The Museum was established by the Municipality
of Heraklion, following the very successful exhibition of documents 1941-
1945; the exhibition took place in 1991 on the occasion of the 50th anniversary
of the Nazi invasion of the island. The Museum is housed in a big hall
of an old building at the city centre (Doukos Beaufort st. and Meramvellou
st.), close to the Walls, at the Sambonera bastion.
There are displayed thousands of authentic photos about the Battle of
Crete and the activities of the Greek Resistence, a good number of books,
historic works and studies about this period, many authentic documents,
as well as relative extracts taken from the press of recent periods.
Personal items, weapons of various kinds (german and british of the period
and older ones), war souvenirs, military suits and other equipment complete
the exhibition.
A Centre of Studies of the period 1940-1945 has also been established
in the Musum; several eminant scholars, historians and researchers work
there, trying to classify, study and show off a huge archive material
coming from many countries; they also deal with the translation of official
documents from all the countries involved in the War, as well as with
the writing of the history of the Battle of Crete.
It is interesting that the Resistence in Crete ends up in 1945, although
the rest of Greece was freed in 1944; this happens because the Germans
were hemmed on the island and more precisely in Chania and Heraklion where
they had took to; from there they left only on the 7th of May 1945, when
the German army signed capitulation on the dotted line. |
