On July 5, 1916, in the town of Ruse, Hristo Makedonski died - the man who saved the flag of the team of Hadji Dimitar and Stefan Karadzha.
"Tell me, sister de – The Karaja?
Where is my faithful companion?
Tell me, and take my soul, –
I want, sister, to die here!"
This is how the genius of Hristo Botev describes the self-sacrificing path of the team of Hadji Dimitar and Stefan Karadzha.
Hristo Makedonski himself was born in 1834 in the village of Gorni Todorak, Kukushko (today Ano Teodoraki, Kilkis, Greece). He studied at the Greek school in his native village and was engaged in trade. Together with his comrade Manol Nakov, he became a bandit in the squad of Stoimen Voivoda, operating in Maleshevo, VMRO - Ruse recalls.
In 1862, he joined the First Bulgarian Legion of Georgi Rakovski in Belgrade and fought with the Turks during the bombardment of the city. After the dissolution of the legion, he went to Romania. In 1864 – In 1865, he was the head of a small company which, on the order of Rakovski, toured the Bulgarian lands.
Later, in the period 1867 – In 1868, he took part in the Second Bulgarian Legion, and after it was disbanded in the spring of 1868, he moved to Romania.
Later that year, he joined the troupe of Hadji Dimitar and Stefan Karadzha. In the Battle of Vishograd, Georgi Chernev, standard bearer of Stefan Karadzha, was killed, after which Hristo Makedonski took over the flag.
After defeating them near Mount Buzludzha, Makedonski with two more Chetniks (Pencho Stoyanov and Iliya Nikolov) managed to avoid Turkish pursuits and passed almost unnoticed through Gabrovo, Sopot, Samokov, Rila Monastery, Melnik and Doiran to the Athos Peninsula, where they found refuge in the Zograf Monastery.
In the spring of 1869, with the help of the abbot of the monastery, the three left via Constantinople for Odessa. From there, Makedonski is again transferred to Romania. In order to protect himself from arrest and handover to the Turkish authorities, he adopted the names Hrista Nikolic and Hristaki Nikolaou and worked under Stefan Beron. Participated in the revolutionary activity of the Bulgarian emigration and in the preparation of the Stara Zagora and April Uprisings.
After their meeting, Braila Hristo Botev wrote about him in one of her letters:
„When I told him about my mission and the state of affairs, he got so fired up that he decided to sacrifice his shirt off his back as well."
In the Serbian-Turkish war of 1876, he was the commander of a company of 200 Bulgarian volunteers. The flag of this squadron is the same flag of Stefan Karadzha, which Hristo Makedonski managed to keep.
It was sewn in 1866, in Braila by Sultana Ruseva. Preserved as a rare shrine, in 1925 it was handed over by the daughters of Christ the Macedonian – Titza and Ekaterina of the Ministry of War. Today this flag is kept in the National Military History Museum.
After the Liberation, Hristo Makedonski lived in Rousse, where he died in 1916
Streets in the cities of Ruse, Varna and Saedinenie are named after him.