Wartime Wednesday: Greek Resistance During WWII

 Wartime Wednesday: Greek Resistance

Like all German-occupied countries during World War II, Greece suffered food shortages, heavy-handed mandates, forced labor conscription, and brutality. The Italians in October 1940, but the Greek army was able to push the enemy forces into Albania and hold them under siege. Seven months later in April 1941, Hitler answered Mussolini’s call for help by sending German troops. Fighting was brutal, and the king fled to Cairo where according to multiple sources waited for “Germany’s defeat at the hands of the British.” Germany was victorious, and in May a collaborative government was set up in Athens.

Within a short time, Greek resistance emerged, initially by sporadic individual acts of sabotage and civil disobedience such as an incident on May 30, 1941, during which two university students pulled down the Nazi flag that had been hoisted over the Acropolis.

The National Liberation Front (EAM) was the largest of the resistance groups to form and is thought to

have had almost 1.5 million members by 1944. The organization was founded by the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and other “left-wing faction” and included a military branch (ELAS) that handled the sabotage and guerilla warfare against the occupying forces. Several sources indicate the group was highly successful in engaging Axis divisions and destroying infrastructure. In addition, EAM organized strikes and protests.

The second-largest resistance group was the National Republican Greek League (EDES) founded in September 1941 by Greek army officer Colonel Napoleon Zervas. Interestingly, the group fought the Axis powers but was also adamantly opposed to the exiled King George. EDES received support from British Intelligence as they performed acts of sabotage and guerilla warfare. One well-known act was the destruction of the Gorgopotamos railway line in November 1942 which disrupted German supply lines. Eventually, EDES’s philosophies led to a civil war, and conflict broke out between them and EAM who defeated EDES in December 1944.

Smaller resistance groups operated throughout the country and were composed of men and women. Many worked in partnership with Britain’s Special Operations Executive (SOE) collecting and passing along intelligence reports, running escape networks for refugees and downed airmen, conducted propaganda events, and staged public protests. Medical staff set up underground hospitals and medical centers.

The combination of sabotage, intelligence activities, and armed combat with resistance forces, sent German troops fleeing from Athens on October 12, 1944.

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About Eye of the Beholder (Apron Strings Tea Tales)

Shunned for his appearance, a disfigured veteran encounters acceptance and love where he least expects it.

Left with physical and emotional scars after the Great War, Hank Drake has been shunned by polite society as the Ugly Duckling. Fine by him. He’d much rather be alone. Until he meets the kind proprietress of a tea stand at New York’s World’s Fair who isn’t repulsed by his appearance. Can he hope for acceptance…or even love?

Grace Sutton has no interest in marrying and is tired of her parent’s snide comments that she’s still single on the eve of her 40th birthday. After she loses her job thanks to budget cuts, she decides it’s time to follow her dream of feeding others. Armed with Mrs. Canfield’s cookbook, she opens a refreshment stand at the World’s Fair unaware how one man will turn her life upside down and upset the apple…er, tea cart.

Purchase Link: https://amzn.to/3Pz88KO

Sources:
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/greek-resistance-during-world-war-ii
https://radicalteatowel.co.uk/radical-history-blog/a-free-greece-how-the-greek-resistance-defeated-fascism
https://greekancestry.net/yiayiaandme-15/
https://redflag.org.au/article/greek-resistance-wwii-triumph-defeat/

Photo Credits:

Members of EAM/ELAS: By Demetrios Andrianis - Own work

Soldiers raising Swastika over the Acropolis: By Ekdotiki Athinon

Protest of University Students: By National Museum of the U.S. Navy - Lot 11618-4, Public Domain

Release Day! Norwegian Nights

 Release Day! Norwegian Nights

Book 2 in The Resistance Chronicles is now live! This series of books feature four Norwegian American siblings and their Norwegian cousins who join resistance cells in Northern Europe to help end World War II. The extensively researched stories highlight the brave individuals who served in the Norwegian, Swedish, Dutch, and Danish resistance organizations. They also find their happily ever after.

About Norwegian Nights

Can their marriage endure a debilitating injury, a devastating loss, 

and a world war?

