Kailis Fur Factory

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Main entrance to the Vilna Ghetto (1941)

The Kailis fur factory in Wilna ( Vilnius , capital of Lithuania ) produced clothing for the German armed forces during the German occupation , including a tailor's shop. In the immediate vicinity there was a concentration camp for Jews and a camp for forced laborers , from which workers were forcibly recruited (the camp opened in September 1943; closed on July 3, 1944). For some time, employment there saved Jewish people from being murdered or transported to the extermination camps .

history

Memorial plaque (Lithuanian / Yiddish) and map of the ghetto

Vilna ghetto

A few days after the beginning of the war against the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, Lithuania was completely under German occupation. In the wake of the Wehrmacht , Einsatzgruppen from the Security Police and the SD came . Their task consisted in the brutal implementation of the National Socialist racial ideology and genocide policy , including the murder of Jews , Communists , Roma and all “hostile elements”. Sometimes even before the German Einsatzgruppen, Lithuanian “partisans” hunted Bolsheviks and Jews immediately after the invasion , which in a very short time developed into the systematic extermination of the Jewish population. In December 1939 there were about 150,000 Jews in Lithuania. Already at the end of 1941 Karl Jäger reported : “Today I can say that the goal of solving the Jewish problem for Lithuania is from the EK. 3 has been achieved. There are no more Jews in Lithuania, except for the working Jews and their families. That is approx. 4,500 in Schaulen , 15,000 in Kauen and approx. 15,000 in Vilnius. I also wanted to kill these working Jews, including their families, which, however, earned me sharp declarations of war from the civil administration (the Reich Commissioner ) and the Wehrmacht and triggered the ban: These Jews and their families must not be shot! "

The important Jewish quarter of the city "Wilna", called "Lithuanian Jerusalem " by the Jews of the world and later called Vilnius, was converted into a Jewish ghetto on September 6, 1941 by order of the Gestapo . Almost 40,000 people (according to another source 60,000) were brought there. The Jewish residents had previously been taken from their homes and most of them killed. In October a so-called “small ghetto” was dissolved again after the “non-productive” prisoners were murdered and those able to work were relocated to the “large” ghetto. In 1943 the Jews of the surrounding ghettos were brought to Vilna, the "surplus" were killed in Ponary.

On September 23 and 24, 1943, the Vilna ghetto was liquidated. About 3,700 able-bodied men were by the Germans in the concentration camp Klooga and Vaivara in Estonia or in the Kaiserwald concentration camp in Latvia deported . The elderly and mothers with children, a total of over 4,000 people, were sent to the Sobibór extermination camp or were murdered in Ponary near Vilna. Excluded from deportation were around 2,500 Jewish workers who worked in the Heereskraftfahrpark (HKP) and in the Kailis fur factory.

Shortly before the ghetto was liquidated, between 1,000 and 1,500 Jewish workers with their wives and children were quartered in two large, multi-storey buildings a few hundred meters apart on Mindaugienes Street (now Taraso-Ševčenkos-Street). In the parlance of the residents they were called the first and the second block. The two houses, each surrounded by a wooden fence, faced the Kailis fur factory. One entered the camp area through a guarded gate. The prisoners' diet was very poor, consisting of some bread and sometimes horse meat . The inmates had to return to their homes for lunch.

Kailis Fur Factory and Kailis Warehouse

Original description: Lithuanian soldier with a group of Jews ready to march to the assigned job. All Jews wear a “J” on a white background on their chest and back to indicate their race.
Work slip for the Vilna Ghetto (October 1941)

As part of the occupation of Lithuania by the Russian army in 1940, Lithuanian industry was expropriated, nationalized and consolidated into trusts. The leather and fur industries played an important role in the agrarian state. The leather trust that was formed included around 35 companies in the leather and fur industry. Some of the previous owners had been imprisoned or abducted by the Russian occupiers, and others continued to work as employees in their former companies. After their invasion, the German Wehrmacht took possession of these factories as spoils of war and later handed them over to a German trust administration, as they were now considered to be Russian state property. German or Lithuanian trustees were appointed as responsible managers in the companies. Two German specialists, one for leather, the other for furs, so-called special guides, had the task of technically supervising the tannery and leather operations, ensuring that the production plans were adhered to and providing them with professional support. From Kaunas (100 km west of Vilnius) they were responsible for bringing in the raw materials, providing the labor and for the proper technical operation of the production. They also had the task of providing the German civilians in Kaunas with shoes and winter furs, for which they were allocated certain contingents for distribution, which they had with release certificates.

