Fana Kochovska

Fana Kochovska
Born	July 27, 1927 Lavci, Bitola Municipality, Macedonia
Died	April 17, 2004(2004-04-17) (aged 76) Skopje, Macedonia
Organization	Yugoslav Partisans

Fana Kochovska - Cvetkovik (Lavci village, Bitola, July 27, 1927 - Skopje, April 17, 2004) was a Macedonian communist, fighter and national hero. She was the youngest named National Hero of Yugoslavia.^[1]

At less than 14 years of age she became a youth activist. In 1942 she was a partisan in the Bitola detachment "Goce Delchev" and a youth leader in the troop "Stiv Naumov". She participated in the February raid.

After liberation, she performed high social and public functions. She died on April 17, 2004 in Skopje.

Еarly life

She was born on July 27, 1927 in the village Lavci near Bitola in a poor family. She was less than three years old when her father went to work in America. Even in childhood, she had to help her mother do hard labor in the fields, to ensure their existence because her father's salary was not enough.

Second World War

After the invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, in the village Lavci there was strong party organization, where she worked as an active member of SKOJ. Bulgarian fascist occupiers managed to catch one member of SKOJ who behaved badly before the police - praising the work of the organization and its members. Fana was able to escape from the fascist police, who came to the village to find her, entered her house and abused her mother and grandmother.

Fana continued to work illegally. Soon after, before she was even fifteen, she went to the partisan unit "Goce Delchev". In the spring of 1944, she was part of a group of seven soldiers who had to stop production at a mine. The task was to attack bunkers maintained by German and Bulgarian fascists. The job was done, but Fana was hurt. Companions barely escaped from the enemy. They decided to leave her to be treated in the village. Fana refused to stay in the village, and continued to fight in the brigade.

During a Battle in the village Lavci in 1943, the commander Tosho Angelovski, a young striker Pande Haize and several others were killed. She hid near the village for about a month and a half with a group of partisans. They were surrounded by the Bulgarian patrols that were looking for them day and night, knowing that they were nearby. Fana was a participant in the February march in 1944, from Kožuf to Kozjak. She was a leader of the youth battalion "Stiv Naumov".

References

Used literature

• Narodni heroji Jugoslavije (book). "Mladost", Belgrade 1975.