Revolutionary Gerasim Ognyanov

Gerasim Ognyanov Petkanchin was a Bulgarian revolutionary and active participant in the movement to liberate Macedonia and the Adrianople region. He was born in 1885 in the town of Bansko.

Ognyanov began his education at the Military School in Sofia but left to complete the American school in Samokov. During the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising he joined Yurdan Stoyanov's detachment. Later he became a member of Petar Samardzhiev's detachment in the Tikvesh region.

In 1907 Ognyanov was appointed Maleshevo district voivode and organised his own detachment there. He engaged in trade in Thessaloniki after the end of the Hürriyet. In August 1909 he represented Maleshevo at the congress founding the People's Federative Party (Bulgarian Section).

Ognyanov was known for his disagreements with Yane Sandanski and opposed his leadership. In 1909 he was the target of an unsuccessful assassination attempt in Thessaloniki. According to testimony, at the outbreak of the First Balkan War, Ognyanov and another revolutionary, Angel Tomov, crossed the front line and joined Todor Alexandrov's detachment. He was, however, killed by that same detachment on suspicion of belonging to the terrorist organisation Red Brothers.

Gerasim Ognyanov Petkanchin died near Lake Ardzhan during the First Balkan War.