I was called up in 1938, and finished my military service about 2 years later. I was discharged on a Thursday, it was on October the twenty fourth or fifth, something like that. And the captain said to me, "Come in on Monday to get your discharge papers. Hand over whatever you have – your weapons, your sword, your helmet – whatever - but you can stay in uniform. And since I was administrative staff and the captain was really busy, I agreed to go in on Monday.

In 1940, I was living in Gouva, at Damareos 160, with a cousin of mine called Ioannis Alevras, who was a policeman. A police officer from the Ymetos station came round at 3 in the morning and told him to go round to his station. And I asked him, "What’s going on, Ioannis?", and he said, "Things aren’t good. We’re going to war." And at 6 that morning, the sirens really did start up…we went to war. I got up, too, and set off to find out where I had to present myself. I went to the city police headquarters at Sokratous 60. They told us to present ourselves there the following day, and they took us to a school at Patision 93, where they trained us for two or three months as reinforcements for the city police. And we came out of there police officers.

During the Occupation, my brother, I remember that lots of his friends who were in the Resistance would gather…they’d come round to our house…very often…and they’d talk. But I was really curious, and one time I hid under the table – it had a long table cloth, so I hid under the table and heard everything they said, but didn’t understand any of it…because I was very young and had no idea about such things. My big brother, Panagiotis, was involved with the political organisation. My other brother, Stavros, was with the guerillas in the mountains.

You asked me about my memories of that time. Well, there are a lot of them, some of them happy, and some of them sad. It was a sad time for the whole world, but especially for Greece because we were facing two major powers, and we’re such a small country. When the sirens started up, everyone was taken by surprise, but we came round right away , and if you’d seen how much enthusiasm there was in the air, how joyful everyone was on the streets, you’d have said we were going out to have fun, not to war. It was a strange situation. All the young people were very enthusiastic. The older folk were a little reserved.

When the Italians hit the battleship Elly off Tinos, the government ordered three drafts to be mobilised. Although there were some troop up on the border with the A, T, and S, which they used to call specialised troops.In the meantime, they told us to present ourselves for duty on the first of September in Chalikida. So, we presented ourselves for duty in Chalkida, they gave us uniforms, they gave us a gun and we did a bit of drill and some physical exercise, mostly cross-country marches. Cross-country so we’d have stamina should there be a war. And we went up and down all the mountains around Chalkida.

When you’ve lived your whole life in Athens – and I’ve lived in this house for 60 years now, that’s to say, from just before the beginning of the Second World War …I came here with my parents in August 1940, and in October, as everyone knows, the war started…a catastrophic war that developed into a world war.

Our story back then…what life was like…Well, the Italians declared war on us and later on, of course, the Germans intervened when they saw that the Italians weren’t doing too well against the Greeks. The Italians started retreating, and we pushed them further and further back – all the way to Koritsa and beyond. But the Germans joined in, and they were much better soldiers…I don’t know, they were tougher fighters. And poor little Greece, tiny little nation it is…was up against two empires, and was forced to retreat and surrender….against our will, of course.

A working-class area in a provincial town in 1939. A precursor of war - the requisitioning of livestock by the army in case a war started, like it did. What made an impression on me was the anguish of the people when they took their livestock away and branded them on their haunches. What animals were they taking? Horses and mules for military use.Then came the sinking of the battleship "Elli" on August 15 and everything was now….the countdown had started to the outbreak of war.

1940 saw me serving in the Salamina navy yard, under the orders of my fellow countryman rear admiral Dalagrammatika, who I remember with a great deal of respect. I had served with him when he was head of the destroyer and submarine units, where we both exhausted ourselves making our submarines fit for battle, and ready to achieve what they did in the war.