Stalin deportations - and the Big Flight from Barbarossa

Some data from some articles in the Encyclopaedia Judaica 1971

from Michael Palomino (2007)

9. Lithuania

from: Lithuania; In: Encyclopaedia Judaica 1971, Vol. 11

1928-1939: Emigration from Lithuania

<POPULATION. According to the census held on Sept. 17, 1923, the Jewish population numbered 153,743 (7.5% of the total), and was the largest national minority. [...] In *Memel (Klaipeda), which with its district belonged to Lithuania from 1923 to 1939 as an autonomous region, there were 2,470 Jews in 1929. Their number in the Memel region rose as a result of migration from other parts of Lithuania. At the beginning of 1939, shortly before the seizure of Memel by Germany, the territory had about 9,000 Jewish inhabitants.> (col. 373)

<EMIGRATION.

Both open and unofficial measures aiming at ousting Jews from their economic positions led many Jews to emigrate. Between 1928 and 1939, 13,898 Jews emigrated from Lithuania, of whom

-- 4,860 (35%) went to South Africa;
-- 3,541 (25.5%) to Palestine;
-- 2,548 (18.3%) to Latin America;
-- 1,499 (10.8%) to the United States;
-- 648 (4.6%) to Canada;
-- and 602 (5.8%) elsewhere.

It is estimated that between 1923 and 1927 at least 6,000 to 7,000 Jews emigrated from Lithuania, and between 1919 and 1941 9,241 Lithuanian Jews emigrated to Palestine (3.07% of all those who settled there in that period).> (col. 375)

<Statistics of 1937 show 157,527 Jews (75,538 males, 81,989 females; or 98% of the total) as having declared their nationality as Jewish, an indicator of the strength of Jewish consciousness among the Jews of Lithuania and th slight influence of assimilation.> (col. 374)

Sep 1939-1940: Incorporation of Vilna [which was Polish before] - Polish Jewish refugees - emigration

<Soviet Rule in Lithuania, 1940-41.

The U.S.S.R.-German Pact of Aug. 23, 1939, brought Soviet dominance to the Baltic area. On Oct. 10, 1939, the U.S.S.R. and Lithuania concluded an agreement in Moscow for "the transfer of Vilna and the Vilna province to the Lithuanian Republic and mutual assistance between the Soviet Union and Lithuania", which came into effect on the following day. With the incorporation of Vilna, the Jewish community of Lithuania grew by about 100,000. Previously the 160,000 Lithuanian Jews constituted 7% of the population, but with the annexed portions they totaled over a quarter of a million, about 10% of the total population of the enlarged country.

The number of Jewish refugees from Poland grew considerably (to 14,000-15,000) in the following months. About 10,000 stayed in Vilna and the rest in Kovno (Kaunas) and other places. About 5,000 refugees managed to emigrate from Lithuania. The Lithuanian Jews made every effort to assist refugees.> (col. 385)

1940-1941: Sovietization and "nationalizations" - Jews loose shops, enterprises, houses and bank accounts

<On June 15, 1940, Soviet troops crossed the Lithuanian border and a "people's government" was established on June 17, which included two Jews, L. Kogan, minister of health, and H. Alperovitch, minister of commerce. On July 14, "elections" to the People's Sejm ("parliament") took place. Five Jews were among the deputies elected. On August 3 the Supreme Soviet acceded to the Sejm's "request" to become the 16th Soviet Republic. Shortly afterward, the provisional Lithuanian government was replaced by a soviet of people's commissars.

All industrial and commercial enterprises, private capital, and larger dwelling houses were nationalized, and a new agrarian reform carried out. All social groups and organizations, general as well as Jewish, had to cease their activities, with the exception of those belonging to the Communists (who had been illegal until the Russian invasion), and the press (again excepting the Communist newspapers) was closed down.

