SERBS ON CORFU 1916 – 1918

For the future and happier generations, the island of Vido will became the Serbian Jerusalem, a place of gathering of our grateful descendants.

(Dimitrije, Metropolitan of Serbia, 1918.)

CORFU (KERKYRA, KRF)

The island of Corfu, the biggest in the Ionian Sea, was named after the beautiful nymph Korkyra, the wife of Poseidon according to Greek mythology. The city of Corfu is administrative and cultural center of this island, which has 110,000 inhabitants today. Corfu, together with the rest of the islands in the Ionian archipelagos, became a part of the Greek state on the 21st of May 1864, an event coommemorated every year in the grand Enosis (Unification) festivities.

City of Corfu and location of the Museum "Serbs on Corfu 1916-1918" (click to

enlarge)

At the end of 1915 and the beginning of 1916, under the pressure of the joint offensive of the Austro-Hungarian, German and Bulgarian troops, the Serbian army, Serbian government, National Assembly, as well as a part of the Serbian civilian population, was forced to withdraw from Serbia through Montenegro to Albania. On this long journey, Serbs went through the biggest exodus in their recent history. In his official report to Serbian Prime Minister Nikola Pasic, General Bozidar Terzic, Minister of Defense, wrote that on their way through Albania, 243,877 persons was killed or taken as prisoners or died from hunger or cold weather. The approximate total number of casualties was at least 150,000 including both soldiers and civilians. - (Read "THE ARRIVAL IN CORFU" by Carlo Sforza, see on the end)

From 18 January to 21 February 1916, 151,828 Serbian soldiers and civilians were evacuated with Allied ships from the Albanian port of Valona to Corfu. The first port of disembarkation on Corfu was Gouvia(Guvino), six km north from the city of Corfu.

Retreat through Albania

Kachanik Somewhere in Albania

The suffering of solders and civilians did not, however, stop upon their arrival on the "Island of Salvation", as the Serbs named Corfu.

The Allies had not had enough time to make provisions for adequate care of such a great number of people. There was lack of food, clothes, tents and heating. For 8 days after their arrival, the cold rain would not stop. Without tents, suffering solders began to die en masse.

On 21 January 1916, the army hospital units from Morava, Pirot and Cacak were the first to land on the rocky island of Vido. Soon afterwards, a couple of thousands of young boys - recruits arrived on the island. Most were seriously ill and on the verge of death.

In the beginning (those first days), up to 300 soldiers were dying every day. Twelve hundred of them were buried in the island shores, whereas later (because of lack of burial grounds), the boats from the French hospital ship "St. Francis of Asisi" would carry the dead bodies and drop them in the Ionian Sea, a few kilometers away from the island, in what was called "the Blue Graveyard".

It is estimated that around 10,000 Serbian soldiers and recruits were buried on the island of Vido and in the "Blue Graveyard".

The Royal Navy of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croatians and Slovenes erected the first monument dedicated to the perished soldiers. It is a Stone Cross situated above today's Mausoleum. The monument was uncovered by King Aleksandar I Karadjordjevic in 1922, in the presence of a great number of Yugoslav and Greek military, government and church officials.

Stone Cross

The Mausoleum (kosturnica) on the island of Vido was the work of architect Nikola Knjazev and was erected bu the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1936. Within the marble walls of the Mausoleum, there are 1,232 coffers (cases), containing the bones of soldiers previously buried in 27 cemeteries of Corfu, the names of which were known. The bones of those soldiers who remain unknown were buried under two separate stone plaques outside the Mausoleum.

Vido

Mausoleum (kosturnica) on the island of Vido

The gentle Mediterranean climate, adequate medical care and proper nourishment by the Allies, new uniforms and, above all, warm and close relationships with the local Greek inhabitants, led to a miraculous recovery of the Serbian army.

By a kind gesture of the local Greek authorities, the sessions of the Serbian National Assembly were held in the National theatre of Corfu from 19 January 1916 through to 19 November 1918.

The seat of the Serbian government was established in the hotel "White Venice"

The churches of St. Archangel, the Holy Trinity and St. Nicholas where given to the Serbs for temporary religious use.

The cultural life of Serbs in Corfu was very lively, with various theatre performances, musical concerts etc. organized frequently.

Serbian Government and Parliament in Corfu

The sessions of the Serbian National Assembly were held in the National

Theatre of Corfu

Serbian Government and Parliament in Corfu

Also, the municipal authorities of Corfu temporarily gave a printing house to the Serbs, which was supplied with the most modern printing equipment offered by the French. This way, they were able to publish the "Serbian Newspaper" with a circulation of 10,000 copies and many valuable books, as for example "Diplomatic Correspondence", "Codification", "Motherland" etc. In addition, school books for children in Serbian schools were printed there.

