Received: 2013-11-26 Original scientific article ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 DOI 10.19233/AH.2016.13 THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN LITTORAL (1940-1945) IN COMPARISON WITH CENTRAL SLOVENIA Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIC Archives of the Republic of Slovenia, Kongresni trg 1, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia e-mail: tadeja.tominsek-cehulic@gov.si Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ Institute of Contemporary History, Kongresni trg 1, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia e-mail: vida.dezelak-baric@inz.si ABSTRACT The aim of this paper is to present the demographic and the historical consequences of the World War II in Slovenia and specifically in the Slovenian Litoral. These consequences are indicated as well by the gender structure of the human losses, since around 90 % of all human losses are being male, and by the age structure as well, since of more than 97,700 human losses in Slovenia - representing a loss of the population in the amount of 6.5 % - the percentage of people younger than 25, is amounting to well over a third of all fatalities. This research has also shown a different dimension, since it has pointed out the WW II historical specifics of the Slovenian Litoral in comparison to the Central Slovenia. Key words: World War II, Slovenia, Slovenian Litoral, human losses of war, post-war violence, demography of war LA DEMOGRAFIA DELLA SECONDA GUERRA MONDIALE: IL LITORALE SLOVENO (1940-1945) A CONFRONTO CON LA SLOVENIA CENTRALE SINTESI Il saggio prende in esame le conseguenze della Seconda Guerra Mondiale in Slovenia, con particolare attenzione alle conseguenze demografiche che la guerra ebbe sulla Primorska (Litorale sloveno). La natura delle conseguenze demografiche si riflette, in-fatti, anche nella struttura delle vittime. Tra più di 97.700 vittime, che rappresentano la perdita del 6,5 % della popolazione della Slovenia nell'ultima guerra mondiale, almeno il 90 % delle vittime erano uomini. La struttura per età dei morti indica, invece, che i giovani con meno di 25 anni rappresentavano più di un terzo di tutte le vittime. Allo stes-so tempo l'intervento mette in luce le specificità della Primorska (Litorale sloveno) per 337 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 quanto riguarda il suo sviluppo storico e la struttura delle vittimie della guerra, nonché il segmento delle perdite demografiche. Parole chiave: II Guerra Mondiale, Slovenia, Litorale sloveno, morti, guerra, violenza post-bellica, demografia di guerra THE ETHICAL ASPECT Slovenia certainly experienced extensive violence during and immediately after World War II due to oppression coming from the occupying forces as well as internal conflicts as the war helped fuel the revolution and civil war. The civil conflict ended after the war, whereby the winning Communist side took massive revenge on those who had collaborated with the occupying forces. That gave rise to "real" victims and those that were left "unacknowledged". In the single-party system, the public memory of the "real" victims was welcomed and even indispensable as it served the communist state to legitimise its existence in light of its former resistance movement. However, any remembrance of the other victims was absolutely forbidden. In case of the "unacknowledged" victims, the conflict between non-existent public memory and intimate urge emerging in those specific environments the victims had come from, started to grow extensively after the war, finally surfacing in the early 1980s when the political environment started to show pluralistic tendencies, and especially in the 1990s after Slovenia had become an independent country. At that point, historical dialogues held at the academic level resulted in the state appointing several expert committees and supporting a few science projects dealing with the issues of war and post-war violence in Slovenia. In this way, the authorities attempted to encourage mutual tolerance in dialogues on the subject of casualties and the nature of World War II events in Slovenia, and also to free the dead from any tendencies of polarisation. Besides a science project on establishing the structure and identity of killed victims, carried out by the Institute of Contemporary History in Ljubljana (WW II Casualties' List, 2012),1 a commission has been appointed with the task to search for locations of "concealed" mass graves, and there was also a science project organised to interpret the symbols of public sites commemorating the victims of World War II and the post-war violence. The traumatic events taking place from 1941 to 1945 continue to affect the Slovenian society therefore the memory of victims from that period is still alive and the issue is still being thoroughly researched (Dežman, 1989; Okrogla miza, 1989; Žrtve druge svetovne vojne na Slovenskem, 1996). 