THE
ISLAND OF LEROS, DODECANESE ISLANDS OF GREECE
Leros has a number of charming small towns and beaches.
Port of Agia Marina - Alinda
Agia Marina has a number of bars, nightclubs and restaurants, all located
in a strip which overlooks Alinda Bay.
Pandeli
Pandeli is also a well known area, littered with wonderful restaurants
which are perched right on the waters edge.
Leros Travel Information
Leros has an Airport at Partheni that connects daily the island with Athens.
There are also ferry connections to and from Athens and the other islands
of the Dodecanese. The journey time from Athens to Leros is approximately
8 to 10 hours. There is also the Catamaran Dodekanissos Express and the
Hydrofoils connecting Leros with most of the Dodecanese islands. For those
who want to visit Leros the alternative way is to fly from Athens with
domestic flights or to fly from Athens to Kos and then to Leros by boat.
The journey time by boat from Kos to Leros takes 1 to 2 hours.
History of Leros Greece
According to Homer, Leros took part in the Trojan war under the leaders
Antifos and Feidotos, grandchildren of Hercules. Thoukididis stressed
the special importance of the bays and the harbours of Leros during the
period of the Peloponnese War , where Leros supported the democratic Athenians.
After the end of the war Leros came under the sovereignty of the Spartans.
It then followed the fate of the rest of the Dodecanese Islands during
the years of Alexander the Great and his successors, the Roman years and
the Byzantine period.
On his campaign east, Alexander the Great passed through Leros as evidenced
by the funerary steles and coins from that period found on the island.
Constantine the Great, founder of Constantinople and builder of the Byzantine
Empire brought Leros into his empire by incorporating it into the Theme
of Samos. In the year 1309 the Knights of St John of Rhodes seized and
fortified Leros. In 1505 the Ottoman Admiral Kemal Reis along with three
galleys and other seventeen war sailing vessels besieged the castle but
could not seize it. The operation was repeated in 1508 with more ships
but again nothing was achieved. On 24 December 1522 a treaty was signed
between the Sultan Suleiman and the Grand Magister of the Knights Adam
Villers de Ille, and Leros was passed into Ottoman hands.
During the Ottoman occupation Leros, along with the other islands, enjoyed
a regime of privilege with partial autonomy and self–government.
During the Greek revolution of 1821, the island became an important base
for the re-supplying of the Greek Navy. After the struggle for revolution
the island became a part of the free parts of Greece.
With the Treaty of London on the 3rd February 1830 which determined the
borders of the newly - established Greek state, the Dodecanese were given
over to Turkey again. In the Diary of the Prefecture of the Archipelagos
of 1886, Leros along with the islands of Patmos, Lipsos and Fourni belonged
to the Turks. The administrative council was made up of both Greeks and
Turks.
The Italian Period
From 1911 to 1912 the Italians occupied all of the Dodecanese islands.
In 1912 the island was seized by the Italian battleship San Giorgio during
the war between Italy and Turkey. Under the watchful eye of Mussolini,
a new town, Portolago, was created in the 1930s, with its now infamous
Italian Rationalist art-deco architecture and streets wide enough for
military parading. The Greeks later renamed it Lakki. The Italians tried
to Italianise the island and the inhabitants responded by declaring the
autonomy of the islands under the title The Aegean State, with the aim
of reunification with Greece.
During the 35 years that the Italians remained in Leros, the Italians
set up a great plan to build and fortify the island, as a result of considering
both its strategic position and its physical form with its large natural
harbours, the largest of which, Lakki, is the largest deep water harbour
in the Mediterranean Sea. The fortification of Leros and the creation
of a major naval base at Lakki, ensured that the Italians had control
over an area of vital interest to the Allies, the Aegean, the Dardanelles
and the Near East. Mussolini saw Leros as a crucial base for Italian domination
of the eastern Aegean, even building a mansion for himself in the town
of Portolago now Lakki.
World War Two
In 1940 as Italy was on the side of Germany, Leros suffered attacks and
bombing by the British Royal Air Force. As a result of the naturally protected
coves and the protection they provided to warships, the island was the
second most bombed during World War Two after Crete. On 8 September 1943,
as Italy could not continue the war on the German side, it signed an armistice
and came over to the Allied camp. After the Italian armistice, British
reinforcements arrived on Leros and the island suffered continuous German
bombing. One of the largest attacks was on the Greek Navys Flagship, the
Queen Olga, sunk by German bombers on Sunday September 26, 1943. The British
Royal Navy ship, HMS Intrepid, was also sunk on that day in Portolago.
Leros War Museum
In September 2005 the Leros war museum was opened in Merkia, near Lakki.
The museum is inside an old tunnel made by the Italians during the Second
World War. It looks like the Dover war museum though on a tiny scale.
There are several items from the battle of Leros including: guns, helmets,
bombs, uniforms and many photos.
Modern History
On the 7 March 1948, Leros a was reunited with the rest of Greece. After
approximately 400 years the Dodecanese became officially Greek once more.
During the post-war years the Greek governments used many buildings in
Leros for various reasons. |