Large glass framed display a Piece of concrete from a New Zealand bunker on Hill 107 overlooking Maleme airfield captured by German Fallschirmjager soldiers in the battle of May 1941 on the Island of Crete

This is a nice glass framed display a Piece of concrete from a New Zealand bunker on Hill 107.The concrete section has been nicely cleaned and retains its original colour and is nice solid section the part has been mounted in to a glass fronted box frame with all the information and pictures including actual pictures of the bits being found in September 2023 the frame is 13 inches long and 13  inches wide. The part is from a New Zealand bunker on Hill 107 overlooking Maleme airfield captured by German Fallschirmjager soldiers in the battle of May 1941 on the Island of Crete and is very rare to get any thing from the battlefield of Crete there is very little about now.

Hill107 which overlooked Maleme airfield which was attacked by German Fallschirmjager soldiers on the morning of the 20th May 1941. It was the scene of heavy fighting during the first few days of operation Mercury the German invasion of Crete, when they captured the island from the British and Greek forces in 13 days. 

The German Fallschirmjager soldiers landed at 8.00am to attack Maleme airfield and Hill 107 both these areas were defended by soldiers of the 21st, 22nd and 23rd New Zealand battalions. The Germans suffered many casualties in the first hours of the invasion, a company of III Battalion, 1st Assault Regiment lost 112 killed out of 126 men and 400 of 600 men in III Battalion were killed on the first day.

Towards the evening of 20 May, the Germans slowly pushed the New Zealanders back from Hill 107 As night fell, none of the German objectives had been secured. Of the 493 German transport aircraft used during the airdrop, seven were lost to anti-aircraft fire. Overnight, the 22nd New Zealand Infantry Battalion withdrew from Hill 107, leaving Maleme airfield undefended. During the previous day, the Germans had cut communications between the two westernmost companies of the battalion and the battalion headquarters this led to mis communication with the wrong orders being given and the hill being abandoned when there was no need to do so. The Germans quickly exploited the withdrawal from Hill 107 to take control of Maleme airfield. In the afternoon of 21 May 1941, New Zealand General Freyberg ordered a counterattack to retake Maleme airfield during the night of 21/22 May, but the counterattack failed because of a delayed start to the attack and German air support.