ATTEMPTS AT REFORM IN MACEDONIA

The first object of the organization which Grueff and Deltcheff set about forming was to remedy this evil. In each village they established a local committee, composed of the more intelligent villagers, whose function it should be to take the place of the Turkish courts. The members of these secret tribunals were elected democratically by the villagers themselves. Later on they elected local delegates to provincial committees, which acted as courts of higher appeal, to which a defendant on trial might appeal should he feel that local sentiment was prejudiced against him. Later on, when these committees spread all over the country, yearly congresses were held, the first of which drew up a constitution for what was nothing less than a secret provisional government for the underground republic of Macedonia. Such was the beginning and the first purposes of the famous Macedonian Committee, so called because authority was always vested in the hands of committees, rather than with individuals, so strong was the democratic sentiment of the people.

The next thing was to get rid of the brigands. To accomplish that the provincial committees organized and maintained armed bands, which patrolled the mountains of the territory assigned to them. Numbering all the way from ten men to fifty each, these bands protected the villages from the bandits and even hunted them down. And, naturally, when the terrorist bands of the Greek Church became active, they were confronted by the armed bands of the committee.

It is notable that when the existence of the Macedonian Committee and its small local armed forces first became known to the outside world, it was not the Turkish Government which showed most animosity. In fact, for a long time the Turks rather treated the committee much as they had treated the brigands; that is, let them alone, so long as they did not cross their path, and the committee did not set out to molest the Turks. It was the Greek Church, and the Greek and Serbian Governments that became most excited. Both the Greeks and the Serbians had been making every effort to arouse a "spirit of nationalism" of their own brand among the Macedonians. The committee was distinctly going to counteract their influence and efforts by arousing a spirit of nationality among the Macedonians which was neither Serbian nor Bulgarian nor Greek. And when the Bulgarian Government understood this thoroughly it showed itself equally unfriendly. For Prince Ferdinand and his clique dreamed of the Greater Bulgaria which they should rule. They wanted no autonomous Macedonia; even less did they want an independent Macedonia.

It was along in the later nineties that the Macedonian Committee began assuming such proportions as to attract the attention of the Balkan Governments. They began preparations for counteracting its influence, even for its destruction. So they organized armed bands, commanded by army officers "on furlough," or, in some cases, by the very brigand chiefs whom the committee had driven out. These bands were sent across the frontier to "arouse the national spirit" among the peasants.

From the very first the Bulgarian bands fought the forces of the committee as did the Greeks. Neither ever penetrated very far into the country from their respective frontiers, for the peasants were opposed to them and would not feed them, though they had plenty of money and did succeed in bribing some. They did, however, do a great deal of damage among the villages near the frontiers and, instead of arousing any national spirit, only planted a deep hatred in the hearts of the Macedonians for their respective governments. But of the three forces, Greek, Bulgarian, and Serbian, the Bulgars and Greeks were by far the most ferocious. The Serbs were inclined to fight fair, attacking only the committee's bands and such villages as sheltered them. The Greeks and Bulgars knew no such restrictions. They burned whole villages, massacred whole communities, including women and children, and frequently outraged women. And wherever they left their bloody marks behind, there they also left the official seal of their master, rudely drawn on rocks or charred timbers—a bishop's miter and cross.

Between the committee's armed forces and the propagandist bands sent over by Prince Ferdinand's Government there were open hostilities. The peasants complained to the committee that some of Ferdinand's band leaders, those who had formerly been brigands, were beginning to resort to their old practices, though now they described their robberies as "contributions to the cause of the revolution." The Macedonians fought Bulgars as bitterly and fiercely as they fought Greeks and Serbs. For months a bloody war was waged in the mountain forests of northern Macedonia. The committee's forces had the support of the population. The invaders had the advantage of a bigger supply of arms and ammunition, and that finally told. Little by little the bands of the committee were driven back. And just at that juncture an authority of the organization, the Executive Committee, was betrayed by a Greek spy. These leaders, who had charge of the organization's funds, were arrested and imprisoned. Without funds the bands in the field were cut off from further supplies of arms and ammunition, which had been supplied in large part by illicit Greek and Turkish traders.

Only two leaders, and less than a hundred armed men, were left in northern Macedonia to resist the further advance of the Bulgarian propagandists.

In 1901 a Macedonian leader, whose headquarters were in Thrace and in the country east of the Struma, of the name of Yani Sandanski, who later became prominent in connection with the Young Turk movement, kidnapped the American missionary, Miss Ellen Stone, and held her for a ransom of $60,000. His desperate venture succeeded. The ransom was paid, arms and ammunition were bought in large quantities, and his committee was able to meet the Bulgarian propagandists with stronger forces than ever in the country east of the Struma. The committee had men in plenty.

The Miss Stone episode, however, had given the Macedonian situation a great deal of publicity in the Bulgarian press, and the Bulgarian public began protesting. Thousands of students in Bulgaria were Macedonians; others were government officials. Thousands also were prospering merchants. Popular demonstrations against Ferdinand's policy were reported all over the country, and finally he was compelled to withdraw his armed forces from Macedonia. Thus was his first intrigue in that direction defeated.

