Dragan Sotirovic
Dragan Mihajlo Sotiroviç (serb. Драган Михајло Сотировић; fr. Dragan Michel Sotirovitch, „Draża”, „X”, „Michał”;; 5 May 1913 - 5 or 6 June 1987) was a Serb Chetnik, Captain of the Yugoslav Army, and Major of the Home Army’s 14th Regiment of Jazlowiec Uhlans. For his service and bravery, Sotirovic was awarded the Virtuti Militari .
Sotirovic entered the Yugoslav Army in 1934, and in 1940, he began studying at Yugoslav Military Academy. Promoted to Captain, he fought in the 1941 Invasion of Yugoslavia, after which he joined guerilla forces of General Draza Mihailovic, the Chetniks. Captured by the Wehrmacht, he was sent with other Yugoslav officers to POW Camp Nr. 325 in Rawa Ruska. After the transfer to a camp in Stryj, Sotirovic simulated appendicitis and was taken to a hospital. He fled on January 13, 1944, and soon made contact with local Home Army unit, which took him to a hideout in the village of Zubrza near Lwow.
After identity check, Sotirovic was in late March 1944 sent to the Home Army’s 14th Regiment of Jazlowiec Uhlans, commanded by Colonel Andrzej Choloniewski. As his deputy, he participated in the pacification of a Ukrainian village Szolomyja, in which headquarters of a local branch of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army was located. He also fought in the Lwow Uprising, attacking German positions east of the city. For his bravery, he was on July 27, 1944 awarded the Virtuti Militari by Colonel Wladyslaw Filipkowski.
On July 31, 1944, Sotirovic was arrested by the NKVD. Together with other Home Army officers, he managed to escape behind the San river. On March 5, 1945, he was arrested again near Dynow. During an escape attempt he broke his foot, jumping off a balcony. Hiding his real identity and presenting himself as French officer Jacques Roman, who had been kept in a German POW camp at Odessa, Sotirovic was taken to a hospital in Rzeszow, where he was freed by members of the NIE organization. In early April 1945, Sotirovic joined anti-Communist forces near Rzeszow. His unit cooperated with local National Armed Forces unit and anti-Ukrainian peasant unit from the village of Grabowka.
After several clashes with the Ukrainians, Sotirovic, who had been promoted to Major, convinced the warring sides to sign a local truce, on May 29, 1945 in Siedliska. Both sides recognized the Soviets as their common enemy, and ceased fighting each other.
The last raid of Sotirovic’s unit was a raid on a Soviet column, which took place on June 25, 1945 near Domaradz. He then moved to Lower Silesia, briefly serving as the president of the town of Leśna (Marklissa). Surrounded by a group of his former soldiers, Sotirovic boarded his people on a train with ethnic Germans being moved to the west, and left Poland for US Occupation Zone in Germany (see Allied-occupied Germany). He then moved to France, taking on the name Jacques Roman. Sotirovic settled in Monaco. He died on 5 or 6 June 1987, during a pilgrimage to Mount Athos in Greece.
Sources
- Jerzy Węgierski – „W lwowskiej Armii Krajowej”, Warszawa 1989