Vukolaj Radonjić

Vukolaj Radonjić (Serbian Cyrillic: Вуколај Радоњић, 1765 – 29 May 1832) was the last Montenegrin guvernadur.

His training was completed in the noble Academy in Šklov (Belarus) in 1778, where he gained the title of kavalijer (Knight), and received the holy order of Ana. He married Stana Vukova Petrovic (Njeguši), about 1775. Still at the time of his father's, Jovan Radonjic term Vukolaj Radonjić served as acting guvernadur between 1798–1799, and as guvernadur was a member of the Montenegrin National Assembly, just like his paternal parallel cousin, clergyman, Stanko Radonjić. He was a nahija (district) judge from 1799 and was formally elected guvernadur on 15 May 1804, by the People Assembly, two years after the death of his father. On October 29, 1813 Vukolaj Radonjić along with Petar I Petrović-Njegoš and leaders of other districts signed the Agreement on the Declaration of union between Montenegro and Boka in Dobrota in the name of the whole of Montenegro and the Highlands (Brda). Vukolaj commanded a group of 3,000 soldiers in the Battle at the Fortress of Trinity (Kotor), which expelled Napoleon's soldiers.

He and his brother, Marko Radonjic, were charged with a variety of offenses, and Bishop Peter II Njegoš had returned General Montenegrin seal (which belonged to his grandfather the first Montenegrin guvernadur Stanislav Radonjic, and then his father guvernadur Jovan Radonjic). On 16 January 1832, they were brought to court and convicted to chains and imprisonment in the cave of the monastery in Cetinje. The cave was later called Guvernadurica, because Vukolaj was the first political prisoner in this prison. Later on, until the end of World War II the cave was used as a cell for mostly political prisoners. 32 members of Radonjić family were exciled from their family houses to the Austrian territory Kotor. 6 of them were immediately killed in their homes, because they did not want to leave. Their property was seized and divided, houses burned and levelled to the ground. Bishop Peter II Njegoš also demanded that the authorities of Kotor force that Radonjići sell their property in Boka, but the Kotor authorities refused to comply.

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