Stjepan Filipović

Stjepan "Stevo" Filipović (Cyrillic script: Стјепан "Стево" Филиповић) (27 January 1916 – 22 May 1942) was a Partisan who was executed during World War II and posthumously declared a National Hero of Yugoslavia in 1949.

Filipović was born in Opuzen, Croatia in the last days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Before the outbreak of the Second World War he lived in Mostar and Kragujevac, then both part of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. He joined the workers' movement in 1937, and the Communist Party of Yugoslavia in 1940. Filipović was arrested in 1939 and sentenced to a year in prison.

Filipović was in Valjevo with the Yugoslav Partisans by 1941. He was captured on February 24, 1942, by German forces and subsequently hanged in Valjevo on May 22 1942. Just prior to his execution, in front of the crowd who were there to watch the hanging, he shouted anti-fascist sentiments, as well as his support for the Yugoslav Partisans and Red Army. Supposedly because of this, he was hanged 15 minutes before the scheduled time.

The city of Valjevo has a monument dedicated to him, with a serbianized version of his name, "Stevan" Filipović". A monument was also erected in his home town of Opuzen in the 1980s, but was torn down in 1991.