Вътрешната западнопокрайнска революционна организация „Въртоп“
The Internal Revolutionary Organization of the Western Outlying District “Vurtop”

Summary/Abstract: Among the clandestine organizations not known to the general public was also the Internal Revolutionary Organization of the Western Outlying District “Vurtop” (VZRO). Formed in the Western (Bulgarian) Outlying Parts, occupied by Yugoslavia after November 6, 1920, it grew into a defender of the Bulgarian national spirit in these lands. This study is an attempt to throw more light on the essence, methods and goals of the Vurtop members. Throughout its existence the extraordinary measures for secrecy accompanying their activity were characteristic of them. In the years of its development “Vurtop” maintained close contacts both with organizations of the type of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO) and with the legal organization of the refugees from the Western Outlying Parts established in Sofia in 1924. The “Vurtop” members spoke with a sence of pride of their formation as independent and possessing its own original character. Their leader Ivan T. Gyoshev, however, was one of the most active leaders also of the legal organization of the Western Outlying Districts. The idea of an internal revolutionary organization emerged as soon as the terms of the Peace Treaty of Neuilly (1919) became known. In the “Vurtop” newspaper which began to be published it was reported that as from 1923 the organization had already been a fact. Data on that are discovered also on the pages of the Belgrade press where with unconcealed alarm was reported the expansion of the underground resistance in the Tsaribrod and Bosilegrad areas. Stronger activity was noticed, however, in the late 20s when the structure of Vurtop was built up. The open actions of the Vurtop members became more frequent, their culmination being the attempted assassinations in various Yugoslav towns. The differences of opinion among the leaders of Vurtop led to a decline in its activity. The change in the political situation in Bulgaria in May 1934 led also to the discontinuation of the activity of the clandestine organization of the Bulgarians of the Western Outlying Parts.

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