1 This e-source is composed of the data acquired in many relevant monographs, further in the archive materials kept in Slovenian archive institutions: The Archives of Republic of Slovenia, The Regional Archives Koper (Capodistria), The Regional Archives Nova Gorica, The Historical Archives Ljubljana. Also many periodicals were taken into consideration: Goriški list, Jutro, Slovenski dom, etc. 338 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 Legend: 1. The Direct Effect of World War I 2. The Decline of Births During World War I 3. The Direct Effect of World War II 4. The Decline of Births during World War II 5."Baby boom generations" 6. The High Fertility Rates in the '70s 7. The Decline of Fertility 8. The Excess of Females over Males Chart 1: The Comparison of Population Pyramids of Slovenia in 1971 and 2008 (Statistical Office RS, 2012) THE DEMOGRAPHIC ASPECT This time we are presenting the results of the project of registering the fatalities during World War II and in the immediate post-war period, taking place at the Institute of 339 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 Contemporary History in Ljubljana from 1997 until its recent conclusion. The processing of all the documents collected has already been completed in 2012. But for now we would like to underline the Slovenian Litoral (the Primorska region).2 The issue of human losses is one of the important aspects of the research on wars, as the nature of wars is often assessed in terms of human losses and the radicalness of violence. Each war affects the population in various ways; the wars among others mark the post-war societies with deep emotional traumas, masses of refugees, homeless, disabled persons and orphans. If we look at the consequences of the wartime and post-war violence from the demographic point of view, these are still reflected in the Slovenian population pyramid (Statistical Office RS, 2012) in 1971, which can only broadly be referred to as a "pyramid" at all. Even at the first glance we can discern how the two World Wars have influenced the population of Slovenia, directly as well as indirectly. Probably at the time when it was drawing up the population pyramid, the Slovenian Statistical Office resorted to the information about the war casualties it had collected itself in the beginning of the 1960s and then communicated to the Yugoslav Statistical Office. According to this data, during the war Slovenia supposedly suffered 42,000 fatalities (excluding post-war violence). (The List of WW II Fatalities in Slovenia, 1964). This means that the indents representing the direct and indirect losses due to World War II are in fact even deeper, as in the context of the aforementioned project more than 97,700 wartime and post-war fatalities were identified. This time we shall focus our attention only on the direct and most severe consequences of the war: on the deaths due to wartime and post-war violence, even though the indirect consequences of wars have had a greater impact on the population structure. This impact is reflected in the pyramid as the indents caused by the diminishing birth rates caused by the war. These are the still evident consequences of World War II. Only World War I no longer actually affects the structure of the population pyramid (Statistical Office RS, 2012). These long-term demographic consequences are also indicated by the age structure of World War II casualties, since of more than 97,700 fatalities in Slovenia (WW II Casualties' List, 2012) - representing a loss of the population in the amount of 6.5 % - the percentage of people younger than 25, who had mostly failed to found a family before then, is high, amounting to well over a third of all casualties (1920-1945: 33,384 casualties). We should underline that we failed to acquire the information about the birth year for more than 15,800 persons, and the percentage of youth among these is certainly similar to the said percentage. However, the issue of casualties of war is not only demographic in nature. Namely, for a long time the historical profession has been interested in the critical scientific analysis of this issue, especially after the new circumstances have arisen after the attainment of Slovenian independence. The nature of wars is most often in fact evaluated with regard to 2 Because of the methodological approach on the represented project the term Slovenian Litoral in this case defines only the territory between the so called "Rapallo border" after the World War I and present-day state border. 