World War II Database

Contributor: C. Peter Chen

ww2dbaseAlexandros Pilatos Sakellariou was born in the village of Mandra in Greece in 1887. He attended the Hellenic Naval Academy between 1902 and 1906. During the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913, he served aboard the Greek Navy flagship, cruiser Georgios Averof, and saw action at the Battle of Elli and the Battle of Lemnos, among others. He was dismissed from the navy in Jun 1917 for his royalist political stance, and shortly after served a three-year prison sentence at the Izzeddin Fortress at Souda Bay, Crete, Greece. He returned to naval service in Nov 1920 after royalists gained power in Athens. He saw actions during the Greco-Turkish War of 1919-1922 in command of destroyer Lonchi, destroyer Ierax, and then destroyer Niki. He retired from military service in Sep 1923 at the rank of captain. In retirement, he was briefly detained for political reasons. In Feb 1925, he was awarded the Cross of Valour in Gold, Greece's highest military decoration at the time, for his service during the Greco-Turkish War. In Jul 1925, he was reactivated into military service under the dictatorship of Theodoros Pangalos at the rank of commander. He commanded the auxiliary vessel Amfitriti in 1925, destroyer Aetos in 1926, the Thessaloniki Naval Defence Area between 1926 and 1927, the Hellenic Naval War College between 1928 and 1929, and train vessel Aris in 1930. Upon promotion to the rank of captain in 1932, he served as General Director of the Salamis Naval Base and Commander of the Destroyers Flotilla until 1935. He was promoted to an admiral rank in Mar 1935 and was made the Chief of the Light Fleet. In this role, he played a key role in the bloodless coup d'état of Georgios Kondylis of Oct 1935, which restored the monarchy.

ww2dbaseIn Jan 1937, Sakellariou was made the Chief of the Navy General Staff. Upon German invasion in Apr 1941, he was appointed by King George II the Deputy Prime Minister (under Prime Minister Emmanouil Tsouderos) and the Minister for Naval Affairs. In this role, seeing the the Greek Navy could not respond effectively to German aerial attacks, he ordered the surviving Greek vessels to withdraw to Egypt. He would follow the fleet to Alexandria, Egypt aboard the British sloop HMS Auckland shortly after. In exile, he resigned his political posts in May 1942, retaining only the command of the fleet. He retired from service for the second time in Dec 1943 with the rank of vice admiral. Immediately after the war in 1945, he published a study on Greece's role in WW2.

ww2dbaseIn 1946, Sakellariou was elected into the Greek parliament as the head of his own political party, the Panhellenic National Party. In Jul 1947, he was awarded the Commander's Cross of the Cross of Valour. In Aug 1947, he was was made the Minister of Supply and the acting Minister of Merchant Marine under Prime Minister Konstantinos Tsaldaris. Under Prime Minister Themistoklis Sofoulis, he served as the Minister for Naval Affairs. In the 1950 elections, he was again elected into the parliament. Between 1951 and 1952, he served as the Minister for National Defence unde Prime Minister Nikolaos Plastiras. He published several memoirs during his retirement, including Voyaging in 1957, From Bridges and Wardrooms in 1967, An Admiral Remembers, and finally Memoirs of an Admiral. He passed away in Athens, Greece in Jul 1982.

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Alexandros Sakellariou Timeline