WWII Monument in Mogorić, Croatia

As we found out from her death certificate, Sophia Ilich, came from Mogorić, Croatia.  Her father was an Ilich (Илић) and her mother was a Djakovich (Ђаковић).

Mogorić is a town that is about a 15 minute drive from Kurjak.  In Mogorić, they have a town center with a few buildings that now appear to be abandoned but were once stores, a church, and a community building.  The town memorial for WWII is located in the town center, posted on the wall of one of the buildings:

Here the list of the people who died while fighting in WWII, grouped by families.  Our family names include Ilich (Илић) and Djakovich (Ђаковић), both of which are found in the 2nd column of this memorial. The memorial is dated July 27, 1962.

The top part of the memorial translates to say something like this:

"In the National Liberation War, 1941-1945, the fighters of this village laid their lives for the liberation of their homeland."

And the bottom part of the memorial translates to say something like this:

   "Still another 122 villagers fell as victims of fascist terror

    Eternal glory to the fallen heroes and victims!

                                            The people of Mogorich"

Finally, here is a list of the last names in Cyrillic and how they could be rendered in English (in case one is looking for an ancestor):

• Бањеглав - Baneglav
• Басарић - Basarich
• Борић - Borich
• Борковић - Borkovich
• Вурдеља - Vurdel 
• Вучковић - Vukovich
• Заклан - Zaklan
• Илић - Ilich 
• Ђаковић - Djakovich, Dakovich 
• Кораћ - Korach
• Корица - Koritsa 
• Лазић - Lazich
• Маљковић - Malkovich
• Милојевић - Miloyevich
• Радаковић - Radakovich
• Стоицављевић - Stoitsavlevich
• Чанковић - Chankovich
• Џодан - Jodan

Here is the other plaque on the same building:

This plaque translates into something like the following:

"During the national freedom struggle and revolution, the Proletarian Brigade originated in Lika and was formed in Mogorich.  

On its way through Yugoslavia during the struggle against the occupiers and domestic traitors, the Proletarian Brigade was the worthy representative of the military and revolutionary traditions of the Lika province and the founder of the brotherhood and unity of our people. 

In honor of the anniversary of their formation, this memorial plaque permanently marks the place where this Brigade was formed.

Mogorich, September 9, 1972."

Tip: Where to Eat in Zagreb

If you are making a family history trip to Zagreb, or for any other reason, I recommend a meal at the restaurant Vinodol.  The restaurant serves food from all over Croatia - all of which is good.  The staff are friendly and speak English.  If you want food they would eat in Lika, just ask for it.

I recommend that you ask to eat on the terrace.  It is the nicest location and also provides a view of the cooking area (just look through the windows at the end of the terrace).  Be sure to take note of the large cast-iron lid.  It looks like a large dutch oven.  Many traditional meals are baked "under the lid" (pod peka).

Vinodol is conveniently located in downtown Zagreb, close to many sites of interest.

Sophia's Tragic Death

Sometimes when looking into one's family history, you can find things that are disheartening.  One of the things we learned was about Sophia (Ilič) Klaich's death.  We ordered a copy of her death certificate to learn more about her family.  And the document provided new information we did not have before about her birthplace and parent's name.

However, the certificate also provided information that I did not know before about the manner of her death: suicide.  I personally didn't know her (she was my great-great-grandmother) and she passed away well before I was born, but it is still saddens me.  

WWII Memorial in Kurjak, Croatia

Kurjak is a small town.  In the 1860 census we found, there were only 51 houses.  I also got a list from registry office from 1989 and they only had about 60 homes (several of which were unoccupied).  With such a small area, Kurjak does not have a town center.  However, when you turn off the main road, you'll immediately see the following monument:

Here's the inscription on the monument:

Deb and I tried to translate this (with the help of Google Translate) in November 2014 (and Deb did most of the good work).  Here's the translation: 

"During the National Liberation struggle of the years 1941-1945 in the village of Kurjak, 57 partisan fighters were killed, 37 inhabitants fell victim to fascist terror, and 47 died of typhoid, winter of hunger, and other miseries of war.  They fell for the sacred cause of freedom and for a better life in the great anti-fascist struggle and revolution which was led and victoriously completed by the Yugoslavian Communist Party with the legendary partisan Marshal Tito at the head."

