His Majesty King Peter I the Great Liberator
(11. July 1844. – 16. August 1921.)
His Majesty King Peter I the Liberator was born in Belgrade on July 11, 1844. He was King of Serbia from 1903 to 1918 and King of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes from 1918 until 1921. He was the grandson of Karađorđe, the third son and the fifth child of Persida (Nenadović) and Prince Alexander. Princess Persida was from the renowned Nenadović family of Brankovina.
His first tutor was a Czech, Dr. Vilem Gabler, during 1852–1854. He completed his elementary school and high school education in Belgrade. After the Saint Andrew’s Assembly in 1858 deposed Prince Alexander, he left Serbia. Young Peter continued his education at the Vanel-Olivier Institute in Geneva. After finishing school in September 1861, Prince Peter enrolled at the Saint-Barbe College in Paris, and in 1862, he attended the prestigious Saint-Cyr Military Academy, graduating in 1864. In Paris, he pursued photography and painting and honed his military and political education, which opened him to the ideas of political liberalism, parliamentarism, and democracy. In early 1868, Prince Peter printed his translation of the book “On Liberty” by the English politician and philosopher John Stuart Mill in Vienna, with his own preface, which later became his political program.
Peter joined the French Foreign Legion in 1870 and participated in numerous battles, for which he was awarded the commemorative medal of the war of 1870. In 1875, he worked on organizing and actively participated in the Bosnian-Herzegovinian uprising under the pseudonym Peter Mrkonjić, where he was wounded in the right hand. In his honour, the city of Mrkonjić Grad is named after him.
In the summer of 1883, he married Princess Ljubica-Zorka, the eldest daughter of Montenegrin Prince Nikola, in Cetinje. Five children were born to them: daughters Jelena and Milena (who died as a child), and sons Đorđe (who renounced his right to the throne in 1909), Alexander, and Andrija (who died as a child). After a brief stay in Paris, the Karađorđević family moved to Cetinje, where they remained for ten years.
Princess Zorka suddenly died on March 16, 1890, soon after childbirth and the birth of the last son Andrija, who passed away a few days after his mother. Wishing to help his wife, Prince Peter called doctors from Vienna, but they could not save her. She was buried in Cetinje, near the Monastery of Saint Peter, but was transferred to Oplenac upon its completion on March 15, 1912. Although she lived shortly, Princess Zorka left a significant mark in history as a link between Serbia and Montenegro and as the mother of the Chivalrous King Alexander I the Unifier.
Due to poor financial circumstances, Prince Peter sold his house in Paris in 1894 and settled with his family in Geneva. His contacts with people from Serbia never ceased, primarily with Nikola Pašić, leader of the Radical Party, and with Aleksa Žujović, also a prominent member of the Radical Party with whom he forged a lasting friendship in exile in Western Serbia and Bosnia.
The army carried out a coup on May 28, 1903, and proclaimed Prince Peter as King of Serbia in his 59th year, which was confirmed by the election of the National Assembly on June 15. The provisional government of Jovan Avakumović, formed on June 11, 1903, convened the dissolved National Assembly. The Assembly accepted the constitution of 1889 with minor changes, thus creating the constitution of June 1903. The National Assembly in mid-June 1903 elected Peter the First Karađorđević as King. A few days later, the new king arrived in Belgrade and took an oath in the National Assembly on the Constitution of 1903. After 45 years, Karađorđe’s descendants once again came to the head of the Serbian state, beginning a new period in its development.
A parliamentary regime was introduced in which the National Assembly made all significant decisions. Thanks to the constitution and (classical) liberal laws after 1903, Serbia became one of the states with the highest percentage of the population having the right to vote in elections (about 70% of adult males).
He was crowned on September 21, 1904, in the Cathedral Church and anointed in the monastery of Žiča. A film was made about his coronation.
Under his command, victories were achieved in the First and Second Balkan Wars, Kosovo and Old Serbia were liberated. After the triple offensive by the Central Powers, refusing to surrender and sign capitulation, he retreated with his people and army across Albania, enduring great hardship. However, he lived to see the ultimate victory, the liberation of Serbia, and the creation of a new state through the unification of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, over which he reigned as the first King.
He is known as the most (classical) liberal King, a protector of basic democratic rights, who lost lawsuits in courts, was declined a loan from the state due to his age, and supported the right to democratic protests by republicans against the monarchy and the government.
He passed away on August 16, 1921, in Belgrade, and was buried in his endowment, the Church of Saint George on Oplenac. Following his death, in a gesture of lasting memory and gratitude, the National Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution to bestow upon King Peter the title of Peter the Great Liberator.