Montenegro and World War I

On 25th August I got my stamp order from Montenegro, which included a maxicard and a stamp about World War I. The maxicard about the Battle of Mojkovac was issued on 9th February 2016 and the stamp about the Battle Cruiser Sankt Georg was issued on 25th January 2018.

The Kingdom of Montenegro entered World War I on 7th August 1914. After the war it became a part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.

After the Kingdom of Serbia was defeated by the Central Powers and after the remnants of the Serbian army had withdrawn through Montenegro and Albania to Italy and later to Corfu, the Austro-Hungarian Empire also turned towards Montenegro. At the end of the Montenegrin Campaign, that was fought between the 5th and the 17th January 1916, Montenegro was defeated and occupied by the Austro-Hungarian Empire. 

The Battle of Mojkovac was fought on 6th and 7th January and is probably the most famous battle of the campaign. Although the Montenegrin army won the battle, this could not prevent the final defeat, but still gave the Serbian army more time for their retreat.

The SMS Sankt Georg was an armored cruiser of the Austro-Hungarian Navy. On 1st February 1918 the Cattaro Mutiny began on this ship, that was later joined by sailors from around 40 other Austro-Hungarian ships in the Cattaro naval base. The sailors had grown weary of the war and the long periods of inactivity and demanded a better treatment, political change and an imminent peace, but already on 3rd February the mutiny was surpressed. The SMS Sankt Georg was decommissioned after the mutiny and awarded to Britain as a war prize after the war. In 1920 it was scrapped.