Bogdan Stojic
(Pending)
Born: 18 April, 1893
Died: 16 January, 1995
Biographical Summary:
My father Dr Bogdan Stojić, Serb Colonel, had fought in three wars: the Balkan war against Turkey, the Serbo-Bulgarian war and World War I. Bogdan was born in 1893 in Delnice in Croatia which was at the time part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. When World War I broke out, his medical studies in Graz, Austria were interrupted because he was conscripted as an Austro-Hungarian citizen and sent to the front. But unwilling to fight against his own people, he took a risk and crossed the frontline to join the Serbian Army in October 1914 and was sent to serve with the Russian Hospital in Niš. Following fierce attacks by the Austrian and German Armies, the Serbian Army was forced into retreat through Albania in November and December 1915, when thousands of Serbs died during the retreat from exhaustion and malnutrition and thousands more at Corfu. Instead of accepting the French Government’s offer of repatriation to continue his medical studies, Bogdan chose to serve in the Russian Imperial Army. For his bravery to care for the wounded under fire in Riga in July 1916, he was awarded the St George Cross twice. He continued his medical studies at Moscow University when on leave. During the Bolshevik revolution he was arrested for wearing the Imperial uniform, but released when he showed them his Serbian passport. He left Russia in March 1918 on an epic journey via Siberia, Vladivostok, Shanghai and Port Said back to the Salonika front. He completed his medical studies in Vienna in 1922 and married in 1932. Wold War II saw him in a POW camp where his mates were Australian, British and French doctors. He came to Sydney in 1965, was naturalised in 1971 and lived to a ripe age of almost 102, still seeing patients aged 101.
In 1973 Dr Bogdan Stojić came to live in Central Avenue, Mosman with his extended family. His surgery was at the same address. He was a member of the RSL and the Anzac Memorial Club. He regularly marched in the Anzac March with his POW mates.
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