season and the unexpected, is the method followed by the Service for transfers to Switzerland.

T/69507 Private  George Pearson R.A.S.C.

describes his journey in his E & E Report WO 208/4265

At the time of the armistice of 8 September  1943 Private Pearson was being held in camp PG112/1 at Ponte Stura, Turin, from where he  escaped on the 10th. 

Left Locana, Province Aosta by bicycle to Pont (Canavese). Train from there to Turin. Stayed the night there and then caught a train to Novara. Thenco to Vogogna. Stayed there the night and then went to Domodossola by train , thence to Varzo. I then walked for a day and a half and crossed the frontier at Gondo. 

Whilst at Locana he and another escaper had been given shelter for two months by the Parvis family. Here is the statement made to the Allied Claims Commission by Commendatore  Egizio Giuseppe Parvis, held in the Fondo Borghetti, Archivio ISTORETO, Turin:

The undersigned declares that on 23 and 24 November 1943, knowingly exposing himself to the danger of being shot together with his family, he gave accommodation in his home to the two prisoners, who had escaped from a concentration camp in Piedmont, coming from Locana, in the province of Aosta

Tney were provided with clothes, alpine footwear, food, weapons and ammunition, and entrusted to my son  Alessandro Parvis, a student. Accompanied by my son Alessandro and a highly compensated mountain guide, the two prisoners crossed the Swiss border from Sempione, reaching Briga, despite the close supervision of the republican guards.

From Briga the two prisoners reached Berne, and were accompanied by my son to the British Legion to the military attaché, to whom he also gave a secret message, entrusted to him by the CLN in Piedmont. The travel and provisioning expenses were borne by the undersigned, and what has been said in this statement can be confirmed by the British military attaché in Berne, who will be able to give further information to the allied command in this regard.

To validate what has been said above, the undersigned, Commendatore Parvis Egizio Giuseppe, cites Conte Solar d'Asti Sergio and his father, living in Turin in Via Poloni 17 (formerly via L. Bazzani) as witnesses, who will be able to report verbally other services rendered by the undersigned to the Partisan Cause.

In witness whereof

 Egizio Giuseppe Parvis