While taking a midday swim in 2008, historian and archaeologist Dr Michael Bendon came across a sunken warship, which 85 years ago carried thousands of Australian soldiers from a little-known battle during World War II.
"Very few people know about the Second Anzacs," Dr Bendon told The Senior.
The discovery has led to almost two decades of research, as Dr Bendon, who has expertise in underwater archaeology, works to create a more complete image of thousands of Australia's "Second Anzacs" who fought in 1941.
"The majority of Australians don't even realise that we had a second Anzac Corps, or that their relatives went to fight in Greece and Crete," he said.
Who were the Second Anzacs?
In 1941, as the Second World War dragged on, thousands of Australians and New Zealanders were sent to Greece and Crete to support the Allied campaign against Nazi Germany.
Allied forces sent to defend Greece were vastly outnumbered, in a campaign the Australian War Memorial (AWM) describes as "ill-planned, disastrous and short".
After the Allied evacuation of Greece, more than 26,000 Australian, British and New Zealand troops were sent to Crete at the end of April 1941, but were unable to hold ground against German paratroopers.
"The campaign was hindered by poor communications between the Greek and British commanders, the primitive road and rail system in Greece, the difficult terrain, and the speed and success of the German advance," according to the AWM.
More than 18,200 Australians boarded ships headed to Greece, many arriving after fighting first broke out in early April 1941, Dr Bendon said.
By the time the last of the Australian soldiers arrived, around 120,000 German soldiers had gathered.
Britain's wartime prime minister Winston Churchill issued an order to send Australians into the battle, where after a perilous few weeks, Allied forces suffered heavy losses and a decision was made to evacuate troops from Greece.
A diary entry from the time shows a Lieutenant-General Sir Thomas Blamey, leader of the Second Anzacs, reflecting on the 26 years that had passed since the Gallipoli campaign.
He wrote: "We have now landed again in these regions to fight alongside the Greek Army to overthrow once more a German effort to enslave (the) world."
By sheer coincidence, records show the evacuation of the Second Anzacs began on the anniversary of Anzac Day, April 25, 1941.
Discovery of the wreck
In 2008, while visiting Crete to work on an archaeological dig for Greek antiquities, Dr Bendon decided to take a swim off the coast of Phalasarna, where he spotted a sunken wreck.
The ship, TLCA6, turned out to be the only vessel from the original flotilla which returned to Crete, and was bombed while attempting to evacuate soldiers from the battle.
The two ships had been trying to move stealthily and were travelling under the cover of darkness. While moored during the daytime, they were discovered by German Stuka dive-bombers, and sunk on May 29.
No soldiers or crew were killed in the bombing as they had been waiting on shore to be evacuated.
Sadly about 5,500 Australians were captured and became prisoners of war in Greece and Crete, after their weapons were exhausted and they became surrounded by enemy forces.
Hundreds of the Second Anzacs lost their lives during these campaigns, and have been remembered in cemeteries across Greece and on Crete.
"Many Australians were only in action for a matter of weeks before they were captured by the Germans and shipped to Austria, to Poland, to Germany, where they served out their war years in prisoner-of-war camps," Dr Bendon said.
After his discovery, Dr Bendon began investigating the ships and the Australian soldiers who had boarded them for battle.
"I found a lot of eyewitnesses who had met Australians who escaped from the ship and were trying to escape from the Germans," he said.
While official records state about 17,000 Australians embarked for the Battle of Greece and Crete, Dr Bendon's research suggests there were at least 18,200 Australians deployed.
Dr Bendon's passion is now to raise awareness of those soldiers, who are often "glossed over" in historical accounts as the surviving records rarely detail individual names.
"You hear of the officers, because their names are very easy to resurrect from the records. But individual other ranks or the ORs [other ranks] you hear very little of these individuals.
"A lot of families would have some very strong connection to the second Anzacs," Dr Bendon said.
"I would assume that their descendants could number in the millions after three generations."