The Bloody Spring

The Bloody Spring is a locality and memorial fountain in Bulgaria's Balkan Mountains where Georgi Benkovski, the chief revolutionary organiser of the April Uprising, died. Situated three kilometres south of Ribaritsa's Kostina hamlet in the Teteven Balkan Mountains, the spring witnessed the voivode's tragic death on 15 May 1876 following betrayal near the river of the same name.
After the killing, Turkish soldiers washed the Apostle's severed head in the nearby spring. Some time later, the traitor Valyo, who had carried Benkovski's head impaled on a stake, placed an Orthodox cross he had made himself at the site of the voivode's death. Ten years after these events, Zahari Stoyanov, the historian of the April Uprising, carved the initials G.B. into a nearby tree to mark the commemorative site. The tree, however, was cut down during restoration in 1950.
Years later, on Neyko Azmanov's initiative, a tradition began of commemorating the anniversaries of Georgi Benkovski's death. Shelters have been provided nearby for those attending the commemorations, and the event includes a historical reenactment performed by local actors from Ribaritsa.