A survey from 1895,[8] had the population at 1139 with 178 households (made up of the main village and the hamlets of Draga Brakusa, Čelina, Gola Brdo and Cvijanović Kuca.

As many households had the same family name although not related (in living memory) the practice of giving nicknames, called 'špicnamen' (German origin) to differentiate themselves, was widespread.

Given the relative isolation, mixed origins, neighbouring Croats who spoke a different dialect (and accent) and the influence of the ruling Austro-Hungarian state, the language used by people in Zalužnica and other nearby Serb villages developed its own character.

In addition, the narrow pass at the eastern part of the village provides one of the few access points from the Gacka valley to the extensive lakes system of Plitvice.

Beyond Draga Brakus towards the Vatinovac peak is the Bezdanjača cave[11] where around 200 burials were discovered dating to the middle to late Bronze Age (1500–750 BC).

In the aftermath of the Battle of Kosovo in 1389 the Ottomans pushed northwards further into south-eastern Europe, progressively taking control of Serbia, Bosnia, and Dalmatia hinterland.

The limited record in Venetian, Austrian and Hungarian lands report the arrival of people variously called Rascians, Serbs, and Vlachs from the 1500s.

Orthodox peoples were encouraged by the Austrian authorities to settle the de-populated borderland as they provided the means to defend the border without the high cost of deploying its own forces.

From around 1600 large number of Serbs and related started to arrive in Croatia and Slavonia and were granted various rights including freedom of religion by the Emperor.

The Croatian nobility on regular occasions made efforts to remove Austrian control of Krajina, subsume the settlers into their feudal property and convert the 'schismatic' Orthodox population to Uniat or Catholicism.

Austrian army records describe land given to local fighters for their efforts and included Grenzers from Zalužnica, pre-empting migration to Bosnia some 80 years later.

The turmoil of the revolving cycle of war, raiding, migration, and settlement for around 300 years in Lika can be viewed simplistically as solely attributable to the Ottomans.

While Ottoman aggression northwards was the cause of initial migrations, for much of this period the political machinations of Austrian foreign policy (and many non-Ottoman wars), Hungarian territorial claims, the Croatian nobility's efforts to hold onto feudalism, and Ottoman foreign policy (and many non-European wars), were the primary factors in the course of events that moulded Lika and therefore the people of Zalužnica.

The protection of the border dominated their lives and the settlers together with the Croatian populace in Lika progressively established themselves as a critical fighting force for the Austrian Empire.

In western Krajina, Karlovac (Karlstadt) became the primary headquarters with regiments based in Otočac, Gospić, Ogulin and Slunj Grenz infantry.

Various Otočac Regiment records, from 1772 to 1819, document Zalužnica soldiers including; Borovac, Brakus, Hinić, Invačević, Kosić, Popović, Uzelac, and Vukovojac.

The vast majority obtained manual work in factories (primary production such as steel making) and mining and of these many died or were significantly injured in industrial accidents.

On Russia exiting the war in 1917 due to revolution, the resulting military and political chaos proved to be a massive obstacle for POWs in returning home.

Although the creation of a 'south-slav' homeland had a basis of support from some sections of the 'south-slavs' themselves (and not just an Allied convenience), extreme nationalist forces quickly ensured a troubled existence throughout the inter-war period.

The Independent Serbian state and the newly freed Croatian populace, having finally escaped 500 and 800 years respectively of domination by Imperialist powers, considered themselves forced into another unwelcome relationship.

Over time, they became embroiled with the broader regional conflict that involved multiple other fighting forces including Italian and German armies, the Ustaša and the communist Yugoslav Partisans under Josip Broz Tito.

At the expense of the 'volksdeutsche' (Danube Swabians who at best were expelled and their property confiscated, the Tito government repopulated the area with a major migration from across all Yugoslavia.

This was bolstered by the German economic explosion from the 1950s and the Yugoslav state's willingness to allow its citizens to work in Germany (also Austria and Switzerland at different times) by way of treaties with those countries.

The most visible outcomes were; construction of new farmhouses across the village, the mechanisation of agriculture (which until the late-1960s was in the main still powered by oxen and horses), and the movement of young people to towns and cities across the country.

The 'Croatian Spring' uprising of the late 1960s / early 1970s together with the heightened threat from Croat nationalists in the diaspora, who sought the re-establishment of an independent Croatia, raised tensions throughout the former Krajina.

Farmers in Zalužnica released their livestock to the fields and joined the long convoy through the ongoing hostilities in Bosnia to reach the Serbian border.

However, the increasing popularity of DNA testing, mainly in the diaspora, is slowly starting to rebuild a cultural memory of its people, which for once will remain intact through the internet.

Where names and surnames were changed to aid assimilation in the new countries, the ability to trace ancestors through official records is made even more difficult.

A useful resource is Radoslav Grujic 'Plemenski rjecnik licko-krbavske zupanije'[18] published in 1915 it lists family surnames and the Lika village in which they were found.

To preserve the heritage and culture of the Zalužnica and related people, the author encourages publication of family trees, however small, and Autosomal DNA tests to establish ancestral relationships.