It was Sunday 1 December 1913 when the Greek flag was raised on top of the fortress of Firka, on the western side of the harbour of Chania in front of King Constantine and Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos.
Following a century of battles, the island of Crete was officially integrated into the Greek state, while Sultan Mehmet V had finally relinquished all sovereignty over the island exactly one month earlier.
The brave Cretans had joined Greece’s War of Independence on 14 June 1821, according to most historians.
In the words of the President of the Greek Community of Melbourne and Victoria Bill Papastergiadis, the history of Crete is unbreakably connected with the history of other parts of Greece even the diaspora stressing the connection with the then Melbourne Greeks who financially assisted Crete during its fights.
“The liberation of Crete is a testimony of battles, starting with the dawn of the revolution of 1821 where thousands of Cretan soldiers took part in the battle for independence and the regeneration of Greece. At the altar of freedom, sacrificed were thousands of Cretans that fuelled the revolution,” President Papastergiadis said on the 100th anniversary of the unification.
“Then, in 1896, more than 40 of Melbourne’s Greeks gave some financial assistance to the Cretan struggle. This first gathering gave also the idea to set up some Greek community in Melbourne, so after a year the Greek Orthodox Community of Melbourne was founded. The struggle for the liberation of Crete was a struggle for all Greeks of the diaspora in that time”.