In September 1943, the Greek island of Cephalonia became the site of one of the most brutal war crimes committed during the German occupation of Greece. More than 8,000 Italian soldiers who trusted the Wehrmacht after surrendering never came home.
The tragedy began after Italy’s sudden surrender to the Allies on September 8, 1943. The armistice shattered the Axis alliance and left Italian forces across Europe confused and exposed. In northern Italy, Benito Mussolini was rescued by German commandos and installed as the head of a new fascist state under Nazi protection. Southern Italy fell under Allied control.
On Cephalonia, the Italian Acqui division found itself caught between conflicting orders. General Antonio Gandin commanded roughly 12,000 Italian soldiers on the island. Around 2,000 German troops were also stationed there under Oberstleutnant Johannes Barge.
The German High Command had long prepared for Italy’s possible defection. Under Operation Axis, plans were ready to disarm Italian units and seize control of occupied territories. When the armistice was announced, communications with Rome broke down. Gandin received instructions that were vague and contradictory.
Negotiations began on September 9. As a gesture of goodwill, Gandin withdrew his forces from the strategically important heights of Cardakata. German reinforcements were already being moved into position.
On September 13, Italian artillery opened fire on German landing craft at the port of Argostoli, sinking two vessels. The exchange marked the beginning of open combat. Even as clashes spread, Gandin hesitated and sought guarantees that his men would be safely repatriated to Italy.
During the night of September 13, Gandin ordered a referendum across the division. Officers and men were asked to choose between cooperation, surrender, or resistance. By morning, the decision was clear. The division would fight.
The Germans issued an ultimatum that expired at 2 p.m. on September 15. Before the deadline passed, the Luftwaffe began bombing Italian positions with Stuka dive bombers. On the ground, the Italians initially held their own and captured roughly 400 German soldiers.
The arrival of fresh German forces changed the course of the battle. On September 17, reinforcements from the elite 1st Mountain Division landed on the island under Major Harald von Hirschfeld. Among them were elements of the 98th Mountain Regiment, a unit already linked to brutal anti-partisan operations in northwestern Greece.
The Germans dropped propaganda leaflets over Italian lines. The message urged the Italians to lay down their arms and promised that the road home would be opened by their German comrades. Gandin appealed repeatedly to the Italian High Command for assistance, but no response came. Allied authorities refused to allow Italian aircraft or naval units to intervene.
German air superiority, combat experience, and control of key terrain steadily weakened Italian resistance. After days of bombardment and mounting casualties, ammunition began to run out. On September 22 at 11 a.m., the surviving Italian forces laid down their arms.
Approximately 1,315 Italian soldiers were killed during the fighting. German losses were reported at around 300 dead. Fifteen Greek partisans also died fighting alongside the Acqui Division.
The surrender did not bring safety. Even before the Italians gave up, orders had been issued from Berlin. Adolf Hitler authorized the summary execution of Italian officers who had resisted. The German High Command declared that no prisoners were to be taken, citing what it called the Italians’ treacherous behavior.
Beginning on September 21, Italian soldiers who laid down their arms were assembled in small groups and shot at close range. The executions were carried out by troops of the 1st Mountain Division, many of them Austrians. When several Bavarian soldiers protested the killing of surrendered prisoners, they were threatened with summary execution themselves.
Senior Italian officers met the same fate. On September 24, General Antonio Gandin and 137 of his officers were hastily court-martialed and shot. Their bodies were thrown into the sea. General Luigi Gatti had already been executed on September 22 immediately after his capture.
Romualdo Formato, one of the division’s seven chaplains and among the few survivors, later described scenes of unbearable anguish. Italian officers wept openly and prayed aloud. Many cried out the names of their mothers, wives, and children. Three officers embraced one another and declared they had been comrades in life and would remain comrades in death.
At one point, German soldiers moved among the wounded and announced that medical assistance would be given. When 20 men crawled forward in hope, a sudden burst of machine-gun fire cut them down.
Austrian soldier Alfred Richter later spoke about the events. Prisoners were shot in the head after surrendering, and their bodies were thrown into heaps. Boots were stripped from the dead for reuse. Groups of Italians were marched to quarries and stone-walled enclosures near the village of Frangata. Machine guns fired for hours.
Richter admitted that he and many of his comrades experienced what he described as a delirium of omnipotence as the killings continued. He recalled a soldier who had once entertained German troops in local taverns by singing arias. During the executions, he was forced to sing again while his fellow Italians were shot.
The disposal of the dead revealed the scale of the slaughter. Thousands of bodies were burned on massive wooden pyres. Others were loaded onto ships and buried at sea or thrown into the water with stones tied to them. In Argostoli harbor, executions were carried out in full view of the Greek population.
The Germans refused to allow Italian soldiers to bury their own dead. When chaplains later searched for remains, they found bones scattered across the landscape. In one final act of cruelty, 20 Italian sailors were forced to load the bodies of executed officers onto rafts and push them out to sea. The Germans then detonated the rafts with the sailors still aboard.
By the time the killings ended, an estimated 5,155 Italian soldiers had been massacred on Cephalonia. The remaining officers and men were transported to the mainland and eventually to concentration camps. Several of the ships struck mines or were hit in Allied air raids in the Adriatic Sea. Approximately 3,000 more Italian soldiers died during those transports.
When the news of the massacre reached Benito Mussolini, he reportedly reacted with anger. He remarked that the Italian men had defended themselves and fought as Italians know how to fight.
The Second World War in Europe ended on May 8, 1945. In the years that followed, those responsible for the killings faced justice. Harald von Hirschfeld, who led the reinforcements from the 1st Mountain Division, was severely wounded during the Battle of Dukla Pass. He died of his wounds in January 1945 before the war ended. By that time, he had been promoted to General Major and was the youngest general officer in the Wehrmacht.
Thousands more who once served in the 1st Mountain Division were killed during the war. Others were executed after it ended. Former divisional commander Josef Kübler was hanged in Ljubljana on February 26, 1947.