340 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 the number and structure of fatalities, even if they also result in a large number of people affected in other ways. In order to understand the implications and limitations of victimology research, which collects precise personal information, information about wartime participation, as well as information about the destinies of individual people, we should first look at its methodological foundations. In view of the complete Slovenian victimology research, the establishment of the number of fatalities in the Primorska region, identification of the relations between the individual groups of victims and their placement into the historical context outline the peculiarities of the Primorska region historical development. The Primorska region war demography has been affected primarily by two facts. First we should mention the state legal framework, in which this region ended up after World War I, since it influenced the region's subsequent historical development and, last but not least, the structure of casualties. However, the specific nature of the Primorska region has also been defined by its geostrategic (and geopolitical) position. The fact that after World War I this region became an integral part of the Kingdom of Italy also gave rise to methodological problems with our research. In the research it was expected that such problems would primarily stem from the population makeup, which was, in certain places, nationally mixed, also as a result of the Italianisation of names during the period of fascism. However, these issues had already been partially overcome in the context of the research already conducted, as well as resolved in the official state registry documents. In fact, the research we are hereby presenting has not encompassed the territory as far as the Slovenian ethnic borders. Instead (especially due to the possibility of carrying out the research at the Institute for the History of the Resistance in Udine) it stopped at what is today the Slovenian-Italian border (Caduti, dispersi e vittime civili, 1990 and 1991). The aforementioned research - a mix of historical and victimology methods - is still based on historical materials, that is, on relevant publications, periodical press, archive sources and lists of victims, drawn up by various civil societies, for example by the Veterans Association for the Values of the National Liberation Struggle (Združenje borcev za vrednote NOB) and by the New Slovenian Commitment (Nova slovenska zaveza), and also on the unpublished lists compiled by professional historians (regarding Primorska Region: Tone Ferenc, Nataša Nemec, Nevenka Troha)3 as well as published lists of the amateur historians (Vilhar, Klun, 1967). As far as archive materials used for the part of the research focusing on the Primorska region are concerned, they originate from Slovenian archives, since the financial resources did not enable us to explore foreign archives. These are mostly secondary sources, for example individual registrations of fatalities with the State Commission for the Determi- 3 The most important unpublished lists of World War II human losses in Primorska Region used for the research were mostly compiled by professional historians, namely Tone Ferenc: Human Losses of WW II in Primorska Region; Nataša Nemec: The List of the Italian Deportees from the Province of Gorizia; Nevenka Troha: The List of The Arrested and The Deported Italians From the Part of the Province of Trieste, 1945-1950. 341 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 nation of Crimes Committed by the Occupying Forces and Their Collaborators (Komisija za ugotavljanje zločinov okupatorjev in njihovih pomagačev - KUZOP), listing almost 8,000 names of war casualties in the Primorska region. The lists of names of war casualties, compiled by the Yugoslav Statistical Office in Belgrade in 1964, are also essential (The List of WW II Fatalities in Slovenia, 1964). These official lists include more than 42,000 names for Slovenia, of these more than 3,800 for the Primorska region. The lists primarily include the names of fatalities caused in this region by the fascist and subsequently German occupation authorities, while in order to study the fatalities suffered by the opposing side, of the archive materials the information provided by the security and police bodies of the partisan movement (Security Intelligence Service, National Guard and Department for the Protection of People) as well as by certain fragmentary archive collections (of the Italian Quaestorship in Tolmin and the partisan military judiciary) have proved to be most relevant. In the research this historical approach has been importantly complemented by the official registry documents, namely by death and birth registers in The Registry Offices in Ajdovščina, Koper (Capodistria), Nova Gorica, Ilirska Bistrica, Sežana, Idrija and Tolmin. As we have looked at the issue of casualties in the Slovenian Littoral and Istria, we have especially been able to solve the dilemmas with regard to the identities of the fatalities, brought about due to the Italianisation of names, because the post-war official bodies had already translated individual Italianised names or even whole registers. However, these documents point out a certain specific feature of the Primorska region, originating from the specific way in which the Italian civil register services have operated or how the Italian death registers have been kept. The basic problem involved in the verification of the identity and structure of victims at the "Italian" civil registers was that regular entries into death registers - that is, entries