“Before the first draft was seen at 5 o'clock in the morning of October 28, 1940, the enemy's cannons began to thunder and scatter fire and iron. The 21st outpost of the Greek-Albanian border, on the Golio hill near Pyrsogianni, was the first target. Vasilios Tsiavaliaris from Pialia Trikalon falls dead there in the trench with a machine gun in his hand. He was the first Greek soldier who sacrificed himself for the country, in the epic of ΄40".
With these words, the former school counselor of Trikala Primary Education Giorgos Papavasileiou, describes the tragic death of the hero soldier who left behind three orphaned children, Nikos, George and Alexandra. His last thought, his last phrase about everything he had was, according to the retired teacher, "my little pussies are going," letting his hot blood run fast.
And Mr. Papavasileiou continues, referring to the testimony of his fellow villager Christos Apostolos Gianniou, who served in the same unit and was further back than Vassilis Tsiavaliaris:"I was a little further back, Vassilis was in front of the outpost. Our commander was Colonel Davakis. At night, before 5 o'clock we heard the shells raining down on the outpost. Later the men of the outpost came back. One came and said to me:Your villager is going, they ate him with the mortars, they hit him on the forehead, above the eye, we brought him back, we told the priest to read him. I was the first to cry for him".
Vasilios Tsiavaliaris, son of Yiannis and Agoras, the fourth of the family's five children, was born in 1912 in Pialeia Trikala, a village located at the roots of Koziakas. Those who caught up with him in life, adds Mr. Papavasileiou, - who comes from the same village - remember him as very hardworking, a model of patience, ethics and kindness. He was brought up, he continues, here in Pialia, with few material goods, but with clear and ancestral values, which are the quintessence of a Greek, the love for justice, respect for the family, respect for the homeland, faith in Orthodoxy.
He served his regular military service in the 5th Infantry Regiment from September 1933 to November 1934 with particular zeal, and after his discharge he returned to his village to raise his own family. On July 22, 1940, the homeland again called its child to defend it and Vasilios Tsiavaliaris, father of three children now, was assigned to the 5th Infantry Regiment, and from there to the 51st Infantry Regiment to take a position at the beginning of September 1940 in Eptachori in first line. The detachment of Pindos commanded by Colonel Constantinos Davakis, consisting of Trikalinians and Karditsiotians, had taken up a defensive arrangement on the Greek-Albanian border.
The soldier Vassilis Tsiavaliaris, together with a few other patriots, undertook to defend the 21st outpost of the Greek-Albanian Border on the Golio hill near Pyrsogianni. The University of Athens, 60 years later, in 2000 erected his statue in his birthplace, Pialeia Trikala, and every year there is a local national holiday, the "Tsiavaliaria", in which the first hero of the 1940-΄41 epic is honored, at the same time all those who fought in the epic of ΄40 are also honored.
APE-ME