The Serbian primary school with 290 pupils and a Serbian highschool with 120 pupils were organized on the island of Corfu.

Furthermore, sport associations were organized and a number of football matches were played with the allied teams.

Finally, the island was full of Serbian restaurants and grocery stores.

The close ties that Serbs established with the local population during their stay in Corfu were so strong that they have lasted up to the present time. Many Serbs decided to stay and live on this island, and also many marriages were arranged.

For instance, the owner of "White Venice" hotel in which the Serbian government had settled, Mr. Ioannis Gazis, married all of his three daughters with Serbs. The eldest one, Djovana, married officer Milovan Colak-Antic, the second eldest, Avgousta, married the future prime minister of the Yugoslav government and founder of modern economy Dr. Milan Stojadinovic, and the youngest one, Zafiro, married the distinguished professor Ljubomir Kazimirovic.

Serbian Prime Minister Nikola Pasic Greek Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos

The wife of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia Aleksandar Cincar-Markovic was also from Corfu.

Regent Aleksandar Karadjordjevic and Serbian officers also were godfathers of many Greek children from Corfu. However, the greatest proof of the living traces of the Serbians' stay in Corfu is the fact that even today, in the vocabulary of elderly people in Corfu, the following Serbian words are still in use: "tata" (father), "baba" (grandmother), "glava" (head), "kuca" (house).

Upon departure from the island, Corfu's men and women were crying and thus blessing the Serbian soldiers: "Kali ora stratioti Serve, may God give you good Serbs a long life and help you and your army to return safely to your homes and families who expect you eagerly. Today and always we will pray to God together as Christian brothers " (from the "Serbian Newspaper", Corfu, 16 June 1916 ; Read also the "LETTER TO A SERBIAN SOLDIER" by unknown Greek woman, see on the end).

The Serbian mansion in Corfu

The Serbian mansion in Corfu is located at the center of the city, in 19, Moustoxidou street and houses the Museum "Serbs on Corfu 1916-1918" and the Honorary Consulate of Serbia and Montenegro.

Museum "Serbs on Corfu 1916-1918"

Museum "Serbs on Corfu 1916-

1918" Memorial Plaque on

Museum Interior of the Museum

Col. (ret.) Milorad Prelevic was the curator of the museum's permanent exhibition. The exhibition is organized in 10 separate topics, which chronologically illustrate the historical period from 1915 until the end of the First World War through photos, maps, documents and objects, as follows:

Corfu - monuments

Guvija (Govino) Memorial dedicated to the

soldiers of Division "Drina" Great friend of Serbs

Giannis Gianoulis

APPENDIX:

Carlo Sforza (Italy)

THE ARRIVAL IN CORFU

(1916)

Pašić was unable to immediately go out and meet the transport ships that had just arrived; it was very fortunate for him. The first landing of the Serbs was described to me by the soldiers who had gone through the horror of the worst bombardments in France and Italy, or had - as I did later - witnessed the appalling spreading of the typhoid epidemic in the trenches in Macedonia when soldiers who had been quite healthy a minute before would first turn grey and than black, dying in only two minutes, fully aware of what was going on. But them - who had seen all that before witnessing the landing of the Serbs in Corfu - assured me that the scenes were far more horrendous than all others.

The doctors on the Italian transport ships had given the crew strict orders that seemed quite cruel but were life-saving:

- Don't give these people anything to eat; we have only bread and toast but they are so weak that they would die of it.

But, as soon as the transport ships neared the coast of Corfu, local merchants surrounded them with their little boats offering sweets and their mandorlato wine. The Serbian soldiers all had a little money, that being the only thing that that had been distributed to them in Albania; Italian sailors who had not slept for three days and nights stopped watching over them. And then a horrific scene occurred: hundreds of Serbian soldiers who had survived the greatest ordeals, died right then and there with a peace of bread or cake in their mouths.

All merchants from Corfu were immediately removed; large boats were sent to carry the Serbs ashore; some three hundred more died in just the few minutes it took to get them to the shore.

This constituted a really dreadful sight: seeing that strong and fearless race - that survived the worst possible retreat, the Albanian Calvary - losing its strength while the salvation was within sight.

