Acknowledgement of people who helped with information and mementos. Introduction of characters, all of whom are real. A small number were used to follow the entire 151 prisoners of war. After joining and training the British, Australian and New Zealand are called to assemble at Alexandria, Egypt. Under the code name Lustre Force the men with equipment were moved to the north border of Greece to help defend the country.
They fail and are withdrawn to Crete. A few weeks later Germany attack from the sky. A huge armada of aeroplanes and gliders drop thousands of parachutists over Crete and bitter fighting goes on until the Ally leader, General Freyberg calls a halt. On the 1st June, 1941 he escapes back to Alexandria and leaves a senior officer to surrender.
Many accept the order while others 'run for the hills'. The story follows a small band of soldiers into the hills. Unfortunately they are captured and made to walk back to Retimo on the north side without water and food.
Germany moves almost all POWs to Germany through Salonika. A small band of 200 is left behind. These men are moved to Iraklion where the group is split. 168 are spirited away to Tymbakion to help clear the thousands of olive trees in preparation for an airstrip. Records show these men literally vanished for four months. No one in official positions mentioned them, the media reported then as POWs in Germany (when they clearly were not) and relations were not able to correspond with them.
William Roy Buirchell had already escaped a second time and remained in the hills until inflicted by malaria. He was clever enough to live 'loose' in the mountains from 9 June to 4 October 1941. Vic Petersen kept a diary during the days when the Tymbakion camp operated, and it was this diary that showed these men had been spirited away. Germany wanted to conquer the World, and a huge airstrip in the middle of the Mediterranean would be ideal to accomplish this goal.
The locals had their farms confiscated, families pulled apart, and livelihoods lost and they are bitter with the Germans. They are also aware of the brutal way the Germans have dealt with their people through reprisals.
The bitterness is not transferred to the POWs, in fact they react with kindness and friendship. The diary kept by West Australian, Vic Petersen gives a day by day blow of what is happening at Tymbakion. The olive trees are cut down and burnt leaving the once productive area denuded of vegetation.
A small group of Royal Airforce personnel have been at the camp since July and built a barbed wire fence around the prison. They are taken away and sent to Germany. On 29th December, 1941 everyone still at Tymbakion is moved back to Iraklion and then shipped to Salonika before a train trip deep into Germany.
Albert Edward Chamberlain has a brilliant idea. He makes a pair of canvas shorts and numbers all the tents. He spends a fortnight visiting each tent and seeking to get the occupants to sign the shorts. It was the finding of these shorts 80 years later that brought the story of the last POWs to leave Crete.
The Cretans are left destitute and working for the Germans crushing rock. The Germans are the victors. The airport slowly is built but not used as readily as they had intended. The POWs floundering in Germany have misgivings and guilt in the way they had been co-erced into ruining the Cretans lives.'
