It must have been around 3:00 p.m. when the 3rd company, under the command of Deputy Athanasios Mamalis, set out to take up positions in front of the Kalampaki hill to attack and capture the hill that "unlocked" the Turkish enclave of Agyrtas - Kioneli from the west. Together with Minister Damianidis Christos, we found ourselves in an advanced position on Pentadaktylos, in front of the headquarters of the 3rd company, and with a view of the Kalampaki hill, where the Minister directed via radio, the mortar shots that fired preparatory fire for the preparation of the attack of the 3rd company.
I remember volleys falling from three mortars – the two mortars were hitting the target normally by hitting the hill fortifications while the third mortar must have been defective because it was constantly hitting at a much closer – off target – range. At some point, along with the mortars, two machine guns started firing from the 3rd company's advance positions... I could see the flashes from the machine gun bullets hitting the rocks on the hill in front of the Turkish machine guns. After a flurry of fire a cease fire order was given and then I will never forget… you could hear the voice “Aaaah….. Aaaah” to vibrate the atmosphere and the men of the 3rd company to charge and climb up the Kalamaki hill... The war cry that we infantrymen used so many times in training was now beyond real, in the conditions of a real battle!
From the observation post where we were, at the same time as the 3rd company was climbing the hill, we saw on the dirt road behind the hill a Land Rover leaving Kalamaki and leaving at high speed following the dirt road that led to Pyleri and Kioneli ... apparently the Turks were abandoning the hill. The 231st TP scored its first war victory!
The next days in Pentadaktylos
I don't remember how, but I separated from Minister Damianidis, and on the evening of July 20 I found myself with others guarding the passage to Gomaristra (and by extension to Pyleri where the 3rd Company was operating). I remember in the middle of the night the red flashes of the guns of the EF battalions west of Nicosia that were fired towards the enclave of Agyrta - Kioneli, and the tracer shots of the machine guns. Death shots, but not spectacular ones... The next day, Sunday 21/07/74, together with others, we transported ammunition from the headquarters of the 3rd Company to Gomaristra to then return again to the observation post - an improvised outpost covering the passage of Gomaristra.
Monday 22/07/1974
An armistice had been declared on Monday for later that afternoon, and we had been under strict instructions not to fire on the enemy. On Monday during the breakfast we noticed soldiers coming up from the path of Gomaristra... after reconnaissance we found out that they were our Location Officers. It was the LOCK Platoon of Minister Karahalios that, acting from Gomaristra, pushed back from the north the Turkish paratroopers who had surrounded the 3rd Company in Pyleri, thus opening an escape route for the men of the 3rd Company under Minister Mamalis trapped in Pyleri .
It was in the early afternoon, during the truce, that the Turkish air force started bombing our positions at the pass of Ag. Paul. I remember the 4-5 men guarding the Gomaristra pass, we found ourselves in a hollow in the rocks to protect ourselves from the air force. There was no room for me so I stayed outside, sitting down, leaning my back against a rock, and looking to the North... I then saw the Turkish fighter dive towards our side. Its silver color reflected the sun's rays and was blinding.
I then saw the long narrow silver bomb which the Turkish plane left spinning, reflecting the sun's rays and falling towards our positions. I remember even today that I was so tired from sleeplessness, that I saw the bomb falling and spinning slowly in the air, as if it would fall on my head, reflecting the rays of the sun and falling on me as if, I looked at it as if hypnotized, without having the strength to move... The bomb finally fell less than a hundred meters to our left, on an elevated spot...
I remember a noise that I didn't expect...a "paaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa" at the base of the hill two or three reservists stopped him and wrapped him in a blanket. It was Sergeant Antonis Manolis, and he had just been hit by napalm, which destroyed his clothes and burned all his skin... He was transferred to the headquarters of the 3rd Company and from there to the Nicosia Hospital where he died shortly after...
Later, on Monday afternoon, I went down to the headquarters of the 3rd Company, where the Commander assigned me, together with two reservists, to go down by car to Ag. Ermolaos and to bring water for the men. Together with two reservists, we got into one of the ordered cars and went down to Ag. Ermolao... All the doors and windows of the houses were closed, but as soon as the residents realized that we were national guards, they came out running towards us and started hugging us... We told them that we wanted water and they immediately took the jerrycans that we had with us and they filled them with water.
Women ran to us and brought us food, to cooks, in pans that barely fit in our car. It was a very moving scene, that of the residents of Ag. Ermolaou who ran to hug us, kiss us and give us food and water. On our way back, halfway up the uphill dirt road to the passage of Ag. Pavlos, we saw a swarm of Turkish fighters making successive dives and bombing the headquarters of the 3rd Company.
We got out of the car which was shining reflecting the sun thus giving a target, and we took cover behind rocks watching the Turkish fighters dive "cross" in pairs... as soon as one rose from the dive, it would start its dive from the sides the other thus creating an imaginary "cross", not giving the opportunity to the defenders to react or cover. When the shelling ended, we got into the car and drove to 3rd Company headquarters. Shortly before we arrived at the headquarters, DEA Achlis Nikolaos was in front of us shouting that the Turks had destroyed everything, that there was nothing left and that we had to leave...
We continued on for a little while longer and reached the 3rd Company HQ… devastation, rubble and debris… The ammunition depot and main cargo depot had been blown up… One of those last days on the pass of St. Pavlos in Pentadaktylos, I remember an enlisted soldier of a certain age who was Anglo-Cypriot, he was a nurse and he came from Karmi – a village on the slope of Pentadaktylos facing the sea of Kyrenia, not far from the passage Ag. Paul...
