Žemaičių Naumiestis

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Žemaičių Naumiestis
coat of arms
coat of arms
State : Lithuania Lithuania
District : Klaipeda
Rajong municipality : Šilutė
Founded : around 1360
Coordinates : 55 ° 22 ′  N , 21 ° 42 ′  E Coordinates: 55 ° 22 ′  N , 21 ° 42 ′  E
Height : 31 m
Community area : 89  km²
 
Inhabitants (place) : 1,373 (2011)
Inhabitant (municipality) : 4,020
Population density : 45 inhabitants per km²
Time zone : EET (UTC + 2)
Postal code : 99005
 
Mayor : Jonas Budreckas
Žemaičių Naumiestis (Lithuania)
Žemaičių Naumiestis
Žemaičių Naumiestis

Žemaičių Naumiestis (German Neustadt ) is a small town in the Rajongemeinde Šilutė in western Lithuania between Klaipėda and the border with Russian Kaliningrad Oblast . The rivers Šustis, Šelmuo and Lendra flow through the village.

For centuries, the small town was on the border with Prussia and thus acquired a specific multicultural population structure. In addition to Lithuanian residents, primarily Jewish and German population groups played an important role in this, and to a certain extent also Russian ones. This multicultural population structure was destroyed by the multi-layered political events on the eve of the Second World War , during the war and the first decade afterwards. Today it is only reflected in Žemaičiaum Naumiestis by the architectural heritage of the place. There is a wooden Catholic St. Michael Church (built in 1782), a stone Protestant church (built in 1842) and a stone synagogue (built in 1816).

Place name

Main square of the place

For a long time the town was called Naumiestis (Lithuanian) or Nowe Miasto (Polish). In Yiddish, the city was called Neishtot Sugint (after the nearby Sugint manor). Under the tsar administration the place was renamed Aleksandrovsk in 1884 . This name was officially valid until 1918. In the twenties, the city of Tauragės was called Naumiestis (Lithuanian) or Neishtot Tavrik (Yiddish) after the nearby city of Tauragė (Tauroggen) as a distinction from other Lithuanian places with the name of Naumiestis. In the 1930s the name Žemaičių Naumiestis (" Samogitian New Town") was introduced, which is still valid today.

history

The place is said to have been laid out for the first time around 1360 by the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order Winrich von Knipprode. The place was mentioned again around 1600 as owned by the Krohne. In 1750 the place gained privileges for markets and fairs.

In 1779 King Stanisław August Poniatowski leased the town for fifty years to the nobleman Mykolas Rionikeris, who settled craftsmen and had the Catholic Church of St. Michael built. In 1792 the king granted Magdeburg law and a coat of arms to the town. During the Third Partition of Poland, the town fell to the Tsarist empire and first belonged to the Vilna governorate, from 1843 to the newly founded Kovno governorate and within it to the Raseiniai district.

Since 1795, the border between the Tsarist empire and Prussia, three kilometers away from the town, has been fortified more and more. In the 19th century there was a third class customs office in the village. The place was mainly known for its annual markets and the markets that take place twice a week. He also had a post office, as the Polangen-Tauroggen and Sartininkai-Švėkšna post lines crossed here.

The place developed strongly in the second half of the 19th century, mainly due to the cross-border trade that took place here. In 1860 there were 165 houses and 1,600 inhabitants, the majority of them Jews. In 1897 there were already 2,445 inhabitants, including 1,438 Jews (59%). There were numerous shops and taverns, three mills and three workshops for leather processing. The two annual fairs and the twice-weekly markets were well attended. The town was an important place for the export of horses and timber.

The place gained notoriety after the Lithuanian press was banned from 1863–1864, as an important path of the so-called book carriers led through it .

When the First World War broke out in 1914, numerous houses were burned down. From 1916 to 1918 the region, like all of Lithuania, was occupied by the German army. After the end of the First World War, Žemaičių Naumiestis belonged to the Republic of Lithuania.

