The destroyers Diamond and Wryneck came back from the convoy to pick up the survivors, but the bombers also came back and both destroyers were sunk; from all three ships only 50 survived.
On the night of April 27 more than 21,000 men of the expeditionary force were safely lifted from five different beaches, and the next night another 5,000 of the 6th New Zealand Brigade group were lifted from the extreme southern end of the Peloponnesus.
The only large group remaining were some 7,000 waiting in Kalamata Bay, from where more than 8,000 had already been taken off. But it was now April 28 and both the 'Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler' Division and the V Panzer Division were in the Peloponnesus. The advance guard of the Panzers overwhelmed a small 4th Hussars perimeter-guard, burst into Kalamata, captured the naval embarkation officer and his signalman, and so cut communication with the approaching ships.
The thousands of Allied soldiers in the town were not organised for fighting; indeed, only about 800 of them were fighting troops, the rest belonging to base units. There was great confusion and very little resistance when the Germans crashed into the town and soon large numbers of prisoners were rounded up. It was easy to be captured; it took determination and courage to fight in these circumstances. Among the few who did was a Royal Tanks major who fired at German gun positions for two hours with a Bren-gun, and a New Zealand sergeant who, covered by the major's Bren-gun, assembled a party of New Zealanders, and even after being wounded led them in attacks on one German machine-gun position after another. Months later in a prison camp he learned that he had been awarded the Victoria Cross.
The fighting at Kalamata on April 28 was vicious, with about 100 casualties on each side and, incredibly, in the end it was the surviving Germans who surrendered, so Allied hopes of being evacuated ran high.
A Royal Naval squadron of two cruisers and six destroyers had been on the way in when the fighting broke out in the town, and a signal lamp warning had been flashed to them, 'Boche in harbour'. The First Lieutenant of the leading destroyer, the Hero, went ashore to find out what was happening, but the Captain commanding the squadron, seeing tracer fire and hearing explosions in the town, reasonably decided that the number of men now likely to be saved did not justify risking his ships.
He therefore ordered his force to withdraw; and although - about 40 minutes later - the First Lieutenant of the Hero signalled that all firing had ceased and evacuation was possible, the Captain did not alter his decision. The cruiser he commanded had not yet taken any part in the evacuation from Greece, and appearances on shore might well have seemed much worse than they were. Whatever the reason, over 7,000 men were left behind, some of whom had fought the rearguards all the way from the mountains of northern Greece two weeks before.
Marshall Cavendish History Of The Second World War
History may not be Mr. Cavendish's strong point.