Written by Hasan and Lajde Blakaj. Translated by Petrit Latifi.
These true accounts were written by Shaban Rrustem Dreshaj, a living witness to the events, now deceased. A very beloved man and patriot of Vrellë. The notes were taken from Shaban’s notebook by his son Smajli and then sent to Bacë Halit Elshani who asked me to edit and publish them since he was ill and could not publish them due to health reasons. I am publishing the writing out of respect for the family of the massacred Dreshaj and in memory of Bacë Halit Elshani as a sign of gratitude and respect for him without any single change, exactly as the email was sent to me. The rest of the part about the surname Nreshaj for the Kaçaks and Qetas are completed as a supplementary appendix by me.
I’m starting with the biography of Uncle Shaban because I am the great-grandson of the Nreshajs. The Nreshajs are from the Kastrat tribe, whose surname came from Nreu, sometimes written Ndreu, meaning their first. The surname Nreshaj was formed from Nreu, and over time, with the development of our language, it has become the surname Dreshaj, which is still used today. Even today, you can find old people pronouncing the surname as Nreshaj, the old surname. So from this great and honorable Kastrati tribe, Shaban Dreshaj is also from.hb
Shaban Rrustem Dreshaj was born in 1914, in the village of Vrellë, in Istog, in a poor family. His father’s name was Rrustem Ukë Dreshaj, and his mother’s name was Dykë (Kajtazaj) Dreshaj. Even though he was young, Uncle Shaban kept his family in mind as a large family community. The family was divided into two families, one that lived in Vrellë and the other in another village in Prigoda, although they were not yet separated from Mahmut Dema Dreshaj.
Mahmut Dema had two sons, Rama and Shabani, and he also had two daughters, Zoja and Ziza. In 1918-1919, Uncle Shabani (I) continues, together with my mother Dyka, we were in Prigoda. That same year, while we were sleeping at night, the Serbs of Llukavc i Begu, led by Gal Terziq and Bllagoj Popi, surrounded us with many of their friends. They surrounded our house in Prigoda, and at the door they called uncle Mahmut Dema to come out.
My mother said to him: Uncle Mahmut, come out, what are you doing, they can break into our house. Mahmut did not come out and they forced their way into the house. First, they grabbed my mother Dyka’s hood and took it, because at that time, village women wore hoods with iron fronts. Then, they opened the chest where she had her chejzi (clothes) and looted everything that was cloth, the other shirts.
I was lying in bed because my right leg was broken in the shin. The Serbs were running around, shooting the muzzles of their rifles at our heads, scattering and making a mess of the whole house. As soon as they came outside, after looting what we had of clothes and food, they loaded all the belongings into carts and took them with them.
The family, being poor, was engaged in agriculture and livestock. At that time, we had 18 cows. We let them out to graze early in the morning in the meadow of Lornica. Immediately the Serbs (Shkijë) came and looted everything. So we were left with only a six-month-old calf at home. Then we were forced to leave Prigoda and put it in Vrelle, a little safer. In Vrelle, along with Mahmut, his two sons and two daughters also came.
Gunshots in Prigoda
When in 1920 Mahmut had decided to separate from my father and go to Prigoda alone with the sons to live. I remember when my father Rrustemi told him not to go to Prigoda because the Serbs (raja) were still on the move. He insistently loaded the clothes into the cart and set off to go to Prigoda. Not even a month had passed, but in 1920 in the winter, we were in Vrelle, at night we heard the gunshots in Prigoda from there, the battery continued to tell with tears in his eyes, uncle Shabani.
Serbian criminals Gale Terziq and Bllagoj Pop
The same Serbs, led by Gale Terziq and Bllagoj Pop, had attacked the villager Mahmut with the intention of kidnapping his daughter Zoja, who was to get married in the spring. She was engaged to Hajdar Avdyl Gashi in Prigoda. As soon as Zoja told the Serbs who wanted to enter, she turned her back to the door, where the Serbs could not break the door to enter, they shot a rifle at her and there in the middle of the house they left Zoja dead, who was heroically killed just to avoid falling into the hands of the Serbs and becoming their captive.