made by the authorities immediately after the deaths of persons - did not state the cause of death, nor the birth date of the deceased, only their age. Therefore the comparison of our information with the aforementioned civil registers has been limited. It has only been possible in cases when the identity of the victim was undisputed. If we look at this problem from another angle, such entries into death registers have also enabled the authorities to cover up crimes taking place in the time of fascism and war. Death registers in themselves are a very dynamic source, since entries have been made on the basis of various documents: communications from military authorities, testimonies of family members, and testimonies of other contemporaries. However, thanks to the birth registers the identities of those fatalities, who had not been entered into the death registers, could be confirmed. Perhaps the most important aspect about the situation is that the official entries in the birth registries - for example those with regard to marriages or deaths in the post-war period - have made it possible for us to realise that the persons entered into the death lists had actually survived the war. Among other things the research of registry documents has also revealed the positive aspects of temporal distance. Primarily this aspect is related to the attainment of Slovenian independence and democratisation of the political life as well as to a range of legal acts addressing the compensation for victims of wartime and post-war violence, which Slovenia has adopted since the 1990s. As it was, families have had to have their killed, 342 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 deceased and missing family members officially proclaimed dead in judicial proceedings. On the basis of court orders, as a rule stating the fate of individual people, these casualties have been entered into death registers. In this manner we have acquired a lot of information about victims, which could previously not be found in the archive materials. It is true that many people have been proclaimed dead on the basis of oral statements; therefore the matter had to be approached in a critical manner. Even before the research took place, it was clear which of the casualties were representative for the post-war authorities. However, a large number of fatalities remained "outside" - the authorities failed to "identify their names" or did not pay (enough) attention to them, although they were not "politically connotated". On one hand these have been "ignored casualties" from the ranks of the anti-partisan camp, while on the other hand such victims also include children, victims of bombings and various (war-related) accidents. In cases when we identify these people on the war damage application forms, which had been the basis for lists drawn up by the State Commission for the Determination of Crimes Committed by the Occupying Forces and Their Collaborators, the piece of information about their deaths has frequently been lost already in the collective lists of names prepared by the same Commission. All that is left is a statistical number. This is the very aspect where the significance of civil registers and methodological approaches aimed at the identities of the victims has been confirmed once again. THE HISTORICAL ASPECT4 Despite all research problems and the fact that unfortunately the list of names cannot be perfect for many reasons, with regard to the Primorska region a database of 14,015 fatalities caused by the war and the post-war violence taking place between 10 June 1940 and the end of January 1946 has been drawn up. In approximately 9.100 cases the deaths could also be confirmed in the civil registers (death registers and partly also birth registers). Therefore the collected data is sufficient for the purpose of establishing a victimology overview, addressing the number and structure of fatalities as well as indicating the relations between individual groups of these fatalities. This in itself enables a certain historical analysis. War Related Deaths Number Loss of Population (%) Slovenia 97.720 6.5 Primorska region 14.015 5.4 Table 1: The Number of World War II and post-war Human Losses in Slovenia and Primorska region (WW II Casualties' List, 2012) 4 The statistical data presented in the paragraph "The Historical Aspect" are based on aforementioned research, carried out by the Institute of Contemporary History in Ljubljana (WW II Casualties' List, 2012). 