The second anniversary of Germany’s occupation of Norway has passed with no end in sight, so Gustav Westgard and his wife are still exiled on Shetland. He’s convinced Oda’s miscarriage would have been prevented back in Norway and decides he must return to his homeland to do whatever possible to rid the country of its invaders. Will he live to see liberation?

Grieving the loss of her baby, Oda turns toward her heavenly Father as Gustav retreats inside himself. Rather than try to stop him after she discovers he plans to join the Norwegian resistance, she stows away onboard the ship taking him home. Can she convince him that they are better united in a cause than apart?

Purchase Link: https://books2read.com/u/bwl5qv

Wartime Wednesday: Resistance During World War II

Wartime Wednesday: 

Resistance During World War II

With the onset of World War II, resistance groups formed all over Europe and throughout Asia as citizens rose up against invaders and occupiers. According to Wikipedia, the most notable organizations were located in Albania, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, the Netherlands, France, Greece, Italy, Norway, and Poland in addition to the Jewish Resistance located in multiple German-occupied countries, and the multitude of groups within Germany. In Asia, the Chinese and Korean resistance organizations were quite effective.

Resistance took many forms from non-cooperation and propaganda to sabotage, assassinations, and outright warfare. Other activities included intelligence gathering, organize uprisings, and leading refugees, escapees, and downed airmen out of their countries. Alone, the organizations would not have been full successful, but fortunately, government organizations such as America’s Office of Strategic Services and Britain’s Special Operations Executive provided personnel, weapons, and equipment as well as training.

United in a cause, resistance members came from all walks of life: political activists, academics, 

civilians, soldiers, and clergy. Stories abound about the very young and the very old doing their part.

In 1944, inhabitants in Warsaw initiated an uprising that lasted an astonishing sixty-three days as combatants tried to liberate their city from the Germans. Interestingly, initial plans for “Operation Tempest” didn’t include Warsaw, however with the anticipated arrival of the Soviet army, the decision was reversed. The organization managed to pull together more than 45,000 fighters to take on 25,000 Germans, which seemed like an easy victory except for the fact that only twenty-five percent of the resistance members had weapons. Unfortunately, the uprising was unsuccessful, and the Germans destroyed over eighty-five percent of the city which led to high civilian casualties.

Most resistance organizations were small with even smaller “cells” within the group. Most scholars agree that the effectiveness of resistance movements were limited; that they are measured “more by their political and moral impact than their decisive military contribution to the Allied victory.” (Wikipedia) Does that make them any less important? I don’t believe so.

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Coming Spring 2026: The Resistance Chronicles

Book 1: Shetland Sunset: Bonded by a cause but an ocean apart, will their love survive a world war?
https://books2read.com/u/4AWqJk

Book 2: Norwegian Nights: Can their marriage endure a debilitating injury, a devastating loss, and a world war?
https://books2read.com/u/bwl5qv

Book 3: Dutch Dawn: Will they survive the 500-mile journey to freedom?

Photo Credits:

Bellorussia Jewish Resistance Group: By Unknown author - http://www.jewishgen.org/yizkor/belarus/bel427.html, Public Domain.

Civilians at the Warsaw Uprising: Courtesy National WW2 Museum

Italian Partisan: By Tanner (Capt), War Office official photographer: from the collections of the Imperial War Museum, Public Domain.

Wartime Wednesday: Filipina Resistance Member Florence Finch

Wartime Wednesday: Florence Finch, 

Filipina Resistance Member

During World War II, hundreds of thousands of people worked behind the scenes and underground; some while remaining in plain view. Florence Ebersole Smith Finch was one of those people. She was born on October 11, 1915 to an American father and Filipina mother in Santiago. Her childhood was “disruptive,” as one source put it, when her father married her mother, but later made a common-law wife of his stepdaughter. He passed away when Florence was twelve.

As an adult, she obtained a job working as a stenographer at the Intelligence Headquarters in Manila where she met her US Navy husband Charles Smith. They married in 1941, then he was transferred to Correigor where he was killed while manning the deck of a ship. Florence did not receive news of his death until May 1942. By this time the Philippines had fallen to the Japanese.

