SAFEGUARDING THE MACEDONIAN LIBERATION MOVEMENT IN SERES

SAFEGUARDING THE MACEDONIAN LIBERATION MOVEMENT IN SERES

Gotse Delchev wasn’t the only one who felt that Macedonia should become self-sufficient and have its own principles for its independence. Gotse Delchev and the Macedonian national liberation movement had reliable followers who believed in his principles and on an independent Macedonia. Most of those followers were from the Seres Revolutionary District and had gathered there after the Ilinden Uprising ended. Most prominent among Delchev’s followers was Iane Sandanski. The most revolutionary and principled core of the Macedonian Internal Organization was built in the Seres Revolutionary District where Delchev’s principles were most energetically defended. After the Ilinden Uprising ended, this District took on many issues including writing letters in the defense of the Macedonian Internal Organization and its role in the Ilinden Uprising. On June 26, 1904, the Seres Revolutionary District leaders sent a letter to the group of Greeks in Melnik to clearly and unequivocally inform them of the Macedonian struggle’s goals and let them know that the Macedonian question wasn’t a Bulgarian issue and that the actions taken by supremacists inside and outside of the Internal Organization were Bulgarian interventions and interference in the Macedonian liberation movement. The letter also emphasized the internationalist character of the Macedonian struggle.

The Seres Revolutionary District leadership took concrete actions after the Ilinden Uprising ended to preserve the above-mentioned principles and to maintain the struggle in the proper course. On January 20, 1905, in a speech addressing all the District and sub-District committees, the Seres District leadership explained the aims of the struggle in the newly created conditions in Macedonia. The speech highlighted the already implemented Balkan country policies showing that they had aims on invading, occupying and dismantling Macedonia. While revealing these warlike policies, the Seres District leadership, with special emphasis, condemned the policies of the Bulgarian government towards Macedonia.

The Seres District leadership also conducted an analytical assessment of the situation in Macedonia and had sharp criticism for the supremacists and Sarafov and his followers, as well as all others who, with their actions and deeds, inflicted damages on the Macedonian liberation movement especially during the Ilinden Uprising. By doing so, the leaders emphasized the need to take concrete measures to preserve the purity of the Macedonian national liberation movement.

PASSING JUDGMENT ON BORIS SARAFOV AND IVAN GARVANOV

On December 23, 1906, Dame Gruev, one of the oldest leaders in the Macedonian Internal Organization, was killed in battle fighting against the Ottoman army on Petlets Peak, above the village Rusinovo in Maleshevo Region. After he was killed, which happened to be one year after he served in the Central Committee as an outside of Macedonia representative of the Macedonian Internal Organization, the Internal Organization began to again fall apart. In fact without a central leadership the Revolutionary Districts began to operate as if they were independent. This prompted the supremacists to reactivate and start taking control of the Internal Organization, especially in the interior of Macedonia. First Boris Sarafov, assisted by some leading figures from the Revolutionary Districts, then Ivan Garvanov and Hristo Matov became members of the Committee representing the Internal Organization outside of Macedonia. After they became members they began to intensify supremacist activities inside the Macedonian Internal Organization. They started sending armed detachments trained in Bulgaria to Macedonia in an attempt to disable and undermine the Macedonian Internal Organization’s activities. As a result the struggle between the left and the right in the Macedonian liberation movement again began to fiercely flare up. In their zeal to destroy the struggle, the supremacists had a special tendency to invade the fortresses of the Macedonian Internal Organization in the Seres and Strumitsa Revolutionary Districts. In doing so they also attempted to assassinate Iane Sandanski, who was one of their greatest opponents. Once the Seres Revolutionary District Committee figured this out, it sentenced Boris Sarafov and Ivan Garvanov to death. The assassinations were carried out by Todor Panitsa in Sofia, in November 1907.

The elimination of Boris Sarafov and Ivan Garvanov was a surprise to some members of the Internal Organization and to the Macedonian public in general, which wasn’t sufficiently acquainted with Sarafov’s and Garvanov’s destructive anti-Macedonian activities in Macedonia. To clear the air the Seres Revolutionary District Committee wrote “open letters” which were then published by the Internal Organization’s press that explained the Internal Organization’s motives for the assassinations. One letter, written in December 1907, said that the leaders of the Seres Revolutionary District were compelled to eliminate Sarafov and Garvanov because they were prone to interfere in the Internal Organization and cause discontent. The letter emphasized that instead of the Internal Organization harnessing all its forces in solving problems arising from the internal situation in Macedonia and in the Organization itself, it was wasting its physical and intellectual efforts in constant quarrels and bloody and mutual clashes. It also emphasized that much of the Internal Organization’s efforts were used to support Bulgarian state interests instead of supporting the Macedonian liberation movement.

Among the other things that were said in the letter presented about Boris Sarafov’s character was the fact that he didn’t care much about Macedonian interests and the destiny of the Macedonian people. He was a man who constantly used his revolutionary movement for speculation.

Sarafov’s and Garvanov’s elimination didn’t end without consequences. During the Internal Organization’s Kiustendil Congress, held 1908, a full and final split resulted in the relations that were previously established in the ranks of the Internal Organization. Only representatives from the right attended this congress. Representatives from the Seres and Strumitsa Revolutionary Districts, as well as some members of the Internal Organization’s Central Committee, didn’t take part in the Kiustendil Congress. The most essential issues discussed and decisions made by the right during this Congress were contrary to the decisions adopted at the Rila Congress. As a result the right became an open supporter of a policy that was contrary to the interests of the Macedonian national liberation movement. The left, although formally in the minority, firmly stood for an independent Macedonian revolutionary movement and, as events in Macedonia in 1908 showed, it was the best position to take.