Then they went inside and killed the old bearded Mahmut and his 22-year-old son Shaban. That night, neither Mahmut’s son Rama nor the other daughter Ziza, who were in Vrellë, were shot in the house, as luck would have it. The next day, news reached us in Vrelle about their massacre. The friends from Vrelle went to Prigoda and brought the three bodies to Vrelle, which they buried in the Vrelle cemetery at the mosque.
They committed these murders because they could no longer achieve their goal of abducting Zoja and taking her as the wife of the Serbs. Before committing the massacre in this family a few days earlier Bllagoj Popi had also robbed Haxhi Gërgur’s daughter in Llukavc te Begu, whom he had married to Bllagoje Popi’s brother, Llukavc te Begu. Not only was she so beautiful, but she was Albanian, and she lived until recently, they baptized her with the name Rada.
A month after they had shot Mahmut Deme with his son Shaban and his daughter Zoja, they also killed his second son Rama, who was on his way from Vrelle to Prigoda, in front of his house. Rama was confronted by Bllagoj Popi’s son with a rifle in his hand and killed him on the road between Vrelle and Prigoda. Thus, from this house, within a month, (4) four members of Mahmut Deme were massacred.
Due to the fear that my late mother Dyka had, she became seriously ill and never recovered, but died within six months. I (Shaban Rrustemi) was left an orphan where my late grandmother Sofia raised me, even though we didn’t have any cows in our house because as I said, they had robbed us of all 18 cows, even with money. I remember that until the cow that was left in our house gave birth, the family of friends Smajl Ibrajt and Cen Ali’s house kept us fed on yogurt and lard.
The Serbs were not satisfied with this family massacre but continued with other macabre murders. They killed the family of Mahmut Demë Dreshaj, Zoja Mahmut Dreshaj, Shaban Mahmut Dreshaj, Ramë Mahmut Dreshaj, This entire family was wiped out, leaving no descendants after the daughter Ziza also died later.
Ukë Dema also had three brothers, 2. Mahmut Dema, 3. Maksut Dema, 4. Daut Dema. Uka left behind 2 sons: Rrustemi and Brahim, and 4 daughters, Ukë Dema, was in the Prizren prison during the Austrian era, being transported to the Skopje prison. He died suddenly in the village of Suhareka, where we do not even know his grave. Neither did his brother Maksut have any descendants because his two sons, Adem and Ahmeti, had died.
Daut Dema left behind a son, Zeqiri, who had three sons: Sejdiu, Miftari and Male, who, due to the oppression of the Serbs, sold their land in Prigoda and went to Turkey. Then Mala was separated from her brothers Sejdiu and Miftari, left Turkey for Albania, then returned to Kosovo, Prigoda, to her home where she also died there. Mala left behind two sons, Muharrem and Zeqiri, who now live in Peja and have families, while Sejdija and Miftari both died in Turkey and left no one behind from their family.
As for Ukë Dema’s share, he left behind two sons: Rrustemi and Brahim, both of these brothers had a son each, Rame and Shaban got married and their number increased greatly. Thus, Uncle Shaban continues his story about the tragedy of his family massacred by the Serbs, and the suffering of the Albanians did not stop.
Crimes by Milovan Malisha and Gal Terziqi in 1919
The Serbs never stop killing when they had the opportunity to kill with impunity. They continued with other murders, such as Niman Sadiku Kajtazaj and his son Shaban. They were mowing their own meadow in Lubovë. These two were killed in 1919 in Lubovë, the murder was committed by Gal Terziqi from Llukavci and Milovan Malisha from Carralluka, this Kajtazaj family buried the murdered in the village of Vrella after they did not dare to bury them in Lubovë.
Then their family Sali Haxhijaj as the head of the family was forced out of fear (fear) by the local Serbs to move for 4-5 years to Peja and sometime after the situation calmed down a bit they returned back to Lubovë where he still lives today.
