Figure 1.--This Lithuanian Jewish boy in the Kovno Ghetto, like other Jews traped in NAZI ghettos, hoped that they could survive the War by making themselves useful to the NAZIs through labor. The Ghettos provided the NAZIs a highly skilled slave labor force that they could have used to support their war effort. Some NAZIs officials argued that the Jews should be used for their labor. Instead led by Göring's, Himmler, and Heydrich under Hitler's orders, the NAZIs decided on murder to the detriment of the war effort. And most of the Jews killed by the NAZIs were killed after the War had began to turn againt them when the need for labor was becoming an increasing problem.

The German invasion of the Soviet Union was launched (June 22, 1941). Within days most of Lithuania was in their hands. Attacks on Jews began soon after the NAZIs had seized control. The first organized pogrom was reported (June 25). Kovno was modern Knaus. Most of the original Jewish residents were killed before the Ghetto was established in the pogroms that occurred after the German invasion. Many of the Jews were killed in an old Russian fort--the Ninth Fort. The Germans first established a civilian administration under SA Major General Hans Kramer to replace te initial military rule. This Lithuanian provisional government was officially disbanded in only a few weeks. Krmaer has already set in motion the Holocaust in his brief period of control. He began the preparation for the Ghetto. The Lithuanian military commandant of Kaunas Jurgis Bobelis was put in charge. Laws were enacted to legitimize actions against Jews. Kramer also authorized the auxiliary police to assist NAZI authorities. The Germans began concentating Jews in desolate suburb of Vilijampolė/Slobodka. This had been a Jewish village for 400 years. It was an area of shoddy houses without running water. The Jews who survived the initial pogroms in Kovno were ordered to move into the new ghetto (July). They sealed the Getto (August 15). At the time 29,000 Jews were interned there. Initially there were two sections, the Small and Large Ghetto. At first there was a relative degree of security within the Ghetto compared to the attacks on Jews that had followed the German invasion. The Jews attempted to reorganize their lives within the Ghetto. They organised a symphony orchestra, lectures, art classes, discussions, and Yiddish classes for the children. This did not last long. The Germans soon launched upon a process off steadily reducing the ghetto. There were several forced relocations. The Germans and Lithuanians auxilleries destroyed the small ghetto (October 4). Almost all of the Jews there were shot at the Ninth Fort. Only three weeks layer the Germans staged the "Great Action" (October 29). They shot an estimated 10,000 Jews at the Ninth Fort. The SS assumed control of the ghetto and turned it into a concentratin camp (autumn 1943). The SS after establishing the concentration camp deported more than 2,700 people from the main camp (October 26, 1943). The SS selected those judged fit to work to labor camps in Estonia. The children and elderly not selected were transported tp Auschwitz and killed. The Germans finally liquidate the Ghetto (July 1944). Those who had survived up to that time were transprted to NAZI concentration camps where they were killed. Men were transported to Dachau and women to Stuffhof. About 500 Jews from Kovno escaped both from work details and directly from the Ghetto, and managed to join Soviet partisan forces in the forests of southeastern Lithuania and Beylorussia. Of the 37,000 Kovno Jews, only about 3,000 survived.

