Battle of Lumë
| Battle of Lumë | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of First Balkan War | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
| Albanian volunteers | Kingdom of Serbia | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| Božidar Janković | ||||||
| Units involved | |||||||
| Third Army of Serbia | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
|
3,000 - 4,000 from Luma 600 from lower Dibra Unknown number from Gjakova highland[1] 2 cannons[2] |
Elsie: 20,000 [3] Albanian sources: 21,800[2] 32 cannons[2] 70-200 irregulars | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 109 (Albanian claim) |
Inconclusive: 198 (Serbian claim) several hundreds (Kosta Novaković) 1,200 (Albanian claim) | ||||||
The Battle of Lumë, also referred by the Albanians as the Uprising of Lumë (Kryengritja e Lumës), was a series of clashes between the Albanian locals of the region of Lumë in Ottoman Albania against the invading Serbian army in 1912 during the First Balkan War period. The Serbians sought access to the Adriatic Sea but against predictions were defeated by the Albanian forces. As a result, Serbia's advancement to the west was delayed, which contributed to the safety of the independence of Albania on November 28, 1912.
Beginning
During the second half of October 1912, the Serbian army continued to occupy numerous Albanian regions. Several battalions of the Third Army, somehow exhausted from the battles in the internal part of Kosovo.,[4] entered Luma. The Albanians organized numerous local assemblies as instructed by the "Shpëtimi" (Salvation) Committee, which held a meeting in Skopje on 14 October 1912. A decision to confront the advancement of the Serbian army was made. In the first week of November, after the Third Army captured Kosovo and the region of Dukagjin, it aimed to conquest northern and middle Albania in order to reach the shores of the Adriatic Sea. Since the 5th of November 1912, the Serbian General Božidar Janković entered Prizren with the regiments "Šumadija 1" for the operations to the Adriatic. To realize this plan the Serbian army had created two separate units, which were named "Units of the coast" and the departments of these units were selected from the divisions "Šumadija" and "Drina" which were deployed in Prizren and Gjakova. Several paramilitary unites preceded the expedition entering Luma first, with their number going from 70 to 200, according to Jaša Tomić's book Rat u Albaniji pod Skadrom (War in Albania and around Shkodra) of 1913. The size of the Serbian force is object of contradictions. The number 16,000 is mostly folkloric, and serves mostly for supporting the other folkloric number of 12,000 casualties. 16,000 coincides to two groupings formed with "Šumadija 1" and "Drina" units, which hurried to reach the Adriatic from the right side of the White Drin. These fractions were engaged only partially in the combat, and missed the 15-17 and 18 November clashes of the second phase of the battle (13–18 November). During this phase, the number of Serbian soldiers and officers goes up to 4,200, according to Serbian military reports, with around 3,000 Albanians on the other side. The third phase (18 November - 6 December) saw the involvement of whatever remained from "Šumadija 1" division, around 14,000, support by artillery personnel of 3,600. Including the second phase battalions which were severely damaged, the total number of the Serbian force to 21,800, excluding the paramilitary units.[2] Elsie rounds the number to 20,000.[3]
To avoid any risks to the units of the coast in the Drin Valley in Luma, the Serbian army invaded the Luma region and the provinces of Has, Vërrin, Opoja-Gora in order to disarm the Albanians and struck down any resistance ruthlessly. Faced with the invading Serb army, thousands of Albanian fighters from Luma, Has, Vërrin, and Opojan Gora, including Albanians from Kosovo, began fighting the Serb army. In this case the highlands of Paštrik (where the provinces of Has and the Gjakova highlands lay) with the Sar Mountains (Gjalicë, Pikllimes, Koretnik) became natural fortresses of war for the Albanians. Given the geo-strategic position, Albanian troops were deployed fronting the Highland of Gjakova, Has, Qafe Zhur, Sharr, and Opoja. The organization of the Albanian resistance were led by Ramadan Zaskoci, Ramadan Cejku, Isjan Lika, Islam Spahija, Hoxha Mehmedi, Osman Lita, Cen Daci, Bajram Gjani, Dervish Bajraktari, Muhtar Nika, Necip Bilali, Sylë Elezi, Ahmet Qehaja, and few others.[1]
Events