The murders of the villagers of Vrella I remember these: Mete Rrustem Vuthaj who was killed on the Bollopoja mountain while coming from Uçe to Vrella, his own home.
The murder of Hasan Uka Blakaj, they killed him on his way from Istog to Vrella, he was killed as soon as he left Istog, near the houses of Llullak, just as he was leaving the house of Milić Kersta with his murder plan. Hasan’s horse arrived in Vrella without anyone on it, with a gunshot wound to the leg, then they went from Vrella with an ox cart and found him dead on the road where I mentioned the place earlier.
Milic Krstic (Milić Kerstić)and his crimes
Voivode Milić Kerstić committed great massacres in the municipality of Istog and its surroundings by himself and his loyal followers, who are called “petica”. Coming from the mountains, Milić Kersta shot Selman Tahiri (Keqi) Blakaj, my father’s uncle, to death, I found him lying down and shot him (invisible) at a rabbit, luckily he escaped with that wound, keeping the bullet in his body for the rest of his life until he died. (Author’s note)
The Serbs of Lubozhda kill Xhemajl Selimi Dreshaj who had gone to cut wood in his forest called Bregu, near the village of Lubozhda, and his house with his brother was empty. They went out to the neighborhood and begged for two days. They barely found him dead in the forest, says Uncle Shabani
Killings of 1924 by Serbs of Istog
In 1924, the Serbs from Istog came to Vrellë and took these people by force: Rrustem Tahirin Blakaj, Ahmet Delin Blakaj, Shaban Rrustemi Vuthaj and Isuf Bajrin Rug. All of them from Vrella started for Istog, when they went near the village of Lubozhda to the place called the meadows of Lubozhda, traveling on foot, those who took these four from Vrella had left some other Serbs on top of a cliff that is very close to the meadows of Pollaqer with the slogan that they would shoot at them with guns!
They told these tied up people to look where the Albanian Kachaks are and they are shooting at us with guns. They immediately shot them on the spot, only Rrustem Tahiri, the brother of Musa Tahiri Kachak, they left him wounded on the spot as if he were about to die, not knowing that he was not dead, and they went to Istog. Rrustem, wounded like that, after a while, went to Zhagas until he crossed the road and entered the fields on the way and thus barely escaped. Later he came home, was treated and lived for quite a few years.
The Serbs then went to the mountains that same summer and killed these people: Istref Selimi with his son Sylën Maraj from Vrella after them, and on the same day they also shot Halil Osman Bicaj at the end of Lugut i đeđe and today that place is called where Hali Osmani was killed.
In the same year, they also killed my great-grandfather Beqir Musë Januzaj in the mountains of the Januzajs in Qarrishta where he is still buried today. Later, they killed Latif Zeqir Demaj near his camp where his grave is still today behind the sheepfolds on the hill of Dynë. (Author’s note)
In the same summer, when they killed (shot) these people in the mountains, they forced everyone they had in the mountains with their livestock to be driven out of the mountains in the summer. I remember when the gendarmerie of the former Yugoslavia came one year and dispersed the people of Vrella, the thing about weapons was that there were cases when they themselves would put the rifle’s bolt in the chest as a pretext to arrest him.
Idriz Selman Maraj, they tied him to a tree with rope and beat him until he was unconscious to tell them where he had hidden the weapon, then they released him with many friends from the village of Vrella. I also remember when they took the first soldiers from Vrella, who had fled from their homes and gone to the mountains, but after they were surrounded, the Vrella forced them to surrender so that the village would not be burned, and so they took the first soldiers with the then gendarmerie without saying goodbye to their families.
The first soldiers to go were: 1. Shaqir Feka Bicaj, 2. Hasan Sefa Blakaj, 3. Halil Imeri Blakaj, 4. Brahim Uka Dreshaj, 5. Halit Rrustemi Vuthaj, 6. Ramë Sejdija Blakaj. All of them were called to serve in Veliki Beqkarek, which is now called Zrenjanin (in Vojvodina).
