Zhelyu Zhelev gives him a deadline “until tomorrow” when calls him for the post
While ambassador to London, Buckingham Palace sent him copies of the letters, which his grandfather wrote to the queen’s grandfather
Donates his home in Varna to a foundation, who works with children with disabilities
Ivan Stanchov left. He gave up the spirit at the age of 92 in his mansion in Scotland. When such people die, life and history seem to become impoverished. This man and his family have done so much for Bulgaria that we must never forget them.
The ancestor of the great Stanchov family was Yani Dimitrov Stanchoglu, who in 1790 left the Albanian town of Berat and settled in Svishtov. When asked if he was Albanian, he replied:
“I am a Bulgarian from
Samuel’s warriors! ”
His great-grandson Dimitar Yanev Stanchov graduated from the Theresian Academy in Vienna and became a doctor of law at the University of Vienna. Internship in the Governor’s Office of Vienna.
He returned to Bulgaria together with Prince Ferdinand and became his personal secretary in the period 1887-1889. He is also the head of his Secret Cabinet. He married Countess Anna de Greno, daughter of the Hofmarshal of Prince Ferdinand, Count de Greno, and court lady of Princess Marie-Louise. They have five children – Alexander, Nadezhda, Feodora, Elena and Ivan.
Dimitar Stanchov is a diplomatic agent of Bulgaria successively in Romania, Austria-Hungary and Russia. From 1906 to 1908 he was Foreign Minister in the governments of Dimitar Petkov and Petar Grudev.
After Petkov’s assassination, he headed the government for several days. In the following years he was ambassador to Great Britain, France, Belgium and Italy. He opposed the inclusion of Bulgaria in the First World War and was removed from office.
Dimitar Stanchov’s son, Ivan, was born on December 18, 1897 in St. Petersburg, where his father was a diplomatic agent. Until January 1907, Ivan was with his family in St. Petersburg, after which he lived mainly in Paris and Sofia. In 1915 he graduated from the French Catholic College “St. Augustine” in Plovdiv.
In 1917 he was mobilized in the Bulgarian Navy. He graduated from the Reserve Officers School in Knyazhevo. In 1918–1919 he was a liaison officer as a military translator for the occupying forces of the Entente in Varna.
At the same time, he cooperated with the Bulgarian military intelligence. Participates in the concealment of Bulgarian weapons, subject to destruction by the Entente forces.
At the same time, he worked in the municipal administration in Varna, where he was responsible for accommodating refugees from Russia.
In 1923 he graduated in law from the University of Friborg in Switzerland and lived mainly in London. In January 1924, he joined the Vickers Chemical Company, which he left in December 1926 after refusing to accept British citizenship.
Since 1928 he has been working in the Bulgarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Initially it was in the encryption department, later – in the protocol. From 1931 to 1936 he served in the diplomatic service in Rome as third secretary, adviser and chargé d’affaires.
In 1937–1942 he was head of the Consular Department at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, then he was appointed Consul General in Galati until June 1944.
In this position he helped the resettlement in Bulgaria of compact groups of Taurian Bulgarians. He also assisted local Jews by issuing Bulgarian passports. In July 1944 he was appointed Consul General in Istanbul.
On January 5, 1945
Ivan D. Stanchov
has been recalled by the new
power in Bulgaria
He refused to return and in May of the same year went with his family to Switzerland. In August 1946, he emigrated to the United States.
In April 1947, he bought a small farm in Urbana, Maryland, where he remained for the rest of his life. In 1948 he acquired US citizenship. Dedicates articles and other public appearances of Bulgaria and communism in Eastern Europe.
His son Ivan Ivanov Stanchov, known as Johnny, was born on April 1, 1929 in Sofia. His mother is Marion Mitchell Stanchov. He is the third child in the family, has two more brothers and three sisters.
(See the Stanchov family tree below.)
Ivan Ivanov Stanchov graduated from Georgetown University in Washington. He served in the Bulgarian company of the American army in Germany. He has worked for IBM in New York, Rio de Janeiro and Paris, where he holds managerial positions in the marketing research and sales departments. He is Vice President of ITEL and Storage Technology Corporation in London.