If we translated that correctly, that would suggest nearly 140 people died during WWII.  We are not sure if we have that correct, because the memorial only lists about 100 names (or at least that's all it has currently).  Either way, that is an enormous part of the population for a village that probably only had between 50-60 households.  

Here are the picture of the names at the memorial:

Books on the History of the Towns in Udbina, Croatia (and the Lika Province)

During my research trip to Lika I stayed with Vjekoslav Medić.   He was a great host.  If you ever go to visit  - and the Plitvize Lakes are worth a visit in their own right - I recommend a stay in his sobe (a type of hotel that is common throughout the former Yugoslavia).  Among other things, he actually helped me get many of the leads that I have been sharing.  He also went to Croatian and Serbian language family history sites to see if they had leads about Kljaić and Kurjak.

There he found two books that give information about Kurjak in general.  I don't think we'll get specific names from these books, but it would still be good to look at this.  He says that the books say that the Kljaich family came to Kurjak after the Turks left.  It says that they came from Brinje (a village near Otočac).  It wasn't a big move, just a move to get people to work the land now open after the Turks left. 

Apparently the patron saint for the Kljaic family is Saint Luke 

Also the books mention the fortress that was on top of the Gradina (originally built by a Duke of some kind).  One of the early leaders in Kurjak during the post-Turk era was Todor Kljaich. 

Supposedly this is all in those books (according to the family history chats).  Currently we are trying to run down copies of them so we can read them and find out what they can tell us about the area's history.  I'll provide any updates I find. 

Author – Stiepan Pavličić  

Book – Naselja i stanovništvo Like

Author: Gojko Knežević   

Title:  Udbina i njena sela

Properties in Kurjak, Croatia in 1989

While I was in Korenica to look at the civil records about our family, I also dropped by to see if there was any information about the properties in Kurjak.  I was hoping that they might have really old records that would allow us to know when the family moved into house #16.

Unfortunately the records only go back to 1989.  Further the house numbers changed after WWII so this won't help us track the family historically.  Still, the one interesting thing is that it does give us the size of Kurjak prior to the conflicts in the 90s.

The list includes 61 properties, but for 11 of those properties, it says either that nothing is there or that there is a property but no one is living there.  So that means that there were about 50 occupied homes at the time - roughly the same as in 1866.

The list is also interesting in that it gives the last name of the owners.  There were 6 different last names in the city in 1989.  Ten of the properties were owned by someone with our family's last name: Kljajić.

Were Younger Brides Common in the Lika Province, Croatia?

One unusual part of family history is Mildred's age at the time that she and Andrew (Jandre) got married.  When they married in April 1924, Mildred was only only 14 but Andrew was 35.  

According to the 1930 Census, Mildred's mother - Sophie - also married when she was very young:

On this record, they have that Sophie married when she was 17.  However it also says that Joseph (her husband) married when he was 25, but there is a 12 year gap between the two, so one of those numbers must be wrong (or this is the second marriage for both of them).  If this is their first marriage, and Joseph's age was correct, then Sophia would have only been 13.   Either way Sophia was young when she got married (even 17 is too young for my daughters!).

One question for me is whether getting married young (and to someone much older) was a common practice in the Kurjak area.  I cannot answer when people got married, but we can use the records from the graveyards in the area to see the age gap of the couples.

In identifying couples I took the conservative approach of only using people who were explicitly identified as a married couple on their tombstone.  From the six graveyards we have taken pictures of, I was able to identify 108 couples.

Below is a histogram of the age gap where larger values indicate that the husband is older (Age Gap = Wife's birth year - Husband's birth year).  I have also marked Jandre-Mildred's age gap on the histogram too.

On average the men were older than their wives.  For the median couple, the husband was 3 years older than their wife.  Further, Jandre and Mildred were relative outliers (though not the couple with the largest gap - although I have my doubts about the largest gap).  Even the 12 year gap between Sophia and Joseph (Jovo) would have made them outliers too (in the top 5%).