Valentinos (Valias) Semertzidis (1911–1983) arrived with his family in Greece just before the destruction of Smyrna, on a ship filled with refugees from the Caucasus. The family initially settled in Drapetsona, then in Old Kokkinia, and finally, in 1941, moved to a house in Tourkouvounia in Athens.

Valias studied painting at the School of Fine Arts, first in the preparatory department and then in the workshop of Parthenis (1928–1936). During the War, he served in the Anti-Aircraft Artillery and spent most of the Occupation in Athens. In the years 1939–1940, he likely joined the Communist Party of Greece (KKE). After his request, in March 1944, he ascended to the mountains of Evrytania, aiming to witness and paint the struggle against the conquerors up close.

The diary he kept, returning to Athens from the Mountain (October 20, 1944) full of excitement and plans for the future after Liberation, is a shocking document: it concerns his life as an artist, as well as the drama experienced by the Greek Left in just four months, the forces of the KKE, EAM, and ELAS, which were systematically led to defeat.

As an interpreter for the Soviet officers who arrived in the Mountains in late July '44, as well as top officials of the KKE, Semertzidis was present in significant discussions both among themselves and with Balkan leaders. The painter describes, initially with anguish and then troubled by what he sees and hears around him, the tragic exodus of civilians, the wounded, and party officials from Athens after the victory of British military forces.

The British political leadership was determined to violently exclude any possibility of participation of EAM and KKE in the political life of the country, which, with the consent of the Soviet leadership, it wanted to keep under its control at all costs.