Kovno/Kanaus

Kaunas or in Russian Kovno was the second-largest city in Lithuania. It has historically been a leading center of Lithuanian economic, academic, and cultural life. Kanaus and Lithuania has been caught in a clash among Germans, Poles, and Russians to control the area. the town was captured by the Teutonic Knights, who destroyed the Kaunas Castle (1362). Vytautas the Great granted the town Magdeburg Rights (1408). It became the center of Kaunas Powiat in Trakai Voivodeship (1413). Kaunas grew in importance as the European medieval economy grew. The city was located at an intersection of important riverine trade routes. Kaunas developed at the confluence of the two largest Lithuanian rivers, the Nemunas and the Neris, and near the Kaunas Reservoir. Kaunas joined the Hanseatic League (1441). The Hansa merchant office Kontor was opened. This was the only Hansa trading point in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Kaunas supported a public school and a hospital (16th century). It was one of the most developed urban centers in Lithuania. The Russians began showing an interest in the Baltic area, including Lituania. The Russian Army attacked the city several times (1665). The city was occupied by the Swedish Army in the Great Northern War (1701). The Black Death devestated Kanaus and the surrounding area (1657 and 1708). There were also terrible fires (1731 and 1732). With the Third and Final Partition of the Poland (which had included Lithuania) (1795), Kanaus became part of the Russian Empire. It became part of Vilna Governorate. Napoleon's Grand Army which invaded Russia (182), passed through Kaunas twice and devastated the city. Kanaus was a center of resistance to Russian rule. There were major risings as part of the November Uprising (1830–31) and the January Uprising (1863–64). The Russians built the Kaunas Prison and maintained a large military garrison in the town. The military fortifications built at the time still exist. The Kovno Governorate centered in Kovno/Kaunas was created (1843-1915). A railway connecting Kanaus with the Russian Empire and Imperial Germany was built (1862). This made Kanaus the most important railway hub in the country. The first power plant in Lithuania began functioning (1898). Lithuania was occupied by the German Army in World War I (1914-18). After the War, Vilnius was occupied by the Bolsheviks (1919). As a result, Republic of Lithuania established its principal base in Kanaus. The Poles seized Vilnius during the Polish Soviet War (1920-21). Kaunas thus became became the 'temporary' capital of Lithuania. After the Soviet World War II invasion of Poland (September 17, 1939), the Soviets seized Vilinus and transfrred it back to Lithuania (October 28). Then as part of the NAZI-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact, the Soviet Union seized cintrol of Lithuania and tghe other Baltic states (1940). Stalin used the NKVD to launch a reign of terrort in the country. Large numbers of Lithuanian wee arrested, shot, and deported to Central Asia under terrible conditions and many died. Thus Kanaus was in Soviet hands when the Germans launched Barbarossa (June 1941). As a result of tolerant policies toward Jews during the medieval era, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth had a substantial Jewish popultion. At the time of World War II, there were some 25,000 Jews in Kanaus, about 35 percent of the city's population. We have noted some larger population estimates. There were also large numbers of Russiand abd Poles, about 20-25 percent each. There were, however, relatively few Lithuanians, only slightly more than 5 percent.

Kanaus Jewish Community

Barbarossa (June 1941)

The German invasion of the Soviet Union was launched (June 22, 1941). Within days most of Lithuania was in German hands. Following the Whermact Army Group North was Einsatzgruppen A with the mission to kill Soviet authorities and Jews. Lithuania would be a primary area of operations because much of the Jewish population of the Baltic states was in Lithuahia. The killing would be conducted both before and after ghettoes were organized. As this was before the death camps were opened, most of the killing was arried out by shootings.

German Pogroms

Attacks on Jews began soon after the NAZIs had seized control of Lithuania. The first organized pogrom was reported (June 25). Kovno was modern Knaus. Large numbers of the original Jewish residents of Kovno were killed before the Ghetto was established in the pogroms that occurred after the German invasion. Many of the Jews were killed in an old Russian fort--Fort IX.

German Administration

The Germans first established a civilian administration under SA Major General Hans Kramer to replace the initial military rule. This Lithuanian provisional government was officially disbanded in only a few weeks. Krmaer has already set in motion the Holocaust in his brief period of control. Laws were enacted to legitimize actions against Jews. Kramer also authorized the auxiliary police to assist NAZI authorities. The Lithuanian military commandant of Kaunas Jurgis Bobelis was put in charge.

Preparations

Gen. Kramer He began the preparation for the Ghetto. The Germans began concentating Jews in desolate suburb of Vilijampolė/Slobodka. This had been a Jewish village for 400 years. About 12,000 Jews lived there. It was an area of shoddy houses without running water. The Jews who survived the initial pogroms in Kovno were ordered to move into the new ghetto (July). A deadline of August 15 was set. Slabodka Yeshivawas located at Vilijampole. Jews because of the ongoing pogroms began moving into Vilijampolė before the deadline set by the German proclamation. The Jews were forbidden to use motor vehicles if they had access ti them to move into the Ghetto. Kovno's mayor limited the quantity of household goods and personal effects that the Jews could bring with them. The fact that they had to move with carts or by what they carried limited what they could take anyway. They were forced into cramped quarters. Commonly three or four families had to share a room.

Ghetto Sealed (August 1941)

The Germans sealed the Getto (August 15). At the time 29,000 Jews were interned here. This is a larger number than the pre-War Jewish population of Kanaus. It this must have included Jews from the surrounduing area. Initially there were two sections, the Small and Large Ghetto. This was a device created by the Germans to separate the useful workers from the non-workers. At first there was a relative degree of security within the Ghetto compared to the attacks on Jews that had followed the German invasion.

