There is a long island under Mount Velebit, the longest one in the Adriatic Sea, white and naked over the hills, green across the vineyards in a narrow strip close to the sea. It fears only gales, but not the winter ones. It is used to them, submissive to the regular annual evil. Even if they pour over it tonnes of sea salt raised from the froth of the channel under Velebit, the gales of January and deadly February cannot harm it much: the wine is in the cellar, the sheep has not given birth to a lamb yet, and the grapevine bud still sleeps its winter sleep in a

The Ustashas established their political camp – Ustasha headquarters – named a camp commander (and in villages they established encampments with commanders), they surrounded him with aides-de-camp, called people to rallies and swore them to Pavelić. The Italian command did not literally share the same views, but they rather strengthened their military, political and policing capabilities in order to ensure they had as much influence on the island as possible and become dominant in that way (not only on the island but also in inland NDH, as far as Karlovac in those days). They helped each party fight the other, both Croatian and Serbian extremists equally, Catholics and Orthodox, they

Event the smallest item in the agreement of this brave group of local Ustashas and outsiders was based on crime. They were aware of lawlessness under which they would arrest people to be brought to Slana; they were aware of the difficult road the prisoners would take across Velebit; they knew that their new organizations were not equipped with transportation vehicles and that prisoners would be tied up and brought on foot from Gospić to Karlobag; they agreed to put them in small, uncomfortable boats in Karlobag, because only those types of boats were available in neighbouring ports; being islanders, they knew that the prisoners would be brought to the

By comparing Ustashas’ confessions, statements from witnesses and other evidence concerning transportation of people from and to Velebit, it seems very clear that Ustashas were asking themselves: where to place these people and where to kill them, on Pag or on Velebit? How else we could explain why Ustashas moved the killing sites? Remember, they brought to the island people from Velebit, from Gospić or Jadovno, where the killings were a constant, and then they took some groups (how many?) from Pag and sent them to Velebit, where all of them were killed, whether next to the sea, on Oštrije, on the road to Jadovno and in Jadovno itself, or

On the following pages we are going to read the testimony of Josip Balaž, Joža, a Hungarian, now retired living in Daruvar. In his written statement from October 9, 1970, which is located in SUBNOR in Pag, comrade Balaž writes that he was born in 1912 in Goveđe Polje, Daruvar Municipality. At age of six he lost both of his parents. His father died in the First World War, while his mother, brother and sister died of Spanish flu. Later on Joža was working for villagers watching over their gees and pigs, and later on also their cattle. For this he was given some food and allowed to sleep in

The conversation was held in the offices of the Municipal Board of SUBNOR, in Pag, on October 9, 1979. Present were: Nikola Bistričić, President of Pag SUBNOR, Srećko Jeličić, Secretary of Pag SUBNOR, Slavko Maržić, President of Pag UBNOR and Professor Ante Zemljar. Before the conversation started comrade Josip Blaž presented a document granting him benefits for his service from June 6, 1941 to May 15, 1945. He also presented documents showing that he had been an active in trade unions from 1932 and a member of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia from 1937, and presented newspapers from that period writing about workers’ strikes. From these documents we could see

After one part of her life, which you can only see in your worst nightmare, and during which she lost her husband and a five-year-old girl, after going through different camp and countless fights that seemed far from reality, the witness got to Italy into a Partisan base. Here she gave her statement to Captain Katalinić on September 8, 1945 in the office of the Section 5 of the Base Command (Rijeka Archives, SLANA, 8/1, 2, 3). Her accurate and clear statement caused me a lot of headache. When I compared her statement to Dr. Radan’s I came across a lot of unclear issues that I could not surmount easily.

“My name is Nada Feureissen, born in Zagreb, maiden name Cernik-Čavle, married, mother of two, now living in Bari, Via Dante Aligieri 270/III k. On July 9, 1941 in Zagreb I was arrested by the Ustasha security service. At the same time my husband and my four-and-a-half-year-old child were also arrested. Police officers who came for us left my old mother at home because I gave them some money. We were held in Zagreb Assembly for 4 days. The head of the camp in the Assembly was Ustasha official Baraković, the head of the Jewish section. There were also several Ustashas in the camp who molested us, but I do

It is very strange, among other things, when for example Nada Feureissen says: “From Metajna we went to Slana on trabaccolo cargo ships. After that we boarded a sail ship and after half an hour reached a bay…” (Slana, Suha bay). For people who know this distance, it is clear that this is probably poor memory, because if you board a ship heading to Slana, it is unnecessary to change vessels since it is not a long distance. It is more interesting that she said they went into trabaccolo ships, so more than one. But if they changed vessels (from trabaccolos to a sail ship, although the trabaccolo is also

Radomir Vidas from Novalja on Pag as a witness gave the following statement in the Pag Town Command in 1945: “In July 1941 I was on my way home for a leave as a Domobran (soldier of the territorial army). From Otočac I went to Pag via Gospić. I wanted to travel to Karlobag in a post bus. Since the bus was not scheduled for that day I had to find another transport. While I was looking for transport I found out that an Ustasha truck is transporting prisoner to a camp on Pag. Several days before I found out there was a camp on Pag, but I had never