Part 25 - The Lerin Uprising

Part 25 - The Lerin Uprising

The Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District (now occupied by Greece) is situated south of the Bitola Uprising Revolutionary District. On its south and west it bordered the Kostur Uprising Revolutionary District. On its north it bordered Dolna Prespa and Pelister Regions and on its east it bordered Voden Region. The most strategically significant part about Lerin Region was the road passing through its territory that interconnected the transportation and communications lines between Bitola and Solun. At the beginning of the 20th century, Lerin Region was supported by a population of about 60,000 people of whom 63% were Macedonians, 19% Ottomans, 7% Albanians, Vlachs and others. (Vanche Stojchev. “Military History of Macedonia”. Military academy. Skopje, 2004. Page 350) Revolutionary activities in the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary district were unfortunately stifled due to an incident that took place in 1902. Because of an accidental discovery of weapons, the Ottomans suspected something was going on in that region and initiated massive and intense weapons searches. In the process they also initiated terror campaigns and committed atrocities against the Christian population. This improper conduct weighed heavily on the Lerin Region Revolutionaries and prompted them to take action against the Ottomans. Regrettably this brought them into a collision course with the Ottoman authorities who felt they needed to eliminate the insurgency. Unfortunately in their unprepared-ness the insurgents could not protect themselves or initiate a prolonged fight against this aggression. But once exposed, the insurgents were pursued, hunted down and killed one by one, including their illustrious leader Marko Lerinski. Unfortunately this incident caused much harm, not just to the insurgents, but also to the Uprising. The incident gave the Ottomans more reasons to further escalate the searches which eventually lead to the discovery and confiscation of over 600 rifles and large quantities of ammunition. Besides overpowering the insurgency and removing the arms from the region, Ottoman authorities also bolstered their defenses, especially around the railway, rail yards and rail stations. Fortunately help came from General Headquarters with the appointment of Georgi Papanchev sent to Lerin Region to replace Marko Lerinski and to lead the Uprising. Then in March 1903 Boris Sarafov was sent to inspect the Revolutionary District’s progress and encourage the local population to join the Uprising. With Sarafov’s help, several meetings were held in various villages including Setina, Banitsa and Ekshi Su. Issues concerning preparations for the Uprising were discussed including plans to create and train new Chetas, procure and stockpile food, acquire medical supplies, etc.

Because of its weakened state, the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District was also encouraged to look to the Kostur Uprising Revolutionary District for assistance, particularly in coordinating simultaneous and joint attacks on the enemy. Primary targets selected for attacks were the railway tunnels near the village Tserevo, the railway station in Banitsa and the bridges near the villages Sakulevo and Ekshi Su. Despite its inability to contribute much to the Uprising, the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District did attend the Smilevo Congress in May 1903 and was represented by Georgi Papanchev and Mihail Chekov from Ekshi Su. It was there that it was decided that Lerin Region had the potential to fight and would definitely participate in the National Uprising. As a result, Georgi Papanchev, Lecho Tserovski and Kosta Gruev were appointed leaders of the Lerin Regional Head Office and were to lead the Uprising and revolutionary activities in that District. After the top leadership was appointed Lerin Region was then sub-divided into six Uprising centers each with its own leader and each reporting to the Regional Head Office. Soon after their return from the Smilevo Congress, Papanchev and Chekov decided to schedule a number of meetings with the local leaders to inform them of the situation. The first meeting was scheduled for the night of May 28th, 1903 in the village Banitsa where local leaders and more than 400 insurgents were in attendance. Unfortunately, and despite the precautionary measures the insurgents had taken to avoid incidents, the Ottoman authorities were aware of their activities and very early in the morning of May 29th, 1903 Ottoman troops surrounded the village. In their attempt to breach the siege, 17 insurgents lost their lives, including their leader Papanchev, again devastating the Organization and delivering another blow to the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District’s effort to join the National Uprising. In spite of the great loss, however, General Headquarters still believed there was potential for the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District to join the national fight so it dispatched Gjorgji Pop Hristov to pick up the pieces and continue the Uprising effort as head of the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District. Hristov’s first priority as top leader was to punish the traitors and informants who caused the disaster. His actions immensely contributed to the straightening and reputation of the Organization. After that Hristov devoted his energy to the preparations for the Uprising. To help things along Damjan Gruev and Boris Sarafov, in the beginning of July, 1903, paid Lerin Region a visit and managed to attract over 800 potential insurgent recruits. Unfortunately there were no weapons available to arm these people so they were told to return to their homes. With the disasters that befell the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District, weapons were rare and not easy to acquire, so most of the Lerin Region insurgents remained unarmed. The number of those who were armed was small and therefore needed to be safeguarded to be effective. For this reason the Lerin Region insurgents had to resort to partisan style warfare. Small units were assembled and assigned to independent actions that mainly had to do with preventing the enemy from executing speedy transfers of troops and material from region to region and with the task of informing and educating the general public about the impending Uprising. Then when the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District received information on the Uprising start date, it exercised its duty to warn the management of the railway in Solun not to transport civilians in the trains. But as soon as the railway was disrupted, due to insurgent diversionary attacks, railway management requested of the Ottoman authorities 25,000 Ottoman soldiers to secure the entire railway line. Unfortunately due to lack of resources only one battalion could be spared, which arrived from Asia Minor, and was tasked with securing the rail line between Banitsa and Lerin.

