Children and War - UDI and War Everyday life in a ... bours, the bombing of towns, acts of retalia- ... Belgrade in 1941-42. Thousands of children of various nation-

D ue to the fact that their very exis-tence depends on adults, childrenare a particularly vulnerable group

of the population at times of socialupheavals, crises and war. Amongst the civil-ian population, there have been many, albeitanonymous, child victims (due to deathfrom starvation, exposure and epidemicsand as a result of direct acts of war). Duringthe uprisings and independence wars in theBalkans in the first half of the XIX century,children (alongside women) have continuedto be a customary part of the ”spoils of war“.

The border between heroes and victims(especially) in the case of children is notsharply defined, and it is sometimes diffi-cult to separate these two categories as theirsymbolic roles are often intertwined. Thus,the killing of the young apprentice SavaPetrović by Turkish soldiers from theBelgrade fortress at the Čukur water foun-

tain on 3 June 1862 in Belgrade marked thereal (and symbolic) start of a major politicalcrisis that, some years later, in 1867, led tothe total withdrawal of the Turkish armyfrom towns over the entire territory ofSerbia.

Thousands of children perished in theuprisings and wars at the culmination of theGreat Eastern Crisis from 1875 to 1878. Thebrutality perpetrated against children, bothChristian and Muslim, was used extensivelyin the propaganda war waged in theEuropean press of the time. The Balkan warsbrought a new wave of violence.

During the First World War in occupiedSerbia, children between the ages of 10 and15 were interned in camps with their parentsand forced to suffer the mistreatment metedout by guards, hunger and disease. Manychildren also perished in various ways dur-ing the suppression of the uprising in

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Children and War

Everyday life in a wartime city, Sarajevo

southern Serbia in 1917. It has been regis-tered that many little girls were raped andsmall boys murdered by the occupyingtroops. Tens of thousands of children wereevacuated to the island of Corfu with theSerbian army, out of whom over 5,000 weresent to convalesce and continue their educa-tion abroad, mainly in France and GreatBritain.

Between 1941 and 1945, children werekilled in huge numbers throughout theBalkans during the military operations ofthe Axis occupying armies, the many domes-tic military formations that took part incampaigns of conquest against their neigh-bours, the bombing of towns, acts of retalia-tion and the conflicts amongst troops ofdiffering ideological, political, religious andnational affiliations. Tens of thousands ofJewish children from Greece, Romania,Hungary, Macedonia... were deported to diein the concentration camps of the ThirdReich. In Albania 28.000 children died dur-

ing the Second World War.Children were also killed in huge num-

bers in camps in the Balkans on account ofbelonging to the ”wrong“ nationality, reli-gion or due to their parentsí political affili-ations. Research has shown that over 19,000children (Serbian, Jewish, Roma, Muslimand those of Croatian anti-fascists) werekilled in the Jasenovac camp complex inCroatia. Thousands of Jewish children wereasphyxiated together with their mothers ingas trucks in a nazi camp in Zemun nearBelgrade in 1941-42.

Thousands of children of various nation-alities perished at the hands of occupationtroops and domestic collaborators in cam-paigns to crush uprisings in Serbia,Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina,Croatia and Slovenia in 1941, as well as inAlbania and Greece.

The complex picture of child victims iscarved deeply into the collective historicalidea of that period. An example of this is the

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Best friends in a wartime city, Sarajevo

group of pupils that were executed togetherwith over 2,000 hostages in an act of retalia-tion by German army units in the Serbiantown of Kragujevac on 21 October 1941. Themotif of the executed grammar school boyshas assumed a central place in collectivememory due to its element of deep tragedy.That motif was particularly fostered afterthe Second World War, taking on a particu-lar significance in the education system.Literature spoke of the massacre even dur-ing the war (the famous ”Fairy Tale ofBlood“ written by Serbian poetess DesankaMaksimović immediately after that tragicevent). A number of feature films have also

been devoted to that massacre. German troops massacred children

alongside their parents in Klisura andDistomo in Greece in the spring of 1944.The case of six children from the village ofYastrebino who were killed by the gen-darmerie for helping Partizans is wellknown in Bulgaria.

In the course of the two world wars, in theBalkans children have become the object of”ideological and national reeducation“,denationalization, violent change of faithand all other abuses perpetrated with vari-ous justifications. They have been both thevictims and the instruments of the dissemi-

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Children in the ruins of their home in central Greece, 1943.

nation of propaganda. The inexorable followers of all wars: dis-

ease, shortages of food, medicaments, andclothing, homelessness... have taken the livesof tens of thousands of children. Such wasthe state of affairs in the occupied territoriesof Serbia and Macedonia in the First WorldWar and during the war between Greece andTurkey in 1922. Twenty years later, in thewinter of 1941-42, in Greek towns and vil-lages numberless children died of hungerand disease. At the same time, children were

falling victim to wartime epidemics oftyphus, scarlet fever, whooping cough,tuberculosis and serious skin and intestinalinfections in the towns and, particularly, thevillages of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina,Serbia, Montenegro, Dalmatia, Macedonia,and elsewhere. These diseases and infectionsspread like wildfire because children’s resist-ance had been lowered due to stress, poornutrition, deficient hygiene, shortages ofmedicaments, lack of medical care...

Hundreds of thousand of children lostone or both parents and other members oftheir immediate families in the two worldwars and in the many local and civil wars inthe Balkans in the 20th century. Hugearmies of orphans have been left withoutparental care to the mercy (or lack of mercy)of the state, relatives or – the street. Thetraumas and psychological scars resultingfrom wartime childhood have been sufferedby generations of children in the Balkans,and their whole lives have been affected.Generations have been ”forced to grow up“,their childhood having been wrested from

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● 6.1. Compare the texts we have present-ed. Point out the similarities in the positionof children in wars, although the examplesgiven are from different countries and fromdifferent periods of history.● 6.2. Has anyone published recollectionsof wartime childhood in your country? Ifthere are examples of such, compare themwith those in the book.

QQ uu ee ss tt ii oo nn ss

Children in the Second World War, Yugoslavia

them by war; they have not been able to havea normal education. When war is a ”normal“part of everyday life, with all its overt andcovert violence, it cannot but change chil-dren’s lives and their concepts of the world.

M.R.

Separated fromParents: Childrenin Greek Civil War

Surely, the new experience was at thesame time threatening and disorientating,specially for the youngest children who insuch moments were longing for their par-ents’ presence. At the interviews this feelingis expressed with the often repeated phrase„Me, young I was“. A child who was particu-larly easily hurt repeated constantly: „I didnot know what was good, what was bad“.But to the most children the seeking of theirparents appears much later in their lives,especially in crucial moments (e.g. decidingwhat to study)

In the opposite, the parents’ sadness washuge, both when they separated and whenthey found their children again in the immi-gration. There had passed three or evenmuch more years and the children had alien-ated from their parents.

I don’t remember me sad at that moment,

but the sadness that was, was the sadness ofthe parents that the village was empty, theywere looking at where we had walked bare-foot and when there were footprints fromrain, says my mother, and she went, wasfalling to her knees and was kissing theearth there where we had walked (...) But me,this you can write, that we had learned to bewithout parents and she seemed to me like astranger. Three years [had passed], she waslike a stranger. Much later I startedapproaching her lap, she was begging, cry-ing, she did, to make me approach.Something, something had happenedbetween us at those times. But then we gotused to.

Ilias Katsanikos, PerivolakiRicki Van Bieschoten, Twisted Years. Collective

Memory and History in Zisak of Gravena (1900-1950),Greece, 1997, p.191-192

AutobiographicTestimonies fromthe Period of Civil

War in GreeceIIn 1946 came the partisans and took my

brother Jianni. At that time other childrenleft also. They were cheated because theywere young. Then the women came and saidto my mother to go and get their children.Secretly the mothers agreed with their chil-dren to flee through the window at nightand they would be waiting a little further. Atlast my brother came back. In spring 1947they took him again. We said, ah, they aregoing to take him anyway, let him at least govoluntarily.

Tasia Veneti, Ziakas, Greece, Twisted years, p.167

IIWe left with the children and me, I had it

in my mind, left like this, like a refugee, wesay, I wanted to leave, alone. I must havebeen 14-15 years old. I had heard children

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A Terrible War, a Terrible WarChilling wind kisses my windowsA terrible war, a terrible warSniper wounds my friends A terrible war, a terrible warI want guns to stop shootingA terrible war, a terrible warI don’t want warAnd I want my daddy home.

