SUPPLEMENT TO DRAUGAS NEWS

MAY / JUN 2018 VOL 6 (S3)

In this issue:
Searching for the Prez. Smetona
Litvinism: Belarus and the GDL
Voices of Children Deported to Siberia
Folk Art of Carved Distaffs
A Blueberry Summer
 Lithuanian
Portraits

The remains of the Lithuanian warship “Prezidentas Smetona.” Photo taken

during a search mission organized by the University of Klaipėda, July, 2017.
Volume 6, Number S3
May / June 2018

FEATURES
Seeking and Finding the Prezidentas Smetona 6
an interview with John Nekus
Nekus describes the search for the wreck, how several expeditions to
find it were organized, and why this particular naval warship was espe-
cially meaningful to him personally.

Litvinism: Belarus and the GDL 12

by Miltiades Varvounis
For more than two decades a pseudohistorical concept called “Litvinism”
has been prevalent in Belarus, claiming that the real
“Lithuanians”(Litvins) were none other than Belarusians, who supposedly page 6
founded the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL).

Children in Siberia: Images of Survival 16

by Milda B. Richardson
Stanislovas Abromavičius has edited four volumes of memoirs written by
survivors of Siberian exile who were deported while still children–voices
of those who lost their rich cultural heritage at a young age.

The Folk Art of Distaff Carving 21

by Aušra Tallat-Kelpša Di Raimondo
Over time the practical use of distaffs has decreased but they remain
an integral part of Lithuanian folk art and tradition, created for gifting,
and awarding and treasuring for major celebrations and life milestones.

Book Review: Waiting for Stalin to Die 24

Review by Daiva Markelis
Irene Guildford’s novel is about four refugees who attempt to rebuild
their lives in Toronto after fleeing Lithuania from the advancing Soviet
army. page 16

Blueberry Summer 25
by Ona Daugirdienė
Blueberries are synonymous with summer in Lithuania. From blueberry
tea bread to blue-nose dumplings, here’s your chance to enjoy some
delicious blueberry dishes.

Cover Credits:
FRONT COVER: Expedition Team. R. Bružas
BACK COVER: Springtime forest. V. Knyva
INSIDE FRONT COVER: Sonar images. LT Navy: R. Arlauskas and
M. Latakas page 25
INSIDE BACK COVER: Lino Kelias (2011 Hanza Kaunas, E. Masandukaitė)

May / June 2018 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 1

LABAS
Connections

J ohn Nekus grew up in Beverly Shores, Indiana, not paying too much
attention to his Lithuanian roots. Then, in 2005, during his first visit
to Lithuania, he stopped by a celebration at the Captain’s Club in
Klaipėda, where he mentioned the name of his grandfather, Adomas
Daugirdas, and found out that his grandfather was a very big deal, at
PUBLISHER
Lithuanian Catholic Press Society
Chicago, IL

EDITOR
least to those in the Lithuanian Navy. One thing led to another, and Jonas Daugirdas
John participated in, and helped fund, several diving and sonar expeditions
in the Gulf of Finland to find once and for all, the long lost wreck of ASSOCIATE EDITOR
the warship Prezidentas Smetona, the pride of the pre-WWII Lithuanian Ona Daugirdienė
Navy once captained by his grandfather. Subsequent journeys to Lithuania
and several expeditions to find the Prezidentas Smetona, the last of which
was finally successful, helped John get reacquainted with his roots and Wondering about your Estate Plan?
heritage.
Remember the Draugas Foundation and
Captain Adomas of the Lithuanian warship is no relation to my
assure the future of our Lithuanian‐Amer‐
family, but his story does increase the awesomeness of my surname; ican Press. Since 1992, the Foundation has
Daugirdas is now becoming popularly used as a first name in Lithuania served to sustain the Lithuanian language
(see boxer “Daugirdas Šemiotas” as an example). Draugas and now comes to the aid of
Lithuania is not a world power today, though admittedly quite feisty, Draugas News and Lithuanian Heritage as
but it certainly was a player in the 14th to 16th centuries, and part of an well. Over the years, it has supported capi‐
tal improvements and invested in printing
empire that stretched from the Baltic to the Black Sea. Lately, the Be- hardware and computers. When times
larusians, who were certainly included in this empire, have been empha- were especially rough, it helped to pay op‐
sizing the role that their ancestors played in making the GDL (Grand erating expenses. The Draugas Foundation
Duchy of Lithuania) great. But some Belarus historians appear to have is our lifeline and guarantor of the future
crossed the line of appropriation to the point of identity theft. Miltiades of Draugas’s unique set of publications.
Varounis explains where they have gone a bit too far. For the Draugas Foundation to fulfill its
What’s more tragic than the fate of Lithuanians deported to Siberia? mission, it needs your support and in‐
The lot of deported Lithuanian children! A project run by Stanislovas volvement. A few legacy gifts of moderate
Abromavičius has documented their voices, and their stories are now size will ensure the health of Draugas
being translated into English. Milda Richardson presents a few notable News, Draugas, and Lithuanian Heritage
for years to come.
examples.
And there is still more in this issue: a description of the folk art of All donations are tax deductible. The
carving distaffs, a book review about Lithuanian refugees rebuilding Draugas Foundation (http://www.draugo‐
their lives in Toronto, and suggestions on how to use blueberries in your fondas.org) is a charitable, 501(c)(3)
organization. You can write the foundation
nouvelle Lithuanian cuisine. into your will by specifying: “Draugas
Foundation,” EIN number: 36‐3916303.
Jonas Daugirdas, Editor For questions, please call: Marija Remiene,
President, Draugas Foundation,

tel. 773‐585‐9500.

Lithuanian Heritage is published by the Lithuanian Catholic Press Society (DRAUGAS), 4545 W.
63rd Street, Chicago, IL 60629‐5532. Lithuanian Heritage is available as a bimonthly (six times
per year) supplement to Draugas News (http://www.draugas.org/news). Please consult our
website or the back page of this magazine for subscription information. Copyright 2018 by the
Lithuanian Catholic Press Society.

2 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018


Heritage
Mailbox
Connections and suggestions
As a long-time subscriber to
Lithuanian Heritage, I was pleasantly
surprised to see two names I per-
sonally know in your publication:
Vyts (Vytautas) Beliajus in your
Jan/Feb 2018 issue about the Inter-
national Friendship Gardens, and
Paul Stogis, my great uncle, in your
May/June 2015 article about the
Lithuanian Auditorium.
Also, why not do a story on
Lithuanian stage actors and what
they endured during the Soviet oc-
cupation, such as my second cousin
Elvyra Žebertavičiūtė? She still re-
sides in Vilnius. I saw her comic
performance in the Fall of 1980 and
my understanding of Lithuanian
was minimal. That was the year we
Americans boycotted the
Olympics...
Kas (Kasimir) Stogis
Denver, Colorado
Brutal honesty
Several years ago Pranas Jurkus
wrote an article for the Lithuanian
Draugas newspaper recalling similar
events to those described in the
Jan/Feb 2018 article “The Tragic
Events of the Summer of 1941.”
At that time, meeting Mr. Jurkus at
a Lithuanian function, I thanked
him! I was struck by his brutal hon-
esty then, and am once again im-
pressed by his willingness to share
these horrific events with your read-
ers. It’s not often that we find such
personal and candid accounts that
acknowledge this dark period in
Lithuania’s history. Thank you Mr.
Jurkus and Lithuanian Heritage!
Dana Gylys
Lemont, Illinois
Kenosha
Greetings. I had to chuckle
while reading the Kenosha article. I
wish I could have given the author
a tour of all the Lithuanian places I
remember. I grew up there. My
mother, age 93, and relatives and
friends, still live there.
Elizabeth Dumonceaux
Lincoln, Nebraska
John Chernoski replies: Fair
comments. As part of my research
I attempted to enlist assistance from
knowledgeable individuals in
Kenosha to point me in the right
direction. I was unsuccessful in find-
ing someone to step up and provide
a first hand perspective. Kenosha is
a great place and next time you plan
a visit to Kenosha, give me some
advance notice and perhaps I can
coordinate and get an insider’s view.
Ačiū !
Lutherans in Lietuva
Dear Jonai: I have enjoyed read-
ing the Lithuanian Heritage magazine
with Sylvia. We appreciate all the
work that you and Ona are doing.
My ancestors originated in the Kar-
aliaučius- Konigsberg area of
Lithuania Minor-East Prussia. Per-
haps more articles could be written
about Prussian Lithuanians (prusai)
of the Lutheran faith. Our minority
group lived primarily in Klaipėda
and Tauragė.
Leonard (Lenius) Bendikas
Lake Forest, IL
Editor’s responses:
To Kas: I don’t know offhand
anyone who could write about stage
actors in Lithuania, but will look for
them. If any readers have leads in
May / June 2018
this area or would like to volunteer
to write on this topic, please write
to us at the journal email listed be-
low.
To Dana: What can anyone say
after reading such tragic stories?
Many of us never met most of our
grandparents because they were ei-
ther killed during the war or de-
ported to Siberia. In reading the story
in this issue by John Nekus about
long talks he had with his grandfa-
ther who managed to escape from
Lithuania to Canada, I must admit I
was a bit wistful, as I never had that
opportunity. I can only imagine how
my feeling of loss must be multi-
plied tenfold in Jewish survivors of
the holocaust from Lithuania, many
of whom lost their entire extended
families in the slaughter. We don’t
know enough about Jewish life in in-
terwar Lithuania nor about what hap-
pened to them during the war, and
we do plan to publish more on this
in the future.
To Lenius: Thanks for your
kind comments about LH. We have
been publishing a number of articles
on Lithuanian Minor in the past two
and a half years (Liudvikas Rėza,
Trakehner horses of East Prussia,
Martynas Jankus, Borisovas’ paint-
ings) and through them I have
learned a lot; but you’re right, the
contribution of Lutherans to main-
taining Lithuanian identity was huge,
and we need to write more about
this, especially as we just passed the
500 year anniversary of the Refor-
mation. Stay tuned. Will definitely
try to find someone to write about
this topic.
We welcome letters and comments
from our readers. Please address cor-
respondence to: Lithuanian Heritage,
c/o Draugas News, 4545 W 63rd St.,
Chicago, IL 60629; Fax: 773-585-8284.
email: draugolaikrastis@gmail.com
Include your full name, address, and
telephone number or email address.
Letters may be edited for space or
clarity.
LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 3

Not your grandfather’s Druskininkai
Druskininkai, lo-
cated in the southern-
most part of Lithuania,
southeast of Vilnius, has
long been known as a
health resort, and its fa-
mous mineral springs
were exalted as early as
Aqua park at Druskininkai.
(shutterstock.com) the beginning of the 18th
century. The first sanato-
rium making use of these healing waters was opened in
1838. Lately, the water-themed resort has moved into
the modern age with new ideas to attract tourists. In
addition to getting a “cleanse” from the mineral-rich
water, or relaxing in a bath of tarry mud, you can take
your kids to an “Aqua park,” which opened in 2006
(www.akvapark.lt), and together you can test your
courage on some challenging water slides, appropriately
named “Extremalus,” “Adrenalinas,” “Bermudai,”
“Azartas,” and “Sūkurys.”
Signato typeface to commemorate Lithuanian in-
dependence document
The creative agency
“Folk” (www.folk.me) has
designed a typeface based
on the document signed
on February 16, 1918,
proclaiming Lithuania’s
independence. This doc-
ument had been hand- Signato typeface; free download
here: http://signato.lt/en/.
written by Jurgis Šaulys. (dezeen.com)
According to an articley
by Gunseli Yalcinkava published at dezeen.com, “Over
a six-month period, Folk worked alongside font designer
Eimantas Paškonis to create the typeface, which is made
up of a series of italic, calligraphic-style letters…A total
of 450 individual symbols were made to achieve a hand-
written effect, using a combination of the Latin, Ger-
man and Lithuanian alphabets.” You can download the
font for free and use it to document your own inde-
pendent thinking. Get it at this link: www.signato.lt/en/
Vilnius University rankings improving
Quacquarelli Symonds is a British company spe-
cializing in education. The company was founded in
4 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
1990 by Nunzio
Quacquarelli and Matt
Symonds. They publish a
website (www.topuniversities.com) which ranks the world’s
universities and assigns rank numbers to 959. Vilnius
University ranks #401 overall, so there is room for im-
provement. Two good signs: (1) The VU rankings are
progressively rising. In 2014, the overall rank for VU
was about #590, and it has steadily grown, such that
VU ranks #405 in 2018. Relative to other schools in
the region, VU outranks the most highly ranked univer-
sity in Latvia (Riga Technical, rank #675), but is out-
ranked by the University of Tartu in Estonia (rank
#314). VU edges out the two most highly ranked uni-
versities in Poland: University of Warsaw (rank #415)
and Jagiellonian University (rank #465). QS also ranks
universities by subject, and VU improved its rankings
in 22 subject area, especially linguistics, natural sciences,
physics, astronomy, engineering, accounting, and finance.
For more information see: www.topuniversities.com/uni-
versity-rankings/world-university-rankings/2018
Cushman and Wakefield Manufacturing Risk Index, 2018.
Lithuania rises to second place in the important
“Manufacturing Risk Index.”
Cushman and Wakefield is a global real estate serv-
ices firm with over 300 offices in more than 70 countries.
Their Manufacturing Risk Index, calculated annually,
“examines a range of risk and cost factors, including
political and economic risk, and labor cost. We have
updated and adjusted our previous model to provide a
more comprehensive assessment of the attractiveness
of 42 countries for global manufacturing.” Hard as it
might be to believe, under a so-called “baseline scenario,”
giving equal importance to operating conditions and
cost, in 2018, LITHUANIA RANKED SECOND
GLOBALLY! Lithuania came in ahead of Malaysia, Tai-
wan, Canada, and the United States, yielding only to
China. Under some other modeling conditions, where
cost and operating conditions were weighted differently,
Lithuania ranked either 3rd or 5th, but was still among
the top 5 countries in the world. For more information,
and to download the free report, see: www.cushman-
wakefield.com/en/research-and-insight/2018/manufacturing-
risk-index-2018/
Women Political Leaders summit to be held in Vil-
nius, June 6–8, 2018.
According to the conference website, “This high-
level conference is a unique gathering of women political
leaders, as it brings together at least 250 female political
leaders from all over the world.” A list of the speakers
is here: https://wplsummit.org/summitspeakers/ and in-
cludes, in addition to President Grybauskaitė: Yulia Tim-
oshenko (Prime Minister of Ukraine, 2007–2010), Katrin
Jakobsdottir (current Prime Minister of Iceland), Vaira
Vika Freiberga (President of Latvia, 1999–2006), and
many other luminaries in both politics and industry.
President Grybauskaitė is the current Chair of the
United Nations Foundation, Council of Women World
Leaders. So, Lithuania is having an enormous impact in
the area of empowerment of women globally. See:
www.unfoundation.org/features/cwwl.html
New technology from Kaunas Technology Univer-
sity keeps drinking water microbe-safe for months
(Abstracted from the
KTU.edu website) Researchers
at Kaunas University of Tech-
nology (KTU) are developing
drinking water disinfection
technology which not only de-
Paulius Danilovas. (Kaunas
stroys microorganisms but
Technology University also provides long-term pro-
youtu.be/KWg4tp4WMr4) tection against a wide range
of them. Treated drinking wa-
ter stored in the open is protected from secondary mi-
crobial contamination for longer than 3 months. Used in
the form of water purification tablets or liquid, it is a
cost-efficient and user-friendly way to provide clean water
when there is need… The water purification products
based on KTU formula do not add any odors or tastes to
the water. According to Dr Paulius Danilovas (researcher
at the KTU Faculty of Chemical Technology) the biggest
challenge in the process of developing water disinfection
technology is to keep a balance between efficiency in de-
stroying microbes and safety for the user.
The UK newspaper Independent chooses a Lithuan-
ian architect design for “home of the week.”
The Independent
newspaper writer Megan
Townsend featured a col-
umn about this wonder-
ful home in the woods
designed by architect
Kazimieras Kasteckas in
partnership with Milda Home of the week. (www.indepen-
and Lukas Rekevičius, dent.co.uk, Megan Townsend)
from the studio “Aketuri Architektai.” When Megan
asked Kazimieras to sum up his architectural philosophy,
he replied, “Architectural haiku in traditional form.” The
house was custom built for two doctors who wanted to
escape to the countryside from urban congestion and
noise. For details of this interview, see: https://www.in-
dependent.co.uk/life-style/design/inspiring-home-of-the-
week-modern-take-on-a-timber-farmhouse-in-lithuania-
a8221011.html#gallery
Vidmantas Gendvilas and
his Lithuanian hounds
There is a society in
Lithuania (www.skalikas.lt) Lithuanian hound dogs.
(https://youtu.be/R71SbaeCWg0)
dedicated to fostering the
raising of hunting hounds, or “skalikai.” The group has
annual gatherings and shows, the last one held at the
end of April of this year. There is a long tradition of
raising these hounds, especially in the ‘lowland’ or že-
maitija region. LH is trying to find someone to write
about the history of the raising this particular breed of
hounds. In the meantime, you can enjoy the YouTube
video above, featuring Vidmantas Gendvilas and his
hunting dogs.
Japanese, Kaunas, and
the bridge over the river
Nemunas
As detailed by the
website visit.kaunas.lt, an
early interaction between First Japanese mission to Europe,
a Japanese delegation and including Kaunas, 1862. (visit.kau-
nas.lt/en/kaunastic/)
the city of Kaunas took
place in the mid 19th century when a delegation from
Japan was visiting Europe to expand their cultural knowl-
edge and explore new contacts. As explained on the
Kaunas website, “In 1860, a mission visited the US, and
in 1862, a 34-man team from the Japanese Embassy
was sent to Europe. This is where Lithuania comes into
the picture. During the mission, the team visited France,
England, the Netherlands, Prussia, and Russia. Back
then, Lithuania was part of the Russian empire. The
Japanese stopped in Kaunas on September 18th, on their
way from St. Petersburg to Berlin. It’s known that the
mission travelled over the Kaunas railway bridge, which
was less than a year old at that time, and was quite im-
pressed by its structure. They also visited a small café
near the railway station.” The impressions of the dele-
gation were documented by Fukuzawa Yukichi, an Eng-
lish-speaking journalist who accompanied it. Fukuzawa
mentions the trip in his diary, now archived at Keio
University. For more info, see: visit.kaunas.lt/en/kaunas-
tic/the-first-japanese-in-kaunas/
May / June 2018 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 5
Searching for the Wreck of
the Prezidentas Smetona
An interview with John Nekus
Editor’s note: In June of last year,
John Nekus and a team of Lithuan-
ian naval historians, underwater
archeologists and sailors in the
Lithuanian Navy lead by Dr. Vladas
Žulkus of Klaipėda University sailed
on what turned out to be the 3rd
expedition to look for the wreck of
the Prezidentas Smetona, flagship of
the modern Lithuanian navy during
the interwar years. The warship sank
on January 11, 1945 during WWII,
several years after it had been recom-
missioned as a Soviet minesweeper
following Soviet occupation of the
Baltic naval fleet. The saga of this
unique naval vessel was described
by Romualdas Adomavičius, a his-
torian working at the Lithuanian Sea
Museum in Klaipėda, in the
March/April 2017 issue of Lithuan-
ian Heritage. In this interview, John
describes the search for the wreck,
how several expeditions to find it
came to be organized, and why the
interest in this particular ship was
especially meaningful to him per-
sonally.
LH: John, could you please share
what your connection is to the pre
WWII Lithuanian Navy and to this
ship?
JN: The Prezidentas Smetona was
purchased from Germany by the
Lithuanian government in 1927. Its
purpose was to protect the coastline
and to interdict boats laden with
contraband, and it later served as a
training ship for the Lithuanian
Navy. The first captain of this ship
6 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
was Adomas Daugirdas, my grand-
father.
LH: Could you tell me a bit more
about your grandfather?
JN: Adomas was born in 1894.
He trained at the Nikolaev Maritime
Academy in St. Petersburg in 1916,
specializing in submarine warfare.
As part of his training, he partici-
pated in a sailboat trip around the
world. In 1918 Adomas married my
grandmother, an eye doctor, Teklė
Hulevičiūtė. After returning to
Lithuania in 1918, he participated in
the fight for independence as a cap-
tain in the Lithuanian army. In 1923,
Adomas cofounded the Lithuanian
Sailors Association, and was a
founding editor of the naval journal
Jūra. He was captain of the Prezi-
dentas Smetona for a short period of
Cpt. Adomas Daugirdas on board a
Lithuanian warship, ca. 1927.
time. From 1933–1939 he served as
Harbor Master for the port of
Klaipėda.
In 1940 he fled Lithuania for
the West when the Russian army oc-
cupied Lithuania, spending time ini-
tially in DP (displaced persons)
camps in Germany, and then getting
a visa to Canada where he lived in
Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario with his
wife until his death in 1979. The
family included his son Jurgis and
daughter Irene, my mother, who was
born on May 5, 1921 in Kaunas.
Irene married my father, Leonas
Nekus (Nekutavičius), who was born
on June 28, 1923 in Panevėžys to
parents Jonas and Ona Nekutavičius.
My father Leonas had one brother,
Valentinas, who studied medicine in
Lithuania. My mother Irene and fa-
ther Leonas married in Germany in
1945 at the end of WWII after they
fled Lithuania. They emigrated to
Canada in 1948 as did many war
refugees by obtaining transportation
and work from companies in the
West including Canada, South Amer-
ica and Australia.
After completing his work obli-
gation at a steel mill in Sault Ste.
Marie, Ontario, my father Leonas
and my uncle Jurgis (mother’s
brother) obtained engineering de-
grees from Queens University in
Kingston, Ontario. My father’s
brother, Valentinas (Dr. Nick Nekus)
married Patricia Morton in Canada
and practiced medicine in Kingston,
Ontario until his death in 2009. Pa-

The Nekus family: from left to right: Nephew Mike, the author, nephew Jim, father Leo,
and brother Andy.
tricia still lives in Kingston. Upon
graduation, my father obtained a job
at an engineering firm and moved
with my mother Irene to Toronto,
where my brother Andy and I were
born. Our family moved to Chicago
in 1960 and after a year in Marquette
Park, Chicago we moved to Beverly
Shores, Indiana, a small town near
the Indiana Dunes on Lake Michigan
where I grew up. My grandparents
decided to stay up in Canada, as they
loved the natural environment there,
reminding them as it did of Lithua-
nia. My mother Irene passed in 1980
and my father Leonas passed in 2009.
My brother Andy and his wife Deb-
bie have two sons, Michael and
James, and live in Ridgewood, NJ.
Today I live in New Buffalo, Michi-
gan and travel to Lithuania often.
LH: As you were living apart
from your grandfather, did you
know him personally? What do you
remember about him? Did he ever
talk to you about the Prezidentas Sme-
tona and his time as a captain in the
Lithuanian navy?
JN: Our family would travel
from Beverly Shores, Indiana to
Canada several times a year to visit
my grandparents. So I spent my
teenage years and into my early
twenties talking with both grandpar-
ents for hours on those visits. I recall
talking to my grandfather, Adomas,
about sailing and sailboats as I spent
my summers on Lake Michigan rac-
ing sailboats. He would tell me about
his voyage around the world in 1916
after completing Marine Academy
training in St. Petersburg. I recall
him describing sailing into harbor in
China in 1916 and about several se-
vere storms they experienced on that
voyage. It was an amazing story.
Only years later after his death
and traveling to Lithuania would I
come to understand and appreciate
his life and Lithuania. He would talk
about the Port in Klaipėda and it
seemed like a dream to me as a
teenager, a place far away in another
world. Today I’ve had the good for-
tune to see it for myself. Klaipėda
and all of Lithuania is an amazing
place. My mother would talk about
summers in Klaipėda when she was
growing up. She would describe
Palanga, Nida and spending sum-
May / June 2018
mers on the beaches there with her
brother Jurgis. I could sense that my
grandfather loved Klaipėda and
missed it. Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario
has a series of locks where large
cargo ships and tankers sail through
as they head toward the St. Lawrence
Seaway and the Atlantic Ocean to
the world beyond. Grandfather Ado-
mas would drive me to the port in
Sault Ste. Marie where the locks were
located and we would watch the
huge ships sail by for hours. He
would tell me, “Jonuk, always respect
the sea.”
While I knew he was a captain
in Lithuania, he didn’t tell me that
he was captain on the Prezidentas
Smetona. I didn’t know that one day,
years later, I’d be part of a group of
Lithuanians searching for the war-
ship he commanded, the Prezidentas
Smetona. Just before he died, he gave
me his captain’s bars from his naval
uniform that he received when he
was commissioned as an officer in
the Lithuanian Navy. He told me
that they were very special to him
and asked that I take care of them
for him. Years later, I brought his
captain’s bars with me on our expe-
ditions to find his warship. They
brought us good luck, as he was part
of our expedition team. His spirit
and the spirit of many sailors in
Lithuania’s long naval heritage led
us safely to find this ship. I’m taking
care of my grandfather’s captain’s
bars as he asked.
LH: Folk wisdom is, that grand-
children often take after their grand-
parents. Do you see any similarities
between yourself and Cpt. Adomas?
JN: That’s an interesting ques-
tion. Yes, we both love the sea, sail-
ing and Lithuania. We both live life
as students of international travel,
learning about different cultures
along the way. I’d say my grandfather
taught me that life is a positive jour-
ney with many rough seas where
leadership, strength of character and
LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 7
loyalty to family, fellow officers and
crew are important. Although I
could never have imagined this as a
teenager, we both sailed out of the
Port of Klaipėda on a Lithuanian
ship with a Lithuanian crew on voy-
ages to the Baltic Sea. We both
learned about, and as a result have a
deep respect for, the Lithuanian
Navy, Lithuanian history and the
many sailors and people who make
up the rich history of the Port of
Klaipėda and Lithuanian naval her-
itage. And we both love Lithuanian
food.
LH: What sort of ties did you
have to Lithuania and Lithuanians
living in Beverly Shores?
JN: Although my brother and I
spoke Lithuanian at home to our par-
ents, we never really participated
much in formal Lithuanian organi-
zations or activities growing up. Bev-
erly Shores is home to many Lithuan-
ian families whose parents or
grandparents emigrated from Lithua-
nia during WWII and after. That’s
because Beverly Shores is near
Chicago on the shores of Lake
Michigan next to the Indiana Dunes
and is similar to the dunes and
beaches near Klaipėda, Palanga and
Nida on the Baltic Sea. There were
social gatherings and a Lithuanian
club that exposed me to Lithuanian
culture, food, language and heritage.
But to be honest, as a teenager, I was
more interested in sailing, high
school friends, sports and girls. Like
many teenagers growing up in Amer-
ica whose parents are from Lithua-
nia, I’d experience Lithuanian culture,
language and food at home and
would also live a normal American
life beyond home. I soon found out
that my friends didn’t speak Lithuan-
ian at home or eat what we did.
While my parents loved their
Lithuanian heritage, they experi-
enced first hand the reality of WWII
and how life can change in an in-
stant. Over dinner one day years
later, my parents shared that after
8 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
Prezidentas Smetona on the Šventoji River in 1940. (Lithuanian Sea Museum)
many discussions on parenting they
concluded that we lived in America
not Lithuania and as a result their
goal as parents was to raise my
brother and I to be functional and
successful adults in the place where
we lived. When I think about that
decision being made by war refugees
less than ten years removed from
Lithuania and a Germany DP (dis-
placed persons) camp, it’s humbling
and I’m thankful to both of them.
Interestingly, something inside drew
me to Lithuania. As an adult I’d
travel to Lithuania years later to find
my heritage. I found a lot more in
the process.
LH: When did you first become
interested in the Prezidentas Smetona?
JN: Actually, I knew very little
about the ship until 2005. I had
started a consulting business focused
on information and computer tech-
nology to the banking and financial
industry that allowed me a lot of
opportunities for global travel. In
September of that year, I traveled
to Lietuva with my brother Andy
for the first time. We flew into
Palanga; driving along the Klaipėda
port on Naujoji Uosto street just an
hour after landing we happened
upon a gathering of naval officers
at a Captains’ Club who were cele-
brating the birthday of the Harbor
Master. We pulled over on Sankryžos
street and I asked Cpt. Ričardas
Lučka, one of the Captains attend-
ing, if he heard of my grandfather
Adomas Daugirdas. Captain Lučka
asked me, “are you his grandson”? I
replied yes, my brother and I are
here for the first time trying to learn
about him and our family heritage.
He said, come with me…
Captain Lučka led us inside and
said they had been able to raise
money and had just published a
book on Lithuanian captains and
naval history. He sat us down and
opened the book to the second or
third page and pointed to a photo-
graph saying, “Here is your grand-
father and your roots.” He intro-
duced my brother and me to the rest
of the captains attending the cele-
bration where we learned about the
Prezidentas Smetona and Lithuanian
naval history, most of which I was
hearing for the first time. Imagine
the odds of happening upon a birth-
day gathering with Lithuanian cap-
tains at that place and at that time
an hour after arriving on our first
visit to the country? Perhaps some-
thing spiritual was guiding us? Need-
less to say, we celebrated together
that afternoon having somehow
found one another.
After returning to Chicago, I
reached out to my uncle Jurgis (son
of Adomas Daugirdas) to inquire
about his father – my grandfather.
Since then, uncle Jurgis and I have
had many discussions about Ado- that my grandfather was Adomas so they could see and experience
mas, the Prezidentas Smetona and Daugirdas. Dr. Žulkus replied that Lithuania.
family life growing up in Klaipėda. we needed to meet. Why was there a wreck? After
Thank you, uncle Jurgis! It so hap- Later that year, prof. Žulkus and Lithuania was occupied by the So-
pens that the Captains’ Club building I met in Vilnius, where he told me viets during WWII, the pride of the
in Klaipėda was where our grandfa- about his research on sonar imaging Lithuanian Navy was recommis-
ther Adomas and family lived when of the Baltic Sea bottom. During sioned as a Soviet coast guard de-
he was the Harbor Master in the that meeting Žulkus informed me fense ship and mine trawler. It was
1930s. My mother Irene and uncle that the ship they had found earlier renamed the Korall and was involved
Jurgis spent their summers living in that year on their initial expedition in naval skirmishes against the Ger-
that building. And now here I was was not the Prezidentas Smetona but man navy. On January 11, 1945, the
standing in the same place. a different ship. I replied, “That’s Korall – ex-Prezidentas Smetona sank
LH: Tell us about how you de- not a problem because the Preziden- on a voyage from Helsinki to
cided to find the wreck. tas Smetona is not going anywhere Tallinn, in the region of Aegna Is-
JN: It turns out that the Rector and we only need to have the will land. Stories were that a mine sank
of Klaipėda University, Dr. Vladas and resources to find it.” I told him the boat; other accounts suggested
Žulkus, had a longstanding interest we had a shared goal of locating the that the warship was the victim of a
in underwater archeology and re- long lost ship. We shook hands and German submarine attack. The
search of historical shipwrecks. He agreed to work together. I spent the problem was that this region was the
and a team of researchers were con- next two years traveling to Vilnius, site of many naval conflicts and bat-
ducting sonar imaging of the Baltic where I created the Adomas Dau- tles during the second World War
Sea floor looking for shipwrecks of girdas Lithuanian Maritime Founda- and as a result, the bottom of the
historical significance and diving to tion, for the purpose of raising Gulf of Finland is strewn with many
underwater sites. My cousin Marius money for sponsorship of this and shipwrecks. So there were several
Daugirdas (son of my mother’s other Lithuanian maritime research expeditions that believed they had
brother Jurgis) and I traveled to expeditions. Meanwhile, Dr. Žulkus identified the wreck of the Preziden-
Lithuania in the summer of 2006, worked on the planning and techni- tas Smetona but later, those finds
at which time we visited the Sea Mu- cal aspects of a second expedition. turned out to be other ships.
seum in Klaipėda and saw a photo I brought my nephews Mike and Jim LH: Tell us about the second ex-
of our grandfather hanging on the with me on trips during this period pedition to find the wreck.
wall along with a photo of the Prezi-
dentas Smetona. I took Marius to the
Captains’ Club I had been to with
my brother the previous year.
We learned that the Prezidentas
Smetona sank at the end of WWII.
After an emotional day at the Sea
Museum and Captains’ Club we re-
tired to a restaurant in Klaipėda Old
Town just off the main square. Over
dinner a thought came to me and I
said, “We need to find that warship.”
That thought would lead to an amaz-
ing journey for me. Several months
later Arūnas Pemkus, a friend in
Vilnius, sent me an article from the
Lietuvos Rytas newspaper about
Dr. Žulkus having found the wreck
of the Prezidentas Smetona. I con-
tacted prof. Žulkus from Chicago to
congratulate him. He asked why
someone from Chicago would be
interested in this ship, and I told him The author in front of the Lithuanian warship, the Jotvingis, 2009.

May / June 2018 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 9

 JN: In the summer of 2009,
Prof. Žulkus decided to organize a
second expedition to find and doc-
ument the wreck site and invited me
along. Dr. Žulkus asked the Lithuan-
ian Navy for assistance. They agreed
to provide the warship Jotvingis
along with its officers and crew for
three days to assist. The Lithuanian
Navy made arrangements to collect
our team at Tallinn after they com-
pleted annual training exercises with
NATO warships in the north Baltic
Sea.
Our team of six included Vello
Mass, a researcher at the Estonian
Maritime Museum who has found
over a thousand sunken ships during
his 40-year career. It was a surreal
experience for me. Here I was, born
far away in another country, and yet
somehow found myself on a mod-
ern Lithuanian warship with
Lithuanian crew looking for the flag-
ship of the Lithuanian Navy. You
can’t make this stuff up. During this
expedition we did find a shipwreck
that we initially believed was the
Prezidentas Smetona, but after more
detailed analysis, it again turned out
to be not the ship we were searching
for. Our journey was not over!
LH: What happened then?
JN: In 2014, a sonar image of a
new shipwreck was taken by Vello
Mass, and a dive team took several
underwater photos of the site. This
time, the wreck was believed to be
the Smetona with a relatively high de-
gree of certainty. So Dr. Žulkus be-
gan organizing a confirmatory third
expedition, which drew great interest
in the Lithuanian popular press.
LH: Can you describe this third
expedition and its results in detail?
JN: This third expedition took
place in late June of 2017. We sailed
from Klaipėda, aboard Klaipėda
University’s tall ship Brabander. We
sailed north for almost 600 kilome-
ters and then into the Gulf of Fin-
land to Tallinn. The Brabander crew
10 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
On station in the Gulf of Finland above the Prezidentas Smetona wreckage site, examining
the first sonar images, are expedition participants John Nekus, Robertas Arlauskas, Dr.
Valdas Rakutis and Dr. Vladas Žulkus. (photo: V. Jarutis)
included Captain Valdemaras
Vizbaras; Ričardas Ramanauskas, Sr.
Captain’s Assistant; Romualdas Vižu-
las, Sr. Mechanic; Rapolas Terleckas,
2nd Captain’s Assistant and Arūnas
Molis, Sailor/Ship’s Cook. The
meals prepared on board by Arūnas
during our expedition were beyond
good and pure Lithuanian home
cooking. Ačiū, Arūnai!
The expedition was again led by
Dr. Žulkus and included Jūratis Lia-
chovičius (now deceased), Director
of the Palanga Cultural Museum;
Dr. Valdas Rakutis, Defense Ministry
Advisor; Lieutenant Valerijus
Krisikaitis, Naval Reserve and Un-
derwater Diving Instructor; Lieu-
tenant Captain Robertas Arlauskas,
Active Duty Lithuania Navy; Ser-
geant Martynas Latakas, Active Duty
Lithuania Navy Underwater Action
Command; and me, the grandson.
Our goal was to once and for
all verify that this new potential
wreck site was indeed the Prezidentas
Smetona. Additionally we planned to
locate and photograph three other
historical Lithuanian ships lost dur-
ing that period, including the
Panevėžys, the Kretinga and the
Utena. These three ships had not
been found nor photographed since
they sank during WWII. Our expe-
dition team included Rimas Bružas,
filmaker and journalist with LRT
Television, Valdas Jarutis, photogra-
pher, and Linas Augutis, film pro-
ducer from ERA Film in Vilnius,
who wanted to make a historical
documentary on Lithuanian naval
history and our expedition to find
these ships. You can read a blog di-
ary of the expedition on my Face-
book page, www.facebook.com/John.
Nekus, examining the timeline from
June/July of 2017.
On July 2nd, we reached the
wreck site of the Prezidentas Smetona
and also found and examined the
wreck site of the Panevėžys. Sonar
images of both vessels were made,
and these were the first known im-
ages of the Panevėžys. The expedi-
tion team then sailed back to the
Port of Tallinn at 0600 the next
morning. The following day, we de-
parted Tallinn and sailed for five
hours eastward toward St. Peters-
burg and Russia. The expedition
plan was to conduct research at a
graveyard of ships located in eastern
Estonian territorial waters where the
wrecks of Lithuanian historical ships
Utena and Kretinga were believed to
be located. During WWII, tens of
thousands of mines had been laid
by the German navy from Helsinki
south to Estonia, to prevent the
Russian Baltic Fleet from exiting St.
Petersburg. Over 64 ships and 2,400
sailors were lost in the area we would
be researching.
We did find the Utena and
Kretinga wreck sites as well, and so
were ultimately successful in finding
and photographing all four historical
Lithuanian warships. The venture
was a resounding success! We fin-
ished our sonar imaging and sailed
back to Tallinn, just beating an ad-
vancing storm.
All expedition participants had
an amazing experience. Many thanks
are owed to the Lithuanian Navy,
Klaipėda University, the Lithuanian
Maritime Foundation, ERA Film,
LRT Television and the entire ex-
pedition team. Rimas Bružas created
a film about our expedition that
aired on LRT last year. Rasa
Miškinytė of ERA Film released a
historical documentary on our ex-
pedition in December of 2017 that
was shown on LRT on February 26,
2018. I traveled to Klaipėda in De-
cember to be reunited with the ex-
pedition participants for the initial
screening of this film. The link to
see this film is at: http://www.lrt.lt/me-
diateka/irasas/1013685957/prezidenti-
nis-karo-laivas-dok-f
LH: So, now that the Prezidentas
Smetona has been found, what are
your final thoughts on this experi-
ence?
JN: I think each person has a
yearning to understand their heritage
and roots. I was fortunate to have
had an opportunity to better under-
stand my heritage through my
grandfather Adomas Daugirdas.
Lithuania and its naval tradition has
a long and complex history. Many
Mementos: Cpt. Adomas Daugirdas binoculars, photo, captain’s bars, and the warship
Prezidentas Smetona.
Lithuanians, whether they stayed in
Lithuania after WWII during Soviet
occupation or whether they fled
Lithuania during WWII through
war-ravaged Poland and Germany,
and then emigrating to the West, ex-
perienced extreme hardship. They
learned how to survive and were
driven by love of country, heritage
and family. They learned to perse-
vere during life challenges and in
stormy seas.
In 2018, Lithuania celebrates the
100-year anniversary of its reestab-
lishment as an independent country.
The Prezidentas Smetona is an impor-
tant symbol of Lithuania’s independ-
ence and nationhood during the in-
terwar period, in which all
Lithuanians can take pride.
This experience brought me in
touch with my Lithuanian heritage.
When I stepped off the plane in
Palanga airport on that first trip to
Lithuania in 2005, I was over-
whelmed with a feeling that I had
finally found my homeland. I re-
member kneeling and kissing the
ground. I’ve returned to Lithuania
many times since. I’ve experienced
this journey with a group of Lithua-
May / June 2018
nians who are passionate about
Lithuania and seek to preseve its rich
naval history. I respect each of them
and admire their achievements. We
were brought together from various
walks of life and became “Smetona
brothers” (Smetonos broliai) during
this expedition. Last year we lost one
of our Smetona brothers, Jūratis Li-
achovičius, who passed suddenly a
couple of months after our expedi-
tion had been completed. His posi-
tive spirit, love of life, wit, humor
and love of the sea will be missed.
Going forward, we want to raise
funds so that we can return to the
Prezidentas Smetona wreck site on a
future expedition to send underwa-
ter divers and a Remotely Operated
Vehicle (ROV) to the wreck and
record high resolution images and
video. The journey is not over. There
are many historical ships at the bot-
tom of the Baltic Sea waiting to be
found. We only need the will and
resources to find them...
LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 11
Litvinism: Belarus
and the GDL
by Miltiades Varvounis

F or more than two decades a

pseudohistorical concept
called “Litvinism” has been
prevalent in Belarus, claiming that
the real “Lithuanians” were
larusian national identity, creating a
mythical glorious past centered
around a medieval Belarusian state
(GDL) of dukes, knights, palaces,
and beautiful princesses.
ism” has been criticised by Lithuan-
ian, Polish, Russian and even some
Belarusian historians (e.g., Ihar
Marzaliuk and Hieorhij
Halienčanka); nevertheless, this
“Litvins,” none other than Belaru- As would be expected, the po- pseudohistorical theory easily found
sians, who supposedly founded the litical-historical concept of “Litvin- a place in the complex political real-
Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL)
and who incorporated the Baltic
tribes (Aukštaitians and Žemaitians)
into that entity. This fanciful idea
has its origins in the last decades of
the Cold War and was propagated
most enthusiastically by nationalist
historians Mikola Ermalovich and
Paviel Urban. This concept has been
actively promoted in the historical,
journalistic and popular literature in
Belarus, and today an increasing
number of Belarusian historians are
distorting the history of the GDL
in an attempt to shape a strong Be-

Belarus coat of arms is almost identical to Present-day Belarus vs. the boundaries of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1430. (Max
that of Lithuania’s Vytis. (wikipedia.org) Kanowski, Wikipedia)

12 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018

ity of Belarus after 1991. Belarusian
historian Alyaksandr Kraucevich ad-
mitted: “The declaration of inde-
pendence of Belarus required that
Belarusian historical science shape
its own concept of national history.
The GDL should undoubtedly play
a significant role in this concept as
the state in which the Belarusian na-
tion developed.” Furthemore, in
1992, Magazyn Polski wrote that
“The Belarusian nation is searching
for its own identity. Under these cir-
cumstances there is a risk that mu-
tual discords and nationalist accents
will emerge.” Published Belarusian
works that promoted “Litvinism”
were not backed by a high level of
historical scholarship. Among them
was a popular pamphlet published
during the first years of the Belaru-
sian independence, titled: 100 Ques-
tions and Answers on the History of Be-
larus. Intended for a mass audience,
this controversial book referred to
the GDL as a Belarusian empire.
In contrast to their Belarusian
congeners, Ukrainian nationalists
and scholars have made no attempts Areas where Lithuanian was the dominant language in the 16th century. (Wikipedia, Z.
to claim that the “Commonwealth Zinkevičius. “Lietuvių tautos kilmė.” 2005, p.230)
of Both Nations” (the term given
to the Polish-Lithuanian common- There are a handful of true Be- ern Belarusians the real “Lithuani-
wealth after 1569) was a Polish- larus persons of prominence, such ans”? As was mentioned above, Er-
Lithuanian-Ukrainian state. Perhaps as Francysk Skaryna, one of the first malovich and later Urban promoted
one reason for this is, that Ukrainian book printers in Eastern Europe, pseudo-theories that in the medieval
national identity was shaped much who published extracts of Biblical period the ancient Lithuanian lands
earlier, from sources in Orthodox texts in the old Belarusian language, were not called Lithuania and their
Christianity, the Kyiv-Mohyla Acad- and Symon Budny, another pro- inhabitants were called Žemaitians.
emy (one of the oldest academic moter of the Belarusian culture and These assertions were refuted in
and theologic schools among Or- language. On the other hand, in Be- depth by historian Edvardas Gu-
thodox Christian countries, founded larus pseudohistory, historical figures davičius in his scholarly article “Fol-
in 1615), and the Cossack het- who are clearly Polish-Lithuanian lowing the Tracks of a Myth”
manate. Unlike Ukrainians, who such as Tadas Kosčiusko (Tadeusz (Lithuanian Historical Studies, Vil-
claim the Kievan Rus’ as their an- Kosciuczko), Ignacy Domeyko and nius, 1996, vol. 1). Further attempts
cestors, the political and cultural Vytautas the Great are often por- to emphasize the supposed Belaru-
universe of Belarus has few martyrs trayed as Belarusians. sianness of the GDL were made by
for a national cause or great heroes historians Uladzszimir Arlou,
such as the rulers of Kievan Rus’, Use of the Ruthenian language in Genadz Saganovich, Usievalad Ih-
including the Ukrainian Cossack the GDL natouski, and others. They chose to
hetmans Petro Konashevych-Sa- Was the GDL a proto-Belaru- be more cautious than Ermalovich
haidachny, Bohdan Khmelnitsky, sian state? Or simply a dual one and pointed out the Belarusian and
and Ivan Mazepa. (Lithuanian-Belarusian)? Are mod- Orthodox cultural aspects of the

May / June 2018 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 13

GDL. For example, it is correct that,
until 1697 the official language of
the GDL next to Latin was Ruthen-
ian (also referred to as Old Belaru-
sian). However, Belarusian media
and historical websites mislead in
purporting a “dominance” of the
Ruthenian language in the GDL dur-
ing the 15th–16th centuries, and give
the false impression that Old Be-
larusian was spoken everywhere in
these territories at the time. The his-
torical reality is, that the powerful
Lithuanian dynasty of the Jagiellon-
ian rulers of Poland-Lithuania
(1386–1572) used the Lithuanian
language in their family and house-
hold until the late 15th century, as
noted in a number of acclaimed his-
torical works, e.g., Timothy Snyder’s
book, “Reconstruction of Nations:
Religions in the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth ca. 1573 (green = Orthodox, white or
Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania, Belarus, clear = Catholic, lavender = Calvinist, blue = Lutheran). (wikipedia, Hoodinski)
1569–1999” and “The Politics of
Language and Nationalism in Mod- empire?” It was quite common at refuse to be subject to the authority
ern Central Europe” by Tomasz this time in several medieval states of the Roman Pope must be ex-
Kamusella. that the native language of rulers, cluded. Privileges of the whole no-
Christianity arrived in ethnic nobles and commoners was not the ble estate must not be applied to
Lithuania from Poland in the form official language used in administra- those who do not recognize the
of Catholicism, and so it was Polish tion. Moreover, during the late 15th Catholic religion and do not obey
that was the language of politics and and 16th centuries, the language that the Pope.” Even though the equality
power in the core of the GDL (eth- was used in the court was not a main of all Christian confessions in the
nic Lithuanian lands). The Union of factor that determined the political GDL was declared in 1563, the real
Lublin (in 1569) fortified the posi- and national identity of a ruler or status of state religion from 1387
tion of the Polish language in the noble. belonged to the Roman Catholic
GDL and marginalized the roles of Church, which always dominated the
the Ruthenian language and the The role of religion political and cultural sphere of the
Cyrillic alphabet. Catholic and The 17th century Lithuanian his- Lithuanian state. That is why the vast
Protestant nobility of the GDL pre- torian Albert Wijuk-Kojałowicz (Al- majority of private land holdings be-
ferred Latin and Polish to Ruthen- bertas Vijūkas-Kojelavičius) re- longed to the elite of the GDL rep-
ian, and Orthodox Ruthenian nobles garded religion as the most resented by the Catholic nobility
were becoming Polonized and west- important attribute of national be- which was almost entirely of
ernized during this period, fre- longing. According to him, it was Lithuanian ethnic origin.
quently converting to Catholicism. neither ethnicity nor language that
Moreover, since the Renaissance and distinguished Lithuanians from How did inhabitants of the GDL
until 1795, most publications in the Ruthenians but rather, their different name themselves (endonym)?
GDL were published in Polish and creeds. The Catholic faith became a According to historian Hieorhij
Latin, while Ruthenian was used only definitive composite of a noble’s Halienčanka in his work “Addressing
in limited ecclesiastical publications identity in the Baroque era of the the Issue of Ethnic and Ethnocon-
and grammar books. GDL. Wijuk-Kojałowicz wrote that: fessional Categories of the Four-
So if Ruthenian was for some “A sovereign must appoint to high teenth-Sixteenth-Century Grand
time the official language of the offices, posts and public duties only Duchy of Lithuania: ‘Belarusians,’
GDL, then, was it a Belarusian state, a person of the Roman creed; infi- ‘Litvins’ and ‘Ruthenians’ in the Dis-
or at least culturally, a “Belarusian dels and even some Christians who courses of Contemporary Scholars