She managed to convince authorities she was Filipino and went to work at the Japanese-run Philippine

Liquid Fuel Distribution Union. She used her position to transfer ration coupons to resistance workers. This diverted supplies from the Japanese. According to the US Coast Guard website, she also arranged acts of sabotage against the occupying forces. When she found out that her boss, Lt. Col. Englehart had been captured, and he and his fellow prisoners-of-war were being badly treated, she began to smuggle food and medicine to them.

It is unknown how the Japanese discovered her activities, but she was arrested in October 1944. Imprisoned in a tiny cell, only two-by-four foot squared, she was repeatedly tortured. However, this stalwart woman refused to reveal her compatriots. According to the Coast Guard, she was given a “sham trial” and sentenced to three years of hard labor in the Women’s Correctional Institution in Mandaluong outside of Manilla.

The US First Cavalry arrived in Manila on February 3, 1945, and Florence was liberated a week later. After five months of captivity, she was less than eighty pounds. She decided to move to New York to be with her aunt and arrived in May 1945 where she enlisted in the Coast Guard Women’s Reserve because as she said, “to avenge the death of my husband.” She subsequently met and married American army veteran Bob Finch with whom she had two children.

After her Coast Guard superiors found out about her work with the resistance, she was awarded the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Ribbon. In 1947, she received the Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the U.S, from President Truman. She passed away December 8, 2016 at the age of 101.

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The American World War II Home Front in 29 Objects:

Unlike Europe the American mainland escaped physical devastation during World War II as it was not subjected to full-scale invasions. However, that didn’t mean the United States wasn’t impacted by the war. The ramifications of large economic, cultural, and societal changes forced Americans to reconsider entrenched beliefs and traditions.

Artifacts collected from across the nation tell the stories of the American people whose lives were shaped by this second “war to end all wars,” World War II.

Purchase link: https://books2read.com/u/47pLxR


Photo Credits:
Florence Finch enlistment photo: By U.S. Coast Guard - The Long Blue Line: SN1 Florence Finch, Public Domain.
Florence Finch, courtesy of US Coast Guard
Map of Philippines: Google

Sources:
https://www.washingtonindependentreviewofbooks.com/bookreview/the-indomitable-florence-finch-the-untold-story-of-a-war-widow-turned-resistance-fighter-and-savior-of-american-pows
https://msmagazine.com/2020/09/02/seven-indomitable-women-of-world-war-ii/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Finch
https://www.history.uscg.mil/Browse-by-Topic/Notable-People/All/Article/1854611/florence-ebersole-smith-finch-uscgr/

Traveling Tuesday: The Risoux Forest

Photo courtesy of
paysdegex-montsjura.com

Traveling Tuesday: The Risoux Forest

With over 2,200 continue hectares (nearly 5,500 acres or 22 square km), the Risoux forest is the largest forest in Europe. Forming a natural border between France and Switzerland, the forest lines the edge of the Vallée de Joux in the Jura Mountains. The Vallée is well-known for its watch and cheese making, but during WWII, the area became one of many routes used by fugitives from France into Switzerland. The border is a dry stone wall with Fleur-de-Lis decorating it and stands approximately three feet tall making escape somewhat easy as long as German troops were avoided.

A group of French and Swiss friends became known as the Passeurs du Risoud and helped countless

Photo courtesy of 
transpiree

downed pilots, those in danger of deportation, and escaped prisoners make it over the border. In addition to smuggling humans, the group passed confidential documents about troop numbers and movements to the British Embassy in Lausanne as well as armaments.

To make it more difficult for the Nazis to track them, the Passeurs formed multiple routes through the forest, many of which are still apparent. Soldiers patrolled the French side of the forest twenty-four hours a day, and anyone found within the two-kilometer forbidden zone was shot on sight.

Courtesy of 
https://www.upvj.ch/

After arriving in Switzerland, the group would hide in one of the two wooden huts (L’Hôtel d’Italie and Le Rendezvous des Sages) to rest. Then the Passeurs would go home under cover of darkness, and the escapees would continue the ten-kilometer journey from the border to the place where they registered as illegal foreigners, then to an internment camp for the remainder of the war. Many downed military personnel did not register and continued their escape to Allied soil.

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Spies & Sweethearts

She wants to do her part. He’s just trying to stay out of the stockade. Will two agents deep behind enemy lines find capture… or love?

