Blackbird's Field: A True Story of the First World War

By Victor Komski

Blackbirds' Field, first published in 1934, recounts the author's experiences as a Serbian soldier (volunteering at age 16) in the First Balkan War of 1912-13, then again in World War I from 1914-18. Born into a good family in Montenegro, author Victor Komski (a pseudonym for Ilija Mimović) is initially happy to enter the fighting for his country, but becomes disillusioned by the horrors of the war; he suffers serious wounds and is captured and held in an Austrian prison camp, from which he manages to escape twice to join guerrilla forces. Returning home after six years of fighting, the author finds he has lost fourteen members of his family, his sweetheart has married another, and food is scarce in his destroyed city. Komski manages to survive and would eventually make his way to the United States. The title, Blackbirds' Field, refers to the site where the Turks crushed the Serb Empire in 1389 and, according to legend, fallen Serb soldiers were turned into blackbirds to spread news of the disaster.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Burtyrki Books
• Release date: Feb 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9781839742804

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Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.

We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.

BLACKBIRDS’ FIELD

By

VICTOR KOMSKI

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS 4

The Author 5

A Letter 6

1 9

2 17

3 26

4 31

5 36

6 43

7 50

8 56

9 59

10 62

11 69

12 73

13 80

14 86

15 96

16 108

17 114

18 120

19 128

Three People and This Book 136

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 137

The Author

Victor Komski was born in 1895, under a plum tree beside a Montenegrin village. After finishing elementary school in his native country he went to Belgrade where he completed his high classical gymnasium and a part of his University course. As a boy of sixteen he volunteered with the Serbian forces in the First Balkan War, 1912-13, and was decorated with the Golden Cross for bravery. He was a schoolmate of Gavrilo Princip, whose shots fired at Sarajevo in 1914 brought about the World War.

Komski enlisted as a common soldier in 1914 and fought from the first moment to the last, of the Great War. He was seriously wounded in action and twice escaped from an Austrian prison camp. He lost fourteen members of his family in the conflict.

After his discharge the new Yugoslav government sent him first to France and then to the United States to complete his University education. At Princeton he obtained his M.A. In 1922 he returned to Yugoslavia and was offered a place in the diplomatic service but he returned, instead, to the United States to continue special studies in the Universities of Iowa, Minnesota and Chicago.

• • •

A Letter

Dear Comrade:

Ah!...How far so?...

None is perfect, of course, but I have no enthusiasm whatsoever for those false prophets who are ridiculing themselves by playing a funeral march to the world. Victor Hugo said that the great ocean of us Slavonic people must go through a rigid discipline in order to become tamed. A huge veil of unsolved mystery covers us; your letters show it. Again and again you ring the same bell: always melancholy, never cheerfulness. The authors of pessimistic doctrines have befuddled you with a revolting opium, for you can’t see with your nihilistic eyes this old witch Europe—chronically diseased, as you say—without being thrust into the monstrous jaws of unprecedented wars, depressions, panics, anarchies, revolutions, and finally into an abyss in which the white race and its culture will disappear. Ah, such a bold prophecy!

You have worried long enough for the whole world. For a day or a month let the world take care of your worries.

As you know well enough, we aren’t rabbits or chickens; not even when you are trying to scare us by emphasizing that this world of ours is approaching its suicide by the governments of mental dwarfs, racial hatreds, ruthless economic barriers, imperialistic policies, gigantic power of capitalistic and militaristic regimes, hordes of selfish parasites, appalling grafts and corruptions, and last, not least, by the choking burden of taxation, two-thirds of which is spent by almost all European nations for war budgets—self-destruction—and one-third for the jails and insane asylums.

I am sorry to say, but I favor neither your theories nor those of your great teachers to which you stick exactly as a notorious drunkard does to a saloon. Why expect an elephant or a cow to lay eggs? Why imagine that this world—every bit of it—must either walk in the ideal boots or else be smashed. Such unrealizable dreams!

You want to see no one suffer on account of poverty; the earth possesses, you say, such untold wealth that it can easily provide all life’s necessities for us and for the peoples of a few other planets. Further, you are hoping to see set forth a lasting equilibrium between the rich and poor, for we modern people cannot live, as you say, like African chimpanzees nor continue the primitive methods of social relationship used by our famous ancestors—the cavemen. In other words you don’t like to see very rich people on one side and, on the other, the appallingly poor. I answer that the spirit of the times is the best medicine to bring about a triumph of good over evil.

You speak further on about the restlessness and quarrelsome trend of the people, which is, as you claim, the sign of another era full of pain and chaotic misfortune. Again we are miles apart in opinion. These pains are the torches to mankind’s progress, while restlessness means life, not death. If husband and wife do not quarrel once in a while, there must be something fundamentally wrong with them. The earth is our mother and the sky is our father. Bad and fine weather are products of their pains and pleasures. The children must have inherited bad and fine dispositions from their august parents.

