Draft:Arandjel Bojkovic

Aranđel Bojković (Serbian Cyrillic: Аранђел Бојковић was a Serbian Chetnik freedom-fighter who led a četa band behind enemy lines in the Macedonian Struggle and the battles that followed (Balkan Wars and World War I. He was a participant and a witness in many skirmishes and battles against Turks and Albanian irredentists, particularly the tragic loses at Čelopek, before the first world war, during the time of Chetnik Action. In 1929 a journalist passing through an Old Serbia village of German in Macedonia in the Krivopalanačkog krug interviewed a war veteran, took his picture in shabby clothes, and wrote an article about Aranđel Bojković who was then homeless and living a hand to mouth existence. The article with a photograph appeared in a Serbian newspaper (1929) titled Kurir naših četa ("Courier of our četa companies") that read:

"When our četa campaign action in Southern Serbia began twenty-three years ago, one of the first to volunteer to safely guide our companies from Vranje to Ristovac was Aranđel Bojković, a farmer from the village of Đerman. He was the our border and foreign border courier and četa company guide. He was a participant in many battles, a witness to the death of Duke Anđelko Aleksić and his company in the village of Pčinjia near Kumanovo. Out of the entire company, only he remained alive from that fight. Today, when our national ideals have been realized, when many pensions and awards are given to the much less deserving, this man, who undeniably had many merits for the fatherland, lives in extreme poverty."

The article provoked public rage in Serbia and the Yugoslav government of King Aleksandar I Karađorđević intervened. Soon, Bojković's circumstances greatly improved with five hectares of arable land and a house.

See also

• List of Chetnik voivodes

References

• Aranđel Bojković's photograph from a press clipping: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Aran%C4%91el_Bojkovi%C4%87.jpg