1942. Emily Strealer is tired of being told what she can’t do. Wanting to prove herself to her older sisters and do her part for the war effort, the high school French teacher joins the OSS and trains to become a covert operative. And when she completes her training, she finds herself parachuting into occupied France with her instructor to send radio signals to the Resistance.

Major Gerard Lucas has always been a rogue. Transferring to the so-called “Office of Dirty Tricks” to escape a court-martial, he poses as a husband to one of his trainees on a dangerous secret mission. But when their cover is blown after only three weeks, he has to flee with the young schoolteacher to avoid Nazi arrest.

Running for their lives, Emily clings to her mentor’s military experience during the harrowing three-hundred-mile trek to neutral Switzerland. And while Gerard can’t bear the thought of his partner falling into German hands, their forged papers might not be enough to get them over the border.

Purchase Link: https://books2read.com/u/m0Od9l

Movie Monday: Casablanca - A Movie About the Resistance

Movie Monday: Casablanca - 

A Movie about the Resistance

Few people have not heard of Casablanca, the 1942 film featuring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, and Paul Henreid that tells the story of a cynical American ex-patriate living in Morocco (at that time a French protectorate) whose ex-girlfriend and her husband show up on the run from the Nazis. Rick (Bogart) must choose between the love he still holds for her and helping her Czech-resistance leader husband escape. Based on the unproduced stage play Everybody Comes to Rick's, the screenplay was purchased by Warner Bros. for a whopping $20,000 (as compared to The Maltese Falcon purchased for a paltry $8,000).

Despite its appearance, the entire movie was shot in the Burbank studios with one exception - that of the opening scene when Heinrich Strasser is flying past an airplane hanger - which was filmed at the Van Nuys Airport. Filming took place over ten weeks and cost about $950,000. Post-production and release were then rushed because of what was actually happening during the war. The movie premiered in New York City at the Hollywood Theater on November 26, 1942 rather than in 1943 as planned because the publicity people wanted it to coincide with the Allied invasion of North Africa and the capture of Casablanca. Eight weeks later Casablanca was then released wide to coincide with the Casablanca Conference, the high-level meeting between Winston Churchill and President Franklin Roosevelt in Casablanca.

Intriguingly, some of the actors had experienced the war personally. S.Z. Sakall, a Jewish-Hungarian,

Public Domain

lost his three sisters in a concentration camp. Helmut Dantine had spent time in a concentration camp, fleeing Europe after his release. Curt Bopis was a German-Jewish actor and refugee, and Curt Bois, was a German film star who'd fled his homeland. He would often be cast as a Nazi in American films. Director Michael Curtiz was a Hungarian-Jewish immigrant whose family members were refugees.

The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards and won three, including best picture, and although was not expected to do more than break even, Casablanca was a box office hit. The US Library of Congress selected the film in 1989 as one of the first for preservation in the National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant." And you'll notice, there has never been a

remake. According to one source, there have been several attempts, none of which have "seen the light of day." 

Perhaps Roger Ebert said it best in 1992 (the 50th anniversary of Casablanca): "There are great movies. More profound movies. Movies of greater artistic vision or artistic originality or political significance...But {it is} one of the movies we treasure the most...This is a movie that has transcended the ordinary categories."

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Spies & Sweethearts

She wants to do her part. He’s just trying to stay out of the stockade. Will two agents deep behind enemy lines find capture… or love?

1942. Emily Strealer is tired of being told what she can’t do. Wanting to prove herself to her older sisters and do her part for the war effort, the high school French teacher joins the OSS and trains to become a covert operative. And when she completes her training, she finds herself parachuting into occupied France with her instructor to send radio signals to the Resistance.

Major Gerard Lucas has always been a rogue. Transferring to the so-called “Office of Dirty Tricks” to escape a court-martial, he poses as a husband to one of his trainees on a dangerous secret mission. But when their cover is blown after only three weeks, he has to flee with the young schoolteacher to avoid Nazi arrest.

Running for their lives, Emily clings to her mentor’s military experience during the harrowing three-hundred-mile trek to neutral Switzerland. And while Gerard can’t bear the thought of his partner falling into German hands, their forged papers might not be enough to get them over the border.

Purchase Link: https://books2read.com/u/m0Od9l