You would smash the world or make all people equally happy and prosperous. Further, you would make them all united because all the world is but one state and nothing in the universe exists independently. I am against the use of any brutal force except in cases of national struggle for liberty and union. Do you think we would be any happier if you were to donate to each person ten sacks of gold? While you speak about unhappiness, you must never forget how many millions are unhappier and in much worse condition than you are. Your metaphysical mind would like to see a new world on this old earth, although your ideal world might have more paralysis and cancers than this one in which you are unconsciously digging two graves, one for yourself, another for those whom you feed with dangerous pills.

You write that some people are nationally as stubborn as the blackest Montenegro mule. Sometimes I read between the lines, and I know whom you refer to as some people. Never mind! In class you once told me that you enjoy watching the birth of true international history, because all national history is made up of great lies. As I remember, I told you then that first of all we must put in order our own home, because you know well enough there are a good many million Slavs still enslaved either by internal or external tyranny. So many millions can’t be fooled all the time, as Lincoln pointed out. Yes, so many Slavs must not be slaves, and sooner or later we, the Slavs, must say and do something very important for the rest of the world. I shall be glad to see you drafted. Your mind, I am sure, will change under the terrifying influence of shells and hand-grenades. Although I am as stubborn as any international mule, I confess that I am very proud that I am the son of a nation which surrenders only to God and His saints. By the way, I regret to say that I despise that damned German, Schopenhauer; also that ugly Greek, Socrates, and their contemptible followers whose happiness can only be in a Utopia. You may still worship them if you please. I never will, because wherever I go, whatsoever I do, I always find a spark of cheer, a crumb of hope for pleasure—even in lukewarm tears. It is human to suffer, is it not?

If our happiness could be weighed, we would find there is one moment in our life when we reach the zenith of happiness—the highest point in the joy of living. My happiness is now in its fullest glory, and it seems to me that I can see no justified reason why all the world, including yourself, shouldn’t be happy as well. To repeat once more, no dark spot, no threatening cloud, shall ever dim my limitless love of life in which I will, by and by, step by step, build up a fine career, while admiring this wonderful world and its rosy future.

I sincerely wish to see you happy and prosperous. Forget that past of which you wrote me. Can’t you determine to be cheerful and bright? If you do this, you will help yourself and others. Your mission in life will not be lost. To hell with Schopenhauer and that old dolt, Socrates. Live and love as I do. I shall see you in a few weeks in our white city of Belgrade.

Au revoir,

VICTOR.

• • •

1

IT WAS a sunny afternoon in July. I pick up my violin, sit down on a bench in the garden which lies in the shadow of the old castle and start playing a lullaby. While I play, Maga comes into the garden. She is dressed in the picturesque embroidered costume of a Montenegrin woman. I put aside my violin and go to greet her, kissing her and taking her hand to lead her to a seat.

You seem very happy today, she begins.

Why shouldn’t I be happy? I ask. I have great hopes, greater ambitions and I am one of the leaders in my class.

Yes, you should be very happy, she ponders. You have been very fortunate, too, Victor. Your life has been a charmed one.

I know that is true, grandmother, I agree.

Of all the boys I know, no one has been as lucky as you, she says. You were not born in a narrow room, but in this very garden, beneath that plum tree near the roses. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons for your luck.

Grandmother is very old. She delights in telling tales in which our family figures. I can see she is in a mood for relating again some of the stories which I know well. I will offend her if I do not urge her to tell again some of the tales which concern me.

Tell me some of the stories about my childhood, I suggest, throwing myself on the ground at her feet.

Well, she begins," you were born under a plum tree in this garden as I said a moment ago. When you were nine weeks old, and in your cradle in this very garden, a dreadful wind tossed the cradle down the embankment here at the edge of the garden and onto that big rock you see down below in the valley. God saved you. I believe that rock is a monument to your good luck. It was on that very rock our ancestors placed the heads of countless Turkish invaders. The skulls of not fewer than six Pashas rotted there. The tooth of time does its share.

You should remember how you were nearly burned to death in a small house on grandfather’s grounds. You had heard him tell how he led his soldiers against the Turks and set fire to their houses so you tried to imitate him and nearly destroyed yourself. Had it not been for some shepherds who saw you run into the burning house, you certainly would have perished.

Yes, grandmother, I interrupt, I remember how delighted I was when I saw the flames leaping into the air. I imagined I was one of grandfather’s brave soldiers. I was curious to see what the burning house looked like inside so I ran in.

God and His saints have been watching over you, she resumes. "When you were only four years old, you were out in the pasture with the sheep one hot afternoon. The flock went into a birch grove and you toddled in among the lambs and lay down to sleep. Your head was pillowed upon a sleeping lamb. When I found you, two big snakes were poised on a nearby rock ready to strike you. I saved you, but the lamb was bitten by the snakes and it died.