It should be obvious by this time that the Macedonian Committee was the key to the whole Balkan problem, in so far as it was an internal problem at least. All the little states surrounding Macedonia wanted to grab her, and Macedonia did not want to be grabbed by any of them. In their selfish greed the governing cliques of all the little states absolutely disregarded the will of the people of Macedonia. In their efforts they were only reviving the old hatreds and creating new ones. Little wonder that the Turks sat back and refrained from interfering too actively. Meanwhile the people of Europe, seeing that the Balkan Christians fought more among themselves than they fought the Turks, believed they were only barbarians, little dreaming that the fight was not so much between Turk and Christian, as between Democracy and Imperialism; the democracy of the Macedonians against the imperialistic ambitions of the selfish little states around them. This point should be realized and emphasized, for this fight culminated in the next big act of the Balkan drama; the rise of Young Turkey.

If the little Balkan States were opposed to the Macedonian Committee, for the very same reason Russia and Austria were opposed, though to these two powers it was not so vital a matter. For the present they, with the rest of Europe were maintaining the status quo. For a number of years Russia had been busy in another quarter in the Far East, and had not much thought to give to the Balkans. Then came her defeat at the hands of the Japanese in 1905 and her hopes of emerging on the open sea in that direction were effectually doomed. Austria, too, was willing to defer the realization of her ambitions, so long as Russia made no move. Yet both realized that they must do battle for their interests in the Balkans. In 1903 the Macedonian Committee, rendered desperate by the pressure of the Greek, Bulgar, and Serbian propagandists, as well as by the Turks, who were beginning to take more active measures against the "comitlara," or "committee people," as they called the revolutionists, precipitated an uprising in the Monastir district, under the leadership of Damyan Grueff, Deltcheff having been killed by soldiers some time previous. The object was not so much a successful revolution as to create a crisis in the Balkan problem; to disturb the status quo of the European statesmen. For, as Grueff expressed it, "horror with an end is better than horror without an end."

The uprising was suppressed with the customary Turkish severity, though not with such atrocities as had occurred in Bulgaria twenty-eight years previously. Nor did the burning of hundreds of villages ruffle the European statesmen. A conference of the powers was indeed called and an attempt made to institute such reforms as had been contemplated by the XXIII Article of the Berlin Treaty, which included foreign police officers, in command of the Turkish police in Macedonia. Each of the powers did indeed send some officers down there, but they had little more influence than so many tourists. After the uprising the same old situation continued. The Greek Church was now making desperate attempts to overrun Macedonia with its terrorist bands and Ferdinand started another intrigue on behalf of Bulgarian propaganda which came near proving more fatal to the committee than any of the Greek attacks.

Ferdinand, through a young Macedonian who had been an officer in his army and was now an active member of the committee, Boris Sarafoff, began a propaganda of bribery within the organization itself. By this means he hoped to work up a majority within the committee in favor of annexation with Bulgaria.

At this juncture Yani Sandanski reappeared on the scene. Grueff had recently been killed in a skirmish with soldiers. Sandanski sent one of his men down into Sofia, where Sarafoff was conferring with Ferdinand at the time, and had him shot down in the streets of the capital. At the same time he sent an open message to Ferdinand, warning the prince that if he continued his interference in Macedonia's internal affairs, he would share the fate of Sarafoff. That ended Ferdinand's second intrigue in Macedonia. Sandanski, who was now the recognized leader of the Macedonian organization, was of course outlawed in Bulgaria. But the time was presently to come when Ferdinand would seek his friendship most humbly.

It must not be supposed that the Macedo-Slovenes, though they formed an overpowering majority in the membership of the committee, were the only ones who were discontented with the rule of Abdul Hamid. The Vlachs of Macedonia stood solidly beside the Macedo-Slovenes. In the beginning some Greeks, too, had joined, but as the Greek Church excommunicated all who enrolled under the banner of the committee, and, moreover, as excommunication meant certain assassination, those few Greeks who really felt sympathy for the cause of a free Macedonia found it expedient to remain quiet.

The Mohammedans, however, though they did belong to the ruling race and had more reason to hold aloof than the Greeks, were by no means solidly against the committee. Whole communities of them, too, joined, or at least offered shelter and comfort to the armed bands of the committee. The Albanians especially were sympathetic, and great numbers of them were active in the work.

But the discontent of the Turks with the Government was more fully represented in a movement of separate origin. Young Turkish men had been going abroad to study in foreign universities for a generation past and had begun imbibing advanced ideas. They returned and began spreading those ideas among their followers at home. Finally they too organized, and this was the beginning of the Young Turk party.

The Young Turks had aims that differed very little from those of the committee. They wanted a constitutional Turkey, under which all the subjects of the sultan should be allowed to enjoy equal rights, regardless of creed or race. Many of them were, in fact, in favor of a republic. It was not long before their leaders came in contact with the leaders of the committee. And for some years they worked quietly together. The Young Turks, it should be remembered, were especially active in the army.[Back to Contents]