343 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 The list includes everyone who lived in the territory of what is today the Republic of Slovenia during World War II. This research does not identify casualties among Italians immigrating to the Primorska region during the fascist rule. Therefore in these cases it resorts to the research conducted by other historians, who estimate that in the autumn of 1943 roughly 300 (Novak, 1992, 135) of these Italians were killed, while immediately after the war they represent more than a half of 1600 fatalities that were caused by the post-war Yugoslav occupation authorities (Pirjevec, 2012, 117-118; Troha, 1999, 9-10, 43-60, 67-71; Kacin Wohinz, Pirjevec, 2000, 121). In this manner, during and immediately after World War II the Primorska region lost more than 14,000 citizens or as much as 5.4 % of its population, which is just below the established Slovenian average. Similarly as in other Slovenian territories, in the Primorska region war got increasingly intense every year, and this was reflected in the number and structure of victims. Year of Death Number of Human Losses 1940 27 1941 139 1942 718 1943 3.665 1944 5.278 1945 3.474 1946 46 Table 2: Human Losses of Slovenian Litoral Regarding to Time of Death (WWII Casualties' List, 2012) After Italy had joined the war on 10 June 1940, 27 fatalities were established in the same year. These were mostly men drafted into the regular and other detachments of the Italian Army. Later, in 1941, the number of fatalities climbed to as many as 139. In 1942 as many as 718 fatalities were identified: 77 casualties among the political activists and fighters of the nascent partisan resistance should be added to the 440 fatalities among Italian soldiers. Then we should mention the 84 unarmed civilians, mostly supporters and collaborators of the partisan movement, retaliated against by the fascist authorities. Finally we should also underline 25 people, shot at that time by the partisan units. Supposedly throughout the most of the year 1942 these units fought against people, who were mostly immigrant Italians or suspected and actual confidants among the natives. Towards the end of the same year the situation tensed, and the regional Party leadership started leaning towards retaliating against the political opponents of the communists, which was a fact later criticised by Edvard Kardelj himself. In the year of 1942 a few people, mostly 344 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 hailing from Brkini, were identified as persons who died in concentration camps. The following wartime years could be referred to as years of total war, as in 1943 3,665 fatalities were identified; in 1944 5,278 fatalities were identified; and in 1945 3,474 fatalities were identified. Of these persons at least 167 natives were allegedly killed after the war (including autochthonous Italians and those immigrant Italians - 53 of them - who married native Slovenians and staid in this region). The victims included at least 40 Home Guard members from the Primorska region and a majority of the 43 members of the Italian collaboration and certain German units. After the war at least 183 persons died due to the consequences of wartime violence. The structure of fatalities - we are referring to the damage and relationship between the individual groups of victims - illustrates the nature of World War II in the Primorska region very clearly. The number of fatalities still point at armed persons, taking part in various military and police formations - this conclusion is clearly evident from 8,351 vic- Category War related deaths (Primorska included) Percentage of all war related deaths (%) Unidentified unit 11.991 12 Partisan movement 31.692 32 Civilians 25.259 26 Home Guards 14.004 14 German uniformed units 10.988 11.5 Italian Royal Army 1.315 1.3 Hungarian Army 314 0.3 Milizia volontaria antisicurezza 817 0,8 Slovenian Chetniks 456 0,5 Yugoslav Royal Army 371 0,4 Slovenian Police unites under German control 190 0,2 Resistance in Europe 119 0,1 Allied Armies 73 0,07 Other 528 0,5 Table 3: The Structure and Number of Human Losses of WW II in Slovenia - including Primorska region (WW II Casualties'List, 2012) 345 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 tims (59.6 %). The largest number of victims - 6,628 - was determined among the members of the partisan units (fighting at home as well as at the former Yugoslav territory). Together with the politically active members of the movement (the so-called activists of the Liberation Front), the losses of the partisans represent more than half of all the casualties and a loss of 2.7 % of the region's population. Only in the Gorenjska region these losses are higher, amounting to a loss of 2.9 % of the population. Victims among unarmed civilian population follow with a little under a third; however its 4,101 fatalities point at the totality of wartime violence. If we take into account that for 1,093 casualties we were unable to ascertain their role in the war, we can establish that quite a few of these people could have been civilians. Therefore the violent nature of World War II in the Primorska region is obvious, since the percentage of killed, dead and missing civilian population climbs to more than a third of all casualties. With few discrepancies this correlates with other Slovenian regions. Only one other group included more than 1,000 casualties - men drafted in the departments of the Royal Italian Army. There 1,307 men fell, were killed or died in war prison camps, special labour battalions, i.e. the so-called military