A wave of arrests swept over the country. At the same time a considerable number of Soviet officials entered Lithuania. Many of the former owners of the nationalized houses, firms, and factories were forced to settle in the provinces.

The effect of the introduction of Soviet rule upon the Jewish population was particularly strong. The new Communist regime was in urgent need of experience and abilities possessed by the Jewish intelligentsia, so that Jews were given prominent positions in the economic, legal, and administrative apparatus. At the same time, although nationalization of all important branches of the economy applied equally to all citizens, irrespective of their ethnic origin, large segments of the Jewish population were affected with special harshness.

A total of 986 industrial enterprises were nationalized, of which about 560 (57%) belonged to Jews; of 1,593 commercial firms nationalized, no less than 1,320 (83%) were owned by Jews. Jews were also strongly hit by the nationalization of houses and bank accounts.> (col. 385)

April-June 1941 approx.: Stalin deportations

The phase before the German attack on Lithuania was marked by deportations to Siberia. IN the spring of 1941 the Soviet security services compiled lists of "counter-revolutionary elements" and submitted secret reports on those listed, which also included Jews in the following categories:
-- leaders and journalists of various Zionist political groups
-- leaders of the Bund and Bundist journalists;
-- leaders of Jewish military and "fascist" formations e.g., of the Jewish veterans of Lithuania's war of independence, of the Jewish war veterans, of *Betar, the *Revisionists and their affiliated bodies.

In mid-June 1941, one week before the German-Soviet war, many people, including Jews, were hastily deported as politically unreliable to Siberia and other parts of Soviet (p.385)

Asia. They were interned in forced labor camps and set to work in coal mines, wood cutting, and other heavy labor. Some of those deported were tried for "crimes" committed prior to the Soviet occupation. Although large numbers of Jews were also among the deportees, Lithuanian anti-Semites alleged that the deportations were the result of Jewish revenge on the local non-Jewish majority, carried out by "Jewish" security officers in charge of the deportations.> (col. 386)

June 1941-1942: Lithuania: The Big Flight from Barbarossa - mass murder by Einsatzgruppen

<German Occupation 1941-44. The entire country was occupied by the Germans within one week, so that only a handful of Jews managed to escape into the Soviet interior.> (col. 386)

[The hand full can be estimated at about 40,000].

<A map drawn up by Einsatzgruppe A to show the number of Jews killed in the Baltic states up to the end of December 1941, indicates that 136,421 Jews were murdered by that date in Lithuania (excluding Vilna), with 16,000 Jews remaining in the Kovno ghetto and 4,500 in the Siauliai ghetto. A comparison of these figures with the Stahlecker report reveals that in this area alone, 56,110 Jews were killed in the last two months of 1941. [...] The sparse material available conspicuously points to the active participation of Lithuanians from all walks  of life, side by side with the Germans in the (col. 388)

slaughter. Most of the Lithuanians who took part in the murder of Jews fled to Germany in the summer of 1944, when the Soviet army liberated Lithuania. After the war whey were classified as Displaced Persons and were aided as Nazi victims.> (col. 389)

1944: Second "Soviet" occupation of Lithuania: Only few Jews left - Jews coming back from inner Russia

<Liberation. Lithuania was liberated by the Soviet army in the summer of 1944 (Vilna on July 13, Siauliai on July 27, Kovno on August 1). The Jewish survivors consisted of several hundred Jewish partisan fighters, and a few families and children who had been hidden by gentiles. Jewish refugees who at the beginning of the war escaped to Soviet Asia also began to make their way back.> (col. 389)

<The 1959 Soviet census report indicated the Jewish population of Lithuania at 24,672 [...] 17,025 declared Yiddish as their native tongue.> (col. 390)

1945: Liberation of Lithuanian Jews in German concentration camps - returning or emigration to Israel and other countries

At the beginning of 1945, when Soviet troops liberated the Stutthof concentration camp, several hundred Jewish women from Lithuania were listed among the survivors, and when Dachau was liberated by the Americans, some Lithuanian Jewish men were found alive there. Both the (col. 389)

women and the men had been deported from Lithuania in the summer of 1944, 80 of whom found their death in German concentration camps.

