Liverpool is home to generations of "Greek Scousers" – but their stories have rarely been told.
It begins more than 200 years ago when merchants fled persecution and massacres from an island named Chios. In his book, The Greek Community of Liverpool: A History 1822-2022, author S B Williams described how and why these people chose Liverpool.
It was London they chose first as this was "where the money was", before moving to Manchester for its manufacturing industry and then in the 1850s to Liverpool when cotton was coming to the city through its ports.
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Speaking to the ECHO, Mr Williams said: “The reason why anyone was In Liverpool during that time was because it was an incredibly rich and important city. It was the second port in the empire and a huge amount of trade was done here."
Mr Williams said the Great Depression meant the Greek community shrank, but after the Second World War it was revitalised.
He added: "At the end of the war quite a lot of Greeks came to Liverpool as brides of the British soldiers and sailors, so that revived the community. The next thing happened, the Cypriots arrived.
"Cyprus at the time was part of British dependency. It's not part of Greece but most of the people there consider themselves as Greek. Cypriots started coming to Liverpool and getting into the fish and chip business. It worked well for them, the English didn’t want to run them and working until midnight.”
Greek Cypriots who had settled here would then invite family members and "bit by bit" they built the community in the city. Mr Williams said: "The short history of the Greek community in Liverpool was the community based on one little island called Chios and then on another island – more in our time – called Cyprus.
"And since then, in the last 20 years, it has diversified completely as you get quite a lot of Greek academics and Greek people working in the NHS.”
The choice of London or Liverpool
George Chrisokhou owns George Gerrys chippy on Aintree Road in Bootle. His family arrived from Cyprus and into Britain in 1947 and went to London due to relatives already having settled there.
George's dad, Gerry Chrisokhou, got a job at a prestigious hotel in London as a silver service waiter and met the rich and famous.
Speaking to the ECHO, he said: “My dad in 1947 got there, had to rent a little room and you can imagine how bad the rooms were then. They then just got jobs and my dad ended up being a silver service waiter in a very high class hotel called the White Tower, which was off Charlotte Street, by all the theatres.
“When I was a kid and we used to watch all the films [my dad] would say ‘I used to serve him, he was a good man’. He was a proper waiter. What used to happen then was they used to help relatives come over. So then he brought my mum’s brother, brought his own brother."
George's family were then invited to come to Liverpool where there was the promise of opening their own business.
The 59-year-old added: “My mum’s brother came to Liverpool first as he had a friend here. They then reversed the gesture by [saying to my dad] ‘you’re working in a restaurant in London, why don’t you come to Liverpool we have the chip shops here and making a better living’.
“So around 1959 my dad saved £1,000, which was a lot of money then, and had the choice to buy the property he lived in London – if you’d bought that now it would probably be worth about £20m as it was right by Leicester Square – or come to Liverpool and get a chip shop.
“He chose Liverpool because the chip shop was going to give an income. They started off Linacre Road, the first chip shop, and I was born there in 1964. The rest is history.”
George became a boss at a young age and started running the chip shops as a teenager at their second on Linacre Lane in Bootle. Then in 1985 the fish and chip shop on Aintree Road was bought by the family, which is ran to this day by George.
'There’s a business where you cut up chips, you fillet fish and deep fry them'
Costa Moustoukas, George's second cousin and best man at his wedding, runs Chris' Chippy on Rose Lane in Mossley Hill with brother Tony. They are the second generation sons of the chippy dynasty, first opened by their dad Chris in 1967.
Costa's family history follows a similar path to George's, speaking to the ECHO, he said: “My mum and dad came in the late 50s. They went to London first, like a lot of Greek Cypriots did and from London, they either stayed in London or in the early days tried different cities around the UK.
“[My parents] came to Liverpool in 1960. They went to London and a cousin told them to come up to Liverpool and basically the way he described it at the time was ‘there’s a business where you cut up chips and you fillet fish and deep fry them.
“That was obviously what a fish and chip shop, but that is how he described it at the time. My dad was working in a restaurant in London and my mum was a seamstress.
“At the time in London there was a big community in the night trade. The Cypriots were in the night trade such as restaurants and food business, so that’s why my mum was doing that in London.
“But when she came over in 1960, my dad’s cousin offered them a fish and chip shop to work in. That’s how they first started.”