In 1980 he started his own business – he founded a company that deals with information technology – “Kresta Marketing”.
After the changes in 1990, John Stanchov returned to his homeland for the first time in 47 years. He was a speaker at one of the first rallies in Sofia.
In 1991 Ivan Stanchov continued the family tradition – he was appointed Ambassador of the Republic of Bulgaria to Great Britain and the first Bulgarian Ambassador to the Republic of Ireland. When she handed Queen Elizabeth her credentials, she was impressed by his costume and even asked what it was. He proudly explained that he was dressed in the ambassadorial suit of his grandfather, Dimitar Stanchov, who was ambassador to Britain in 1908 and 1922-1924. And that he specially “restored” it for the audience.
This slight deviation from diplomatic rules creates a pleasant atmosphere for conversation. Three weeks later, Stanchov received copies of the letters his grandfather had written to the queen’s grandfather. “It was very nice of her,” Stanchov said later. “And it shows how important tradition is in this country …”
President Dr. Zhelyo Zhelev personally invited him to be Foreign Minister in Reneta Indjova’s caretaker government. When she called him on the phone in Scotland, Stanchov was digging in his garden.
He hears the offer and says he has a job now. “Abe, miss this job, come here!” – the president insists.
“Let me think,
and to ask
his wife…”,
says Stanchov. Zhelev gives him until tomorrow. The next day, Stanchov announced that he agreed. To take up the post, he renounced his American citizenship.
“As Foreign Minister, John Stanchov represented Bulgaria very well, opening many doors, which was terribly important for a nascent democracy,” said Dr. Zhelev of Stanchov’s work. After the mandate of Indjova’s cabinet ended, Stanchov became a foreign policy adviser to President Dr. Zhelev and his successor Petar Stoyanov.
Ivan Stanchov is an exceptional supporter of charitable and socially useful activities. He is the founder and chairman of the Karin Dom Foundation in Varna. He houses the foundation in his hereditary villa at the northern end of the Sea Garden.
He founded the foundation with the idea to create a new model for raising children with specific problems. He named her after his cousin Karin, who suffers from cerebral palsy.
Stanchov admits that his acquaintances called him crazy because he gave up his beautiful hereditary house in the Sea Garden. Karin Dom is the first non-governmental organization in Bulgaria that works on modern methods of working with children with disabilities.
Ivan Stanchov is a member of the Atlantic Club in Sofia. He is also a member of the Bulgarian Antarctic Institute in London and the Royal Geographical Society also in London.
For many years Ivan Stanchev has been a patron of the Bulgarian School at the Bulgarian Embassy in London. “An epoch, a man, an example is gone – the nobleman who taught us, the Bulgarians, how to be real Bulgarians is gone – said the director of the school Snezhina Mecheva. – He was ours, we were his. I love is a small word for people like him, I adore it is inaccurate. There are no words for an enigma, but it is not accurate either, because it does not recreate great humanity. And grief is an inaccurate word because it is small and because it does not include the pride that we have been touched in his lifetime by his closeness. The maxim that there are no irreplaceable people has never sounded so meaningless as today … ”
Ivan Stanchov is the winner of
Medal for good
service in the army
of the United States (1956)
He has been a cavalier of the French Legion of Honor since 1995. He was awarded the Order of the Grand Cross of Rio Branco, Brazil, in 2002. In 2010 he was awarded the highest Bulgarian order – “Stara Planina I degree”.
He speaks 8 languages: Bulgarian, English, French, German, Italian, Greek, Spanish and Portuguese.
Ivan Stanchov was married to an American woman with whom he has 4 children. After their divorce, Ivan Stanchov married the Englishwoman Alexandra, who “protruded” with her whole head above him. They have no children. “She is a photojournalist, and she is very good,” said the family’s friend, the famous translator Aglika Markova.
In his condolences on Stanchov’s death, President Radev said:
“Highly erudite, strongly connected with his homeland, despite the long years spent abroad as a political emigrant, Ivan Stanchov served Bulgaria with dedication, contributing with great zeal to building and promoting its new and democratic image …”
– .
