Revolutionary Hristo Tsonev-Latinetsa

Hristo Tsonev Kulaksazov, also known as Latinetsa (the Latin), was a Bulgarian national revolutionary, born in 1848 in the village of Kakrina in the Lovech district. He studied in his native village and emigrated to Serbia in the early 1860s, where he participated in the Second Bulgarian Legion in Belgrade between 1867 and 1868.

In Serbia he met Vasil Levski, whose associate he became. After the dissolution of the Second Bulgarian Legion, Tsonev lived briefly in Wallachia before settling in Lovech. There he built his house in the Drastene neighbourhood, where Levski frequently found shelter and support. Tsonev was known in the town by the nickname Latinetsa and became an active member of the Lovech Local Revolutionary Committee.

In 1872, on the committee's instructions, he rented the Kakrina inn for revolutionary purposes. In this connection, he was arrested together with Vasil Levski and Nikola Tsvyatkov on the ill-fated night of 27 December 1872 by the Turkish police from Lovech. He suffered torture in the prisons of Lovech and Tarnovo but did not disclose information about the committee led by Levski.

Tsonev was transferred to Sofia, where he was subjected to an investigation by the Internal Revolutionary Organisation. Before the Sofia Extraordinary Investigative Commission he behaved with dignity and admitted nothing. He was released on the guarantee of influential citizens of Lovech.

Hristo Tsonev Kulaksazov met his tragic end early, at the age of 35 in 1883. His early death and the subsequent investigation of the Kakrina episode by Zahari Stoyanov, Hristo Ivanov-Golemiya and Professor Paraskev Stoyanov prevented the preservation of his recollections.