« Previous Page Table of Contents Next Page »




Šeduva (Shadeve) {Cont.}





During World War II and afterwards

In summer of 1940 Lithuania was annexed to the Soviet Union and became a Soviet Republic. Under the new regulations, the Shadeve factories, owned mostly by Jews, were nationalized. Jewish shops were also nationalized and in many cases the former owners were appointed to manage them. All Zionist parties and youth organizations were disbanded, and the Hebrew school was closed. Supply of goods decreased and, as a result, prices soared. The middle class, mostly Jewish, bore the brunt of this situation and the standard of living dropped gradually.


lit6_285f.jpg
A fragment of the oldest Sefer Torah in Lithuania


In the middle of July an order was issued for all the Jews to lock and leave their homes, after pasting a note on the door with the name of the owner. They were then ordered to gather in the market square. They were allowed to take a small parcel and were told to hand over keys of their homes to the police.

They were then transported, heavily guarded, passing a few stations on the way, and in the middle of the night they arrived at the village Pabarstyciai, about five kilometers from Shadeve. There, they were crowded into two unfinished wooden structures with no water and no light that the Soviets had intended to use as barracks; it had a low barbed wire fence with a guard stationed at it. Twenty-five Jewish youngsters who had worked at nearby farms were brought to this camp as well. They had wounds from blows inflicted by the Lithuanian guards. The only Jewish doctor present at the scene was Dr. Patorsky, who tended the wounded.

The camp inmates were provided with small amounts of food that guards had collected from the deserted Jewish homes.

The day the Jews were taken out of their homes amid death threats, they were forced to hand over money, gold and other valuables in their possession. On August 3, 1941 the Lithuanians took ten more men out of the camp for “labor” activities. On the way to Radvilishok (Radviliskis) they were shot near lime pits, and their bodies covered with lime. In the middle of August the Lithuanians took twenty-seven Jews out of the camp, including Rabbi Mordehai-David Henkin, and led them to the neighboring village of Kauliskiai where they were shot dead. Thirty-five Jews who worked on the farms at the Raudondvaris estate, a few kilometers away, were also murdered and buried at the same place.

On August 25, 1941 (2nd of Elul, 5701) the last Shadeve Jews were loaded on trucks, and driven to the Liaudiskiai forest, about 10 kilometers to the south-west of Shadeve, where all were shot. According to Soviet sources two mass graves were found containing the bodies of 664 men, women and children. After the murders, the murderers held an all-night drinking feast.

Three families, which included Dr. Patorsky, and the Nul and Kuper families who were fighters in the Lithuanian battles of independence were allowed to remain in the town six further weeks, but were shot later. Only Shulamith, the wife of Nul, managed to survive by hiding at a peasant's farm all the years until the liberation.


lit6_285g.jpg
Mass grave near the village Pakutenai (one of two massacre sites).
The inscriptions on the tablet are in Yiddish, Hebrew and Lithuanian.


The names of the Lithuanians who robbed and murdered the Jews are recorded at the archives of Yad Vashem in Jerusalem.

After the war monuments were erected at mass graves.

According to the census of 1970 and 1979 one Jew lived in Shadeve. In 1985 not one Jew remained in the town.


lit6_285h.jpg
The second massacre site near Pakutenai village.
The burial site of the six Jews who managed to escape
from the camp in Pabarstyciai village. In August 1941 all of them
were tortured to death by the Lithuanian Nazi collaborators.




lit6_285i.jpg
The massacre site in Liaudiskiai forest
The inscriptions in Yiddish, Hebrew and Lithuanian state:
“In this place, on August 25, 1941, the Hitlerist murderers and their local collaborators
murdered about 800 Seduva Jews, men, women, children.”


Sources:

Yad Vashem archives, Jerusalem, M-33/975; Koniukhovsky collection 0-71, files 61-64
YIVO, collection of Lithuanian Jewish Communities, files 1207-1211, pages 56688-56835
Lipman M.D., The history of the Jews in Kovno and Slabodka (Hebrew), Pages 25-33
Kamzon Y. D., Yahaduth Lita (Hebrew), pages 95, 100
HaMelitz, St. Petersburg (Hebrew), 28.11.1867; 1.1.1879; 5.8.1879; 31.5.1881; 25.4.1884; 30.6.1884; 21.7.1884; 24.2.1887; 6.3.1887; 13.2.1888; 21.2.1888; 27.6.1888; 15.11.1899; 23.7.1902
Di Yiddishe Shtime, Kovno (Yiddish), 13.11.1931; 17.12.1931; 25.3.1932; 22.6.1932; 1.3.1938; 12.2.1939
Dos Naie Vort, Kovno (Yiddish) 22.7.1934
Folksblat, Kovno (Yiddish) 16.41937; 28.2.1938
Der Yiddisher Kooperator, Kovno (Yiddish) # 8-9, 1929
Dos Vort, Kovno (Yiddish) 13.12.1935
Yiddisher Hantverker, Kovno (Yiddish) # 16, 1939
Kovner Tog (Yiddish) 8.6.1926
Naujienos, Chicago (Lithuanian) 11.6.1949
Augustinas Janulaitis; Zydai Lietuvoje (Jews in Lithuania) (Lithuanian), Kaunas, 1923


