The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1903-10-17
REBEL LEADER IN
BALKANS KILLED
CONTINUED from page /,

lance to the military academy there,
+! his idea being, of course, to become a
! professional soldier in order to be able
| to fight the Turks more efficiently. In
| his enthusiasm he went so far as to
serve as common soldier in the ranks
| for six months, so that he might be
| familiar with the life and duties of
the men under his command. He pass
| ed his examinations with honor and
! distinction and received a commission
as lieutenant of the 1st Bulgarian in
fantry regiment at the age of 20. He
remained in the army for three years;
but the life of an officer in garrison
was far too tame for his restless spirit
and when the Macedonian question be-
gan to attract the attention of the
world in 1895 he threw UP his military
career to devote himself to the new
cause.
Collecting a hundred young men of
his own age and position in life, Sara
foff drilled them necessarily and in
spired them with his own enthusiasm
On the LIST of July, 1895, he crossed the
Turkish frontier with just eighty fol-
lowers and marched toward Melnik by
way of the hidden paths which he had
learned to know in former years
Twelve days later Sarafoff entered
Melnik, town of some Importance, at
the head of his eighty followers, and
made himself master of the place. The
post and telegraph office was first seiz-
ed, and the wires connecting Melnik
with the outside world were cut before
the astonished Turks had time to sum-
mon help from the nearest garrison
town. The prefecture was next attack
ed and it's guard of fifteen gendarmes
overpowered and captured. By this
time the garrison of Melnik, numbering
100 soldiers, was alarmed and advanced
to repel the invaders, who, however,
met them with a deadly rifle fire and
put them to flight after more than fifty
had been killed or wounded.
Sarafoff was now master of the town,
and his first act was to burn the pre-
lecture, the gendarmerie station, the
post office and other official buildings.
The local prison was then opened and
the convicts set at liberty, while the
Turkish officials taken by Sarafoff were
locked up in their place. Sarafoff de-
Iivered a fiery speech to the assembled
inhabitants in the market place, in
which he announced the beginning of a
new crusade against the Turks, and
summoned the Christian residents to
accompany him to the local Greek
church to give thanks for his victory
over the hated Moslem tyrants. The
summons was followed by the entire
Christian population, and the day end
ed with greatest festivities in the
streets and open places of the town.
On the following day regiment of
cavalry and several battalions of in
fantry were making forced marches
from Series to Melnik, and Sarafoff's
little band, being too weak to face an
encounter with them, hasty retreat
was made to the mountains. The
Turkish troops went in hot pursuit, but
thanks to Sarafoff's knowledge of the
country he was able to lead his men in
safety across the Bulgarian frontier.
This adventure was the first of sew
eral raids into Turkey, each of which
was a madly reckless undertaking, in
volving the greatest risks to every one
connected with it. Sarafoff would
swoop down on some town in Turkey,
.overpower the garrison, stir up in
habitants to active discomfort and dis
appear over the frontier before the
Turkish authorities could organize an
elective he SlOly VI iiio
guerrilla warfare, his marvellous feats
of arms and his thousand and one
hairbreadth escapes would fill volumes
of surprising interest.
1t was his activity during this period
that made Sarafoff the idol of the
Macedonians in Turkey and Bulgaria.
He was feted at Sofia and throughout
Bulgaria as a national hero, and his
name became household word in ev-
cry Bulgarian family in the Balkan
peninsula. The Turkish government
too, paid a tribute to his Importance by
setting price of 100000 francs on his
head.
Sarafoff's next task was the organ
ization of the Macedonian revolutionary
committee, which has figured so largely
in all the Balkan troubles of the last
year or two. The Macedonian commit
| tee is really a union of many local
committees, under the direction of an
executive at Sofia. Each district COM
mittee has staff of voluntary secret
service agents and "executioners" at
| tached to it.
An agent of the committee presents a
| blank receipt to a wealthy merchant
and bargains with him regarding the
| amount he shall contribute to the revo-
| lutionary cause. If no agreement is ar
| rived at, the local committee arbitrarily
| fixes the sum. A receipt for this
amount is then presented to the mer-
| chant and the money peremptorily de-
manded. If the victim is still reluctant
| to pay, a revolver or something equiva-
| lent is held at his head, and in nine
cases out of ten the desired amount is
| then forthcoming. In the tenth case,
when the victim is obdurate, he is
summarily executed for his lack of
zeal in the Macedonian cause. In this
way the Macedonian committee has es-
| tablished a reign of terror and has in
| stigated a large number of atrocious
murders, for which the primary respon-
| sibility rests on Sarafoff as the organ
| izer of the whole movement. In this
respect Sarafoff has allowed his fanat-
| icism to transform him into a blood
| thirsty desperate, whose enthusiasm
| for a good cause has become pretext
for system of Matchmaking, robbery
and murder on an unprecedented scale
in fact, for tyranny more cruel than
| that of the Turks