Mihailo Petrović (
Gradac,
Serbia
, image_flag = Flag of Serbia.svg
, national_motto =
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Serbia.svg
, national_anthem = ()
, image_map =
, map_caption = Location of Serbia (gree ...
, 30 June 1871 –
Raška,
Kingdom of Yugoslavia
The Kingdom of Yugoslavia was a country in Southeast Europe, Southeast and Central Europe that existed from 1918 until 1941. From 1918 to 1929, it was officially called the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, but the term "Yugoslavia" () h ...
, 28 April 1941) was an early member of the
Serbian Chetnik Organization and the
Society of Saint Sava. He participated in the early Chetnik struggles to liberate
Old Serbia from
Ottoman, Albanian and Bulgarian treachery (1903–1912), the Balkan Wars (1912–1913) and the Great War (1914–1918).
Early life
Petrović was born in the nearby village of
Gradac, just outside of the town of
Raška, in 1871. His mother died when he was a youngster and his father, a military man, was killed in the
Serbo-Bulgarian War of 1885. As a 14-year-old he went to Belgrade to live with his uncle
Stanojlo Petrović and aunt Draginja, who carefully tended to his education. Mihailo Petrović graduated from the
First Belgrade Gymnasium and the School of Theology at the Seminary of
Saint Sava, better known as ''Bogoslovija'', part of
Visoka škola (since 1905
University of Belgrade
The University of Belgrade () is a public university, public research university in Belgrade, Serbia. It is the oldest and largest modern university in Serbia.
Founded in 1808 as the Belgrade Higher School in revolutionary Serbia, by 1838 it me ...
) in 1895. His professor was Archimandrite
Firmilijan Drazic, also the
Rector of the seminary. That same year Mihailo married Leposava Obradinović, the daughter of Vujica Obradinović, a wealthy Belgrade industrialist, and then joined the priesthood in the ranks of married men. He settled first at
Ivanjica, where he had relatives. In 1900 he officiated the funerals of Mihailo Mihailović and Smiljana Mihailović (née Petrović), the parents of seven-year-old
Dragoljub Mihailović. Then, he was transferred to a parish in Raška where he remained a priest until retirement.
In 1904 when King
Peter I was crowned, Very Reverend Mihailo Petrović was an invited guest of the new king at the grand reception in
Belgrade
Belgrade is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin, Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula. T ...
. During the Serbian uprising of 1904 in
Old Serbia and
Macedonia, the
Balkan Wars (1912 and 1913), and the
Great War, he served as a military pastor to the fighting men at the front lines. He also wrote for the ''Glasnik'' (Herald) of the
Serbian Orthodox Church
The Serbian Orthodox Church ( sr-Cyrl-Latn, Српска православна црква, Srpska pravoslavna crkva) is one of the autocephalous (ecclesiastically independent) Eastern Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodox Eastern Orthodox Church#Constit ...
as a regular contributor soon after becoming a priest. Among his colleagues at the time were
Milan Rakić,
Jovan Dučić,
Nikolaj Velimirović, and other prominent Serbian men of letters, diplomats, and theologians. He was an outspoken critic of
Vatican's attempt to legalize a
Concordat with the
Serbian Orthodox Church
The Serbian Orthodox Church ( sr-Cyrl-Latn, Српска православна црква, Srpska pravoslavna crkva) is one of the autocephalous (ecclesiastically independent) Eastern Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodox Eastern Orthodox Church#Constit ...
that took the life of Patriarch
Varnava.
Mihailo and Leposava Petrović had eight children four girls (Katarina, Radmila, Natalija, and Vidosava) and four boys (Ljubiša, Dragiša, Milan, and Alexander).
Serbian Chetnik Organization
He joined early the
Serbian Chetnik Organization, formed to rid the Turk from the Balkans and consequently mainland Europe. Petrović was also a member of the Association of Reserve Officers and Warriors that commissioned a number of monuments to the fallen Chetnik fighters in the mid-1920s. It was an opportunity to praise the Chetnik leaders' effort for the liberation of
Old Serbia and to criticize the post-war neglect of Serbian war veterans, to attack those who too easily forgot the great sufferings the Serbian people in their plight for emancipation.
The first reliable data about early Chetnik activity came with the fall of Communism in the early 1990s, written by Vladan Virijević, a professor from
Kosovo-Metohija, who mentions archpriest Mihailo Petrović "as an old warrior" who came to bless Chetnik standards, banners and flags in villages and towns throughout
Raška in 1937 at a time of the
Concordat crisis in
Yugoslavia
, common_name = Yugoslavia
, life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation
, p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia
, flag_p ...
.
Archpriest Petrović was Bishop of
Žiča Nikolaj Velimirović's deputy (''arhijerejski namesnik''/Bishop's Dean) for the
Studenica district with its seat in Raška from 1919 to 1920 and later from 1936 to 1941 before Bishop Nikolai and Patriarch
Gavrilo were arrested by
Gestapo
The (, ), Syllabic abbreviation, abbreviated Gestapo (), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe.
The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of F ...
agent and kept under surveillance in a monastery until 1943 when they were both sent to
Dachau. He also held the same post (bishop's dean) during the time of Bishop Jefrem Bojović during his tenure from 1920 to 1933. As a contributing editor to the Glasnik (Herald) of the
Serbian Patriarchate of Belgrade, Petrović often emphasized in his articles the continued security threats Serbs faced in the region, writing about the need to organize armed or paramilitary defences against those national threats. Petrović was calling for a continued role for the Chetniks in the southern regions of Serbia throughout the 1930s.
Legacy
During
World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
his son Alexander Petrović, a freedom-fighter, and daughter
Vidosava "Vida" Milenković (née Petrović) harboured and hid a Jewish family from the
Nazis
Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...
in
Raška. Alexander was captured during the early part of the war and lost his life at
Mauthausen's
Hartheim in 1944. He was 27.
The Petrović and Milenković families are honored by
Israel
Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...
's
Yad Vashem memorial as one of the ''
Righteous Among the Nations'', an honour given to non-Jews who behaved with heroism in trying to save Jews from the
genocide of the
Holocaust.
See also
*
List of Chetnik voivodes
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Petrovic, Mihailo
Chetniks
1871 births
1941 deaths
People from Raška District
Revolutionaries from the Ottoman Empire