Appendix 1

A partial list of rabbis who officiated in Shadeve till World War I

Gershon Kremer, cousin of the Rabbi Eliyahu, Gaon from Vilna, served in Shadeve 1831, wrote several books.
Eliezer-Simhah Rabinovitz (1832-1911), was active in public issues.
Noakh Rabinovitz (1832-1902), in Shadeve from 1890, preached for the settlement of Eretz-Yisrael, published several books.
Simhah HaLevi Hurvitz, in Shadeve from 1871.
Yehudah-Leib Rif, from 1886.
Avraham-Aharon Burshtein (1867-1926), in Shadeve 1901-1902.
Yosef Kanovitz, from 1903.
Yosef-Yehudah-Leib Blokh (1849-1930), in Shadeve 1905-1910, moved to Telz where he became the rabbi of the town and the head of the famous Yeshivah.


lit6_285j.jpg
 
lit6_285k.jpg
Rabbi
Yosef Yehudah Leib Blokh
  Rabbi
Eliezer Simhah Rabinovitz

lit6_285l.jpg
Rabbi
Aharon Baksht


Appendix 2

A partial list of personages born in Shadeve

Rabbi Mosheh ben Ya'akov-Moshe (HaGolah) (1449-1520), studied in Istanbul, returned to Shadeve in 1495 where he wrote his book Sodoth Shoshan (in the steps of the Rambam), later was Rabbi in Krim, where he died.

Shemuel-Yits'hak Hilman (1868-1953), was Rabbi in Berezino, Glasgow and London. In 1934 emigrated to Eretz-Yisrael where he became headmaster and director of the Yeshivah Or HaYashar in Jerusalem. He published twenty volumes of his book on the Talmud.

Hayim-Mordehai Kotz (1894-1930), was active in the Yavneh movement and in the establishment of the preparatory class of the Telz Yeshivah. In 1940 arrived in America where he together with A.M. Blokh established the Cleveland Yeshivah.

Yisrael Mah-Yafith (Ma Yofis) (1897-1930), authorized rabbi, writer and poet, translated popular poems of Kh. N. Bialik into Yiddish and the allegories of Krilov into Hebrew and Yiddish. For ten years he wrote for the Yiddish newspaper Di Yiddishe Shtime that was published in Kovno. A selection of his writings in Hebrew and Yiddish was published in a book in Tel Aviv in 1970, by Menorah publishers.


lit6_285m.jpg
Yisrael Mah-Yafith


Appendix 3

List of 57 Sheduva Jews, donors for the Settlement of Eretz-Yisrael, as published in HaMelitz 1893-1900
(from JewishGen>Databases>Lithuania>Hamelitz by Jeffrey Maynard)