Despite its ill preparedness, the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District continued to contribute to the Uprising through hit and run operations and by attacking non-defended parts of the railway, cutting telegraph lines, bombing bridges and generally disrupting the transportation and communications corridor between Bitola and Solun. But after the National Uprising began and Krushevo was liberated, the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District switched its operational tactics from hit and run to fully offensive. One of its biggest offensive operations was the attack on the village Ekshi Su where more that 200 insurgents, lead by Gjorgji Pop Hristov, assembled and destroyed the local railway station. As the District’s fighting skills improved, more and more successful offensive operations were carried out and more armed insurgents enlisted and joined the fighting. Their continuous successes allowed the leadership to shift from small operations to fighting the enemy in frontal attacks and larger battles. On August 13th, 1903, when a large force of 3,000 Ottoman soldiers arrived in the region, the smaller Macedonian Chetas combined into a single large Cheta and held off the Ottoman advance until all the local villages including Bitosha, Bouf and Rakovo were safely evacuated and the civilians escorted into the local woodlands. Following that incident the Lerin and Kostur Uprising Revolutionary Districts began to coordinate attacks and to combine their forces. Combined actions between Kostur and Lerin were best demonstrated during the attack on Neveska which took place at the end of August during the Ottoman counter-offensive. The battle for control of Neveska was one of the greatest successes demonstrated by the Macedonians during the Ilinden Uprising which took place during the height of the Ottoman counter-offensive when the Ottomans were attempting to demonstrate their strength. Unfortunately this glorious military success was not meant to be because a large Ottoman force arrived just in time to rob the insurgents of their victory, marking this the last major offensive carried out by the Macedonians in that region. Neveska at the time was a small Vlach town of about 5,500 people located in the southwestern part of Lerin Region. Before the Uprising, Neveska had its own telegraph office and a permanent Ottoman garrison of 70 soldiers residing inside Neveska. But as the insurgency intensified, Ottoman soldiers that were driven out of liberated villages began to concentrate and set camp outside of Neveska. By mid-August the Ottoman soldiers residing in and near Neveska numbered over 250 making this town a formidable Ottoman stronghold. Plans to invade Neveska were prepared during the successful attack on Psodery, a nearby Vlach town. The actual plans of attack were prepared by the famous and experienced vojvoda Vasil Chakalarov and were carried out efficiently and effectively by a coordinated attack involving the forces of vojvodas Lazar Pop Trajkov, Ivan Popov, Nikola Andreev and Nikola Mokrenski. The insurgence force of 650 was divided into four groups. Each group was then dispatched to each of the surrounding villages that had a road leading into Neveska. In the north, a group was dispatched to Bel Kamen, in the east to Zelenich, in the west to Elovo and in the south the last group was dispatched to Prekopana. Chakalarov in the meantime took to the hills from where he had a view and could observe all the action as well as keep an eye out for possible outside intervention from the Ottomans. The groups remained in seclusion during the day and in the dead of night simultaneously advanced on Neveska. By 3 a.m. Ivan Popov’s insurgents advanced to within 600 meters of the Ottoman camp without being spotted. The first to open fire on Neveska was the Lerin unit which commenced the attack from the north, from the road leading from Bel Kamen. The next to open fire was Ivan Popov’s unit of sharp shooters who pinned down the Ottomans in the camp, preventing them from getting to their weapons.

Unable to fight back, the Ottomans fled in panic leaving their weapons and equipment behind. No sooner had the Ottomans left than Popov and his insurgents collected their weapons and proceeded to enter the town. Andreev and his insurgents followed from the south and opened fire on the installation where the permanent garrison was stationed. A battle broke out but the Ottomans were quickly overpowered. Unable to maintain resistance, the Ottomans fled allowing the compound to fall into the hands of the insurgents who quickly claimed its contents and burned it to the ground. The loot left behind included 37 modern Mauzer rifles, 6,000 rifle shells, military overcoats and some military machinery.

After the town of Neveska was officially declared liberated, marked by the hoisting of the Uprising flag, the Kostur Region insurgents left for Kostur. The victorious Lerin insurgents, under Pop Hristov’s command, were left in charge of defending the town and assisting its people to establish provisional authority. Three days later, on August 27th, 1903, a 15,000 strong Ottoman force consisting of two columns was spotted heading for Neveska. One column consisting of about 10,000 Ottoman soldiers was observed marching briskly from the south through the village Zagorichani. The other column of 5,000 soldiers was advancing from the north from Lerin through the village Bel Kamen. No sooner had the insurgent leadership become aware of the new situation than it was decided it would be futile to resist such a formidable force. At this point a decision was made to withdraw all the insurgent forces and in future resort back to hit and run partisan style operations. The retreat was well planned and skillfully executed with much care not to further anger the Ottomans. No incidents were reported and no civilians were harmed by either side. In their withdrawal from Neveska most of the insurgents retreated to the south towards Emborska Mountain to Kajlari Region passing through Vrapchishte, Ostrovo Lake and Rudnik. The rest fled towards Koreshta ending up in Kostur Region. The retreat was hasty in order to avoid contact with the Ottomans and not to spark a conflict which would have been detrimental to both the insurgents and the civilian population. Without any resistance from the insurgents the Ottomans quickly re-established themselves in the various villages and took extraordinary measures to also occupy the mountains and former insurgent strongholds in order to prevent the insurgents from returning. They also systematically cut and burned the forests to prevent the Uprising forces from re-establishing camps and shelters. In essence the Ottomans established permanent control over the entire territory. Even though the vast majority of the Lerin Region insurgents remained active in other parts of Macedonia, the Uprising in the Lerin Uprising Revolutionary District, by the end of August 1903, was effectively over.