In the first months after the establishment of the Lithuanian ghettos, special labor brigades were set up to sort through the stolen Jewish property. In Kaunas City Hall it was the so-called Jordan Brigade. These brigades also served the private needs of the German occupiers, which is why they employed not only jewelers and watchmakers but also the most capable master tailors and furriers . Wehrmacht, police and SS members sent some of their products home to their wives. Employees of the workplaces (private, sergeants, sometimes officers) even issued individual Jews with certificates that allowed the prisoners to move freely around the city for a while.

The various fur workshops in Vilnius belonged mainly to Jews. The three fur factories "Pelze", "Nutria" and "Ursus" (bear) were combined in one factory after the Soviet occupation as part of the nationalization. Before the war, the fur factory was in the old town of Vilnius, Etmonu 1. In October 1941 the factory moved to 16 M. Mindaugienės Street, where the company "Elektrit", a manufacturer of radio housings, was located before the war. Immediately after the occupation, Wehrmacht orders began to be carried out. The relocation of the company was initiated by Oscar Glik, one of the directors of the Jewish hospital. Glik was a refugee from Austria. He had met a school friend who was a member of the military in Vilnius who helped him to obtain papers that made him a “ Volksdeutscher ”. After persecution and economic loss, the managers of the fur factory faced the decision to close the business. In order to help the Jews, Glik suggested to the German Major Hauzler, who was in charge of supplying the camp, to take over the fur factory from the Wehrmacht and move it to the more spacious Elektrit. With the move, Oskar Glik became the actual manager of the company. The fact that the company was declared to be particularly important for the defense because of the production of warm winter clothing for the Eastern Front, almost all furriers and fur finishers working there were among the first to receive the essential "yellow certificate", which ensured their temporary survival and which they compared to the others Camp inmates "privileged". The contemporary witness Gidon Arye, who after his escape into the woods also got a jacket sewn from furs stolen by someone else in the factory, gives the total number of Jewish furriers as around 50, the rest of them came from the area.

In 2010, Vladimir Porudominski reported in a video documentary (available on the Internet) about his father, who was born in Vilnius, and who worked with two brothers as a trained furrier in the Kailis fur factory. He was part of the management of the factory and had introduced the production of fur mosaics there , which are pictures made from leftover fur , some like paintings, which are used as carpets or wall hangings. In addition to other jobs, these products were so in demand that one was in Hermann Göring's hunting lodge and another was with another member of the leadership of Nazi Germany. This occupation prolonged his and his family's lives for two years, until all of them were killed a few days before the liberation, along with almost all of the Jewish prisoners who had survived there.

In the beginning, German soldiers and other people had unhindered access to the ghetto immediately adjacent to the fur factory, perhaps also directly to the factory. They did business with the Jews, and Jews, among whom were numerous well-trained skilled workers and craftsmen, were particularly sought after as workers not only in the fur factory. For daytime work outside the camp, they were initially “wildly requisitioned” to a large extent.

The overall importance of Lithuanian industry for the German armed forces was considerable. The orders from autumn 1941 alone comprised a volume of 4,841,800 RM. With the completion date on October 15, 1941, the fur workshop received the order, for example, to work “4790 pieces of furs and 9000 fur collars”.

A fur jacket brought to Germany from the fur factory (11 centimeters long)

In January 1942 there were a total of 537 people who worked in the “Reichskelzfabrik Kailis”, including 123 Jews and 53 Jewish women. Through contact with the non-Jewish workers, it was possible for the Jews to buy additional food in order to supplement their small rations, or to use it as barter goods. The security forces discovered the special conditions in the fur factory through a fire, presumably caused by an iron that was not switched off: "[...] it was established that all employees in the factory had constantly stolen Wehrmacht goods [sic!]. A total of 16 people were arrested, of whom 13 were shot and the others were sentenced to prison [...] It was also determined that the factory manager, who pretended to be an ethnic German, was a full Jew and was involved in the thefts discovered. "Economic manager Oskar Glik and his wife was arrested and shot in February that year. There was also suspicion of sabotage. The fire destroyed 60,000 finished sheepskin soldier furs .

The spatial conditions were very cramped at the time. Not only was there a lack of workshop space, most of the apartments in a house described by Gregory Schur in his diary consisted of two rooms and a kitchen. Sixteen people lived in the kitchen of one of the five by three square meters, and another ten in each of the two rooms.