Most of the Serbian tombs in the cemeteries of Corfu are the graves of the soldiers who died in the first ten days

upon landing on the island. /.../

Serbian soldiers' camps were randomly scattered around the hills and the valleys that gave the entire island the look of a gigantic park. The Serbs felt its beauty, but their rustic instincts could not find any interest in a land that yielded merely oranges, lemons and oil. They did not feel at home in the shade of the lumpy olive trees, planted on Corfu by the Venetians during the 13th and 18th centuries. /.../

Of all the foreigners who came and went, Serbs were the ones who aroused most sympathy - and for a number of reasons: firstly because the Serbian officials and officers, who lived in the town, felt the urge to hurriedly spend all their money immediately after receiving it, lacking any sense of economy of the Italians and French that have this trait deeply rooted; because the Serbian soldiers living in small camps all over the island always had the greatest respect for the women of Corfu, whilst the French and the Italians strove to become heroes of Boccaccio's novels. The Serbs were particularly respected for the fact that none of them showed any intention of staying on the island, but longed constantly for their native land in Šumadija, for their home in Belgrade or Niš. /.../

Due to the climate, diseases and the nostalgia for Europe, the front in Macedonia was hated by all English, Italian and French soldiers alike. But from Thessaloniki to Bitolj no officer or simple soldier of the Entante armada ever dared compare his grief with the tragic pain of Serbian soldiers.

Just as they had recovered from the suffering they had faced in retreating through Albania, they were condemned to endure pains worthy of Dante's Inferno in Macedonia: to watch their native mountains and plains from afar, and to constantly ask themselves with fear, if their army - the only one that had no reserve troops - will be able to keep its strength for the decisive battles. This thought tore them apart making them alternately desperate and impatient.

Nikola Pašić and the Unification of Yugoslavs, 1938

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Unknown Greek Woman

LETTER TO A SERBIAN SOLDIER

(After the departure of the Serbian Army from the island of Corfu)

I am sorry that my response to Your beautiful and cheerful letter will be a serious and sorrowful one. But I cannot help it. Ever since Your departure, I have been in this mood. I do not mean only You personally, but all of the Serbs. This is the truth, believe me, and I am not the only one to think and feel that way. All the women who live on this small island say so.

Ever since the Serbs came to Corfu, I no longer like my race. Our fathers have forced us to renounce any desire of the world, the need for fun and spiritual pleasure, even the need to eat well. It would have been much better for us if you had not come to Corfu, for we are much worse off now. We have come to know you in the worst misery, in your greatest distress, in rags, exhausted, hungry, without your families, without a country, and still you seemed to us so much nicer than our men. Over the past three years, I have grown so accustomed to the mild faces of your soldiers, their benevolent and honest eyes, to these men who allow - deliberately and with resignation - to be cheated only to find a roof over their head and a peace of bread. You are a peculiar race! Just the other day I have talked to a Russian colonel about it. He said that it is a trait common to all Slavs. If this is true, then Slavic wives and daughters are really fortunate.

Us women can best feel this difference. Imagine our men that fear tomorrow and are terrified by the thought that some day they might not have anything to eat. They fast today so that they might have food tomorrow; tomorrow they fast to leave something for the day after - and so they fast all the time. Denying themselves any pleasure that might cost, they are happy when today they have more money than yesterday. And You and your men! You have heroically gone through such an ordeal, you came hungry, frozen to the bone, but still you are not selfish nor closefisted.

We lived happily in the past three years you have spent here. We were not looking for affairs, since we did not even know what this meant; we had no one to have it with, because, you know, an affair or a simple love might prove costly. But every day I used to run to the window to see some Serbian officer, just to hear him say hello - whoever he might be - and to smile at me gently. That would fill my day 'till bed time.

Corfu is now as it was before 1915. I now think that it is even worse. Mute and empty, it no longer sings. Your people always sing, and I had grown accustomed to the songs and the chatter. You can think of me as a great enemy of your people because I have always wanted you to stay as long as possible before returning to your mother country. You came, showed us what life is and then left, leaving us desolate. We will be alone once again, surrounded by frowning faces, submerged by talk about money, and besieged by this terrible sea till our death, because we cannot go away - it costs! What is beauty worth and all the other nice qualities Serbs have discovered in us, when no one here enjoys them. Fortunate are the girls that the Serbs have taken along, saving them from a life on this love island full of sun and cypress trees -but lacking people and love.

Taken from Golgotha and Resurrection of Serbia 1916-1918, BIGZ, Belgrade 1971

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Children from Serbia at Corfu (2001)

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Serbia in war from 1912 to 1918 (on serbian)

- Србија у ратовима од 1912-1918 (01:21:00) http://www.srbijazemljaheroja.com/srbijauratu.html

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