Draft:Damnjan Kotešanin

Damnjan Kotešanin also spelled in Serbian Дамњан Котешанин was an early revolutionary with the title of Harambaša who joined forces with Damnjan Nedić, Gligorije Nedić and Panta Damnjanović to fight the Turks very early on in the First Serbian Uprising. The four met the same fate on the same date along with the rest of 300 freedom fighters.

It all started when a kabadahija (one of the lesser janissary commanders), referring to the Turkish phrase kabadayı, a colloquial phrase for bullies of the Dahija by the name of Mula Nožina and Mehmed-pasha Vidajić, who previously to the insurrection, went to Bosnia to amass more than a thousand or so men with the intent of relieving the beleaguered Turks at Šabac, besieged by Serbian troops. Before they could do this, standing in their way are 200 Hajduks under the command of Đorđe Ćurčija near Čokešina. The smallness of their number even after Jakov Nenadović brought a reinforcement of 100 more bringing the total force to 300-strong Ćurčija still despaired: "A cloister burned to the ground," he said, "can be re-built a new, but a dead man cannot be brought back to life again." Jakov Nenadović understood better; that was not a question of the walls of the cloister, but of the continuation of the siege of one of the most important fortresses. "Think," Ćurčija replied to the young Hajduks, "that the seed of mankind will perish with you!" Ćurčija turned away enraged, abandoned the monastery, and rode into the mountains, leaving the leadership to Kotešanin, Damnjanović, and the Nedić brothers.

Nor could Jakov Nenadović persuade the others to undertake the defence of the walls. They were accustomed to fighting only in the forests and the mountains. "They would not remain blocked up, awaiting death like women," they said. However, they resolutely determined to wait upon a neighbouring height for their enemies, who were evidently five times as numerous as themselves -- a Thermopylae of Serbian Haiduks! It must not be supposed that they thus calmly awaited death without a prospect of relief; Jakov went to obtain further assistance; but before he could return, all was decided. The Hayduks surrounded on their hill, fought with the utmost courage from morning to night; until they had expended all their powder, and their guns, from frequent discharges, had become almost unserviceable. Many were killed and the rest, already wounded and crouching behind trees, fired only now and then. In the evening, the Turks, reinforced by fresh numbers attacked them with renewed force and killed every one of these brave men. Kabadahija Nosčina gained possession of Čokošina but discouraged by heavy losses he sustained, broke up his camp and returned where they came from with only a couple of hundred men. Šabac fell into Serbian hands and so did Čokošina. It became evident that the Serbian Hajduks did not die in vain, after all.