internment (Čermelj, Perini, 2005, 38-45), or due to other war consequences. Category War related deaths Percentage of all war related deaths (%) Unidentified unit 1.093 7.8 Partisan movement 7.074 50.6 Civilians 4.101 29.2 Home Guards 252 1.8 Italian Royal Army 1.307 9.3 Italian partisan movement 62 Resistance in Europe 22 Allied Armies 43 TIGR 7 Other 35 Table 4: The Structure and Number of Human Losses of WWII in Primorska region (WW II Casualties' List, 2012) Due to the effects of wartime violence in the Primorska region the environments where the fascist or Nazi violence manifested itself most prominently suffered the most 346 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 severe consequences. It had all started with the arrest of 300 Primorska region antifascists in 1940 and the related 2nd Trieste Trial, which, a year later, dealt a difficult blow to the pre-war political associations between Slovenians in the region. We are also referring to offensive operations, undertaken by the fascist and later even more violent German occupation authorities against the partisan movement (Ferenc, 1983, 661), in order to establish control over the region. We should also at least underline the autumn of 1943 and the first months of 1945, as well as all the other violence caused against the civilian population (special court proceedings, hostages, internment of the population, repression against offensive operations etc.). Where this sort of violence has been contributed to by the internal (inter-Slovenian) conflict, the consequences suffered by the population were even harder. Municipiality Numb. of Human Losses Loss of Population (%) Brda 469 8.9 Miren-Kostanjevica 461 8.8 Komen 467 8.7 Cerkno 542 8.6 Tolmin 1168 7.1 Nova Gorica 1637 6.7 Sežana 657 6.7 Idrija 956 6.7 Ajdovščina 1030 6.5 Kanal 509 6.5 Ilirska Bistrica 1091 6.1 Vipava 404 5.8 Other communities / Less than 5 % Piran 272 Less than 2 % Izola 146 1.6 Table 5: World War II Human Losses in Local Communities of Primorska region (WWII Casualties'List, 2012) 347 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 L* tu« 'li priti i*M Cre. 3kupoa iiMk« K.ft.1 1 k »S in atijijt Storilci Opoafea 13 j 11 i? pntip t mUlitl1? j ^flllltl. 1 u>rl na poaladlc*n. j 1945 22 1 11 | pratap « ;nttl«t( 33« »Hi t a i 3 lin H 0 t I l 1 2 i C in #11 yri— Mlini L-k op <16 tt«T. t^Ttdtnl t t r 1 i « 1 ¿«3 ■ t. •tneltlt * JtaliJJo. It»llj*nl 1943 ¿73 fll.t^tcillt v Italijo " fAVüUO '■S'.'iiWi IX 0CKFIBDZUJ1UE SSjfllAvj-JtatB SIK Stlu tU pri-' blifcnl «r* L urufl veil ar« fa Erl t»» uDitlh rltilld 1943 21 2 i«klici :tt(l. 1344 5 fOSIM Dato.« «11 pri- P a * 'f. * i h _ - _ . , _ . ti li tnl t»! nI ft .'Orp. JOI Tppji 1943 11 M»l ab. U ■ 1945 3 Fig. 1: Statistical data on war violence for the Brda district (ARS, AS 1818, t.e. 225, a.e. 2964)5 5 Statistical data on war violence for the districts are based on Statistical data of the State Commission for the Determination of Crimes Committed by the Occupying Forces and Their Collaborators of the Presidency of the Slovenian National Liberation Committee (Statistični podatki Komisije za ugotavljanje zločinov okupatorjev in njihovih pomagačev pri Predsedstvu Slovenskega narodnoosvobodilnega sveta) (ARS, AS 1818, t.e. 225, a.e. 2964). 348 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 B » 0 S I p ? ¥ 0 L J I ¿.m j i 0 itroftj*: TrE fifco. • Lutum »11 pvi- 91**110 * rte» 3 t or 1 1(1 t 1041 do 194% it uptrelj- oi «:iell do »®fti fobiti * totbrsl Tt»llj**i< V4} do S* Bitrtljeai cutvcl dO »r?tl 1or«l. 1<*4*------ 3 uitr' lji*ni ,■ i c J i L i r 0 V JrtuH fll prl — Cfifl 1f*T ttM. IttTe: tori 1 c li 1041 do int! tcrllclt 30©»*»* i ,Q4 1 dO '' 75 ¥ ItHliJO ltftlljMl * tflfcorfia uurlo ¿. >04 "do ' '5. 'ea T lpt1 jO In D4TC1 "TMS B t' It I 11. jI * 0 B 1 L I At. J J A Uetiim ril pribil Srni *t«,wbi"lj . 1 rrnjh! r" • ppii tori 1 e 1 J 11) 1 do 1c tj« 1 r Italijo prt« It"11jeol, tPfiel * U, P H 1 B I J. K 0 V t 1 0 flftOttir *Ji pri-Mllti ffu: t 0 r 1 1 c i : Knkloo deloi T943 d0 7Ö0 K t "O i Jfor-acjr }fit4o*t don.< in t &«irfiljo. P R I j I i i 1 ; I T V DntciB nil pri — tiliini ins. ^terilos t 0 r i 1 c i ( od*'-rietit 1941 do 1943 104 « do s I ten Jeni 1? MRI » Itiliio, k#H* 'Hr.:, mi ic AW.IK r, tC 11. 0/ H PIK i,n' ' p«f i 3 Jt^IlOT* i« U«P0da >r*db. . t 0 r 1 1 e 1 * i''4l do >ept. &<} 1943 do if'45* y>r »CKi, Fig. 2: Statistical data on war violence for the Koper (Capodistria) district (ARS, AS 1818, t.e. 225, a.e. 2964) 349 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 Such an internal conflict took place especially in the Gorizia region, where the radical Catholic camp surrounding Janko Kralj, following the Ljubljana policy of the Slovenian People's Party, was even stronger. The elements of the revolutionary violence became more and more evident, and after the Italian capitulation the formation of the Primorska Home Guard, operating under the German controle, took place. At that time the internal conflicts, especially in the Gorizia region, developed into armed conflicts between the