Order of the People's Hero

For other uses, see People's Hero (disambiguation).

Order of the People's Hero
Order of the People's Hero medal and ribbon bar
Awarded by  Yugoslavia and  Serbia and Montenegro
Type	Medal
Awarded for	Distinguishing oneself by extraordinary heroic deeds
Status	Incepted
Statistics
First awarded	1942
Last awarded	1993
Total awarded	Around 1,400
Precedence
Next (higher)	Order of Freedom
Next (lower)	Order of the Hero of Socialist Labour (1948-1992)[1] Order of the Yugoslav Flag (1998-2006)[2]
ribbon

The Order of the People's Hero (Serbo-Croatian: Orden narodnog heroja, Cyrillic script: Oрден народног хероја; Slovene: Red narodnega heroja, Macedonian: Oрден на народен херој) was a Yugoslav gallantry medal, the second highest military award, and third overall Yugoslav decoration.^[1] It was awarded to individuals, military units, political and other organisations who distinguished themselves by extraordinary heroic deeds during war and in peacetime. The recipients were thereafter known as People's Heroes of Yugoslavia. The vast majority was awarded to partisans for actions during the Second World War. A total of 1322 awards were awarded in Yugoslavia, and 22 were awarded to the foreigners.^[3]

After the dissolution of SFR Yugoslavia, the Order of the People's Hero was awarded in Serbia and Montenegro.

History

The bulletin of the Supreme commaned of the People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia no. 12–13 (December 1941 and January 1942) announced the establishment of the title of "People's Hero" for heroic and self-sacrifing participants of the People's Liberation War. The first person to be awarded the title was Petar Leković. On 15 August 1943, the title was formalized as an order together with Order of the People's Liberation, Order of Bravery, Order of the Partisan Star, Order of Brotherhood and Unity and the Medal for Bravery.

The Order consists of an oval gold badge showing a soldier with rifle and banner superimposed upon a rayed star surrounded by a wreath of laurel. The badge is suspended from a red ribbon, with a narrow white stripe towards each edge. The design for this and the other Orders were undertaken by the painter Đorđe Andrejević Kun and the sculptor Antun Augustinčić. From its inception until around 1993, the Order had been awarded nearly 1,400 times. Marshal Josip Broz Tito was awarded the Order three times: in 1944, 1972 and 1977.

The holders of the order were entitled to certain benefits, like free fares on public transport, and pensions for the surviving family members of deceased people's heroes. Although the benefits have since been downscaled, post-Yugoslav countries still provide certain benefits to people's heroes. Many schools and streets in post-war Yugoslavia were named after people's heroes, and many of the names remain, to varying degrees in different successor countries.

Several cities in Yugoslavia were awarded the order, and proclaimed Hero Cities: Beograd, Cetinje, Drvar, Ljubljana, Novi Sad, Prilep, Pristina and Zagreb^[3].

After the dissolution of SFR Yugoslavia, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (later renamed Serbia and Montenegro) continued to use some of the decorations of former Yugoslavia, among them Order of the People's Hero^[4]. In the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Order of the People's Hero was the fourth highest order after the Order of Yugoslavia, Order of the Yugoslav Star and the Order of Freedom^[2].

Notable recipients

Petar Leković became the first ever recipient in February 1942.

Josip Broz Tito was awarded the order three times.

Notable recipients of the order include:

Božidar Adžija Maks Baće Milić Vlado Bagat Vladimir Bakarić Josip Broz Tito Marija Bursać Boško Buha Rade Bulat Anka Butorac Krste Crvenkovski Rudi Čajavec Rodoljub Čolaković Peko Dapčević

Nada Dimić Petar Drapšin Stjepan Filipović Ivan Gošnjak Petar Gračanin Većeslav Holjevac Blagoj Jankov Mučeto Žikica Jovanović Španac Edvard Kardelj Boris Kidrič Franjo Kluz Lazar Koliševski

Rade Končar Sava Kovačević Josip Kraš Nikola Ljubičić Veselin Masleša Miloš Minić Kosta Nađ Nada Naumović Marko Orešković Boško Palkovljević Pinki Moša Pijade Koča Popović

Ognjen Prica Lepa Radić Vladimir Rolović Ivo Lola Ribar Velimir Škorpik Slavko Šlander Mika Špiljak Milan Tepić Hristijan Todorovski Karpoš Veljko Vlahović Svetozar Vukmanović-Tempo Žarko Zrenjanin