Some of the survivors returned to Lithuania, but the majority stayed in the *Displaced Persons (DP) camps established after the war in Germany, Austria, and Italy. Later, they were joined by other Lithuanian Jews who had escaped from Soviet Lithuania via the Jewish underground escape route (see *Berihah). When the DP camps were dissolved, the Lithuanian Jews settled in Israel, the United States, and other countries overseas together with other Jewish DPs.

-----

Vilna (Lithuania)

from: Vilna; In: Encyclopaedia Judaica, Vol. 16

1939-1940: Vilna becomes part of Lithuania - Jewish refugees from parted Poland

<With the outbreak of World War II. Soviet Russia invaded Vilna [which was Poland at that time] and in October 1939 ceded it to Lithuania. Jewish refugees from divided Poland - the German-occupied part and the Soviet-occupied one - found refuge in Vilna. Among the refugees were many rabbis (and hasidic rabbis), scholars, community and party leaders, as well as Zionists and members of Zionist youth movements who immediately organized into temporary "kibbutzim". By long and tortuous ways (even via the Far East), some succeeded in reaching Erez Israel.> (col. 148)

1940-1941: Vilna: Sovietization - Stalin deportations

from: Vilna; In: Encyclopaedia Judaica, Vol. 16

<In June 1940, Lithuania was annexed to the U.S.S.R. The Soviet authorities closed down Hebrew cultural institutions and Zionist organizations. All Yiddish press was replaced by the Communist Party's organ.

Many Jews - active Zionists, Bundists, and "bourgeois" - were exiled in 1941 into the Soviet interior and many were interned in camps there. Some active Yiddishists, including writers (Z. Rejzen, Joseph Chernikhov, and others), were arrested, deported to Russia, and murdered there.> (col. 148)

1940-1941: Vilna: Sovietization - Stalin deportations - emigration

from: Poland; In: Encyclopaedia Judaica, Vol. 13

<Generalbezirk Litauen und Weissrussland (Lithuania and Belorussia). [...] From September to December 1939, a large number of refugees arrived in the area, especially in Vilna. For nearly 11 months (from Oct. 10, 1939, until the end of August 1940), Vilna and its environs formed a part of Lithuania. In August, the entire country was absorbed by the Soviet Union. Under Soviet occupation, thousands of Jews were arrested and deported to distant parts of the Soviet Union, but several thousand escaped to the United States, Palestine (see *Berihah), and *Shanghai. It is therefore impossible to determine the size of the Jewish population in June 1941.>

[The withdrawal of the Red Army and Big Flight from Barbarossa is not mentioned in the article].

Vilna since 24 June 1941-1944: NS occupation

from: Vilna; In: Encyclopaedia Judaica, Vol. 16

<In June 24, 1941, the Germans entered Vilna and were welcomed by the Lithuanian population with flowered and cheers. Persecution of Vilna's population (approximately 80,000) began immediately.> (col. 148)

[The withdrawal of the Red Army and Big Flight from Barbarossa is not mentioned in the article].

<It is estimated that approximately 100,000 Jews from Vilna and the vicinity perished in the Vilna ghetto. Those who were not killed in Vilna died in labor concentration camps in Estonia and other places.> (col. 150)

since 1944: Jews coming back - 16,354 registered Jews in Vilna in 1959 census

from: Vilna; In: Encyclopaedia Judaica, Vol. 16

<After the Soviet Army liberated Lithuania (July 12, 1944) about 6,000 survivors from the forests and other places assembled in the city. [...] In the 1959 census 16,354 Jews (6.96%) were registered in Vilna, 326 of whom declared Yiddish to be their mother tongue.> (col. 150)

Teilen / share:

Facebook

Twitter

^