conflicting Slovenian camps: partisans and anti-partisans. Despite that, in the Primorska region - especially due to the Slovenian experience with fascism, Slovenian anti-fascist disposition, the calming role of the Primorska region centre and the importance this region represented to the communists - this internal conflict did not culminate to such extents as, for example, in the Ljubljana Province (Mlakar, 1982, 7-16, 21-37; Mlakar, 1997, 325-334; Godesa, 2001, 65-75; Pelikan, 1997, 21-49; Bajc, 2000, 91-146; Podbersic, 2011). Therefore the established proportion of fatalities of the aforementioned conflict was lower here as in central Slovenia. Including the immediate post-war period the partisan formations retaliated against at least 516 civilians and 225 armed adherents to counter-revolution (Home Guard and Slovenian Chetniks). In independent or joint actions with occupation forces, the latter caused 565 deaths among the partisans and their political activists, as well as 96 civilian casualties. All of these people represent a 10.7 % share of all the casualties, while only in the Ljubljana Province the interwar victims of the conflict among Slovenians (5,946) represent 18.4 % of all the dead; in addition to those Ljubljana Province experienced another 9.952 victims of the post-war retributions, who were mostly Home Guards. Similarly as elsewhere, the male population in the Primorska region suffered the most, as the war was still mostly a matter of men. Namely, we have established 12,591 casualties among men, representing almost 90 % of all the casualties in the Primorska region. Largely the Primorska region casualties - as is the case all around Slovenia - involved people, among whom many had not (yet) created a family or who could conceivably have a few children more. Among these casualties, until the year 1900 from a few ten to a maximum of 100 casualties were born per year of birth. Meanwhile, between the years of 1901 and 1907 from 200 and 300 casualties were established per individual years of birth. Between 1908 and 1915 we have established between 300 and 400 casualties per individual year of birth, while those who were born towards the end of World War I were a bit less prominently represented among the casualties, as up to 205 casualties per individual birth year were established. However, as of 1920 people most severely affected by the war started to be born. Until 1925 between almost 500 to almost 700 casualties have been established each year. As it is, among the casualties we have indicated 5,241 single persons (mostly young), 1,106 underage casualties, while for 3,941 casualties we were unable to determine their marital status. However, for these persons we are able to predict they were unmarried. These data make us suspect that after the war the Primorska region had to face severe demographic consequences. This research has also shown a different dimension - all the locations where the people of Primorska have lost there lives. As Italian soldiers they fought from Africa to the vastness of the former Soviet Union. Most of them died in special labour battalions in 350 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 Fig. 3: Monument to the Exiles in Third Reich from Community Komen, where 17 people died (photo: Tadeja Tominsek Cehulic, May 2016) 351 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIC & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 Year of Birth Numb. of Human Losses (Females and Males) Year of Birth Numb. of Human Losses (Females and Males) Unknown Year of Birth 1592 1920 492 Born before 1900 2132 1921 573 1900 174 1922 556 1901 205 1923 482 1902 202 1924 682 1903 215 1925 641 1904 235 1926 482 1905 231 1927 407 1906 231 1928 208 1907 249 1929 82 1908 300 1930 42 1909 342 1931 31 1910 291 1932 27 1911 323 1933 31 1912 415 1934 33 1913 376 1935 21 1914 367 1936 25 1915 308 1937 22 1916 205 1938 26 1917 205 1939 23 1918 197 1940-1945 70 1919 350 Table 6: The Number WWIIHuman Losses in Slovenian Litoral by the Year of Birth (WW II Casualties' List, 2012) Italy; further in the German concentration camps all around Europe; in the Allied prison camps in Africa and even India. As members of overseas and other partisan units they have perished in the Balkans, but most of them have been lost in the war back home. In the territory of what is today Slovenia, 8,319 people from the Primorska region have lost 352 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 their lives, another 1,226 of them in Italy, 1,158 in Germany, 1,008 in the territory of the former Yugoslavia, and 382 in the former Soviet Union. In comparison with the rest of Slovenia, perhaps in the Primorska region - in view of the structure of the victims - the following fact may be most evident: that the partisan movement lost at least 7.074 people, what amounts to as much as a half of all the casualties (50.6 %), while in this case the proportion established for Slovenia amounts to approximately one third (32 %). Meanwhile, in the Primorska region a few more civilian casualties