Foreign citizens recipients of the order

Sergey Biryuzov Ivan Bulkin Andrey Vitruk Pavel Dmitrienko Vladimir Zhdanov

Michał Żymierski Pavel Yakimov Boris Kalinkin Semyon Kozak Ivan Konstantinov

Luigi Longo Rodion Malinovsky Alexander Managadze Grigoriy Ohrimenko Ludvík Svoboda

Vladimir Sutetz Fyodor Tolbukhin Vasiliy Ulisko Alexander Shornikov

Hero Cities

Belgrade Zagreb

Ljubljana Novi Sad

Prilep Priština

Titov Drvar Cetinje

Public and political organizations recipients of the order

SKOJ (Young Communist League of Yugoslavia)[3] OK SKOJ (Municipality comity of SKOJ) of Drvar

SUBNOR (Union of Veterans of People's Liberation War) Union of the Spanish War veterans of Yugoslavia

Military Units recipients of the order

WWII units

1st Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade[3] 2nd Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade 3rd Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade 4th Montenegrin Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade 5th Montenegrin Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade 6th East Bosnian Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade 10th Herzegovinian Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade

1st Lika Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade 2nd Lika Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade 1st Vojvodina Proletarian People's Liberation Strike Brigade 2nd Krajina People's Liberation Proletarian Regiment "Dr Mladen Stojanović" Side Battalion of the Supreme Command of People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia Workers' Battalion of the Užice People's Liberation Proletarian Regiment Central Hospital of People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia Partizan Hospital on Petrova Gora

Kosovo War units

• 124th Police Intervention Brigade, Serbian Ministry of Internal Affairs
• 126th Brigade for Air Reconnaissance, Military of Yugoslavia
• 250th Air Defence Missile Brigade, Military of Yugoslavia

Statistics

Tomb of the People's Heroes at Zagreb's Mirogoj cemetery.

Tomb of the People's Heroes at Belgrade fortress contains graves of Ivo Lola Ribar, Ivan Milutinović, Đuro Đaković and Moše Pijade.

Tomb of the People's Heroes in Ljubljana

A total of 1,307 awards were awarded in Yugoslavia by 1957.^[3]

By sex^[3]

1,220 were male and 87 were female.

By place of birth (not ethnicity)^[3]

• Croatia - 282
• Bosnia and Herzegovina - 284
• Serbia (including Kosovo)- 256
• Montenegro - 247
• Slovenia - 156
• Macedonia - 63
• abroad - 17

By social status^[3]

• 506 workers
• 207 peasants
• 404 intellectuals
• 78 former members of the Royal Yugoslav Army
• 73 clerks
• 39 other occupations
• 5 unknown

By year when they joined Partisans^[3]

658 of them were also members before World War II. The majority, 1,261, joined partisans in 1941; there were 41 heroes from 1942 and five from 1943.

By the way they died^[3]

Of the National Heroes who died in the war, there were:

• 624 killed in combat
• 104 shot themselves
• 55 other suicides
• 30 died from fatal injuries
• 20 killed in prison
• 13 hanged
• 12 massacred
• 4 died of disease
• 3 buried alive
• 3 strangled
• 1 impaled
• 1 burned on a skewer
• 5 died in accidents

See also

• Orders and medals of Socialist Yugoslavia
• Orders and medals of Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
• Hero of the Soviet Union

References

• Narodni heroji Jugoslavije (People's Heroes of Yugoslavia), "Mladost", Belgrade, 1975 (Serbo-Croatian)
• Војна енциклопедија (Military Encyclopedia), Belgrade, 1975 (Serbo-Croatian)

1. ^ ^{a b} Orders and Decorations of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, 1945-90 by Lukasz Gaszewski 2000, 2003
2. ^ ^{a b} Orders and Decorations of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, 1990- by Lukasz Gaszewski 2000, 2003
3. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i j} Зборник народних хероја Југославије, Omladina, Belgrade, 1957 (Serbo-Croatian)
4. ^ Vreme: Zakon o odlikovanjima, 24 April 1999 (Serbian)

External links

• ZAKON O OSNOVNIM PRAVIMA LICA ODLIKOVANIH ORDENOM NARODNOG HEROJA (Law on Basic Rights of Persons Awarded the Order of the People's Hero) (Serbo-Croatian)
• Narodni heroji Jugoslavije (People's Heroes of Yugoslavia) (Serbo-Croatian)
• Narodni heroji (People's Heroes) (Serbo-Croatian)