Milo Bošković
Born(1911-10-20)20 October 1911
Brčeli, Kingdom of Montenegro
Died21 September 1944(1944-09-21) (aged 32)
Jasenovac concentration camp
NationalityYugoslav
OccupationPhysician

Milo Bošković ( Brčeli, 20 October 1911 –Jasenovac concentration camp, 21 September 1944), physician, participant in the National Liberation War and national hero of Yugoslavia.

Biography

Education

He was born on 20 October 1911 in the Montenegrin village of Gornji Brčeli, in Crmnica, near the coastal city and port of Bar.[1][2] [3] His father Ivo worked in the United States, and Milo stayed in Montenegro with his mother and brothers.[2]  He finished elementary school in his hometown, and high school in Cetinje.[2]  He studied medicine at the University of Bologna, where he graduated in 1937.[3][1][2]  He came to Belgrade just before the outbreak of the Second World War. As a doctor, he specialized in parasitology and was employed as an assistant at the Bacteriological Institute of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in Belgrade.[3][1][2] 

Secret print shop in Nazi occupied Yugoslavia

At first he was a fellow traveller, and since 1940. a member of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia (CPY).[3][2] After German occupation of Yugoslavia, according to a party assignment, he rented a house at Banjički venac number 12, in Belgrade in July 1941.[1][4][5][6][7][3] He was the member of the CPY, but unknown to the Belgrade police, because he studied abroad. In the basement of house was located the secret print shop of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia.[3][1][4] A special closet was placed to hide the secret entrance to the basement of the pressroom. Because of the conspiracy, Bošković opened a doctor's office in the house.[3][4][7] Then he formally married Zagorka Zaga Jovanović, a medical student and a worker at a printing office.[3][4]

At the beginning of January 1942, Milo was wanted by the German police, on suspicion of being an "English spy".[3][1][4][7] While the police entered the house, he managed to hide in the closet in the basement, where the secret print shop was located.[4][7] Zaga then gave the police an explanation that Milo had gone to his relatives out of Belgrade.[3][1][7] Police then searched the house, but found nothing suspicious. A week later, another German patrol came by the house and brought a new invitation for Bosković to report to Gestapo.[7] Party organization than made a decision that Bosković is no longer legal tenant of the house, so he started hiding in the secret print shop.[7]

Arrest

Due to his personal safety, as well as the security of the print shop in the house, Milo travelled to Zagreb in July 1942, on a party assignment, with false documents.[3][4][1][5][7] He met with  Ivanka Muačević-Nikoliš in Zagreb on 14 July.[4][1] With help of Ivanka he was supposed to get in touch with the Yugoslav Partisans in the liberated territory.[3][7] While they were walking down the street, an Ustaše policeman recognized Ivanka and immediately arrested both of them.[4][1] He was terribly tortured and beaten in prison.[3] They smashed out all of his front teeth, and then threw him from the second floor of the police building.[3][4] Although with a broken leg, Milo did not admit anything, neither about his activity, nor about the secret print shop in Belgrade.[3][1] 

Death in concentration camp

Since Bošković did not admit anything, they transferred him to the Stara Gradiška concentration camp, and at the end of December 1942 to Jasenovac concentration camp.[3][1][4] Together with several inmates, he was preparing to escape, but the guards discovered them.[8] After another terrible torture, he was sentenced to death by hanging.[8] On the day of the execution of his death sentence, 21 September 1944, he appeared in front of the camp commander Dinko Šakić, protesting the way the sentence was carried out.[8][9] He said: "I am a son of Montenegro, and I protest against this shameful way of carrying out the death sentence. In our country, people are killed with guns."[3][8][9] After Sakic decided to fulfill his "last wish", Milo refused to turn his back and put on a black bandage to cover his eyes.[8]

On 27 November 1953, Boskovic was declared a national hero of Yugoslavia by decree of the President of the Federative People's Republic of Yugoslavia, Josip Broz Tito.[3][8]  

Distinguished brothers Bošković

Milo Bošković had two younger brothers – Đuro and Petar. His brother Đuro Bošković (1914–1945) was a lawyer, a revolutionary, a participant of the National Liberation struggle and a member of (OZNA) the security agency of Yugoslavia that existed between 1944 and 1952. Djuro became particularly prominent during the World War II battle of Sutjeska, when he reported to the military commanding staff that even though they lost two-thirds of the fighters, they can count on them as being in full force.[10] He died after the war in a gun fight against the Chetniks as an officer of OZNA (Security Agency of communist Yugoslavia).

His brother Petar Bošković (1931–2011) was a Yugoslav and Serbian diplomat. He was an ambassador of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to the Republic of Cyprus.[11] In 1999, he was a witness at the trial of Jasenovac camp commander Dinko Šakić, who was then sentenced to 20 years in prison.[12] Their sister Velika was a fighter in the Yugoslav Partisans movement engaged with the Fourth proletarian Montenegrin task force brigade.[13]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Narodni heroji Jugoslavije 1982, p. 51.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Dan I 2020.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 "Bošković Iva Milo". znaci.org/.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Dan II 2020.
  5. 1 2 Politika 14.6.2019.
  6. ↑ "Споменици културе у Србији". spomenicikulture.mi.sanu.ac.rs.
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Dr Milo Boskovic 2019.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Narodni heroji Jugoslavije 1982, p. 52.
  9. 1 2 Dan III 2020.
  10. ↑ Vladimir Dedijer (1953). Prilozi za biografiju Josipa Broza Tita, tom 2, Beograd, Kultura, page 345
  11. ↑ Odlazak Petra Boškovića, Pobjeda, 16. 1.2011
  12. ↑ Slobodna Dalmacija, October 5, 1995
  13. ↑ Janković, Blažo (1975). Četvrta proleterska crnogorska brigada. Beograd: Vojnoizdavački zavod, page 19

Literature

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