GARLIAVA
Pre-1940: Garliava (Yiddish: Gudleva), town, Kaunas apskritis, Lithuania; 1940–1941: Kaunas uezd, Lithuanian SSR; 1941–1944: Godlewo, Kreis Kauen, Gebiet Kauen-Land, Generalkommissariat Litauen; post-1991: Garliava, Kaunas rajonas and apskritis, Republic of Lithuania
Garliava was originally located a few kilometers south of the city of Kaunas; later it was incorporated into the city as a suburb. According to the 1923 census, there were 311 Jews living there. Owing to the migration of a number of Jews abroad in the years before World War II, the Jewish population declined.
German armed forces occupied the city on June 24, 1941. Immediately afterwards, three Lithuanian partisan units were formed in the Garliava area, and they recruited approximately 120 men. Lithuanian nationalists formed a local administration and police force, which implemented a series of anti-Jewish measures. Jews were marked with the Star of David and were ordered to perform compulsory labor. They were also subjected to lootings and beatings by local antisemites and were prohibited from walking on the sidewalks or having any relations with the other Lithuanians.
On August 7, 1941, the Kaunas District governor issued an order calling for the resettlement of Jews into ghettos by August 15.1 The Jews were also registered, and on August 12, 1941, the head of the Garliava Rural District reported to the Kaunas District governor that there were 285 Jews there.2 Shortly after this, in mid-August 1941, local policemen and [End Page 1053] partisans forced the Jews of Garliava and neighboring villages into the local synagogue, where they were confined for about two weeks in a form of “synagogue ghetto.” Almost nothing is known about the conditions for the Jews in the synagogue, but clearly the sleeping and living arrangements were appalling.
On the morning of the liquidation Aktion, policemen and partisans drove several dozen Jewish men to a site close to the village of Rinkunai (just to the east of Garliava) and ordered them to dig a trench. When the Jews realized its purpose, they refused to carry out the work. The policemen then brought a group of Lithuanians from Garliava, who dug a ditch 60 meters long by 2 meters wide and 1.5 meters deep (197 by 7 by 5 feet).3
Men of the 3rd Company of the 1st (13th) Lithuanian Police Battalion arrived in Garliava in trucks on that day under the command of officers B. Norkus, J. Barzda, and A. Dagys. Local policemen and partisans drove the Jews out of the synagogue and escorted them to the prepared trench. The Jews were forced to surrender their possessions and remove their clothes and shoes. The Jewish men were shot first. They were lined up on the edge of the trench and shot from behind at a distance of several meters.4 The mass shooting started in the afternoon and was completed by nightfall. By torchlight, men of the 3rd Company finished off some of the Jews who had only been wounded. Afterwards they returned to Garliava and drank alcohol in a pub before leaving for their barracks.5
According to the report of Karl Jäger, who was in charge of Einsatzkommando 3, the 247 Jews of Garliava (73 men, 113 women, and 61 children) were shot on a day between August 28 and September 2, 1941.6 The witnesses do not mention the presence of any Germans, and it appears that the shootings were carried out by local policemen, partisans, and the men of the 3rd Company.
For their participation in the murder of the Jews in Garliava and other places in Lithuania, eight former policemen of the 3rd Company were sentenced to life in prison after court proceedings in Kaunas from September 27 to October 4, 1962.7
SOURCES
Information on the extermination of the Jews in Garliava can be found in the following publications: Arūnas Bubnys, “The Holocaust in the Lithuanian Province in 1941: The Kaunas District,” in D. Gaunt, P.A. Levine, and L. Palosuo, eds., Collaboration and Resis tance during the Holocaust: Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania (Bern: Peter Lang, 2004), pp. 283–312, here pp. 301–303; and Dov Levin and Yosef Rosin, eds., Pinkas ha-kehilot. Encyclopaedia of Jewish Communities: Lithuania (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1996), pp. 185–186.
Documentation on the fate of the Jews of Garliava during the Holocaust can be found in the following archives: LCVA (R 1534-1-193); LYA (K 1-58-47337/3); RGVA (500-1-25); and YVA (O-3/3217 and 3239).
NOTES
1. B. Baranauskas and E. Rozauskas, eds., Masinės žudynes Lietuvoje (1941–1944): Dokumentu rinkinys, vol. 1 (Vilnius: Leidykla “Mintis,” 1965), pp. 290–291.
2. LCVA, R 1534-1-193, p. 17, letter by the head of Garliava Rural District to the Kaunas District governor, August 12, 1941.
3. LYA, K 1-58-47337/3, vol. 8, pp. 26–28, interrogation of J. Ivanauskas, March 20, 1962.
4. Ibid., vol. 1, pp. 36–38, interrogation of J. Vosyius, April 10, 1961.
5. Ibid., pp. 310–315, interrogation of J. Palubinskas, October 12, 1961.
6. RGVA, 500-1-25, p. 113, report of Einsatzkommando 3, December 1, 1941 (the report spells it as Carliava).
7. Sovetskaia Litva (Vilnius), October 4, 1962.
