AEGINA PRISON
The Aegina Prison was one of the oldest correctional facilities in the country. The building was founded in 1828, to serve as an orphanage for children of the Greek War of Independence, housing at the same time various technical schools and part of the National Printing House. The building, covering an area of approximately 20 acres, changed many uses during the 19th century. During the reign of Bavarian King Otto, it housed the Military Academy and later was converted to a prison, before being abandoned. In 1880, it was rebuilt to serve exclusively as a correctional facility with the official name “Criminal Prisons of Aegina”. The prison accepted large numbers of convicts and, from 1925, political prisoners, members and officials of the Communist Party of Greece. The number of the latter increased in the 1930s after the passing of the infamous anticommunist law. During the same period, the living conditions of the inmates were extremely harsh. Clothing, bedding and medicine were scarce, resulting in many cases of tuberculosis and venereal diseases, while beatings and abuse of prisoners were frequent.
During the Occupation, Aegina Prison continued to operate as a criminal prison. In the autumn of 1941, there were 371 prisoners[1], divided into those held by the Greeks, those held by the Italians and those held by the Germans. The prison was also used by the German forces as an annex of the Central Military Prison of Athens (Kriegswehrmachtgefängnis Athen – Abt. Aegina). The number of prisoners grew in line with the increase in convictions by the Greek courts and arrests by the occupying forces. At the end of September 1942 there were 468 people in prison, of whom 314 had been convicted by Greek courts, 54 by order of the German authorities and 100 by order of the Italian authorities. Onthe 1st of May 1943, there were 250 political prisoners alone, referred to as “destitute” in correspondence from the GRC Prisoners’ Office.[2] In October 1943, as part of the temporary decongestion ordered by the German authorities, 277 prisoners remained in Aegina, 170 of whom had been convicted of crimes committed during the occupation, while there were also 29 deserters from the 1940/41 war.[3] The number then increased again to include those convicted by Greek military courts and Resistance fighters. The prisoners were divided into those held by the Germans (Chapters 1, 2 and 3) and those held by the Greeks (Chapters 4 and 5). Several prisoners were put to forced labour by order of the local German authorities, performing various tasks in requisitioned buildings or on German fortifications in Mesagros (Tourlos) on Aegina, where deaths, executions and escapes took place.[4]
The Aegina Prison was severely affected by the tragic food situation in the capital during the winter of 1941/42. In a document addressed to the Prison Administration (19 August 1941) the prison doctor himself reports that every day he finds himself “faced with ghosts whose exhaustion due to malnutrition has progressed to such an extent that their appearance before me moves my pity for these living corpses, which the State nevertheless wishes to reform and not lead to death by starvation.”[5] Official documents of the time report that a total of 150 prisoners lost their lives due to malnutrition and hardship, while many died during their transfer to other prisons or hospitals in the capital.[6] On 25 November 1943, a committee of prisoners appealed to the qusiling Prime Minister Ioannis Rallis for emergency assistance from the Ministry of Food, “considering that in the winter of 1941-42, four-fifths of the prisoners here died of starvation.”[7] The Red Cross and its representative at the Aegina Prison, Sister Meropi Petsaggouraki, played an important role in ensuring the regular supply of food (cheese, raisins, olives, bread), clothing, medicines and cigarettes, at a time when the Germans had banned the sending of parcels to political prisoners by regular mail.[8]
The prison continued to operate without interruption until 1985, when it was closed permanently. During the Civil War, it was one of the most important prisons for political prisoners in the country. A total of 122 prisoners, convicted by criminal courts and courts-martial, were executed between 1946 and 1949. In the post-Civil War period, leading members of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) were held there, such as Nikos Belogiannis, Stefanos Sarafis, Antonis Abatielos, Charilaos Florakis, Kostas Loules, Leonidas Kyrkos, and Manolis Glezos, while during the dictatorship, Alekos Panagoulis, Lefteris Verivakis, and Stathis Giotas were imprisoned there. In 1996, an initiative by members of the National Resistance prevented the demolition of the building complex.
[1] GRGSA, Ministry of Food Supply Archive, file 99, Status of State prisons and reformatories, including the number of staff and inmates, n.d. [1941].
[2] DAEES Archive, TB No. 13, GRC Prisoners’ Office to Meropi Petsaggouraki, AP 4553, Athens, 1 May 1943.
[3] GRGSA, Ministry of Justice Archive, f. 174a, Criminal Prisons of Aegina, ref. no. 2458, Nominal list of prisoners in the above prisons on 1 October 1943, Aegina, 12.10.1943.
[4] GRGSA, Ministry of Justice Archive, f. 174a, subfile 14, EP, Criminal Prisons of Aegina to the General Direction of Penal Justice/Corrections Directorate, Aegina, 20 October 1943
[5] Quoted in: Nikos Pigadas, Aegina…Kathe keli mia selida istorias [Aegina… every cell a page of history], Athens 2005, pp. 84, 85.
[6] Ibid., p. 83.
[7] DAEES Archive, TB No. 13, To the Honourable President of the Government, Aegina Prison, 25 November 1943.
[8] DAEES Archive, TB No. 13, GRC Prisoners’ Office to Meropi Petsaggouraki, AP 4553, Athens, 1 May 1943, also in the same, Aegina Prison/GRC Sisters Office to GRC Prisoners Office, Aegina, 26 December 1943. Cf. Panas, Three Years in the Hands of the Nazis, pp. 69, 70.