Živojin Mišić

Živojin Mišić

Živojin Mišić (* July 7 ^{. Jul} / July 19, 1855 ^greg. In Struganik , Principality of Serbia ; † 20 January 1921 in Belgrade ) was a Serbian Field Marshal ( Voivod ) and one of the most important Serbian military leader of the early 20th century.

Life

Mišić was born as the youngest of 13 children to a wealthy Serbian farming family. He attended high schools in Kragujevac and Belgrade and in 1874 was accepted into the 11th grade of the Old Artillery School in Belgrade. In 1876 he interrupted his training to take part in the Serbian-Ottoman War . In December 1876 he was promoted to lieutenant and company commander. He also served in the Second Serbian-Ottoman War (part of the Russo-Ottoman War of 1877/78) and in the short Serbian-Bulgarian War of 1885. As a newly promoted captain , he then devoted himself to perfecting his training, including in Bruck, Austria the Leitha . From 1888 he completed a general staff course in which Radomir Putnik was one of his teachers, and in 1893 he was promoted to major in the general staff. As a lieutenant colonel , he taught at the military academy from 1898 to 1902 in addition to his other duties. In 1901 he received command of the Belgrade 9th Infantry Brigade and was promoted to colonel . In the following year he took over command of the Drina Infantry Division.

After the murder of King Aleksandar Obrenović in 1903, Mišić became Putnik's assistant after he had been appointed Chief of the General Staff, and after Putnik's appointment as Minister of War, he temporarily held this post himself. In the spring of 1904, however, at the instigation of the putschists, he was expelled from the army without a pension. In the following time he tried to keep himself financially afloat by publishing his earlier lectures at the military academy, but got into ever greater debts.

In the time of the Bosnian annexation crisis in 1908/09 he was reactivated and returned to his old post as Putnik's assistant. As such, he was involved in the preparation of the First Balkan War . After the Serbian victory in the Battle of Kumanovo , he was appointed general. In the Second Balkan War , the victory over Bulgaria on the Bregalnica was largely due to his perseverance. After the end of the war, Mišić retired for the second time.

With the outbreak of the First World War , Mišić was again the "right hand man" of Putnik, who had taken over the supreme command of the Serbian armed forces. During the Battle of the Kolubara in late 1914, after Petar Bojović was wounded, he was given command of the 1st Army, with which he made a decisive contribution to the victory over the Austro-Hungarian invasion troops. For his services, he was then named Vojvoda. During the withdrawal of the Serbian army after the Central Powers' Serbian campaign in 1915, Mišić spoke out in favor of continuing the fight, but was overruled by his colleagues and King Peter I at a meeting in Peć . The Serbian army was first evacuated to Corfu in order to be used again later on the Salonika Front. After a long period of rest in Western Europe, Mišić took command of the 1st Army again and fought back the Bulgarians in Macedonia. Towards the end of the war he was appointed commander-in-chief of the Serbian army and as such took part in the successful final offensive that led to Bulgaria's withdrawal from the war.

Mišić died in Belgrade in 1921 and was buried in the New Cemetery there. His memoir was published in 1969.

Web links

Commons : Živojin Mišić  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Short biography on firstworldwar.com