Georgios Georgiou Ionas: A Young Builder Joins EOKA
Georgios Georgiou Ionas worked as a young builder. He joined EOKA in March 1956 at only 17 years old. Immediately he took on critical duties distributing leaflets printed by him. Also he carried the Organisation’s correspondence and supplied food to the guerrillas and hid them. He also prepared the ground for strikes against the British.
A Martyr’s Page in the Struggle
The sacrifice of 19-year-old Georgios Georgiou Ionas (known as Hadjiionas) from Lysi, together with his comrades Anastasis Souroullas and Christofis Panagidis, records one of the fiercest and most martyr-like pages of the Struggle. In this episode, the colonial forces and their allies showed their most inhuman face.
The Big Strike in Lysi
On 1 August 1958, Hadjiionas and his team escorted the wanted man Yiangos Panagidis so he could join the guerrilla forces of the area. They set up an exemplary ambush. They struck three military trucks full of British soldiers with automatic weapons and hand grenades. The blow landed heavily. The British suffered two soldiers dead and dozens wounded.
The Manhunt and the Brutality
The British revenge came immediately. The next day, 2 August 1958, they imposed a harsh 15‑day house arrest on Lysi. Georgios, Anastasis and Christofis decided to break the encirclement and escape towards Tremetousia. However, fortune turned against them. A British helicopter spotted them from the air and gave the signal.
According to the shocking testimony of a shepherd who saw everything, a Turkish sergeant from Athienou — leading Turkish auxiliaries and irregulars from the village of Arsos — set up a deadly ambush against them. The British gave him full cover. The three young men became trapped and fell dead.
The Torture of the Autopsy
The doctors at Nicosia General Hospital saw something that surpassed any human understanding. The three young fighters had not simply suffered gunshots to the head from automatic weapons. Their executioners, in a frenzy of hatred, had also thrust spears into their backs and savagely into their stomachs and other body parts — after they had already fallen.
Georgios Hadjiionas breathed his last breath on the soil of his beloved Lysi. He passed into the pantheon of heroes as a symbol of bravery that never bowed to any numerical superiority or any atrocity.
Georgios Ionas Hadjiionas. Immortal!