The murder of Albanians by the infamous OZNA
During the time of the infamous OZNA, people were taken at night, all unprotected civilians were sent to the OZNA, where they were then shot without any reason but only because they were Albanians. The best Albanians were chosen to be shot in the swamp of Istog, which was then on the banks of the Istog River, opposite the now-built hotel called “Trofta, then called Ribnjak”. All tied up with barbed wire, they threw them into the swamp, one on top of the other, like pumpkins.
Serbian war criminals Dushan Popovic, Radoje Milosevic and Ruza Raiqevic
The commander of Ozna was Dushan Popovic, who came to Istog from Montenegro – Ivan Grad, like a ghost. All the murders were carried out as if on the orders of Radoje Milosevic and Ruza Raiqevic, who at that time had the Istog district in their hands. Immediately at the beginning of May-December 1944, they began the massacre operation on Albanian people who were known as men known before.
I am mentioning some names as best I can remember: Rrustem and Uke Rugova, the father and brother of Ibrahim Rugova from Cerca, Col Bajraktar from Uça, Bajram Rama, Suhogerllë, Rexhep Haliti with his family from Muzhevina, Idriz Selman Lipaj from Studenica, Halil Mehmet Maraj from Vrella, Adem Uka Hajdaj with his brother Shaban from Lubova. Shabani, that night they shot me from the Pop tower, attacked the guard, broke the lamp that lit the building, jumped from the second floor and fled to Albania.
Then they shot Bek Halil Bicaj from Vrella, Llesh Xhoni from Zllakuqan. All these people who were shot in the ditch called the mosque ditch were killed in the middle of the night so that the population would not hear either the footsteps or the sound of the scuffles. They played the accordion behind them, where Sadri Gabeli from Istog played the accordion.
At the beginning of 1945, there was a snowstorm when in the evening all the Chetniks of Istog came from Kolasin, headed by Ral Vuliq, also from Istog. I saw with my own eyes all of them armed with three rounds of ammunition and one through and two rounds of rifles, revolvers and bombs that were hanging from their necks. All these Chetniks were divided into places where the partisans were both in Istog and in the field.
While Ral Vuliq was sent to Peja to the Peja Ozna, whom the chief of the Peja Ozna liquidated that night. And in the morning the leaders of Istog asked him to return Rade to Istog so that they could shoot him in court, but the chief of Ozna in Peja had been an activist and was liquidated the same night.
Thus, the leadership of Istog failed to meet their request. The massacre against Albanians began with great intensity right when the Chetniks joined the partisans. After they killed Regjep Haliti from Muževina with his family and burned his house, most of them fled from Muževina and went to Vrella to take refuge, because there were prominent people there, such as Smajl Bajrami Kastrati, who immediately gathered the people of the Vrella district and attacked Istog to stop the terrorism that the workers of Ozna in Istog were carrying out at that time.
As can be seen from Uncle Shaban’s account, all the killings were on unprotected civilians and all Albanians, so the people had no other choice but to organize themselves illegally in order to protect themselves at least a little from the genocidal Serbian hordes.
First they were organized in Kachakist movements and later in armed movements such as the war in Drenica led by Shaban Polluzhen. Even Vrella and the surrounding area did not lag behind in self-organization in Kachakist movements, such as the Kachakist movement of Musa Tahir Blakaj, the Kachakist movement of Binak Perkiqi, the Kachakist movement of Bardh Isufi, the Kachakist movement of Hajdin Zeke Gashi (Muzlijaj), the Kachakist movement of Tal Kurteshi and many others.
The brave Azem Bejta for liberation from Serbia was joined by young men from Vrella e Istogu, worthy and brave fighters until the last breath of our hero Azem Bejta, such as Sadik Perkiqi and Shaban Perkiqi, now with the surname Dreshaj (from their descendants), where they are also documented in this photograph.
I hope that someone from this side of Podgur will deal more with these events, both painful and proud. I just wanted to sensitize historians, students, and genuine researchers not to forget these topics and to deal with them in the most professional way possible, because by commemorating our glorious history, we pave the safe path for the future.
Reference
Balkan Academia 