After the occupation by the Red Army in the summer of 1940 and the annexation to the USSR , factories were also nationalized in the village. The German minority left in March 1941 on the basis of the German-Soviet resettlement agreement of 1941. On June 14, 1941, local citizens were exiled to Siberia. On the morning of June 22, 1941, the Wehrmacht marched into Žemaičių Naumiestis. There were violent exchanges of fire, as a result of which 14 German soldiers were killed. Thereupon the Wehrmacht arrested the majority of the Jewish men and locked them in the Evangelical Church of the village. The pastor present was able to convince the German officers of the innocence of the Jews, so that they were released again. After the occupation by the Germans, an "advanced border inspection post" of the Reich Finance Administration was set up in the town. The Jews were ghettoized and shot after a short time. In the summer of 1942, part of the German population returned.

During the Soviet-Lithuanian period there was a state estate here, a vocational school for agricultural training.

Church of St. Michael the Archangel in Žemaičių Naumiestis, consecrated in 1790
Evangelical Lutheran Church in Žemaičių Naumiestis, built in 1842

Jews

Former synagogue of Žemaičių Naumiestis

Jews lived in the place since the 17th century. An old Jewish cemetery was mentioned at the end of the 17th century. A Chevra Kaddisha was established in the early 18th century. There was a Jewish school, a synagogue and a prayer house.

Since the middle of the 19th century there were Jews who mainly traded in the nearby East Prussia and then also moved there. In the last third of the 19th century, a great emigration movement began. First, numerous Jews emigrated to the USA. Many later emigrated to South Africa.

After the Wehrmacht marched in in June 1941, a local command office was set up on the market square, to which the Jewish male residents had to report daily. Many were used to clean up and clean the streets; others were employed in a German field bakery. They also had to bury the soldiers who fell on the first day of the fight. In June 1941, the Jews were physically forced with kicks and blows to bring the synagogue's inventory from scrolls to benches to the forecourt and burn it there. At the beginning of July 1941, the Jews were assigned apartments on a specific street. They had to wear a yellow stripe on their clothes and were no longer allowed to walk on the sidewalks.

On July 19, 1941, the SS von Heydekrug, under the direction of Werner Scheu, organized a second “Jews procurement campaign”. It was set with the goal of Žemaičių Naumiestis, 14 km east of Heydekrug, to go to one of the few places in the northern border strip where the murder of Jews had not yet occurred. On July 19, 1941, all male Jews who were 14 years of age and older were ordered to the synagogue. SS men and Lithuanian policemen were standing there. All men were loaded onto trucks and taken to the barracks to the east. The old and sick, around 70 people, were singled out and later shot and shot at Šiaudvyčiai on the same day. The shooters were Lithuanian police officers. A total of at least 220 Jewish men were shot there that day. The selected persons capable of work came to the Schillwen camp near Heydekrug, among others.

In September 1941 the Jewish women and children were brought to Šiaudvyčiai and shot there. The Jewish men had to work for two years in different camps in and around Heydekrug. Anyone who fell ill or was no longer able to work was shot by the SS. At the end of July 1943, the labor camps were dissolved and the remaining men were transported to Auschwitz. Few survived. Some Jews from Žemaičių Naumiestis who survived the war in the Soviet Union and returned to their hometown in 1946 were killed when their houses were blown up.

German

At the end of the 18th century, Protestant craftsmen from nearby East Prussia were settled under the noble Mykolas Rionikeris. At that time the border was porous. The parishioners already had their own school around 1800. The parish was initially maintained by Prussian preachers and was from 1800 a branch of the parish of Tauroggen. Around 1824 there were 327 Protestant parishioners in the village. As a rule, the cantor held services. The prayer house burned down twice at the beginning of the 19th century. Then a church in the classical style was built from donations in 1842 . The congregation received its first pastor in 1919. When the Germans were evacuated in March 1941, community life came to a standstill. After the end of the war, some of the German residents returned. In 1947 a Protestant community was founded again. 1958–1960 the community was again strongly decimated by leaving due to the departure agreements between the Soviet Union and the Federal Republic.

