Author(s): Peter Ewer

NZ Military

This is the largely unknown story of an Anzac force which fought not at Gallipoli, but in Greece a generation later.

On 12 April, 1941, General Thomas Blamey, commander of the Australian Imperial Force in the Mediterranean, issued an order of the day announcing the formation of a new Anzac Corps. With the very existence of his force in the balance, Blamey invoked the spirit of Gallipoli to inspire his troops. However, desperately outnumbered, and fighting in deeply inhospitable conditions, the Anzacs found themselves engaging in a long retreat through Greece, under constant air attack. Most of the Anzac Corps was evacuated by the end of April, but many men got only as far as Crete.
Fighting a German paratroop invasion there in May, large numbers were taken captive and spent four long years as prisoners.