Surname Given Name Comments Source Year
AMALS Tanchum in Johannesburg, SA #2 1897
AMALSKI Tanchum   #137 1900
AMALSKI Zalman   #137 1900
BERGMAN Shlomo Elihu   #35 1900
BRET Akiva   #35 1900
DIMONT Shmuel   #10 1897
FLEISHMAN Mordechai   #10 1897
FRANK Dovid   #35 1900
FRANK Noson   #35 1900
FRIDGUT Avraham Yakov   #10 1897
FRIDLAND Boruch Tzvi   #35 1900
FRIDLAND Meir Yona   #35 1900
FRIDLANDER Yehoshua ben Yehuda Leib born 1896/7 #10 1897
FRIDLANDER Yehuda Leib father of Yehoshua   #10 1897
GODIN Yisroel   #35 1900
GUTMAN Asher returned from Africa #35 1900
KAHANOWITZ Mordechai   #35 1900
KALIAN Yakov   #10 1897
KANTOR Moshe   #56 1899
KANTOR Shacna Shatz #56 1899
KAPLAN Eliezer Arieh   #35 1900
KARL Kalman grandfather of baby boy from Riga #10 1897
KRIGER Osher husband of Bertha Yossel wed #56 1899
LEWIATAN Yeshiahu   #10 1897
LICHTENSHTEIN Eliezer   #35 1900
LIPSHITZ Yona   #10 1897
LIPSHITZ Yosef   #35 1900
LURIA Shmuel   #10 1897
MAWSHOWITZ Aba Moshe   #35 1900
MEIROWITZ Yakov   #35 1900
MEIROWITZ Yakov   #247 1895
MER Chaim   #137 1900
NEWIAZKE Elke   #35 1900
NISAN Avraham   #10 1897
OLEIZKE Avraham   #35 1900
OLEIZKE Dovid   #35 1900
POLB Zalman   #10 1897
RABINOWITZ Bebe bas Noach wife of Ephraim Nisan
of Droia
wed 13 Elul #204 1893
RABINOWITZ Noach father of Bebe Rabbi Gaon #204 1893
RABINOWITZ Rivka   #56 1899
RABINOWITZ Zev   #63 1895
RAPOPORT Dovid   #35 1900
SEGAL Yosef   #10 1897
SHAPIRO Avraham Rabbi #35 1900
SHAPIRO Chaim   #10 1897
SHAPIRO Nisan Shatz #35 1900
SHEIN Leib returned from Africa #35 1900
TANOR Rochel   #35 1900
YAFT Moshe   #10 1897
YOSSEL Bertha wife of Osher Kriger wed #56 1899
ZACHS Aharon   #35 1900
ZEGALL Yosef   #56 1895


Appendix 4

List of 128 Shadeve Jews, donors for the victims of the great famine in Persia in 1871-72 as published in HaMagid
(from JewishGen>Databases>Lithuania>HaMagid, by Jeffrey Maynard)