And do you remember how Rada heard your cries and saved you when you were about to drown in the river where you were swimming? You were always such a careless boy. Even lightning did not kill you although it struck a group of shepherds with whom you took refuge from a storm under a big fir tree in the mountains. Two of the shepherds were killed, but my lucky Victor was not harmed.

Yes, grandmother, I am your lucky Victor, I agree. Would you like to hear of another lucky escape from death?

She nods and I begin: While I was away at school, I was riding with a police official when the horses drawing the carriage became frightened and ran into the path of a train. The coachman could not control them, the train struck us, but I was only cut and bruised. The police official was killed, the coachman was crippled for life and the horses were killed. I did not write to mother or to you about it for I did not wish to worry you.

You must have been born under a lucky star, Maga murmurs. Yes, darling, there must have been something watching over you, because if there had not been you couldn’t escape death so many times. All of us have invisible guardians and a predestined fate. God and His saints would punish you severely if you doubted that. Remember, my boy, all unseen isn’t a lie nor are all things seen the truth.

She sits silent a moment. Then she rises.

I must take my nap now for we old ones like to sleep. I shall go in now.

I escort her to her room. Returning to the garden I ponder trying to discover why I should have escaped death so many times.

I am indeed fortunate and very happy, for I am a son of little Montenegro, which has resisted for more than five turbulent centuries all invasions of wild Asiatic hordes which swept over a Europe cowering under the threat of the Crescent. All the folk tales of my country glorify warriors and great military heroes.

All the country is but a great military camp bowing to nobody and fearing no one but God. The army consists of all males of the age of ten years and over, for when a boy reaches the age of ten he is considered fit to fight. He is expected to be conversant with firearms and to go about fully armed. Montenegrin fighters even sleep with their arms within easy reach.

Our little village is among the finest in Montenegro.

The houses are modest and comfortable with walls of rough marble. Sturdy timbers support the roofs. Near each house is a little orchard of apple, cherry, plum and olive trees. In the center of the village is the church of white polished marble, nestling in the valley like a snowy swan in the middle of a green lake. In that church we gather to pray; outside of it we play, dance and sing. Through the village the river, Lim, flows, its water clear as crystal. South of the village is the magnificent snow-capped Kom rising into the skies like a hoary-headed giant in Oriental tales. There are other mountain peaks nearby, but Kom is greatest of them all. From its heights flow many springs. On its sides grow wild plants and flowers and great forests like those in Switzerland. Near the foot of the mountains are green pastures in which shepherds tend flocks of sheep, goats and cattle.

The music from the shepherd’s pipes, the song of the birds, the rustle of the soft wind through the trees and the babbling of little streams make a symphony of beguiling natural music.

Nearly every foot of this ground is of some historical significance. Almost every stone bears an inscription commemorating some happening which is famous in Montenegrin history.

According to a popular folk tale, all Montenegrins go direct to Paradise after death. St. Peter tells them when they reach the heavenly gates: You had so much hell on earth, you shall go directly to heaven. But they protest saying, Father Peter, we will not stay here for a single moment. We are not accustomed to this kind of life. We like to suffer and fight.

Suffer and fight! exclaims St. Peter. I shall throw open the gates of hell and you may have your wish.

Suiting his actions to his words, he opens the gates of hell and the Montenegrins enter, killing all the devils and destroying hell. After they finish their task they fly to Montenegro exclaiming: There is no place like you, O beloved rocky land. Of course they prefer Montenegro to heaven.

I roar with laughter when hearing this story, but older men believe it religiously. They maintain they have no fear of sin done in killing the foe since their countrymen who died long ago have destroyed hell and no place of punishment remains.

Another amusing story is included in the folk lore of my people. It concerns the creation of these gigantic mountains. The story says that when God was creating the world, He crossed Montenegro. A huge sack in which He was carrying part of the earth broke open. The lofty mountains fell from that sack.

I love Montenegro and I am proud I was born in this land. My ancestors were of the Vaso tribe which gave to Montenegro some of its best military and civil leaders. The family of the first liberator of Serbia, which is now the ruling dynasty of Yugoslavia, originated in this tribe. I long for the coming of the day when I shall be one of the great leaders of my people, for I am preparing to enter the diplomatic service and am eager to complete my college course in Belgrade as soon as possible.

My people are happy. The artificial and mechanistic side of life is unknown to them. Happiness is not measured in earthly possessions. We are poor in property, but rich in spirit. There is a saying indicative of the disregard for wealth. It goes: If we do not have supper, our neighbors will have it.

Everyone is honest. One night, the ruler of our country ordered gold pieces dropped on roads throughout the state. The next morning the location of every piece of money was reported to authorities. That happened many times and the money was always found, for no one dared to touch a