File photo: The Koraes Central Public Historical Library in Chios town, where the flag fragment is kept. Photo: Christos Volanakis / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Why Only a Scrap of a Chios Regiment Flag Survives

by · Greek City Times

A small piece of a Chios regiment flag, cut away before soldiers burned the banner in April 1941 to keep it from German troops, survives in a library on the island.

The Koraes Central Public Historical Library of Chios holds the fragment, which bears a painted head of Saint George. It also keeps a handwritten report by soldier Ioannis Maris describing how that piece escaped the fire.

How soldiers saved the Chios regiment flag

Maris wrote his account on 31 May 1950. On 12 April 1941, during the German invasion of Greece, his commander made him head of the regiment’s flag rescue group under reserve Lieutenant Paradeisis.

The Chios regiment flag moved with the 23rd Infantry Regiment as it began a hurried retreat that day. By the fourth day, only one of its five escorts, a soldier named Axiotis, remained.

Read more: Vassilios Tsiavaliaris was the first fallen Soldier of the 1940 Greco-Italian War

As a result, Maris recruited friends to fill the gaps. On the seventh day, one of the regiment’s battalions fought the Germans near Argos Orestiko.

After the line broke, the retreat turned disorderly. The next morning, the exhausted Maris threw away the flagpole.

Then near Tsotyli, the group ran into German soldiers searching Greek troops outside the village school. Escape was impossible, so Paradeisis ordered Maris to burn the flag.

That order followed an instruction from Colonel Aristotelis Barbanos that the Chios regiment flag must never fall into enemy hands. Before the fire, the men cut away one piece, which fellow escort Karousos kept.

Maris buried the flag’s cross. When he passed through Tsotyli again as a soldier in June 1948, however, he could not find it.

According to Maris, Karousos later handed the Chios regiment flag fragment over in Athens, possibly to the Archbishop. From there it reached Chios, where the library lists it as item 132.

Off to the front in 1940

On 28 October 1940, crowds filled Vounaki Square in Chios town as about 1,000 men boarded ships for the front. They joined the regiment, part of the 13th (Archipelago) Infantry Division based in Alexandroupoli.

Initially, Lieutenant Colonel Efstathios Rokkos led the regiment, followed by Barbanos. On the night of 19 November, a misunderstanding left some units trapped, with the loss of 30 men and 100 more wounded.

Despite poor equipment, the islanders went on to help capture many enemy-held heights. Greeks honour that fight on OXI Day, 28 October, along with troops who battled snow and frostbite.

Library researcher Anna Chaziri documented the items. She said the Koraes library keeps the Chios regiment flag fragment and the report to honour islanders who refused to surrender their symbols.

Source: AMNA

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