Given the geostrategic position, the Albanian troops were deployed fronting: Gjakova highland (Qafë Morinë - Qafë Prush) - Has (Planejë - Gorozhup) - Qafë Zhur - Vërri (Billushë - Jeshkovë - Lybeqevë - Lez) - Sharr (Gur i Zi) - Opojë (Llapushnik gorge). The organization of the Albanian resistance was done by Ramadan Zaskoci, Ramadan Çejku, Qazim Lika, Islam Sali Spahija, Hodja Mehmed, Osman Lita, Cen Daci, Bajram Things, Dervish Nezir Bajraktari, Muhtar Nika, Nexhip Aga Bilali, Sylë Elezi, Ahmet Ilaz Qehaja, Jemin Gjana, Elez Isufi, Cuf Xhelili, and Xheferr Doda from Debar, Bajram Curri from Gjakova highland, Sali Bajraktari from Has, Sheh Hasan Prizreni, Jahja Sait Sahiti from Kuki of Opoja, Kapllan Opoja, Nail Hyseni, Dani Rapça, Esat Berisha, Abdul Osmani, Arif Krusa etc. To prevent the Serbian troops from crossing on the other side of White Drin, the Albanians organized an ambush in the villages of Shalqin, Domaj, and Gjinaj. The Luma forces numbered circa 4,000 people, while the ones from Dibra around 600.[1]
The first battle along the border of Luma continued into Morinë. The Serbian army fought for 2–3 days and suffered heavy losses with many dead and wounded. After the loss, the Serbian army took 37 ethnic Albanian civilians as hostage and took them to Prizren, threatening people not to support the uprising. They were reorganized with new units and launched towards Luma again. Albanian forces, now facing detachments of the Šumadija division, fought sporadically along the banks of the White Drin river and the slopes of Koretnik and Gjallicë. They hit the Serbian units with constant strikes and many other Albanian fighters from Morinë and Përbreg joined in. Tactical withdrawal of Albanian guerrillas and their positioning gave results. The plan to withdraw was due to the large amount of Serbian soldiers but also due to the artillery and heavy weapons. While pursuing, the Serbian forces were subsequently trapped. The division of Šumadija suffered heavy losses and were forced to leave.
The Albanian council of war was centered in Tabe (Qafë Kolesjan), securing backlines through the Përbreg - Gjegjën - Bardhoc - Morinë - Vërmicë - Shkozë - Dobrusht - Zhur. On the morning of November 15, 1912, the war council gave the order to attack the Serbian units from several directions. Thanks to the configurations of the mountainous terrain and bad weather with rain and thunder, the Luma Albanians managed, although badly equipped, to launch an major attack on the Serbian forces on the hills of Kolesjan, causing them severe losses. Due to the strong resistance, the Serbian forces withdrew from Kolesjan and Gabrica and positioned themselves on the southern shores of Shejesë and the eastern shores of the Black Drin. The Council of War, after a realignment of Albanian forces in the field, on November 16, ordered the Albanian forces to continue their offensive towards the Serbian positions and clashes took place, mainly on the left side of Shejesë. The Serbian army was caught in panic, and while shooting in all directions, started fleeing where many were shot and killed and others drowned in the river. To the advantage of the situation created, the Albanian forces moved from Kolosh to Zbor and Nangë and set up three groups in order to pursuit. The Albanians had considerably less casualties, including one of the leaders, Ibrahim Zeqiri, bayraktar of Radomirë.
The Serbians were trapped in panic and left the battlefield, leaving many killed or drowned in the rivers Drin and Shejesë. To take advantage of the situation created, the war council already moved to the area of Zbor-Nangë, and there set a two-direction offensive (consisting of 3 groups) to further pursuit. To prevent new enforcement of Serbian forces coming from Prizren to Lumë, heavy fighting took place in the region of Vërrin, Dobrushë, Qafë Zhur, Billushë, Lez and Lezkovac. Serbian units tried to break the front line of Vërrin in order to attack the Albanians from behind but they did not succeed. Serbian side had many casualties. The Albanian war council had a meeting led by Ramadan Zaskoci on 15 November. In November of 17, 1912, the council ordered a further offensive forces against the Serbs in all front. The highlanders of Lumë continued to fight the Serbian units as they tried and failed to regroup in the hill of Galipë and Zbor. The Serbian army was devastated after losing hundreds of soldiers and many abandoned the battlefield.
Ultimate fighting took place on the banks of the White Drin and Black Drin. Several Serbian detachments who escaped annihilation in the region of Bicaj towards the Tower of Luma, managed to flee to the opposite shore of the Luma river, down the valley. Serbian sources say that "the whole day of 17 November 1912, heavy fighting took place between Serbs and Albanians with attacks coming from all sides, especially from the left side of the Luma river. Many Serb soldiers drowned in the river fleeing. The strongest Albanian force was on the right brink of the White Drin river."
