24 April 1941

On 24 April 1941, General Wilson's staff tried to order General Freyberg to withdraw. You have to think that the staff, and possibly General Wilson, were living in some fantasy world. For one thing, it would have made sense to leave the ANZAC Corps in command of operations and let them control the withdrawal to the beaches. Instead, they sent General Blamey off to Egypt where he was out of the picture. General Freyberg let the staff know that he was involved in a battle with German tanks and he intended to stay and command the New Zealand Division. After that, General Freyberg was free to control the New Zealand Division operations. On 24 April,, the plan was to embark as follows:

Date       Athens             Megara     Navplion       Tolos        Kalamata
4/24-4/25  5th NZ Br.                    Corps troops
                                         RAF personnel
4/25-4/26  19th Brigade
           Part 1st Ar.Br.

4/26-4/27  6th NZ Br.         4th NZ Br. Base details   Base details 16th Br.
           Part 1st Ar.Br.               3rd RTR                     17th Br.
                                         4th Hussars                 4000 Base

This is based on the account in Vol.II of the Official History. We can see that General Wilson and his staff were not really up to the task that they had to perform, as it this stage they were making greater mistakes.