Momčilo Gavrić (military)

Momčilo Gavrić (1 May 1906 – 28 April 1993) was the the youngest soldier-participant in the First World War.

Biography
The youngest soldier of all armies in the First World War, Momčilo Gavrić was born in May 1906, in Trbušnica, near Loznica, on the slopes of the mountain Gučevo. He was the eighth child of his parents, Alimpije and Jelena Gavrić.

It was noted that Momčilo took part in the Battle of Kolubara and the Albanian golgotha,​​ and was wounded at Kajmakčalan. He participated in the breakthrough on the Salonika front and was demobilised at the age of twelve, as the youngest lance sergeant in the world.



At the beginning of August in 1914, Austro-Hungarian soldiers of the Croatian 42nd Home Guard Infantry Division (known as the "Devil's Division") killed his father, mother, three sisters, four brothers, and grandmother. His house was set on fire, but he survived thanks to his father who had sent him to his uncle. Left without family and without a home, Momčilo went to the mountain Gučevo to find the Serbian army. He found the Sixth Artillery Regiment of Drina Division, under the command of Major Stevan Tucović, brother of Dimitrije Tucović. When he told what had happened to his family, the same day Serbian soldiers took revenge, and Momčilo became a soldier in Drina division.

During the visit at Kajmakčalan, vojvoda Mišić was stunned when he saw in the trench an eleven-year-old boy in a uniform. He asked Major Tucović what the child was doing at Kajmakčalan. "Enemy killed Gavrić's parents, seven brothers and sisters, and he has been with us ever since Battle of Cer and Battle of Kolubara, crossed Albania, and wounded" – reported Major Tucović.

On the same day, by the order of Živojin Mišić, Corporal Gavrić was promoted to Lance Sergeant, and the order was read to all units of the Serbian army.

After the war he attended "Henry Wright" high school in London, and later he finished training as a typographer and training for drivers in Belgrade. He married, Kosara, with whom he worked in the Vapa paper mill in Belgrade.

In 1929, Momčilo was arrested by his former enemies, Austrian officers in the Yugoslav Royal Army. During The Second World War he was imprisoned twice in a concentration camp by German occupying forces. After the Second World War, OZNA arrested him for claiming that the Albanians were no brothers to Serbs, and at that time the presidents of Yugoslavia and Albania, Josip Broz Tito and Enver Hoxha were great friends.

Momčilo Gavrić died in Belgrade in 1993.