McCoy cites ample textual evidence that Leon the general was one of the commanders of the Athenian fleet that was trapped in the harbor of Mytilene on the island of Lesbos by the Spartan blockade in the year 406 BC. The blockade was ultimately broken when the fleet's supreme commander, Conon, dispatched two blockade runners to get word of their situation to Athens. One of the ships, commanded by Erasinides, succeeded and Athens lifted the blockade a month later in the famed Battle of Arginusae.