Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

British Red Cross Society Medal for the Balkan Wars 1912-13, 3 clasps, Bulgaria, Montenegro, Servia, silver-gilt and enamel, reverse inscribed, ‘Woislav M. Petrovitch’, clasps soldered together; with ‘Balkan War 1912-13’ slip bar, good very fine, scarce £500-600

Woislav Maximus Petrovitch - aristocrat, linguist, diplomat, soldier, author - a man seemingly on the edge of international intrigues.

Woislav Maximus Petrovitch was born in Montenegro c.1885, a nephew of Queen Draga of Serbia and related to Prince Milo of Montenegro. In 1904 Lieutenant Petrovitch of the Montengrin Army, came to London to sell the jewels of Queen Draga at Christies, an event widely reported at the time. He was multilingual, able to speak Serbian, Spanish, English and Italian fluently. In 1912 when the First Balkan War started between the armies of Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria and Greece, against Turkey, he served in the British Red Cross Society as liaison officer and interpreter for the Director of the Northern States (Serbia, Montenegro and Bulgaria). After the end of the Second Balkan War in 1913 he came to London as Attaché to the Serbian Royal Legation. As such he was on the periphery of the intrigue leading up to and the aftermath of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir apparent of the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg on 28 June 1914 - events that led to the start of the Great War.

Woislav’s movements during the war are a little blurred but he appears at the outbreak of War to have been employed as an interpreter for the War Office. He also states, without specifics, that he fought in one of the bloodiest battles in the War and lost 32 relatives and had his land seized, leaving him with little money. In 1915 he travelled to the USA and then back to Serbia where he was a Liaison Officer between the Serbian War Office and the British H.Q. He was second Chief of the Slavonic Division, at New York Public Library from February to December 1917. By 1918 he was Head of Slavonic languages at the New York Public Library.

After the War he returned to Serbia and by 1922 he was Dr. Petrovitch, Secretary to the Royal Ministry of Education, Belgrade, Serbia, but in 1923 he returned to London, possibly under a cloud. During 1924 he visited the U.S.A., stating his occupation was that of Diplomat.

A significant event then occurred on 9 October 1934 when King Alexander 1 of Yugoslavia was assassinated in Marseille. Detective Inspector Arthur Davies, Special Branch, Scotland Yard had an interest in Woislav, as he had come to notice as a person associated with foreign agitators, some of whom have been arrested in other countries for alleged complicity in the assassination of King Alexander of Yugoslavia at Marseilles. In November 1934 the Home Office asked him to leave England as he was considered a dangerous subversive. He was in fear of torture and death if he returned to Serbia. On 21 November 1914 DI Davies interviewed Woislav and informed him his stay in England could not be prolonged and gave him 48 hours to leave. On 24 November 1934 Woislav killed himself by gas after taking half a bottle of whisky, half a bottle of champagne & 6 grains of morphia, in a room at a boarding house in New Compton Street, Soho, London WC. Petrovitch was the author of several books.

With a quantity of copied research. For a more extensive history of the man and his life, see ‘Woislav Maximus Petrovitch: Arisocrat, Diplomat, Soldier, Author and Linguist (1884-1934), by Simon Butterworth, in the Journal of the O.M.R.S., December 2013.