The ''Balkan News'' was a daily newspaper produced in

Salonika Thessaloniki (; el, Θεσσαλονίκη, , also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece, with over one million inhabitants in its metropolitan area, and the capital of the geographic region of ...

for the British Salonica Force (BSF) fighting on the

Macedonian front The Macedonian front, also known as the Salonica front (after Thessaloniki), was a military theatre of World War I formed as a result of an attempt by the Allied Powers to aid Serbia, in the autumn of 1915, against the combined attack of German ...

. It was first published in November 1915 and the final ‘Adieu’ edition appeared on May 10, 1919. It contained war news from all fronts, mainly based on radio reports. Items relating to the Balkans, Austria and Russia predominated, and were mixed with verse and other writing. There was also local advertising and an “Orient Weekly” column written by editor Harry Collinson Owen under the pseudonym Comitadji. Initially 4 pages, by mid-1918 the paper had been reduced to 2 pages per issue and contained almost exclusively war news, with a few advertisements. The newspaper was printed on poor quality paper. Copies are now rare, and the runs held by

British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...

and the

Imperial War Museum Imperial War Museums (IWM) is a British national museum organisation with branches at five locations in England, three of which are in London. Founded as the Imperial War Museum in 1917, the museum was intended to record the civil and military ...

are incomplete.

Mentions in memoirs

The Balkan News is mentioned frequently in ‘Salonica and After’, which was written by its editor Harry Collinson Owen. It was described by

Cyril Falls Cyril Bentham Falls CBE (2 March 1888 – 23 April 1971) was a 20th Century British military historian, journalist, and academic, noted for his works on the First World War. Early life Falls was born in Dublin, Ireland, on 2 March 1888, the elde ...

in the British Official History of the Macedonia operations, as "one of the best Army newspapers of the days of the war" The Balkan News was referred to by

Alan Palmer Alan Warwick Palmer (1926 – 25 March 2022) was a British author of historical and biographical books. Background Palmer was educated at Bancroft's School, Woodford Green, London, and Oriel College, Oxford. He spent 19 years as senior history t ...

in ‘The Gardeners of Salonica’, where he noted that “Even after half a century, its files show the determination and doggedness underlying the mocking self-pity that was as fashionable in Macedonia as it was in the trenches of Belgium and France” In “The Macedonian Campaign”, Luigi Villari, who was for two years Italian Liaison officer with the various Allied Commands in the East, said that "“The British had only one paper, The Balkan News, edited by Mr. Collinson Owen. It was purely a paper for the army, containing the news of the day and a few special articles, and was well written, bright, full of wholesome cheerfulness and wit, and wholly free from local political tendencies — unlike the French papers, it never tried to create bad feeling between the Allies”.

Editors

Harry Collinson Owen was a professional journalist sent out to Salonika specifically to edit the Balkan News.

Owen Rutter Edward Owen Rutter (7 November 1889 – 2 August 1944) was an English historian, novelist and travel writer. After serving with the North Borneo Civil Service from 1910 to 1915, Rutter returned to Britain during the First World War and was commi ...

served in Macedonia in the 7th Battalion of the Wiltshire Regiment. After the war he became a prolific writer of travel books, history books and novels

Tiadatha

used the Balkan News to serialise (under the pseudonym ‘Klip-Klip’) his epic poem ‘Tiadatha’,Rutter, Owen (‘Klip-Klip’). 1920. The Song of Tiadatha. Serialised in The Balkan News, 1917. First impression in book form, Salonica, 1919. First UK Edition, T. Fisher Unwin Ltd., London, 1920 a parody of Longfellow’s ‘Hiawatha’ that described the trials and tribulations of a young British officer serving in Macedonia. Although written by one of the editors, and much advertised in it, the Balkan News is mentioned only once in the poem, when its 'hero', after being wounded in an assault on the Bulgarian trenches, had a spell in hospital where: :Every morning after breakfast :He would lie back on his pillows, :Read his Balkan News in comfort, :Spend his day in eating, sleeping …….

References

{{Greek Newspapers Defunct newspapers published in Greece Newspapers established in 1915 Daily newspapers published in Greece