SEREDŽIUS
[End Page 1117] Pre-1940: Seredžius (Yiddish: Srednik), town, Kaunas apskritis, Lithuania; 1940–1941: Seredžius/Seredzhius, Kaunas uezd, Lithuanian SSR; 1941–1944: Seredschius, Kreis Schaken, Gebiet Kauen-Land, Generalkommissariat Litauen; post-1991: Seredžius, Jurbarkas rajonas, Tauragė apskritis, Republic of Lithuania
Seredžius is located 37 kilometers (23 miles) northwest of Kaunas. According to the 1923 population census, 449 Jews were living in Seredžius. By mid-1941, the number of Jews in the town had decreased significantly, owing largely to emigration.
German troops captured the town on June 24, 1941. Immediately, Lithuanian nationalists formed a local administration and a police force, which implemented a series of anti-Jewish measures. Jews were marked with the Star of David and were forced into labor of various kinds. The Jews were subjected to assault, robbery, and other forms of degradation by local antisemites. Jews were also prohibited from appearing in public spaces or having any relations with the Lithuanians. The Lithuanian nationalists arrested and shot Jewish men suspected of having collaborated with the Soviet authorities.
Soon the Jews were evacuated from their homes and resettled into the town synagogue, which effectively became a ghetto for them. The homes and property of the Jews were confiscated and distributed among their Lithuanian neighbors. In the middle of August 1941, Jewish men aged over 15 and Jewish women who had been accused of collaborating with the Soviet authorities in 1940–1941 were singled out and transported to Vilkija. In Vilkija, they were shot along with the local Jews on August 28, 1941.1 The 193 Jews that remained, comprising 6 men, 61 women, and 126 children, were shot in the Pakralė Forest, just outside the town, on September 4, 1941.2
SOURCES
Information on the persecution and murder of the Jews in Seredžius may be found in the following publications: Shalom Bronstein, ed., Yahadut Lita: Lithuanian Jewry, vol. 4, The Holocaust 1941–1945 (Tel Aviv: Association of Former Lithuanians in Israel, 1984), p. 325; “Seredzius,” in Dov Levin and Yosef Rosin, eds., Pinkas ha-kehilot. Encyclopaedia of Jewish Communities: Lithuania (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1996), pp. 442–443; and J. Woolf, comp., “The Holocaust in 21 Lithuanian Towns,” available at www.jewishgen.org/Yizkor/lithuania3/lithuania3.html.
Relevant documentation can be found in the following archives: LCVA; and RGVA (500-1-25).
