Draft:Jovan Cakic

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Jovan Cakić (Kumanovo, 1875 — Prilep, 1918) was a Serbian teacher, national representative of Serbs in the Ottoman Empire, a member of the Chetnik organization in Old Serbia, today's North Macedonia, during the Chetnik action at the beginning of the 20th century and a participant in the Balkan Wars and World War I.

Cakić was born into a wealthy family. Zaharije's father was a leather merchant, and lucrative jobs in Constantinople and Thessaloniki brought him good income. He graduated from the seventh-grade Serbian gymnasium in Skopje and the teacher's school in Šabac. He also lived and studied in Petrograd, and then became a teacher at the Serbian school in Kumanovo.

Together with the teacher Antonije Todorović, Lazar Božović and the archpriest Atanasije Petrović Taško, he formed the city board of the Serbian Chetnik Organization in Kumanovo during 1904. This committee was established in the fall of 1904 and had the task of informing, supplying, and supporting the Serbian troops in the Kumanovo district. name="automatski generisano1">[http://www.vranjske.co.rs/2012-04-19/%D0%B3%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%B3%D0%BE%D1%82%D0%B0-%D1%83%D1%87%D0%B8%D1%82%D0%B5%D1%99%D0%B0-%D1%98%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B0.html Golgotha ​​of the teacher Jovan | Newspapers of VRANJSKE]{{Botovski title The committee in Kumanovo maintained close ties with the committee of the Chetnik organization in Vranje (founded in 1903). Meetings were held at the Prohor Pčinjski monastery and actions were agreed upon there, as well as the transfer of committees, especially from the Preševo ​​kaza, through Kozjak and their reception in the eastern Povardarje. When the committee of the Internal Macedonian-Adriatic Revolutionary Organization killed the Serbian archpriest Atanasije Petrović Taško on 14-15 January 1905, the committee of the Serbian organization in Kumanovo decided to kill the exarchate archpriest Aleksandar, in revenge, on the day of the forty-day commemoration of Taško. The murder of archpriest Aleksandar was organized in Kumanovo by the committee of the Serbian Chetnik organization, headed by Cakić. This was the first example of a Serbian organization taking revenge for the murders of Serbs by the VMRO.

False witnesses accused Cakić of being the direct perpetrator of the murder. An exarchate priest was a witness at the trial who heard the shots, saw how "Archpriest Aleksandar fell and how Jovan Cakić ran away, his coat flying after him". The court sentenced Jovan to five years in prison. His mother came out of the crowd and patted him on the shoulder: "If only, my son, you would come out of the apse, and the grave will not be exposed". In the Kuršumli Han in Skopje, Cakić found himself in the same prison yard as Trajko Mitev and Ilija Levkov, leaders of the Kumanovo committee of the VMRO, who were convicted of the murder of Serbian priest Atanasije Petrović Taško, also based on false testimony. Cakić then organized the beating of Mitev and Levkov. An investigation was launched, and Cakić was thrown into the deepest underground cell without light as punishment. He was fastened with an iron ring around his neck, attached to a damp wall. Every night, a song rose from his underground lair. The Serbian consulate was informed that Cakić had gone mad from the torture. Mikica Ristić asked the Russian envoy Mikhail Belyayev

and the Austrian Count Paru to go to the Kuršumdi Han. In the deep cell, by the light of a lantern, they saw "a face distorted, smiling, stretched out like a madman." Upon the intervention of the Serbian consul and guards who claimed that he had gone mad, Cakić was returned to the other prisoners, where he immediately recovered. He remained in prison until 1908, when he was amnestied after the Hurriyet, like all perpetrators of political murders. After the Hurriyet, he became a deputy for Kumanovo and the surrounding area in the First Assembly of Serbs in the Ottoman Empire.V. Ilić, Serbian Chetnik Action 1903–1912, Belgrade 2006, 48.S. Krakow, Plamen četništva, Belgrade 1930, 182–190.

File:First Skupshtina of the Ottoman Serbs 1909.JPG

After his release from prison, he was paid all his wages for the three-year period during which he was in prison. With that money, he bought land in Vranjska Banja and built the Cakića villa. After his release from the Skopje prison, Cakić returned to Kumanovo, and rented out the villa in Banja to guests. He and his wife Sofija had three daughters: Leposava, Pravda, and Vera.

Before the First Balkan War, he came to the Vranj region, where he organized a volunteer company with which he fought in Macedonia.

He commanded a Chetnik detachment formed in Vranje and the surrounding area.

File:Јован Цакић, портрет.jpg

He participated in Great War, where he crossed Albania during the Great Retreat of the Serbian army. He landed on Corfu, where he recovered and was transferred with his unit to the Salonika Front. During the breakthrough of the Salonika Front, he fell ill with malaria and was granted three months of sick leave on Corfu by order of the minister. He died after the breakthrough of the Salonika Front due to an accident involving the ambulance that was transporting him, on the road between Salonika and the village of Dragomance. He was buried at the Serbian military cemetery in Prilep.

The daughters of Leposava and Pravda helped restore the church in Vranjska Banja, in whose narthex there is still a memorial plaque to Jovan and Sofija Cakić.