He was sitting in despair with his family, who went up the mountain on foot to avoid the Turks who entered their village... I remember an old woman who was worried because, leaving her house in a hurry, she forgot to lock the kitchen shutters, and so the cats would eat the food that was in there... Poor old woman... it would not be the cats that would seize her food and living but the Turks, and she did not realize (as none of us did then yet) that she would never see her home again, and that a a new word full of pain would now enter our lives... "refugee"...
One of those days I remember that I met some old acquaintances from other units who had come up as passers-by at the passage of Ag. Paul. I remember that I had given a small handwritten note to someone I had known since elementary school and who was serving in the GEEF, and I had asked him to convey it in any way he could to my mother in Limassol. Many years later my mother showed me that little handwritten note (I told her I was fine), which she kept ever since as a sacred relic.
After Monday, July 22 (where a truce was declared - which the EF respected reverently in opposition to the Turks), the commanders reorganized the available men at the pass of Ag. Pavlos, and I remember that he placed me together with others of the Command Company, in positions that oversaw the narrow dirt road that went down to Lapithos. From there we could clearly see the coast at Five Mile where the landing had taken place, and we could see vehicles moving east towards Kyrenia.
We took binoculars and hardly slept. Even though it was hot summer, the altitude and humidity combined with the fact that we were lying prone made it cold and uncomfortable, with scenes of infinite beauty when someone was thrown into the wild dawn for "force majeure" - as happened to me. Finally, I remember some of the men in the 1st Company who had recaptured F. "Aetofolia" from the Turkish paratroopers who rushed from Kotziakaya after the departure of the Lokatzis, and who showed us their loot:FN rifles (no relation to ours "hajimartins"), portable single-use rocket launchers, howitzers, and a 45-gauge revolver – the latter eventually going to the commander. However, what really impressed me was the FN bayonet...a long, double-edged knife...that made you cringe when you imagined that iron thing going into your breeches.
Friday 26/07/1974
In the early afternoon, I joined the men of the 3rd Company under General Mamalis, and we climbed the ridge to the west of the pass of Ag. Pavlou – and east from the top of Kyparissovounou. We perched on the ridge, to monitor the narrow dirt road that goes up from Ag. Ermolaos at the passage of Ag. Paul. We knew that the line had been broken (during a truce - which the Turks never kept) and that they had recaptured the Kalampaki hill and advanced to Ag. Hermolaus, using tanks and infantry.
I don't remember what time it was, but I think it was well into the afternoon... and then we heard the roar of the tank engines but still couldn't see them because of the terrain. At some point, the leading chariot and the rest of the phalanx, which also included military trucks in the tail, were seen in a straight distance of about 200 meters and lower than the ridge.
We started to charge into the phalanx and then I remember a few things happening almost simultaneously:There was something like an explosion and the leading chariot stopped abruptly and started honking and going backwards at the same time! We learned afterwards that the advancing tank had been hit by the 57 mm PAO that had been set up at the passage of Ag. Pavlou, operated by "Smoky" from Varosi. Unfortunately we also learned later that the PAO 57 jammed after the first successful shot, so it was not possible to hit the leading tank again.
At the same time as the tank was hit in reverse and honking, a burst of bren from the right of our line on the ridge hit the last truck of the phalanx which must have been carrying ammunition... a great explosion followed and many smaller ones that spread like tongues of fire around the hit truck.
A spectacular firework display….Chaos prevailed… The phalanx halted in the narrow road and some Turkish infantry were seen running for cover away from the explosions…. We continued to hit and hit in the cold. Meanwhile a fire broke out from the explosions, and the pines blazed up, producing thick smoke that suffocated us.
I remember then the thunder of cannon from the seaward side behind us, and heavy shells whistling through the air. Apparently the leader of the stationary phalanx below us, south of the ridge requested covering fire from the navy patrolling in close proximity to the Karavas and Lapithos coasts north and behind us. Fortunately, they must have been given the wrong coordinates because the navy's missiles were hitting further west, at Kyparissovounos.
I was impressed by the intensity of the explosions from the naval cannons that were carving up Kyparissovounos, cutting the proud mountain into slices. It was frightful to hear first the whistling of the shells, then to hear the loud explosions, and to see so many masses of earth, rocks, and trees thrown into the air after each explosion. The fire continued throughout the night, but the firing stopped on both sides. For a long time we heard heavy metallic banging... it was obvious that the Turks were trying to repair the battered crawler of the leading tank which had immobilized the entire Turkish phalanx.
Late in the evening, perhaps near midnight the order was given to descend from the ridge. We descended in order and arrived at the headquarters of the 3rd company. There was no one... the whole battalion, apparently the 1st company opposite Kotziakaya and St. Hilarion, had converged towards Lapithos following the dirt road that connected the passage of Ag. Pavlos with the big town. Deputy Mamalis advised us to drink water before we started... I will never forget how thirsty I was... I drank water straight from a big plastic barrel and didn't stop... I drank to shit. After that, we started a man-by-man foot phalanx on both sides of the dirt road, taking the downhill road towards the Lapithos fountain.
We were leaving behind the passage of Ag. Pavlou which the temporarily immobilized Turkish phalanx would step on the next morning. Pentadaktylos, except for its westernmost end (Kyparissovouno, Larnakas of Lapithos) would now be Turkish. We walked in silence in a double phalanx, man by man, all night, until we came to the headwater of Lapithos… The smell of the lemon trees, mixed with the moisture of the night, was intoxicating… I could not stop myself from thinking of magic and contradiction of that moment, with such intoxicating fragrances, in a beautiful landscape where death was chasing us.