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War, occupation, civil war · War and occupation · Harbour and pier

The caique with Wilson's luggage is bombed and sunk off Leonidio

27 April 1941 Proven

After Baillie-Grohman transferred to HMS Havock, the caique Aghia Varvara sailed on south from Myloi with Smith-Dorrien, Leigh Fermor and Wilson's aide. At dawn it reached Leonidio, where German dive bombers sank it in the little harbour. General Wilson's kit, which had left Myloi in the caique, went down with it; the men on shore found another boat and reached Crete.

Where
The pier and harbour
Who
Patrick Leigh Fermor, Peter Lockwood Smith-Dorrien, Henry Maitland Wilson
Threads
War and occupation, Harbour and pier
Certainty
Proven confirmed by primary sources

Sources

  • Artemis Cooper, Patrick Leigh Fermor: an adventure, London 2013, pp. 130–132 (after the unpublished account of Lt-Col. P. L. Smith-Dorrien) Open
  • Antony Beevor, Crete: the battle and the resistance, London 1991, p. 9 Open
  • H. M. Wilson (Field-Marshal Lord Wilson), Eight Years Overseas 1939–1947, London: Hutchinson 1950, pp. c. 95–98 Open
  • A. Heckstall-Smith and H. T. Baillie-Grohman, Greek Tragedy 1941, London: Anthony Blond 1961, pp. 126–127, 157–159 Open

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