Stefan Stambolov (1854 - 1895)

Stefan Stambolov is the most enthusiastically praised and the most violently denounced politician in Bulgaria's modern history. Born in Turnovo in 1854, he made his way into political life after the liberation of Bulgaria. He started his career as a champion of national revival. He was a student at the Odessa Seminary, leader of the suppressed uprising in Stara Zagora in 1875, head of the 1876 uprising in the region of Turnovo. In the first post-liberation years he threw himself with equal energy and ambition into the struggle against the Treaty of Berlin, into the formation of a liberal party and into parliamentary debates. His resolution and his ability to distinguish the possible from the impossible turned him into the most influential and respected politician of the Principality of Bulgaria. He was the natural choice for a first regent during the brief interim preceding the selection of a new monarch. Stambolov was prime minister from 20 August, 1887 to 17 May, 1894. He was responsible for Bulgaria's modernization in economic, political, administrative and cultural aspects. He built a complex transport network, created laws which promoted agriculture, provided government protection for locally produced goods, and signed favorable trade contracts with the large European states. On the other hand, Stambolov's adversaries had much to blame him for: authoritarian rule, violent treatment of political opponents, persecution of the opposition. His purposefulness eventually led to a clash with the no less ambitious Tsar Ferdinand and sealed his political fate. He was now exposed to the vengeance of his enemies, and subjected to various indignities and persecutions; he was refused permission to leave the country, and his property was confiscated. On July 3 1895 he was attacked and barbarously mutilated by a band of Macedonian assassins in the streets of Sofia, and succumbed to his injuries three days later.