Thrasivoulos Marakis grew up hearing stories about the grandfather he was named after but who he never met — about how the tall man was executed during Nazi reprisals in Greece during World War II.
For decades, the only image Marakis had of his grandfather came from a worn family portrait picture.
But last month another photograph emerged. An online auction contained a photograph showing his grandfather walking calmly toward a firing squad alongside other prisoners.
The image shook the Marakis family and has stirred powerful emotions across Greece, where the execution of 200 prisoners by Nazi occupation forces on May 1, 1944 remains one of the country’s most poignant symbols of wartime resistance.
For Marakis, the photographs carry a deeply personal meaning.
“They went to their deaths with their heads held high so that we could be free today,” he said.
On Thursday, the Culture Ministry presented the chilling photographs of the execution — the first verified images ever made public — after purchasing the collection from a private collector in Belgium.
Marakis, who lives on the island of Crete, said he recognized the tall, broad-shouldered man at the front of one group — sleeves rolled up, striding forward with his head held high — as his grandfather, 40-year-old dairy farmer Thrasivoulos Kalafatakis.
He showed the image to elderly relatives and their friends, including a 97-year-old woman who lives locally.
“That’s when I got the final confirmation,” he told The Associated Press. “It was very moving for the family — deeply, deeply moving.”
The photograph shows prisoners walking under guard toward the Kaisariani firing range in Athens, where they were executed in groups of 20 in a reprisal for a resistance ambush that killed a German commander in southern Greece.
The Greek government purchased the archive from a Belgian collector for 100,000 euros ($115,700). It includes 262 photographs taken by German Wehrmacht lieutenant Hermann Heuer, who was stationed in Greece in 1943–44, along with wartime banknotes and press clippings from the period.
Presenting the material in Athens, Culture Minister Lina Mendoni said the images provide powerful documentation of Nazi occupation policies and restore individual identities to victims long known mainly through written accounts.
“The value of this collection is immense,” Mendoni said. “The photographs…are priceless, because they give a face and a visual dimension to historical testimonies.”
“What matters is how the Greeks faced the Nazi system with courage,” she added.
Several photographs show the prisoners’ final moments.
One series depicts trucks transporting detainees along dirt roads from the Haidari prison camp outside Athens to the firing range east of the city center. Another image shows the men entering the shooting range, where piles of coats are stacked near the gate.
Valentin Schneider, a researcher at the University of Athens’ Department of History and Archaeology who helped verify the images, said the detail was significant.
“Most likely it was on the orders of the German army,” Schneider said. “To make the bullets penetrate more easily, they asked them to remove their coats and heavy clothing.”
Other photographs capture moments rarely documented: one shows the instant the shots are fired, while another depicts the executed prisoners lying on the ground, all fallen backward.
Historians say such visual records are extremely rare.
During the Nazi occupation of Greece from 1941 to 1944, German commanders frequently ordered executions of hostages or civilians after resistance attacks.
Many of the prisoners killed at Kaisariani had been arrested years earlier by Greece’s prewar authoritarian government for communist political activity and remained imprisoned when German forces occupied the country.
The 200 prisoners were shot in response to the ambush and killing of a Germany military commander in southern Greece by resistance fighters.
The archive also reveals another side of the German officer who took the photographs. Among the images are scenes from Heuer’s private life — including swimming near Athens, visiting the Acropolis and spending time with his family after returning to Germany.
Stavroula Fotopoulou, the head of the Culture Ministry’s department of antiquities and cultural heritage, said the photographs reflected a broader system encouraged by the Nazi regime.
They “created a powerful propaganda machine, not only with professional photographers in the propaganda units, but by encouraging everyone — soldiers and their families — to take photographs,” she said. “Why? So these images could be sent back home and build the impression of the Wehrmacht’s successes.”
Mendoni said the official identification of people shown in the photographs will begin immediately. Digital copies will be provided to families of the victims as well as institutions and museums that request them.
“In that moment, the Greeks — and these people in particular — showed true greatness,” Mendoni said. “They reacted with bravery and dignity. That’s what we must hold on to.”
Marakis said the images show his grandfather “stood by his beliefs and his ideology. He never renounced them”
He added: “If he had renounced them, he would have lived longer.”
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