The “Kailio” fur factory block at Mindaugienės Street 7 housed 228 male and 275 female persons in March 1942:

0 to 4 years = 13 boys, 13 girls
5 to 14 years = 46 boys, 44 girls
15 to 19 years = 23 boys, 45 girls
20 to 29 years = 29 men, 37 women
30 to 39 years = 32 men, 39 women
40 to 49 years = 50 men, 62 women
50 to 59 years = 27 men, 24 women
60 to 69 years = 7 men, 8 women
from 70 years = 1 man, 3 women.

In August 1943, consideration was given to moving the Kailis fur factory from Vilna to Riga. In consultation with the Reich Commissioner , however, it was decided that “a relocation to Riga is no longer an option. The fur goods factory will continue its previous operation [...]. A factory concentration camp is to be set up for the Jews employed there. be erected within the factory premises ”. This also made the idea of ​​making the factory site available to the Wehrmacht's motor vehicle fleet.

The main work in the fur factory with the associated tailoring consisted of cleaning and sorting military clothing, in addition to the work in the skinning. Other prisoners worked in the Elfa electrical appliance factory, across from the camp. Some women stayed in the camp and looked after the children, or they worked in the bakery. Although it was forbidden, the inmates tried to maintain a minimum level of cultural life. In the first building there was a prayer room in the basement and under the roof, and a school for the children in the second block. Musical evenings were organized for the young people and there were performances by Jewish actors and singers.

The Jewish workers were off on Saturdays. They had permission to visit the only bathhouse in the camp in guided groups. This kept them in contact with the surviving ghetto residents, where they met friends and relatives.

Cells of the Jewish underground movement FPO had also established themselves in the apartment blocks . When the final liquidation of the camp began on September 23, 1943, a number of residents managed to escape through previously dug, hidden tunnels, including all members of the Jewish resistance movement who hid themselves with other resistance members in the surrounding forests. After difficult and painful discussions, it was decided to smuggle out members of the resistance and young ghetto residents, but leave their families behind. On the fateful September 23, about 100 of the last fighters left the camp literally at the last minute through the sewer system, crawling to the “Aryan” side within several hours. Some were hidden inside the Kailis fur factory, others in the basement of the Pushkin Palace. Those in the Pushkin Palace continued their escape on the night of September 26th and reached the Rudniki forests the following day . Those from the factory left their hiding place on September 27 and arrived in the woods two days later.

  • The building of the former electric and temporary fur factory in 2001
  • Elektrit Vilnius Szeptyckiego 2001 b.jpg
  • Elektrit Vilnius Szeptyckiego 2001 a.jpg

In mid-October 1943, the SS and members of a Lithuanian special unit surrounded the apartment blocks after the men had been brought to the fur factory. They selected 30 people who did not belong to the families or who seemed suspicious to them. They took them to Ponary, where they were shot. Nevertheless, 200 “illegal” Jews subsequently found refuge in the Kailis camp. The head of the fur factory, Friedrich, registered some of them as workers. In consultation with Major Plagge , he sent the other part from Army Motor Vehicle Park 562 to the Subocz-Strasse camp. Karl Plagge managed to save at least 250 of the Jewish forced laborers assigned to him from murder.

On the morning of March 27, 1944, the children of the camp were called to roll call by SS-Unterscharführer Richter. It was stated that they would be taken to the nearby military hospital for a medical examination . Since such actions had already taken place several times, one did not become suspicious. The children were then dragged out of the hospital by SS men and a Lithuanian unit onto trucks. Around 200 children were most likely shot in Ponary. Few children managed to hide in the hospital and return to the camp, some are said to have managed to jump from the truck.

On July 3, 1944, the Kailis camp was also liquidated by members of the branch of the Security Police and SD Wilna, and most of the prisoners were shot by them in Ponary.

The already mentioned Gideon Arye reports in his memoirs that immediately after the Russian invasion of Vilna, he and his father, who also survived, worked for a while in the fur factory again; the mother and his brother had been killed.

Web links

Commons : Kailis Pelzfabrik  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Commons : Vilnius Ghetto  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

literature

  • Vilnius Ghetto: List of Prisoners . Volume 2. (336 pages), Vilna Gaon Museum, Wilna 1998. A list of the orders and prisoners of the fur factory Kailis u. a., documents relating to the structure of the Vilna Ghetto (person search in the database: [1] )