Surname Given Name Comments Source Year
ABRAHAM Yakov ben Yeshi   #9 1872
ABRAHAM Yeshei father of Yakov   #9 1872
BEITLECHEM Mordechai   #9 1872
BENA Eli   #9 1872
BERMAN Avraham   #9 1872
BERMAN Avraham father of Tzvi #25 1871
BERMAN Tzvi   #9 1872
BERMAN Tzvi ben Avraham   #25 1871
FATZTER Zalman   #9 1872
FREED Tsvi   #9 1872
FRIDGOT A Y   #9 1872
FUNKEL Moshe   #9 1872
GARBER Yehuda   #9 1872
GOMPIL Yosef   #9 1872
HOROWITZ Yosef ben Simcha Halevy   #9 1872
KA"TZ Moshe   #9 1872
KA"TZ Yitzchok Meir   #9 1872
KALIBANSHKI Shmuel   #9 1872
LEVI Kalman ben Shimon   #9 1872
LEVITA Chaim   #9 1872
LEVITAN Yitschak Hagvir #9 1872
LEWINTHAL Yitzchok   #25 1871
LIPSHITZ Avraham   #9 1872
LIPSHITZ Avraham   #25 1871
MAHAR Yehuda   #9 1872
MAKLEBANSHIK Moshe   #9 1872
MALCHHAS Aharon   #9 1872
MAN Menachem   #9 1872
MANOSH Yitschak   #9 1872
MELMAN L   #9 1872
MELMAN Leib   #25 1871
MER Avraham   #25 1871
MER Chaim ben Eli   #9 1872
MER Chaim ben Eli   #25 1871
MER Dov   #25 1871
MER Eli father of Chaim #9 1872
MER Sarah widow #9 1872
MER Tzvi   #9 1872
MER Eli father of Chaim #25 1871
MERSHAN Avraham   #9 1872
MIPRASITZTZ Yehuda   #9 1872
MORDECAI Yitschak   #9 1872
POLOK Yosef   #9 1872
RABINOWITZ Natan Neta   #9 1872
SANDLER Neta   #9 1872
SEGAL Dov   #9 1872
SEGAL Moshe Yakov   #9 1872
SEGAL Yosef ben Yona   #9 1872
SHADINER Shmuel   #9 1872
SHAWLANER Natan   #9 1872
SHLAPABERSKI Chaim Titzchok   #25 1871
SHLAPEBERSKI Baruch ben D   #9 1872
SHLAPEBERSKI Ch"ai Hagvir #9 1872
SHLAPEBERSKI Dovid   #9 1872
SHMID Shmuel   #9 1872
SHMID Yisroel   #9 1872
TALPIOS A   #9 1872
TALPIOS Avraham   #25 1871
WABELE Eizik   #9 1872
WEINMAN Aharon Yakov   #25 1871
WOLPE Mordechai Leib   #9 1872
YAKOV Yisroel   #9 1872
YEHONATAN Boruch   #9 1872
YENTES Shmuel son in law of Shmuel ben Tzvi #9 1872
ZALIMAN Yakov   #25 1871
Abba ben Moshe   #9 1872
Avraham ben Kalman   #9 1872
Avraham Chaim   #9 1872
Avraham Yitzchok ben Nechamiah   #9 1872
Avraham Yona   #9 1872
Bena ben Shmuel   #9 1872
Bentzion son in law of Shraga #9 1872
Bentzion ben Tzvi   #9 1872
Bentzion Yudel   #25 1871
Binyamin Ari   #9 1872
Dov son in law of Avraham Mershan #9 1872
Dov ben Moshe   #9 1872
Eizik ben Eliezer   #9 1872
Eizik ben Moshe   #9 1872
Elazar ben Eliezer   #9 1872
Eli ben Boruch   #9 1872
Ephraim ben Leib   #9 1872
Heshil ben Micha   #9 1872
Leib ben rabbi A   #9 1872
Leib ben rabbi D   #9 1872
Leib ben Yakov   #9 1872
Leib Yakov ben A   #9 1872
Leizer Micha   #9 1872
Meir Eliezer son in law of Avraham Yona #9 1872
Meir son in law of Shraga Yakov #9 1872
Meir Eliezer   #25 1871
Mordechai ben Moshe   #9 1872
Moshe ben Shmuel   #9 1872
Nechamiah ben D   #9 1872
Nechamiah ben Moshe   #9 1872
Noson Note ben Rabbi M   #25 1871
Pesach ben Eizik   #9 1872
Pesach ben Ephraim Meir   #9 1872
Rase woman #25 1871
Reuven ben Shmuel   #9 1872
Rivka woman #25 1871
Rivka bas Eli   #9 1872
Shmuel ben Dovid   #9 1872
Shmuel ben Moshe   #9 1872
Shmuel ben Tzvi   #9 1872
Shraga ben Dov   #9 1872
Shraga ben Manish   #9 1872
Shraga Yakov ben Dovid   #9 1872
Yakov son in law of Menachem Man #9 1872
Yakov Rabbi Gaon M”tz ABD #25 1871
Yakov ben Alexander   #9 1872
Yakov ben Avraham   #9 1872
Yakov ben Avraham   #25 1871
Yakov ben Ephraim   #9 1872
Yakov ben Tzvi   #9 1872
Yakov ben Leib   #9 1872
Yehiyahu ben Yehuda   #25 1871
Yeshei ben Binyamin   #9 1872
Yisroel Yakov   #25 1871
Yitzchok Ari   #9 1872
Yitzchok Menachem   #25 1871
Yochanason son in law of Abba #9 1872
Yona ben Yechiel   #9 1872
Yosef son in law of Avraham Berman #25 1871
Zalman Yitschak   #9 1872
Zev ben Ari   #9 1872
Zev ben Eliahu   #9 1872

 

The above article is an excerpt from “Protecting Our Litvak Heritage” by Josef Rosin. The book contains this article along with many others, plus an extensive description of the Litvak Jewish community in Lithuania that provides an excellent context to understand the above article. Click here to see where to obtain the book.

http://yurburgfriends.com/Rosin/Heritage.html

« Previous Page Table of Contents Next Page »


This material is made available by JewishGen, Inc. and the Yizkor Book Project for the purpose
of fulfilling our mission of disseminating information about the Holocaust and destroyed Jewish communities.
This material may not be copied, sold or bartered without permission of the copyright holders: Josef Rosin z”l and Joel Alpert.


JewishGen, Inc. makes no representations regarding the accuracy of the translation.The reader may wish to refer to the original material for verification.
JewishGen is not responsible for inaccuracies or omissions in the original work and cannot rewrite or edit the text to correct inaccuracies and/or omissions.
Our mission is to produce a translation of the original work and we cannot verify the accuracy of statements or alter facts cited.

  Protecting Our Litvak Heritage     Yizkor Book Project     JewishGen Home Page


Yizkor Book Director, Lance Ackerfeld
This web page created by Osnat Ramaty

Copyright © 1999-2024 by JewishGen, Inc.
Updated 14 Aug 2011 by OR