Charalampos Filippidis

He was born in the village of Pano Arodes¹, Paphos district, in 1939.

He died from torture by English interrogators, in Paphos² interrogation rooms, on October 11, 1958.

His mother died while giving birth to him and was soon followed to the grave by her husband and father. Her mother, Evanthia Averkiou, took charge of raising her two children. Charalampos finished the primary school of Arodes, attended the Greek High School of Paphos³ until the fourth grade and continued his studies for six months at the Technical School of Leros. Later, he opened his own shop in Paphos and worked as a plumber.

At the beginning of the Struggle, he joined EOKA and belonged to the executive of the city of Paphos. He took part in many actions of the executive in Paphos, but also in his village where he carried out actions by dropping locally made bombs against English soldiers. After each dangerous mission, he took refuge in the Paphos guerrilla and stayed for a while with the guerrillas in their mountain hideouts.

Charalampos Filippidis, following orders from EOKA, attempted, together with his fellow fighter Georgios Yiangou Tzortzis, to execute an officer of the Crime Detection Department, who was one of the torturers in the interrogation rooms of the Paphos Auxiliary Corps Center. The officer was wounded in the head but survived.

After the attempt, house arrest was imposed.

Filippidis had permission to move around, because he worked at the English barracks in Dasaki, Paphos, and could not fail to show up for work. He was arrested and identified in a reconnaissance group by Turkala, who lived in a house near the place where the attempt was made. He appeared in court but was acquitted due to doubts about the testimony given by Turkala.

“Two or three days after his acquittal,” testifies his fellow activist Georgios Yiangou Tziortzis, “I saw him sitting outside the cafe in Paphos. Two English officers, along with the son of the officer who was attacked by us, also a policeman, approached him and arrested him. The next day, a rumor spread that he had escaped and we never saw him again.”

The official British statement on his disappearance claimed that Charalampos Filippidis escaped while being led to a hideout for EOKA fighters and that the authorities were searching for him.