Loathsome hunger that houses with darkness
(Famine dwells with darkness)
Aeschylus, ancient tragic poet, 525-456 B.C.
ON FOOD DISTRIBUTION / ORGANIZATIONS / SOUP KITCHENS
The severe food shortages that plagued Athens and other major urban centres, as well as some isolated islands, from the early months of the Occupation, quickly led to the introduction of rationing. In May 1941, the occupation government implemented a food rationing system, starting with bread, and later expanding to other essential food items, aiming to distribute necessities evenly across the population. However, as the looting by occupation forces, the state’s disintegration, and Greece’s economic collapse continued, these rations dwindled, and essential foods became entirely unavailable.
Amid this crisis, with soaring prices, high unemployment, and widespread poverty, the first efforts to establish soup kitchens began. Initially aimed at vulnerable groups, they quickly expanded to feed hundreds of thousands of Greeks who could no longer secure enough food to survive. Survival became a daily struggle for more and more people as the months went by. The first deaths from hunger were recorded in September 1941, and soon, the horrifying sight of the dead lying on sidewalks, transported to cemeteries in small two-wheeled carts or municipal vehicles, became part of daily life.
The first soup kitchens started, but the food supplies ran out far too soon. In October 1941, the first relief mission arrived from Turkey with the steamship “Kurtuluş,” bringing beans, chickpeas, onions, eggs, and salted fish purchased by the American Vanderbilt Committee, as well as food donated by the Red Crescent for children. There were also parcels sent by Greeks living in Turkey to their families in Greece. Around the same time, the first Management Committee of the International Committee of the Red Cross Representative was established to oversee the difficult task of distributing the food arriving in Greece.
Marika Antonopoulou writes in her diary: “Hunger and inflation tighten their grip every day, and the organization of soup kitchens becomes more intensive. Besides charitable soup kitchens for the poor, there are those for children in schools, universities, associations, banks, offices, factories, and ministries, there are soup kitchens everywhere. And you see people in the streets, from the poorest beggar to the well-dressed clerk, women and men, children and the elderly, all with their small tins in hand. They rush when their tins are empty and walk slowly, carefully when they’re full.”
—Marika Antonopoulou, Occupation Diary 1941-1944, Athens 2014.
Many organizations took on the task of organizing soup kitchens, and their number kept growing. The state itself organized public soup kitchens, supported by private charitable organizations. The National Organization of Christian Solidarity, founded by Archbishop Damaskinos of Athens in December 1941, municipalities, and even individuals organized efforts. Businesses also set up soup kitchens in workplaces, offering them either alongside wages or, in some cases, as a substitute. These efforts were mirrored by associations of public and private employees, including bank workers and various professional groups like writers, artists, teachers, doctors, and lawyers.
Additionally, the National Liberation Front (EAM), through its National Solidarity organization, the Workers’ EAM, the United Panhellenic Organization of Youth (EPON), and other branches, organized their own soup kitchens and gradually took charge of them to combat profiteering networks diverting food to the black market.
Soup kitchens usually served a single meal each day outside schools, universities, churches, town halls, banks, and other public spaces. As distribution time approached, hundreds would gather, clutching small pots, waiting patiently for their modest serving—a thin soup with a few lentils, beans, or greens, and some cooked cornmeal. For many living in the cities, the taste of wheat bread, meat, fish, oil, or dairy quickly became a fading memory.
Antonopoulou writes again in her diary: “Endless QUEUES for everything. For the tram at every stop, for cigarettes at every kiosk, for the grocery store, for the bakery, for the ration card, for the identity card, for the soup kitchen, for everything and everywhere, people stand in line. One stands and waits, burning under the relentless sun, legs trembling and minds growing hazy. One must get in line, one must wait.”
—Marika Antonopoulou, Occupation Diary 1941-1944, Athens 2014.
The “Kurtuluş” made three additional voyages in November and December of 1941, with a final trip in January 1942. This aid allowed hospitals and charitable institutions to receive much-needed supplies, and the soup kitchens were able to expand. However, despite running for months, the soup kitchens could neither provide food every day nor offer sufficient portions.
By early December, “hunger had cast its dreadful shadow over everything. Athens had turned into a city of horror. Along Kifissias Avenue, Stadiou Street, and Panepistimiou Street, people collapsed from starvation. The cart carrying the dead had become a familiar sight. At the Third Cemetery, a great heap of bodies awaited burial. Even the dead were standing in line.”
—George Theotokas, Diary Notes 1939-1953, Athens 2005.
In March 1942, under international pressure, the British government was compelled to partially ease its naval blockade of Greece. Slowly, the country began receiving food shipments from abroad, primarily wheat, allowing soup kitchens to operate more consistently. During the brutal winter of 1941-1942, it is estimated that nearly 45,000 people perished from starvation in Athens alone.
Merlin Street: The Hellhole of the Gestapo
During the German occupation, the headquarters and detention center of the notorious Gestapo in Athens was housed in the building at 6 Merlin Street, also known as the Gestapo’s hellhole. In its basement, thousands of people arrested by the SS and their Greek collaborators were imprisoned, interrogated, and brutally tortured. Many of them died or were executed there, while others were transferred to prisons and concentration camps, and ultimately to execution sites. Post-war, the building hosted various services and commercial uses.
On its facade, in remembrance of Nazi brutality and the sacrifice of the Greeks, is a relief sculpture by Thanasis Apartis depicting a young man bound to a post. The wooden door and the iron bars of the prison are part of the monumental composition.