have been identified - 29.2 % of all casualties, in comparison with the Slovenian percentage of 26 %. Perhaps the reasons for this could be found in the escalation of the resistance since 1943, as well as in the fact that the demobilised Italian soldiers have been known to join the Oveseas Brigades (Bajc, 2002, 182-196, 215-219, 226, 228, 285, 292-294; Uršič, 2014) and contribute to the liberation taking place all the way from Dal-matia to Trieste (Vilhar, Klun, 1969; Klun Gošnik, 1984). After 1943 the struggle for the Primorska region, undertaken by the partisan movement, began. However, the geostrate-gic location of this region had contributed to the fact that all of the retreating army forces, collaborating with the German occupation units in the Balkans, gathered here. This even intensified the military situation and caused harm to the local population. Furthermore, in the Primorska region the circumstances of the total war, blurring the dividing line between the hinterlands and the front, were most obvious during the German occupation, as the fascist wartime violence resulted in approximately 1,100 fatalities (repression during military offensives, reprisals, confinement for political suspects, internation of people in concentration camps, special court proceedings etc.), but the German occupiers themselves killed at least 7,696 Primorska inhabitants. In 3,048 cases these were civilians. Of these at least 1,347 civilians died or were killed in German concentration camps or due to their consequences. Furthermore, purges during offensive operations and other forms of repression claimed another 1,321 lives. Thus - as elsewhere in Slovenia - the intention to commit an ethnocide against Slovenians was expressed clearly. We would also like to point out that all those war and post-war events (post war violence, emigrations, deportations of the German nationals etc.) caused a great demographic loss in Slovenia, which was no less than around 146.000-150,000 people (Vodopivec, 2005). Nevertheless, present-day Slovenian deliberations about the character of World War II in Slovenia still burden social relationships, especially when dealing with the dimensions of the issues pertaining to victims of the internal struggle among Slovenians during the occupation and with the retributions undertaken in its aftermath (Žajdela, 2011). Among the other goals with the presented - demographic in nature - project this gap tried to be narrowed. 353 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 DEMOGRAFIJA DRUGE SVETOVNE VOJNE: SLOVENSKO PRIMORJE (1940-1945) V PRIMERJAVI Z OSREDNJO SLOVENIJO Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ Arhiv Republike Slovenije, Kongresni trg 1, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenija e-mail: tadeja.tominsek-cehulic@gov.si Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ Inštitut za novejšo zgodovino, Kongresni trg 1, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenija e-mail: vida.dezelak-baric@inz.si POVZETEK V prispevku so orisane posledice druge svetovne vojne na Primorskem, pri čemer so upoštevane smrtne žrtve vojne. Demografske posledice so še vidne v prebivalstvenih piramidah Slovenije. Statistični urad je zanje verjetno uporabil podatke o številu vojnih žrtev, ki jih je zbral na začetku 60. let. Glede na te podatke je Slovenija utrpela 42.000 žrtev. Danes pa vemo, da je projekt Inštituta za novejšo zgodovino ugotovil več kot 97.700 vojnih in povojnih žrtev v Sloveniji. Ugotovitev števila smrtnih žrtev, določitev razmerja med posameznimi skupinami žrtev in njihova umestitev v slovenski zgodovinski kontekst izkažejo posebnosti razvoja Primorske. Državno-pravni okvir, v katerem se je ta znašla po prvi svetovni vojni, in geopolitični položaj, sta vplivala na njen bodoči zgodovinski razvoj ter na strukturo vojnih žrtev. Seznam smrtih žrtev sicer ne more biti popoln. Za Primorsko obsega 14.014 imen. ki pomenijo 5,4 % izgubo prebivalstva. To je sicer manj kot slovensko povprečje (6,5 %). Izstopa pa podatek, da predstavljajo žrtve med pripadniki partizanskega gibanja na Primorskem več kot 50 % delež vseh žrtev, medtem ko v slovenskem povprečju 32 %. Kako težke so bile demografske posledice te vojne za Slovenijo in Primorsko, nakazujejo podatki, da je bilo vsaj 90 % žrtev moških, mlajši od 25 let pa so predstavljali več kot tretjino vseh žrtev. Razmerja med posameznimi skupinami smrtnih žrtev, povzročitelji smrti, naraščanje nasilja, starostna in spolna struktura žrtev pa omogočajo tudi natančnejšo identifikacijo narave druge svetovne vojne na Slovenskem. Ključne besede: druga svetovna vojna, Slovenija, Primorska, smrtne žrtve, vojna, povojno nasilje, vojna demografija 354 ACTA HISTRIAE • 24 • 2016 • 2 Tadeja TOMINŠEK ČEHULIČ & Vida DEŽELAK BARIČ: THE WORLD WAR II DEMOGRAPHY: SLOVENIAN ..., 337-356 SOURCES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY ARS, AS 1818 - Arhiv Republike Slovenije, Ljubljnaa (ARS), fond Pokrajinski narodnoosvobodilni odbor (AS 1818). 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