The Rocky Road

Thomas Karathanos was 25 years old when the Communists took over Albania, and his life has never been the same since. The Communists slowly tortured his father to death, because as a Greek and a small merchant he was considered "an enemy of the state." They put young Thomas in forced-labor camps for five years, and when he was released they put him in the army. When he was finally released last year, he returned to his village of Lazati to find that the schoolteacher had drowned himself and the storekeeper had slashed his wrists and killed himself when accused of being an enemy of the state. As a Greek, Thomas Karathanos knew that at any moment he might be next. He talked things over with his brother-in-law. They worked out a bold plan to save the whole family: Thomas' mother, his sister and three in-laws.

Rendezvous in a Cave. Late one afternoon in May, the seven members of the family walked separately and casually out of their village. Shortly after dark they met in a secluded cave. There they also met Andreas Ghioris, a shepherd who for $160 and a small barrel of olive oil had agreed to lead them across the mountains to Greece.

Behind their guide the seven climbed steadily into the blackness along a narrow path. "Nobody was frightened except me," said Thomas later. "My mother said I should be ashamed, that I was leaving slavery and had a whole life of freedom ahead of me." Once they stopped to rest, for Angelica, Thomas' 24-year-old sister, was seven months pregnant and tired easily. Ghioris the shepherd went ahead to reconnoiter, and threw stones back to signal that the road was clear. They climbed on.

An hour later Ghioris again went ahead, presumably to scout. This time there was no reassuring sound of stones. Instead, the night burst into flame and thunder as rifles and machine guns blasted into the party from three directions. The shepherd had led them into an ambush. Flares arched overhead while tracers and steel slugs slammed against rocks, whining off into the night. Thomas heard the screams of the women, and once by the light of flares caught a glimpse of moaning clumps on the ground.

Escape in the Night. He fired his pistol once in the direction of the shooting, then slipped off his shoes and scrambled up a steep, rocky cliff out of the line of fire.

Racing barefoot over sharp stones, he escaped into the night. At dawn he saw familiar Mt. Stougara, and knew that the Greek border was only a short distance away. He skirted an Albanian outpost, and an hour later met a Greek army patrol.

Last week, safe in Athens, Thomas heard news from the underground of what had happened to his mother, his sister and the rest of his family. Those who lived through the ambush had been executed.

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