Result
The Luma Albanians captured the Tower of Luma with bloody fighting, which marked the victory in this battle. Albanian forces on the evening of the day of 17 November, after reaching the position in the line, attacked the convoy with carriages of the Serbian forces attempting to withdraw in the direction of Prizren. During these fights, the Serbians lost many soldiers and much materials in the line of war. The fighting in the mountains was described in the memoirs of Kosta Novaković, a Serbian soldier who participated in the fighting.
He wrote:
"I will not mention the first task of our department of Luma - the disarmament of Luma - which we did not succeed with and for this we chose to return to our commanders. We paid with our lives for this fight and we lost many soldiers, much ammunition, food and shelter. After the horrible fighting in Luma, after 4 nights without sleep, after walking in water up to my waist, we finally were supported with another battalion, and then we immediately began fleeing, exhausted, to the region of Zhur, 8 km away from Prizren."
The success achieved in these days of fighting highlighted the skills of the Albanian guerrillas, who were victorious although inferior in forces and armament.[1]
Casualties
Calculation of the number of casualties is difficult since the very primary sources were contradictory. Serbian military reports talk about "several hundreds", same number as what Kosta Novaković gives. The Serbian historians later placed the number to 198, and 31 wounded. The narrative stories of the Luma highlanders place the number as far as 16,000 or even up to 18,000, much more than the 12,000 which mostly circulates, also placed in the Albania memorial dedicated to the battle. Albanian scholar Shefqet Hoxha calls these numbers simply folkloric.
An Ottoman telegram sent from Ohrid to Elbasan, dated 20 November 1912, reported 3 officers and an "uncountable" number of soldiers, with around 1,000 riffles captured by the Albanians. Another telegram, dating 2 December, sent from Aqif Pasha Elbasani to Ahmet bey Zogolli, mentions that the Serbians lost 6 battalions. The British consulate in Skopje reported by late February 1913 that they had lost 8 battalions. Sali Onuzi places the number around 2,000 based on second phase (13–18 November) reports from the Ottomans of over 1,000. This without including any possible losses from the paramilitary units which were proportionally less.[2] Albanians recorded 109 casualties on their side.
Afterwards
General Janković ordered the annihilation of the Luma tribe where the Serbian army massacred an entire population of men, women and children and burned 27 villages in the region.[5] Following the Serbian offensives of 1912-1913, Luma was the area that experienced one of the most appalling atrocities committed against the Albanians. Luma tribe was practically decimated and went near to ceasing existence.[3] Women and children were tied to bundles of hay and set on fire before the eyes of their husbands and fathers. The women were then barbarously cut to pieces and the children bayoneted.[5] Leon Trotsky collected reports during the period and he added in his report: "It is all so inconceivable, and yet it is true!" 400 men from Luma who gave themselves up voluntarily were taken to Prizren and executed day after day in groups of forty to sixty.[6][7] In connection with the news report that 300 unarmed Albanians of the Luma tribe were executed in Prizren without trial. Regular Serbian troops committed the massacres but there was no doubt whatsoever that even the heinous massacres committed by irregulars were carried out with the tacit approval and in full compliance with the will of the Serbian authorities. At the beginning of the war the Serbian officials that "we are going to wipe out the Albanians." Despite European protests, this systematic policy of extermination continued unhindered.[8][9][10]
Importance
The Battle of Luma ended on the morning of November 18, 1912, with Albanian forces prevailing against the third Serbian army. The battle of Luma, together with other events as the battle of Bitola, and the Ottoman resistance in key city of Shkodër in the north-west and Yannina in the south gained historical significance because they secured the holding of the National Assembly in Vlora, on the 28 of November, 1912 which led to the proclamation of independence of Albania from the Ottoman Empire. Specifically the battle of Luma secured the central Albania Adriatic cost, permitting Ismail Qemali and other Albanian representative to disembark in Durres, since Vlore was threatened by the Greek forces, who had already landed in Himara.[11]
See also
Sources
- 1 2 3 4 Daci, Fatos (2013-09-24), Lufta 9 vjeçare e Dibrës më 1912-1921, si u organizua kryengritja e përgjithshme, masakrat, gjenocidi serb dhe shpërngulja masive [The 9-year war of Dibra in 1912-1921, how the general uprising was organized, massacres, genocide from the Serbians, and massive displacement] (in Albanian), Sot News
- 1 2 3 4 5 Sali Onuzi, Mundja e Serbeve ne Lume 1912 [The loss of the Serbs in Lume 1912] (in Albanian), Kosovari Media
- 1 2 3 Robert Elsie (30 May 2015). "10. The Tribes of the Upper Drin Basin". The Tribes of Albania: History, Society and Culture. I.B.Tauris. p. 283. ISBN 978-1-78453-401-1.
- ↑ Shaban Braha (1981). Idriz Seferi në Lëvizjet Kombëtare Shqiptare. Shtëpia Botuese "8 Nëntori". p. 130.
Forcat sërbe ishin të rraskapitura gjatë përleshjeve në thellësitë e vilajetit të Kosovës dhe tani, në skajet më të largëta të Kosovës...
- 1 2 Archbishop Lazër Mjeda (1913-01-24), Robert Elsie, ed., Report on the Serb Invasion of Kosova and Macedonia, Texts and Documents of Albanian History, Vienna
- ↑ Report of the International Commission to Inquire into the Causes and Conduct of the Balkan War (1914)
- ↑ Levene, Mark (2013). Devastation: Volume I: The European Rimlands 1912-1938. Oxford University Press. pp. 106-108. "It is in this context that the very high level of Serb atrocity visited on Albanians in 1912—13 should be examined and understood. While other belligerents also mercilessly attacked Albanians—some two hundred villages, for instance, in the south were burnt down by the Greek army —the Serbs. perfectly aware that the Shqiptar too large, entrenched, and also, critically, martial a population to simply shift, resorted instead to a different method to resolve at least some of the problem: they killed. One acute observer—operating under his given name of Lev Bronstein—when filing a report for the Ukrainian paper Kievskaya Mysl noted that the Serbs, in order ‘to correct data in the ethnographical statistics not quite favourable to them, are engaged quite simply in the systematic extermination of the Muslim population’. Trotsky firmly ruled out of court the Serb official version, which proposed that atrocities had been isolated and, where they had occurred, were the work nor of regular units but overzealous Chetniks, or just plain criminals. Mainstream commentators—in addition, that is, to Tucović, and including Brailsford, Durham, and the Austrian social democrat Leo Freundlich—came to similar conclusions; Freundlich’s evidence being compiled in a 1913 collection suitably entitled Albaniens Golgotha. The evidence, indeed, was all too abundant. There were major military massacres of Albanian men throughout Kosovo: at Gjilan, Gjakova, Ferizaj in the Peć region, and, above all, in the major centres of Prizren and Prishtina, bringing total deaths in the region to around 25,000 by early 1913. But this was not the peak of Serb anti-Albanian violence. That did not come until late September 1913, that is, more than a month after the Treaty of Bucharest had brought official hostilities between the former League members to an ostensible end. Its immediate cause was an Albanian revolt against Serbian control in the Luma district, down to and including the town of Dibra, Luma, as we have already noted, was identified in the Belgrade world view with historic treachery, as an area that had repudiated its intrinsic Serbianness and instead ‘gone Albanian’. But combined with this—not unlike famous Armenian thorns in the side of Ottomania such as the Sassun region. or that of the so-called Armenian Montenegro, Zeitun—Luma was known as a particularly, indeed famously, independently minded component of the Malësi the highland zone of the central Balkans. It was from Luma that serious Albanian resistance against CUP tax impositions had kicked off in 1910, causing, in turn, sufficient concern in Belgrade for it to authorize Serb çetes in the area to support the CUP’s quelling of the insurrection. If Luma, in an existential sense, spelt danger to the Serbs’ colonial project in Macedonia in 1913, its immediate threat was also a matter of its geographical location. At the end of the two wars, Albania as an entity despite massive depredations from its League neighbours, had managed to defend its neutrality and—albeit largely thanks to Austrian backing—had survived on the international map. In national terms, however, large chunks of the Albanian people were now stranded on the wrong side of the border, in Macedonia and Kosovo, which were primarily under Serbian rule. Luma happened to be keenly poised in this new reality, nor only because it was literally beyond the black Drin, Albania’s eastern fluvial frontier, but because it also was at the furthest western edge of territories which had been claimed by the Bulgarians. When Serbian units entered in force into Luma, in mid-September 1913, terrorizing the population, killing local tribal chieftains, removing the highlanders’ cattle, and setting fire to villages, something more than simply the usual opportunity to pillage. loot, and rape may have been behind their orders. Here was occasion to stamp Serbian control on the district and to make it utterly clear to its population, Albanian and Bulgarian alike, that dissent, foreign intrigues, and opposition