On 31 March 1982, Acting Lieutenant Keith Paul Mills, Royal Marines, landed on South Georgia with a 22-man detachment from HMS Endurance. They had been sent to watch a party of Argentines who had landed illegally, and to protect the British Antarctic Survey team at Grytviken. Mills was 22. Two days later, the day after the fall of Stanley, a far larger Argentine force arrived off King Edward Point. Captain César Trombetta, in Bahía Paraíso, called on the garrison to surrender. Mills, given command once the landing turned hostile, told them to do one. London had signalled that any resistance should be token. What followed was not token, the Argies weren't happy. For about two hours his detachment fought from the shore against the corvette ARA Guerrico, helicopters and Argentine marines. They hit Guerrico hard — including with an 84mm anti-tank round below the waterline and a 66mm round near her forward gun — and shot down a Puma, damaging a second helicopter. Enemy bingo was in full flow. Argentine losses were three dead. One Royal Marine was wounded. Only when the detachment was surrounded, and further fighting would achieve nothing, did Mills order a ceasefire. He then walked forward himself, under a white coat, to make the surrender. The London Gazette citation records that he placed himself at great personal risk to do it, and that his leadership “reflected the finest traditions of the Corps.” He and his men were taken prisoner and later repatriated. Mills was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross; Sergeant Peter Leach received the DSM for the same operation. Mills was later promoted captain and left the Corps in 1996. The fight did not hold South Georgia. It did show, on the first full day of the war, what a handful of Royal Marines could do against a ship, helicopters and a landing force and it set the tone for what followed. South Georgia was retaken on 25 April.