The battle at the Barn at Liopetri

received no reply. Using the owner for cover, they then fired inside the barn, but once again they received no reply. On the morning of 2 nd September another curfew was imposed and the barn owner was once again subjected to torture. The four men fired on a posse of soldiers drawing near the barn. The British then asked for reinforcements that were not long in arriving. The shooting continued and the fighters were called upon to surrender. A small interruption followed and the shooting resumed with even greater intensity. Several soldiers were wounded. The British threw bombs and hand grenades but to no avail. One of the fighters ran out of the barn shooting but was gunned down by a British soldier. The remaining fighters continued to shoot injuring a soldier and a captain. In a new exchange of fire a second freedom fighter was killed. A group of sol- diers climbed on to the roof of the barn, where they opened a hole and threw down petrol-soaked rags. The rags caught fire but this soon went out. While the battle continued with automatic weapons and hand grenades, an English helicopter dropped firebombs and the barn was immediately set alight. The two fighters immediately ran out only to be gunned down by the soldiers. The heroic deaths of the four EOKA fighters touched the entire Cypriot people and caused world-wide admiration. Immediately after Cyprus became independent, the place of their sacrifice, in which statues were set up honouring the four men, became a shrine of national pilgrimage. The barn and the courtyard surrounding it are now a Monument to the magnificence of their heroism and self-sacrifice. Barn of Liopetri