A separate machine gun is located on top of a hill on the Tripoli-Sparti highway. It is in excellent condition compared to other fortifications and could be used as a historical memorial site instead of a "place" for sheep and goats but also for various wild animals of the area.
It is a German fort under Italian construction and was used during the occupation of Greece by the Germans during the Second World War.
Its shape looks like a "bone" from above. It includes a basement, a ground floor and a first floor. Structurally, it consists of reinforced concrete in the form of a monoblock, i.e. it has no built-up parts but only solid concrete, while its external cladding is in the form of stone masonry.
But what makes it stand out is a story of pain that unfolded in the early hours of November 25, 1943.
As narrated by Lefteris Manolakos, an 87-year-old resident of Sparta:
"I was 17 years old and in those difficult years at that age you were characterized as a man and not a child. A man ready to hold a weapon, but also to take part in the struggle against the conqueror.
But that night I, like many young people in the area, remained inactive because the plan was dangerous and top secret.
Thus 58 insurgent real men got together and with a cruiser raid on the fort of the conquerors they succeeded in conquering it and killing a great many Germans. 18 to be precise, this had the result that the next day the Germans gathered from the wider area of Sparta and Tripoli 118 (10 Greeks for every German) prominent men of the time, such as bankers, doctors, lawyers, priests, pharmacists but and families that had many children (males only). Typical is the case of the Tzivanopoulos family who lost all 4 of their boys (Demosthenes, Socrates, John, Paraskevas).
The execution was carried out in retaliation for the attack they received the previous day but it was intended to hurt not only the spirit of the resistance but also to inflict a crucial blow on the functioning social fabric of the city of Sparta".
The memory of those executed is commemorated every year with events. At the place of the execution, on the old Tripoli-Sparti highway, a monument has been erected with the names of the fallen, while a memorial sculpture has been placed opposite the Holy Church of Saint Niconos in the center of Sparta. The construction of the monument at the site of the execution faced many obstacles, and after its construction a night guard was required to prevent sabotage.
Finally, one of the main streets of Sparta, which connects the main avenue of Konstantinos Palaiologos with the exit to Tripoli and to Monodendri, was renamed from Tripoleos street to "Ton 118" street, as it prevailed to be called by the residents immediately after the execution.
Second run in Monodendri
Four months after the execution on March 13, 1944, at Kokkinoloutsa, a few kilometers from Monodendri, ELAS rebels attacked a German phalanx of German cars and killed 17 German soldiers. In retaliation, the Germans allegedly executed another 45 Greeks in Monodendri. A monument was erected in Kokkinoloutsa for those executed by the Crokees, designed by the painter Michalis Agraniotis.
Other executions took place in the area during the Occupation:32 people in Alepochori, 25 in Analipsi Spartis, 55 in Trypi, 50 in Pasavas Gytheiou, 10 in Monemvasia. There were also executions of hundreds more that were executed individually in the various villages.