Tag #120813 - Interview #78797 (Maurice Leon)

We had a small share in an oil refinery at a factory in Chalkida [the chief town of the island of Euboea in Greece, situated on the strait of the Evripos at its narrowest point]. There was a friend there, someone called Petrogiannis, an employee of that factory. He came to Athens and helped us to escape. We left by bus. At some point the Germans stopped the bus we were riding on. They ordered all the passengers to step down. They put us in a line and the Sergeant Gendarm [lowest rank German police officer] was checking our IDs. We showed our false IDs as he was just staring through us. Then we were allowed to enter the bus again and continued.

We arrived at Agia Anna in Evoia [34]. From Agia Anna we took a small boat and went to the Island of Skopelos [35] where we stayed until the end of the war. There were no Germans yet on Skopelos Island. My brother Jacque had already arrived at Skopelos and was expecting us. People there were very good to us. They had a welcoming hospitality custom: to wash our feet. It was Mrs. Magdalini Mitzelioti, wife of the president of the Community of Glossa in Skopelos, who welcomed us according to the traditional way of Skopelos, by washing our feet. We were staying in village houses. Everybody knew that we were Jews. Nobody was talking about it. They loved us very much. All this until Germans reached Skopelos.