Speaking to the ECHO previously, Costa said running their now famous Rose Lane chippy was hard work for his parents, but Liverpool was "very welcoming".
He said: "After working in a couple of shops in Liverpool, we bought the shop in Rose Lane around 1967 and that was bought from my dad’s brother whose name was Steve. We've had the shop ever since.
"It was difficult at first, they could speak a little bit of English and it was just them two on their own so it was difficult to learn how everything worked over here in business. My dad had to get up around 5am or 6am and go to the markets to get fresh fish everyday and other things we needed to buy for the shop.
"The hours were a lot more those days as well, we'd open at around 11.30am and close at midnight with a few breaks in between. My mum and dad had five kids, it was hard.
"There was never any problems, they took to it like ducks to water. It was such a multicultural place and everyone was very welcoming – it was like home from home really."
The orthodox church – a beating heart in the community
The Greek Orthodox Church of St Nicholas has served parishioners from its iconic Berkley Street building, at the start of Princes Avenue, in Toxteth, since 1870. The church is also the extended replica of St Theodore's church in Constantinople.
The building was designed by architects W and J Hay, whose design was chosen following a competition, and the building of the church was overseen by Henry Sumners. He was the son of a Bold Street bootmaker and well-renowned architect who was also responsible for many other city buildings. He also designed the layout for Cressington Park.
Its first service was held on January 15, 1870 with a special mass held by Alexandros Lykourgos. Today, the church is overseen by Father Stavros Kasinos who followed in his dad's, Father Iakovos Kasinos, footsteps.
George said the church is a place where Greek people in Liverpool come together. He said: “I am proud of where the church is. I am not very religious but I do agree with the church being there, I think it is a good community thing. I was christened there, I was married there, my kids were christened there, my daughter was married there. It’s good, it’s a good tradition.
“Our priest and his wife are very nice people and now it is the son taking over. The church is beautiful.”
Speaking to the ECHO back in 2020 as part of the church's 150th birthday, Father Stavros said: "It is the community who keep the building going. We've been through two world wars and the riots and nothing happened to our building – people in the area respect the church and the local community are very good with us."
'Greek Scousers'
Many of the people the ECHO spoke to identified themselves as "Greek Scousers" and said Liverpool is now their home.
Stella Pavlina Panaretou, 51, came to the city to study when she was 20-years-old and her sister was already living in Liverpool. But 31 years later, she is still here.
Speaking to the ECHO: “My sister was living here already, she was working under the Greek Educational Authority and she was appointed to the Greek School of St Nicholas for five years. That was the idea behind the choice of moving here, to come for three years to study. Maybe four years to do my Masters and back to Greece.
“In the meantime I met my husband. He is Greek as well and he also studied and everything in Greece. He came to work at the university [Liverpool]. 31 years later we are still here.”
Having lived longer in Liverpool then she has in Greece Stella and her husband, Lakis Liloglou, said they can't imagine living anywhere else.
She said: “We have put good roots down with people we knew and we still know. Many people from the Greek Cypriot community. We have a very, very good group of other families around and that’s why I can’t think of leaving.”
Stella added:
The 51-year-old has also seen the influence the Greek community has had on Liverpool, she said: “The Greek community brings colour of customs and traditions for sure. Now you can certainly see because there are so many Greek restaurants.
“Not of the traditional, old-type only. You can see a bit more of really Greek flavour as it is in Greece right now. It doesn’t go back to the old-fashioned way, it is more modernised and has Greek character and Greek spirit around.”
For Costa and George, they see themselves as "Greek Scousers".
Costa told the ECHO: “The community now is second and third generation and we are all well settled at the moment. We’re all Greek Scousers at the moment aren’t we?
"We’re second generation and the third generation coming through now are not very involved in the food business or family business, they tend to be more educated then what the second generation was, such as the likes of me.”
George said: “I am proud to be from Cyprus. But I was born here and I am a Greek Scouser. This is where we grew up, this is where we went to school and this is where I know how to run a business.”
A history from 1822 to now
The Greek Community in Liverpool by S B Williams (published by World of Creative Dreams) follows the often untold stories of the Greek community in the city. George, Costa and Stella were all interviewed for the book.
The book is a deep dive on the community's whole history from 1822 to now. It can be bought here and in book stores across the UK.
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