of any sort were not going to be tolerated and would be met, henceforth, with an iron fist. Whatever the intent the operation badly misfired, a general grass-roots insurrection ensuing. What then followed, though localized, closely follows the pattern of the genocidal, imperial small wars of fin-de-siècle Africa and elsewhere. Violent uprising was met by the full force of the Serbian army, with scorched earth, systematic butchery, and outrages which extended beyond adult men to women, children, and the old. The massacres included barricading communities in their homes or mosques and setting fire to or shelling them. As one Serbian soldier reported in a letter to a friend, reprinted in the socialist paper Radnitchke Novine: Luma no longer exists. There is nothing but corpses, dust and ashes. There are villages of 100, 150, 200 houses, where there is no longer a single man, literally not one. We collect them in bodies of forty to fifty, and then we pierce them with bayonets to the last man. Pillage is going on everywhere. Radnitchke Novine’s report concluded by noting that this was not the worst the soldier had seen but the rest of his account was too horrible to publish. Information on these events, beyond such reports, is sketchy. We have no obvious figures for how many people were killed in the insurrection—though we do know that some 25,000 Albanians fled western Macedonia and Kosovo in its wake. Too out of the way, or insufficiently significant in itself, to be remembered, except as part of the broader swathe of atrocity of the Balkan Wars, this event—a localized genocide within a much larger, extraordinarily brutalized landscape—has been largely lost to history’s gaze. Yet Luma was not alone."
- ↑ Leo Freundlich (1913), Robert Elsie, ed., Albania's Golgotha: Indictment of the Exterminators of the Albanian People, Texts and Documents of Albanian History
- ↑ Elsie, Robert (2015). The Tribes of Albania: History, Society and Culture. IB Tauris. pp. 282-283. "During the First Balkan War beginning in October 1912, Serbia took advantage of the power vacuum left by the crumbling Ottoman Empire to invade and conquer Kosovo and the Luma and Dibra regions in late October and early November of that year. While the Great Powers recognised Albania as a sovereign state on 29 July 1913, Kosovo, Luma, Dibra, Ohrid and Monastir remained under Serbian military rule and, on 7 September 1913, King Peter I of Serbia proclaimed the annexation of the conquered territories. A large uprising against Serbian rule took place in the Luma region and in the mountains vest of Gjakova, which was suppressed by a force of over 20,000 Serbian troops who advanced into Albania, almost reaching Elbasan. An amnesty was declared by the government in Belgrade in October 1913, yet the pogroms against the Albanian population continued. During this uprising and later during World War I, the Luma tribe was decimated by Serbian forces."
- ↑ Banac, Ivo (1988). The national question in Yugoslavia: origins, history, politics. Cornell University Press. pp. 295-296. "The logic of this sort of chauvinistic harangue became evident in the Balkan wars. Serbian and Montenegrin units committed many massacres of Albanians in the course of hostilities. The indiscriminate slaughter in the Lume tribal area of northeastern Albania was reported in the Serbian socialist press and was later retold in the report of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which summed up the rationale of Albanian horrors: ‘Houses and whole villages reduced to ashes, unarmed and innocent populations massacred en masse, incredible acts of violence, pillage and brutality of every kind—such were the means which were employed and are still being employed by the Serbo-Montenegrin soldiery, with a view to the entire transformation of the ethnic character of regions inhabited exclusively by Albanians.” Villagers, alerted to the intentions of invading armies “by tradition, instinct and experience,” fled before the invaders, who set the abandoned cottages to flame (p. 151)."
- ↑ Skendi, Stavro (2015). The Albanian National Awakening. Princetown University Press. p. 461. ISBN 9781400847761.
But Vlorë was threatened by the Greeks, who had landed in Himaré, and there was fear that their armies might increase as the fight between them and the Albanians of the surrounding regions had begun. In order to protect the town, Albanians of the surrounding regions had begun
External links
- http://radiokosovaelire.com/?nav=70,2&id=6359 "the Uprising of the Albanians in Kosovo against the Ottoman Empire and Serbia"
- http://www.pashtriku.org/?kat=60&shkrimi=2050 "Red Luma: A Martyr"