(Inga Hukovic, “War”, taken from “ the Corridor”magazine, Sarajevo, January 1995, III year, no. 14, p. 30)

went there, got educated, studied, and I did-n’t want to stay. From an early age I hadloved school and we had spared it for somany years, no school, nothing. And I wasorganising a few children to leave, whoseparents didn’t let them go, what means toleave secretly. My father didn’t want to sendme, because he wanted me a little here withthe sheep. But I had made up my mind toleave earlier.

Apostolis Vergos, Perivolaki, Greece,Twisted years, p.190

IIIOf all organisations of resistance, the

most active one, on village level, was perhapsEPON. The activating of young people in aseparated organisation set simultaneously anew direction and an important and defi-nite break with tradition on the level of rela-tionship between the generations. Theenthusiasm with which the youth took partin the activities of EPON was not only out oftheir will to fight, but also because of theirde facto independence from their father’s

authority. Nikos Papanikolaou, the youngman who 1941 gathered guns and watchedover the village to protect it from a possibleattack of the Italians, had the duty ofSecretary in the EPON. As many of his peers.He remembers the time of EPON as a bigcelebration.

Rickie Van Bieschoten ”We passed a lot of rain-show-ers, my girl... Publ. Plethrou) Testimonies 1998, P.88

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● Look for similar examples of children’swartime experience in your history or liter-ature.● Point out to your pupils that, despite allthe differences and the different sides thecountries of Southeast Europe have beenon in the various wars — the suffering ofthe population, and especially of children,has been a common factor.

RR ee cc oo mm mm ee nn dd aa tt ii oo nn

Children refugees, Montenegro 1942

IVAs soon as we heard that the Germans

were coming, we left everything, all, we leftit, we went to the hiding places, up to thecaves, we went everywhere. And my mothersays to me, ” My children, let’s go to the vil-lage, to save our house, because theGermans say everybody who is at homewon’t be hurt. Neither is his house burntdown nor anything.“. She says we go. Wecome here to Sipito, where the water springis. She says, ”My children sit down here“, (wewere five), ”sit down here, I will go alone“.And what was to see, the whole village was inflames! My mother comes over, what did shedo, I don’t know what she did. What did wedo? We waited for our mother to come andtake us. In the meantime we saw around 30persons, that much, Germans, coming from

Perivolaki. As soon as we saw them we start-ed crying. Fear!!! That’s it, they will slaugh-ter us now. They passed in front of us. Andhere I remember this officer, of the Gestapo:”Gut, gut“ he says. That means, ”good,good“. That thing I remember he didn’thurt us. We came then here, what was to see?Houses burnt down, all the animals killed,the place was stinking. It was warm. Wearranged a little bit the stable here, went in.

Rickie Van Bieschoten ”We passed a lot of rain-show-ers, my girl... Publ. Plethrou“ Testimonies 1998

I Hate WarWar means shooting, wounding, killing,

theft, closed roads. During the war there isnot enough food, water, electricity, gas andfootwear. Families are separated; mothers

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At the end of the war: the search for lost parents and children

and sons go away and leave their husbandsand fathers. People are left without apart-ments and they become refugees.

I hate war. War prevents me from havinga nice life – going to school on a regularbasis, walking far away, going to the seaside,buying a bicycle…

(part of Rados Jovanovic’s letter, 8 years old,Elementary School “ Osman Nuri Hadzic”, II grade,

taken from “the Corridor” magazine, Sarajevo, Bosniaand Hercegovina, October 1994 II, no.11, p. 11)

We Cry for theWorld Without

FearBefore the war I was afraid of the dark-

ness, neighbor’s dog and Mathematics. Thewar broke out four years ago. I am afraid ofnew things. I know, I saw it, adults are afraidas much as I am. The difference is that weare all afraid of the same things. It was won-derful when I was afraid of the darkness,neighbor’s dog and Mathematics. While itlasted – my childhood lasted too. This war isreally a great injustice, the greatest injusticedid to children who cannot be children any-more.

My world is a world without fear. I dreamof peace and I hope that none of the chil-dren will know of horror.

(Dino Makarevic, VII grade, taken from monograph ofElementary School “Skender Kulenovic” – Children andSchools Grow Together 1992- 1998, Dobrinja, Sarajevo,

Bosnia and Hercegovina, p.51)

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