The Cretan Runner - Wartime Service

Wartime Service

As an airborne Nazi invasion began on 20 May 1941, Psychoundakis immediately went to the nearest town Episkopi, Rethymno about 15 km away. He took part in an ill-armed resistance soon followed by defeat of the allies. The Cretans hid many hundreds of British forces left behind, and the resistance organised their movement to the south coast. From there the British were shipped to Egypt. Psychoundakis helped guiding groups from village to village. By the autumn of 1941, SOE were beginning to organise with British liaison officers on the island, one of whom was Patrick Leigh Fermor. He arrived clandestinely by sea in July 1942. Psychoundakis acted as Fermor's runner, carrying messages between resistance groups and guiding parties unfamiliar with the territory.

Leigh Fermor described the man in his introduction to The Cretan Runner:

When the moon rose he got up and threw a last swig of raki down his throat with the words Another drop of petrol for the engine, and loped towards the gap in the bushes with the furtiveness of a stage Mohican or Groucho Marx. He turned round when he was on all fours at the exit, rolled his eyes, raised a forefinger portentously, whispered, "the Intelligence Service", and scuttled through like a rabbit. A few minutes later we could see his small figure a mile away moving across the next moonlit fold of the foothills of the White Mountains, bound for another fifty-mile journey.

The Cretan runners performed amazing feats and made essential contributions to the British operations in the Mediterranean. In 490 BC Pheidippides ran 42 km from the battle of Marathon to tell about the victory over the Persians, and died just after delivering his message. In comparison, Psychoundakis ran from Kastelli-Kissamou on the northwestern coast of Crete to Paleochora on the southwestern coast in one night. The distance along the present main road is 70 km. Through a rugged landscape with deep ravines, where he had to run to avoid the Germans, the distance may have been twice as far.

The resistance fighters faced baking Cretan summers and severely cold winters, particularly in the hills. Food was often short and fighters suffered from hiding in cold, dripping caves with deep snow outside. The island's fighters were never put to the ultimate test; they had hoped Crete might be a starting point for the invasion of southern Europe. The island was liberated in 1945. The British offered Psychoundakis payment for his work, but he turned them down. He said that he worked for his country and not for money.