Qualla: St. Nedelya Church Bombing

St. Nedelya Church Bombing: Introduction

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. Holy Thursday, 16 April 1925. The funeral of General Konstantin Georgiev was filling St. Nedelya Cathedral in central Sofia with the country's political and military elite - generals, ministers, mayors, and the families who had come to mourn alongside them. Two days earlier, the general had been shot in the street as he walked toward another church with his granddaughter at his side. His funeral, the bombers calculated, would draw exactly the people they wanted to kill. At 15:20, twenty-five kilograms of explosives concealed above the south column of the main dome detonated. The dome collapsed inward onto the congregation. By the time the dust settled, 213 people were dead and roughly 500 wounded - the deadliest terrorist attack in European history until Air India Flight 182 sixty years later.

Image: CC BY-SA 3.0

St. Nedelya Church Bombing: The Plot Hidden in the Attic

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Agence Rol. Agence photographique (commanditaire), Public domain. The plan came from the Military Organisation of the Bulgarian Communist Party, an underground arm fighting for survival after the failed September Uprising of 1923 had been crushed and the party banned in 1924. By 1925 the Bulgarian government was systematically dismantling the B...

Image: Agence Rol. Agence photographique (commanditaire) | Public domain

St. Nedelya Church Bombing: The Holy Thursday Service

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Agence Rol. Agence photographique (commanditaire), Public domain. Bishop Stefan, the future Bulgarian Exarch, led the service. Forged invitations on behalf of the Association of Reserve Officers had been sent out to swell attendance. The coffin was originally placed beneath the rigged column, but the crowd was so large the bearers shifted it fo...

Image: Agence Rol. Agence photographique (commanditaire) | Public domain

St. Nedelya Church Bombing: The Reprisal

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Martial law was declared that night. What followed has its own death toll. Over the next two weeks, roughly 450 people were executed without trial in a wave of killings carried out by the Military Union with the government's quiet approval. The dead included people who had nothin...

Image: Unknown author | Public domain

St. Nedelya Church Bombing: What the Cathedral Holds

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Agence Rol. Agence photographique (commanditaire), Public domain. St. Nedelya was rebuilt; it stands today on the same square in central Sofia, the dome restored, the city flowing around it as the city always had. A plaque inside lists the victims of the bombing. The cathedral is again working - weddings, funerals, ordinary services - and most ...

Image: Agence Rol. Agence photographique (commanditaire) | Public domain