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wolfgang Benz , Konrad Kwiet ( Center for Research on Antisemitism , Technical University Berlin): Yearbook for Research on Antisemitism , Volumes 7–8, Campus, 1998, p. 71.
  2. ↑ Skroblies / Jetter, p. 30.
  3. ↑ Skroblies / Jetter, p. 21. Secondary source: Karl Jäger, report December 1, 1941, in: Bartusevicius u. a., p. 309.
  4. ↑ www.avivshoa.co.il: Ghetto list ZRBG steering group . January 28, 2011. Retrieved February 27, 2016.
  5. ↑ Skroblies / Jetter, p. 27.
  6. ↑ a b Benz / Distel: Primary source: Marianne Viefhaus: For a community of the "lonely among their peoples" . Major Plagge and the Heereskraftpark 562 in Wilna , p. 106. In: Wolfram Wette (Ed.): Moral courage. Outraged helpers and rescuers from the Wehrmacht, police and SS . Frankfurt am Main, 2003, pp. 97-113.
  7. ^ Benz / Distel. Primary source: The Jews of Vilna . The records of Grigory Shur 1941–1944. Munich 1999, p. 204, 207ff., 211.
  8. ↑ Richard Schweizer: Report on the action of the Winiks brothers, z. Currently Landsberg / Lech, DP camp against Richard Schweizer, manufacturer and Richard Franke, fur trader, both in Murrhardt. Murrhardt, letter of March 1948, pp. 1-2, G. & C. Franke collection .
  9. ↑ Martin Löffler: Legal opinion. Stuttgart, January 19, 1948. p. 1. G. & C. Franke collection.
  10. ↑ Petra Bräutigam: Medium-sized entrepreneurs under National Socialism: Economic developments and social behavior in the shoe and leather industry in Baden and Württemberg . R. Ouldenburg Verlag Munich, 1997. ISBN 3-486-56256-8 . Retrieved April 12, 2016.
  11. ^ A b c Joachim Tauber: Work as Hope: Jewish Ghettos in Lithuania . Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG, 2015, pp. 184ff., 201.
  12. ↑ Bubnys, Arūnas (2011). Vilniaus žydų žudynės ir Vilniaus getas. Holokaustas Lietuvoje 1941–1944 m (in Lithuanian). Lietuvos gyventojų genocido ir rezistencijos tyrimų centras . pp. 41-42. ISBN 978-609-8037-13-5 .
  13. ^ A b c d Jewish Resistance in the Holocaust . Based on: From the memoirs of Zvi (Hirshka) Travotsin .
  14. ↑ a b c d www.jmuseum.lt: Irina Guzenberg: Vilniaus geto darbo stovyklos ir 1942 m. gyventojų surašymas (Vilnius Ghetto and Labor Camp 1942. Census) (Lithuanian). Retrieved March 9, 2016.
  15. ↑ a b Gideon Arie (Gidon Arye) RG-50.030.0009 collections.ushmm.org: Two video cassettes, recorded in Hebrew on July 11, 1989 (English). Retrieved April 11, 2016.
  16. ↑ www.juedische-lebensgeschichten.de: Life stories of Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union in North Rhine-Westphalia . Video, interview with Vladimir Porudominski on May 5, 2010 by Thomas Roth and Lew Walamas, NS Documentation Center Cologne. A project of the synagogue community of Cologne and the regional associations of the Jewish communities of North Rhine and Westphalia-Lippe, carried out by the NS Documentation Center of the City of Cologne. Retrieved February 26, 2016.
  17. ↑ See LCVR R-743, ap. 5, b. 21, BL. 5 Back, Lithuanian Statistical Office, monthly overview of the activities of the industrial enterprise, here Kailis from January 18 to 31, 1942.
  18. ↑ http://www.vilnaghetto.com:/ Chronicles of the Vilna Ghetto. Retrieved April 10, 2016.
  19. ^ Ilya Ehrenburg, Vasily Grossman: The Complete Black Book of Russian Jewry . Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick and London, p. 273.
  20. ↑ a b Benz / Distel. Primary source: War diary of the Wehrwirtschaftskommando Wilna (formerly branch of the Wwi Kdo Kauen), July 1 - September 30 , 1943 , in BArch Berlin, R 91 / Kauen-Land / 10
  21. ^ Benz / Distel. Primary source: The Jews of Vilna . Pp. 208f., 211: Statement by Jack A., August 29, 1996 in No. Woodmere, Interview No. 19 III of the USC Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education.
  22. ^ Benz / Distel. Primary source: The Jews of Vilna . P. 214ff .; Statement by Arie J., October 15, 1963, in: BArch Ludwigsburg, B 162/2512, B, 5841.
  23. ^ Benz / Distel: Application from the StA Frankfurt am Main. 4 Js 1106/59 of September 7, 1961 on the opening of a preliminary judicial investigation against Schmitz u. a., in BArch Ludwigsburg, B 162/2517, p. 8273.