A TERRIBLE REMEMBRANCE.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 3021, 2 December 1882, Page 3

A TERRIBLE REMEMBRANCE.

Philios A'exin who died in Lamia the other day, at the great age of 94, had in his youth contributed —under compulsion—to one of the most terrible deeds perpetrated by the Turkish forces to crush the Greek rebellion of 1821. He was plying his trade as a carpenter, in his native town, when Omar Brionis Pasha entered Tjmia in triumph, after his victory over the insurgents at Thermopylae, where he had taken several insurrectionary leaders prisoners, amongst them the celebrated champion of Hellenic liberties, Athanasios Diakos. The fierce Moslem doomed the heroic ynuOi to be spitted on a wooden stake and roasted alive, and Alexin was required, on pain of death, to supply the executioners of the barbarous sentence with all implements needed for its fulfilment; that is to say a spit of timber, fitted at either end with a handle, by which it might be made to revolve, and two wooden trestles, whereon both extremeties of the stake might have free play during the patriot’s martyrdom. As soon as Alexin had completed the task imposed upon him, the inhuman decree was carried out to the letter. Diakos displayed unflinching fortitude throughout his horrible torture ; and his death scene, to which Alexin was a witness, made an impression upon the latter’s mind that time could not efface.