“Among the items I leave here is a box of plum seeds from California. I saved them for you to plant plum trees in Ekali… You will call them Alexander’s plum trees…”
Alexandros Kairis
Averof Prison, 2/11/1943
Excerpt from his last letter to his family, shortly before his execution at the age of 28. He was a resident of Athens, from a wealthy family, and a lawyer. He was sentenced to death for espionage.
Alexandros Kairis was born on September 25, 1913, the third son of Dr. Michail Kairis and Pinelopi Kairi, known for her social activism. A cultured lawyer and an excellent speaker of German, he worked in the fall of 1941 at the “German Directorate of Engineering – Fortifications of Southern Greece and Crete.” Having gained the trust of the Germans, he began his espionage activities as a member of the secret group “5-165” (the numbers correspond to the initials E.P.E: Greek Patriotic Society). He gathered information and maps on German convoys in the Mediterranean, which “5-165” transmitted via radio or trusted boats to the Middle East. In doing so, he caused numerous acts of sabotage.
“At least 24 hours before the departure of any ship, we telegraphed abroad every detail about the vessel, its cargo, and its course to the port of its final destination, whether it would be traveling alone or in convoy, the general composition of the convoys, the possible speed of the convoys depending on their slowest ships, and a detailed description of the accompanying warships” [Rigas Rigopoulos, “Secret War – Greece – Middle East 1940-1945” (Estia Publications)].
On Great Thursday in 1943, the organization’s radio was discovered. Rigas Rigopoulos, its founder, urged Kairis to flee the country, but he refused. The following day, he was arrested by the Gestapo. Kairis spent six months in Averof Prison, where he was tried three times, ultimately receiving a death sentence. During his imprisonment, he wrote a diary, poems, letters, and studies, which were later published in 1970 under the title “Manuscripts from Prison,” 27 years after his execution by the Germans at the Kaisariani Shooting Range on November 2, 1943.
“…in the corridor, a woman dressed in black appeared to pass slowly… she was dressed entirely in black, tall and slender, resembling Doxa… but she also wore a pitch-black veil, covering her entire face. She walked with a majestic slowness, her arms crossed in front of her, and when she found herself right in front of my door, she paused and slowly turned toward me…”
Alexandros M. Kairis, Manuscripts from Prison, Athens 1970