Krste Misirkov was elected as President of the group for the following reasons: he was one of the founders of the group; he had graduated from the history-philology faculty; he had submitted two "referats" (lectures) - one on Krali Marko, the Bulgarian national "hero", and the other on the ethnical composition of the Macedonian population, as outlined by the findings of B Koncheff, who concludes that Macedonia is a Bulgarian country. Through these two lectures he made an excellent impression amongst us, even though we knew that his high school education was a Serbian one.
We knew that he was born in "C. Pela (Postol)" located in the heart of the "Vardarjata", the population of which stretches to the walls of Thessalonika and is pure Bulgarian. We also knew that his place of birth was next to the place of birth of "Archimandrite" Pavel Konikowski , who during the middle of the nineteenth century use to read from the Bible in Bulgarian, although the Bible was written in Greek. The news of the reading of the Bible in Bulgarian spread to all villages around. Nevertheless the village "Postol" remained until the end of the nineteenth century under the Greek (Voden) Metropolitan, who was tolerated by the Turkish administration in Enijevardar. So the young Misirkov received his primary education in a Greek school. Later on he has been persuaded by the Serbian "propaganda" which has penetrated a few families in Enijvardar, to receive his secondary (high school) education in Belgrade. After that he has been sent to Petersburg to receive his university education (history and philology).
Due to the variety of his education Misirkov's character was somehow labile. In his "eeriness" he liked to associate with people of influence. Before and after being elected as President of the group, he would come to me in the dormitory and have discussions. I had the impression that he was not familiar with the differences between the "Vrhovistite" (BMOK) and the "Centralistite" (BMRO). He insisted that the group correspond with BMOK in Sofia. During the "Shipchen ceremonies", on Misirkov's insistence, the first letter of the group was sent to BMOK in Sofia. But when the BMOK started the autumn uprising, against the advice of BMRO, the disagreements between him and his associates and my associates, developed into open conflict. The correspondence was carried out by him and signed by Krasnikov, one of his people, as secretary. He asked BMOK to send all letters to his address, and not the address of the elected secretary.
During November 1902, Krste Misirkov left Petersburg without advising the group about his departure. He went to Bitolia to take a position as a High school teacher. There he became familiar with the Russian Consul Rostkowski, and even became teacher and educator of his children. After the assassination of the Consul, Misirkov returned to Russia and became a high school teacher in Ukraine. At that time he published his work on the "Individuality of the Macedonian Culture".
When in Nov 1902 he left Petersburg, the group advised ZK about Misirkov's departure to Bitolia, and asked ZK to find a way to advise Misirkov to adopt the policies of BMRO. On his return to Petersburg he avoided meeting his friend of the Petersburg group (Krajok). After the October revolution Misirkov went back to Bulgaria, and was a high school teacher in Karlovo, and was associated with the newspaper "Mir". In 1924 he submitted to me, for publication in "Ilinden", an article on "Macedonian Individuality". I did not publish it.