Having rested from his travels around Greece, in March 1924 Gilbert offered to translate George Baltazzi’s legal defense into English in order to help exonerate his reputation internationally and restore his good name. The grieving widow was profoundly grateful.
When Gilbert mentioned Sir Arthur and Lady Crosfield in one of his letters to her, Mme Baltazzis asked him if the Crosfields’ close friend Lt Col Henry George Mayes, who was then in Rome, could supply “the names of politicians, financiers, journalists, and members of society who have associated, chatted and worked in London with Mr. Gounaris and my husband. … My husband often spoke with emotion of his inexhaustible interest & of his infinite pains which he gave himself during their stay in London to back them up and facilitate their so arduous task. Will you tell him that in the correspondence of my husband that his name comes up almost every day with the expression of his acknowledgement for services rendered.” (Letter dated 28 March 1924 from Chariclée Baltazzis to Gilbert Bagnani)
Mayes was a former Manitoban tennis champion who trained the Canadian Air Force and the RAF and was invited by the Greek Government in 1919 to advise on national physical education. He had closely followed the court martial proceedings and sent unheeded warnings to the British Foreign Office of the imminent danger to the accused. When Mayes died of blood poisoning at their London home in 1928, Crosfield wrote his obituary for The Times.
Mme Baltazzis also asked Gilbert if he could supply names of friends encountered during her husband’s long stay in Rome in January-February 1922, such as “[Italian Foreign Minister for part of 1922 Carlo] Schanzer, [Italian Foreign Minister Tommaso] Tittoni, [Italian Ambassador to London Marchese Pietro Tomasi] Della Torretta, Cardinal Gaspari, Roberto Galli [Italian Deputy who turned in his Greek medals upon hearing of the execution of the politicians] and several journalists, diplomats and ordinary people. … It is impossible for me to tell you how much your desire to publish in England the defenses of the victims with the official documents has moved me to the depth of my soul. I have thought of it several times without finding the means to do it. I feel – I am sure – that they would have desired that, and that we owe it to them.” (Letter dated 3 April 1924 from Chariclée Baltazzis to Gilbert Bagnani)
“I then went to the K[ozadinou] & we went on together to poor Mme Baltazzis whom I found very much in the same condition as last year. She seems very grateful. The K agreed that the French [translation?] was awful. I there met Ma Bouboulina very pleased to see me. Mme B thanked you so much for all that you had done & were going to do. … I have naturally seen a good deal of the Baltazzis. … The old lady [Mme Baltazzis] I find is no worse physically than last year, of course she is no better. They all say that I do her such a lot of good and treat her so well. She was perfectly delighted with your letter to the Kozadinou. She weeped [sic] as she spoke to me about it yesterday morning. She told me to thank you so much and that she felt so much your phrase that ‘it was a labor of love.’ She has given me a beautiful old silver Greek répoussé bowl. Of course I did not want to accept it but she insisted. She is going to send you some cards to put into the [translated defense] pamphlets. You might send a few copies to the Kozadinou. I think they would be quite safe.” (Thursday, 15 May 1924)
Mme Chariclée Baltazzis died in December 1926.