Jewish Organization

The Jews attempted to reorganize their lives within the Ghetto. They organised a symphony orchestra, lectures, art classes, discussions, and Yiddish classes for the children. This did not last long.

George Kadish (1910-97)

George Kadish was born Zvi Hirsh Kadushin in Raseiniai, Lithuania, at the time part of the Russian Empire (1910). He grew up after Wotld War I in independent Lithuania. He studied electrical engineering at Aleksotas University and taught science at a Jewish high school. Some Jews, the lest religious oriented, attended Lithuanian public schools, but there were also Jewish schools they could attend, eiher because of religious orientation or they felt more comfortable among other Jews. Kadish was an amateur photographer and on his own photographed the pogroms that took place in the wake of the German invasion. After the formation of the Kovno ghetto, Yehuda Zupovitz (1918-March 27, 1944) and his two older brothers, Moshe and Meir, volunteered for the Jewish ghetto police. Unlike many such individuals, they used their position to help organize a ghetto underground. He also encouraged Kadish, a friend, to create photo-documentation of life in the Ghetto. Kadish had a Leica camera, but often used a smaller camera that he hid under his coat. This allowed him to secretly take photographs through his buttonhole. The Germans employed him to maintain the X-Ray equipment in their military hospital. He was thus able to developed his photos using the chemicals available to him in the hospital. He smuggled the prints out of the Ghetto in crutches. Jews in other ghettoes also tried to document what the Germanswere doing. It was, however, very dangerous. Kadish is one of only two Jewish photographers whose work is known to have survived the Holocaust. His last major undertaking was to photographs are the deportation of Kovno Jews to Estonia (September 1943). This was when the Kovno Ghetto with a sharply reduced number of Jews was being turned into a concentration camp. The SS arrested Zupovitz (March 1944). This was paet of the 'police action' that rounded up the Jewish Police who now had out-lived their usefulness. Not only were they Jews, but they knew to much to be allowed to live. The Grmans had some knowledge of underground activities and had learned that photographs had been taken. Zupovitz was tortured, but refused to betray Kadish nd others in hiding. He and 36 other Jewish Police were shot in Kovno's Fort IX (March 27, 1944). Kadish as the Ghetto was being reduced buried his photos in milk cans and swam across the Vilya River to Konvo to escape the SS. The Germans destroyed what remained of the Ghetto when the Russians advanced as part of Operation Bagration (July 1944). Kadish photographed the destruction from the other side of the river.

Reducing the Ghetto (1941-42)

The Germans soon launched upon a process of murder from a very early point. They began teadily reducing the ghetto, meaning renmoving Jews to be murdred. There were several such forced relocations. The Germans and Lithuanians auxilleries destroyed the small ghetto (October 4). Almost all of the Jews there were shot at Fort IX. Only three weeks later the Germans staged the "Great Action" (October 29). They shot an estimated 10,000 Jews at Fort IX. Further reductions were carried out (May 1 and October 5, 1942).

Concentration Camp (September 1943)

The SS assumed control of the ghetto and turned it into a concentratio camp (September 1943). Slabodka Yeshiva was destroyed. The role of the Jewish Council's was curtailed. As a concentratiin camp, the Ciouncil was no longer needed. The SS dispersed more than 3,500 Jews to subcamps. At these camps, strict discipline controlled all aspects of life for the internees. The SS after establishing the concentration camp deported more than 2,700 people from the main camp (October 26, 1943). The SS selected those judged fit to work to labor camps in Estonia. Conditions at these camops was severe and most perished there. The children and elderly not selected were immediately transported tp Auschwitz and killed.

Liquidation (July 1944)

The Germans finally liquidated what was now a concentration camp (July 1944). The SS wantd to destroy as much evidence of the Holocaust as possible. Those who had survived up to that time were transprted to NAZI concentration camps frther west where most perished. Men were transported to Dachau and women to Stuffhof.

Survivors

About 500 Jews from Kovno escaped both from work details and directly from the Ghetto, and managed to join Soviet partisan forces in the forests of southeastern Lithuania and Beylorussia. Of the 37,000 Kovno Jews, only about 3,000 survived.

Created: 5:33 AM 10/2/2008
Last updated: 5:21 PM 7/3/2013