#ontheotherside

 

Museum item: An ideal representation of the graves, Gomilice, 1st-3rd century.

Digital item: Veliša Vučetić’s pen

Donor of digital item: Milan Vučetić

Note from donor:

My Uncle Veliša Jovanov Vučetić * was born 1912 in Vilusi, Montenegro, where he was a farmer – he grafted fruit trees and kept bees. Upon his return from military service in 1936, he became a member of the KPJ.

From the very first day of World War II, along with his father and brother, he joined the uprising movement against the enemy. In March 1943, he took part in the Battle of Konjic as the founder of the Fifth Montenegrin Proletarian Brigade. Veliša was killed by mortar grenades while supplying food to fighters on the battlefield. He was 30 years old.

He was buried in an unknown place. His mother and family knew nothing about his fate or where his grave was. Ten years later, during the exhumation of his grave, his relatives recognized the pen that was given to him in 1930 by his uncle Novica. It was only then that his family found him.

The pen still had ink, so his cousins wrote a postcard to Veliša’s mother Sinđi. They told her that his remains would be brought to Vilusi, to be buried in the family tomb in which lay his brother Miljko, who, died at the age of 19 in 1942 as a Partizan.

In my family, Veliša’s pen is a symbol of freedom, something worth fighting and sacrificing for. Just like my uncles Velisa, Milijko and Jovan fought in WW2 and those before them in WW1, the Balkan wars, the Herzegovian uprising and all previous battles for the conquest of freedom and defense of dignity.

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* For more stories about the Vučetić family scan the following museum items: