The Plungė massacre (in

Yiddish Yiddish, historically Judeo-German, is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated in 9th-century Central Europe, and provided the nascent Ashkenazi community with a vernacular based on High German fused with ...

Plungyan – פלונגיאן) was a

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

massacre committed on 13 or 15 July 1941 in the town of Plungė, in

Lithuania Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania, is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, bordered by Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, P ...

. Following the anti-

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

June Uprising in Lithuania and the German invasion as part of

Operation Barbarossa Operation Barbarossa was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and several of its European Axis allies starting on Sunday, 22 June 1941, during World War II. More than 3.8 million Axis troops invaded the western Soviet Union along ...

, Plungė was captured by German forces on 25 June 1941. Lithuanian nationalists, led by

Jonas Noreika Jonas Noreika (8 October 1910 – 26 February 1947), also known by his post-war nom de guerre Generolas Vėtra (), was a Lithuanian anti-Soviet partisan, military officer, and Nazi collaborator. In July 1941, he was the leader of the Lithuan ...

,„Die Mörder werden noch gebraucht“
''Der Spiegel'', Von Leonid Olschwang, 23 April 1984
Chicago Tribune, Ron Grossman, 14 January 2019 formed a town administration and police force. Lithuanians accused 60 young Jewish men of being a rear guard for the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

; shortly after the town's capture, German forces killed these men. On 13 or 15 July Lithuanian nationalists transported the Jews to ditches near the village of Kausenai where they were shot. Of the 1,700-1,800 remaining Jews of Plungė, only a few survived.The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933–1945 ''Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933–1945'' is a seven-part encyclopedia series that explores the history of the concentration camps, ghettos, forced-labor camps, and other sites of detention, persecution, or state-sponsored murder ru ...

, Geoffrey P. Megargee, Martin C. Dean, and Mel Hecker, Volume II, part B, p. 1105.

Background

Jews first arrived in Plungė in 1348; by 1900, the Jewish population of more than 2,500 comprised more than half of the people of the town.Around the Jewish World Lone Jew in Lithuanian Town Spends Life Preserving the Past

Jewish Telegraphic Agency The Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) is an international news agency and wire service that primarily covers Judaism- and Jewish-related topics and news. Described as the "Associated Press of the Jewish media", JTA serves Jewish and non-Jewish news ...

, 13 June 2002 After the June Uprising in Lithuania and the German invasion of the Soviet Union, Plungė was occupied by German forces on 25 June 1941.

Ghetto and repressions

Lithuanian nationalists led by

formed a town administration and police force. On 26 June 1941, the Lithuanians forced the Jews to the area around the local

Beth midrash A ''beth midrash'' (, "house of learning"; : ''batei midrash''), also ''beis medrash'' or ''beit midrash'', is a hall dedicated for Torah study, often translated as a "study hall". It is distinct from a synagogue (''beth knesseth''), althoug ...

and synagogue which they declared a

ghetto A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other ...

. Lithuanians took Jews out of the ghetto to perform hard manual labor, accompanied by humiliation and beatings, and some were murdered and did not return to the ghetto. The living conditions (filth, overcrowding, lack of food and water) in the ghetto led to high mortality and disease, particularly so among the elderly. Valuables were extorted from the Jews by the Lithuanian authorities.

Massacre

On 13 or 15 July the Lithuanian nationalists transported the Jews to ditches near the village of Kaušėnai in Nausodis eldership where they were shot. Of the 1,700–1,800 Jews of Plungė, only a few survived. Survivors included people deported to the Soviet Union prior to the German invasion, and six who were sheltered by Lithuanian friends. Catholic priest Petras Lygnugaris baptized 74 young Jewish girls in an effort to spare them, but the Lithuanian activists killed them there, notwithstanding. Plungė was perhaps the first town in

German-occupied Europe German-occupied Europe, or Nazi-occupied Europe, refers to the sovereign countries of Europe which were wholly or partly military occupation, militarily occupied and civil-occupied, including puppet states, by the (armed forces) and the governmen ...

where all of the Jewish inhabitants were murdered, including children, women and the elderly.Captain Jonas Noreika Museum. Grant Gochin's "Query Regarding Jonas Noreika’s Criminal Gang."
Andrius Kulikauskas, 15 June 2018

Aftermath

72 Plungė Jews joined the Red Army, of whom 42 died in combat. Following the war there were 138 Jews in Plungė, most emigrated to Israel, South Africa, and the United States. By 1970, 45 remained. By 2002, Jacob Bunka was the last Jew in Plungė. Bunka died in 2014. Bunka created massive wooden sculptures commemorating the massacres in Plunge and other sites as well as the life of the Jewish community. Remembrance sites for the events of 1941 exist in and around the town. A memorial wall bearing the names of most of the 1,800 killed Jews stands at the Kaušėnai Holocaust memorial.Lithuania

International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA), until January 2013 known as the Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance, and Research or ITF, is an intergovernmental organization founded in 1998 wh ...

Jonas Noreika was executed for treason in 1947.

References

External links