We made a short stop in regional hub Kragujevac to recharge our Telenor sim cards. It lies in Central Serbia on the Lepenica River. Here at the beginning of the 19th century, Karadjordje led the first Serbian uprising against the Turks. It was the capital of Serbia from 1818 to 1841, during which time a high school, a theatre, a military school, and a printing press were established. The first newspaper in Serbia, Novine Srbske, was published there. In Šumarice in 1941 German military authorities executed 7,000 males between the ages of 14 and 70 from the area of Kragujevac and Kraljevo. Initial planning for the Šumarice massacre site to be turned into a 340-hectare memorial park began in Belgrade in 1953. However, of all the memorials built here at Šumarice, one above all others has become the de facto symbol of the memorial park. The sculpture officially titled “Monument to Executed Students” was situated directly on the site of the mass grave where the remains of the executed school children are interred. The sculpture is comprised of two large white concrete monoliths emanating from the ground forming a sharp “V” shape. On the faces of the sculpture can be seen faint impressions which represent the children and teachers who were executed at the site.
Parking location – Kragujevac: 44.008512N 20.915664E