Daughters and sons of the city

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b E. Meilus: Žemaitijos kunigaikštysteje ‐ XVIII amžiuje: raida, gyventojai, amatai, prekyba. Lietuvos Istorijos instituto Leidykla 1997 ( [1] )
  2. ↑ a b Słownik geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego i innych krajów słowiańskich, Tom VII (Netrebka - Perepiat). 1886
  3. ↑ Ново-мѣсто. Географическо-статистический словарь Российской империи, T. 3 (Лаарсъ - Оятъ). , СПб, 1867
  4. ^ Bronius Kviklys: Mūsų Lietuva. Krašto vietovių istoriniai, geografiniai, etnografiniai bruožai. Tomas IV. 2nd edition. Mintis, Vilnius 1991
  5. ↑ a b c Our Town Neishtot, ed. v. Neishtot-Tavrig Natives Committee, op cit, 1982; Yad Vashem Archives; ROSIN, Preserving Our Litvak Heritage, p. 695.
  6. ^ F. Bauer: Justice and Nazi Crimes: Collection of German criminal judgments for Nazi homicidal crimes 1945-1966. University Press Amsterdam 19 1981 ( [2] )
  7. ↑ Harry Stossun: The history of the German school system in Lithuania. 2001 ( PDF )
  8. ↑ Archive link ( Memento from July 11, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  9. ^ Aliza Cohen-Mushlin: Synagogues in Lithuania: a catalog. [Vol. 2]: N - Ž. Vilnius Academy of Arts Press, Vilnius 2012
  10. ^ Josef Rosin and Joel Alpert: Preserving our Litvak heritage. A history of 31 Jewish communities in Lithuania. JewishGen, Inc., League City, TX 2005
  11. ^ A b Ruth Leiserowitz: Sabbath candlesticks and warriors' association. Jews in the East Prussian-Lithuanian border region 1812 - 1942. fiber, Osnabrück op. 2010
  12. ↑ Isa Sarid: Hermann Kallenbach. Gandhi's friend in South Africa; an introductory biography with documentation. 1st edition. Gandhi Information Center, Berlin 1997
  13. ^ Benjamin Lee Gordon: Between Two Worlds. The Memoirs of a Physician. Bookman Associates, Inc., New York 1952
  14. ↑ Boris Senior: New Heavens: My Life As A Fighter Pilot And A Founder Of The Israel Air Force. Potomac Books 2005 ( [3] )
  15. ↑ Michael Greve: Perpetrator or assistant? - On the criminal handling of Nazi violent criminals in the Federal Republic of Germany. 2003, pp. 194-221
  16. ↑ The following units were involved in this action: Police and border police Heydekrug, police and border police Kolleschen, Reiter-SS: SS-Reitersturm 2/20, 20th SS-Reiterstandarte, Allgemeine SS: Sturmbann II / 105.
  17. ^ Statement by Esriel Glock, 37 years old in 1961, hometown Žemaičių Naumiestis, Federal Archives Ludwigsburg, II 207 AR-Z 162/59, Vol. 2, Bl. 320.
  18. ^ A b Ruth Leiserowitz: Border region as a gray area. Heydekrug a town on the periphery of East Prussia. 2006, pp. 129-159
  19. ↑ Justice and Nazi Crimes Vol. XVII, Case No. 511
  20. ^ MAB Vilnius: F-170, B. 2369 Bl. 5.
  21. ↑ a b [4]
  22. ↑ a b E.H von Busch: Supplements to the materials on the history and statistics of the church and school system of Ev-Luth: Congregations in Russia. Haessel1 1867 ( [5] )
  23. ^ Entry in the Jewish Encyclopedia
  24. ↑ entry in the Encyclopedia Jewisch
  25. ^ Richard Mendelsohn: Sammy Marks. The uncrowned king of the Transvaal. D. Philip; Ohio University Press; in association with Jewish Publications-South Africa, Cape Town, Athens 1991
  26. ↑ Isa Sarid: Hermann Kallenbach. Gandhi's friend in South Africa; an introductory biography with documentation. 1st edition. Gandhi Information Center, Berlin 1997