14 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018

and Written Sources in Studia His-
torica Europae Orientalis,” several
14th–16th century sources prove that
the Belarusian population for vari-
ous reasons retained the traditional
“endonym” (an endonym is the
name that a culture gives to itself)
of Ruthenians (and not Lithuanians)
to determine their origin.
Halienčanka notes, “in the minds of
the then Ruthenians of the GDL,
‘Ruthenian people’ were usually per-
ceived as a single unified ethnocon-
fessional community [editor’s note: a
“confessional” community is one char-
acterized by similar religious beliefs] of
the Belarusian-Ukrainian area.
Ruthenians’ rare confessional con-
versions until the last third of the
sixteenth century and the formation
of a political nation – the GDL
szlachta (nobility) – did not consid-
erably affect the ethnic, confessional,
historical and religious conscious-
ness of the people of Belarus and
Ukraine.”
Another Belarusian historian,
Ihar Marzaliuk considers Ruthenians
– and not ancient Lithuanians - to
be the ancestors of Belarusians. His
book “People of the Old Belarus:
EthnoReligious and Socio-Cultural
Stereotypes (Tenth-Seventeenth
Centuries)” caused anger among Be-
larusian nationalists. Marzaliuk col-
lected and systematised extensive
material that showed that in the 16th
century, the designations Lithuanian
and Ruthenian related to different
ethnic groups. Furthemore, in a sec-
ond book, “Ethnic and Religious
World of the Belarusian Town in
the Sixteenth-Eighteenth Centuries
(Population Ethno-Confessional
Composition, Ethnic and Religious
Stereotypes of the Belarusian Citi-
zens),” Marzaliuk attempted to
demonstrate that there was a strong
tradition at the level of mass con-
sciousness to identify Orthodoxy
(and later the Uniate Church) with
the Ruthenian (Old Belarusian) eth-
nic group, while Catholicism was at-
tributed to the Lithuanian and Polish
ethnicities.
The name of Belarus (White
Ruthenia, Russia Alba) was men-
tioned often to denote these lands
in the 16th–18th centuries (in fact, the
chronicles of Jan(ko) of Czarnków
mention the name as early as the
14th century where they note the im-
prisonment of Lithuanian grand
duke Jogaila at “Albae Russiae,
Poloczk dicto”). Moreover, “White
Ruthenia” was the term used by the
Catholic Church to denote this part
of the Vilnius Bishopric, where the
Orthodox faith was dominant. Al-
most all of the present-day Belaru-
sian lands, which were under
Lithuanian administration, belonged
to the Catholic Bishopric of Vilnius,
except the Palatinate of Brest near
Poland, which belonged to the
Catholic Bishopric of Lutsk.
Russian historian Mikhail Di-
unov has warned recently that the
Lukashenko regime seems to be just
a period of transition from the So-
viet era into a time period where Be-
larus is becoming increasingly char-
acterized as a national state with a
nationalist orientation. Indeed, even
Belarusian President Alexander
Lukashenko. Lately he has embraced Be-
larusian nationalism, showing interest in
the concept of ”Litvinism.”
(wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Lukashenko)
May / June 2018
Belarus’ authoritarian leader Alexan-
der Lukashenko has showed recently
a sudden enthusiasm about the her-
itage of the GDL. In 2017, he ar-
gued that “Belarus needs to intro-
duce into the minds of our people
the truth: that Belarus started its his-
tory from the states of Polatsk and
the GDL.” It remains to be seen if
Belarus will embrace its past or if
“Litvinism” will prevail in the end.
In summary, Lithuania is un-
doubtedly the direct heir of the
GDL, although Lithuania today rep-
resents only a small part of that once
expansive empire. However, it is a
particularly important part, repre-
senting as it does the ethnic lands
of the Lithuanians, where the his-
tory of the pagan GDL began and
where the nucleus of the Lithuanian
state was. The Lithuanians differed
from the Ruthenians in their lan-
guage, traditions and religion (Pa-
ganism initially, and Catholicism
since 1387). The ancestors of Be-
larusians were Ruthenians and not
“Lithuanians.” Belarus was formed
from those Ruthenian lands which
remained under Lithuanian rule after
1569, when the Ukrainian lands of
the GDL were given to the Polish
kingdom. No Western historian, in-
cluding Lithuanians, denies the fact
that Ruthenian culture had a signif-
icant influence on Lithuanians dur-
ing a key part of their history, but
for Western historiography and
many Europeans, in line with his-
torical facts, the GDL was a multi-
ethnic state founded and ruled by
Lithuanians.
LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 15
Images of Survival
by Milda B. Richardson
T he purpose of the narrative
that follows is to broadly
promote discourse by raising
the level of consciousness surround-
ing the forced deportation of more
than 55,000 Lithuanian children un-
der the age of 16 during the period
1941–52. The memoirs quoted are
particularly vivid because they rep-
resent the genuine voices of simple
people who lost their rich cultural
heritage. What emerges is the story
of a humanitarian crisis which de-
serves better illumination and ac-
countability. This project is a trans-
lation into English of memoirs by
Lithuanians who were exiled to
Vytukas Dargis was born in Siberia, in the Krasnoyarsk region. He lived there with his
parents in a ramshackle cottage with his sister Onutė. In his “yard” was a broken-down
tractor; 1955.
16 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
Siberia as children. The inspiration
for this project came from Stanislo-
vas Abromavičius, an internationally
recognized writer and poet as well
as political activist. Abromavičius ed-
ited four volumes of extensive mem-
oirs written by survivors of Siberian
exile. These were published between
2012 and 2018 (see afterword). The
translators and editors of the Eng-
lish text (of the first 3 volumes) are
Julija Živilė Vaitkienė, Rūta Jerasius
Guffey, Milda B. Richardson and
R.E. Richardson. A priority for the
translations was to preserve the tone
of the original texts without altering
them stylistically. The goal of the
project is to widely distribute the
English language volume to Western
embassies, libraries and research in-
stitutes.
Wrenched from Home without
Warning
Milda (Rapkauskaitė)
I have been to the frozen wilder-
ness of Yakut. I was eight years old
on June 14, 1941, the fateful day of
our deportation.…My father was the
principal of the local grammar
school [in Panemuninkai]…earlier,
together with Father and the stu-
dents, we brought little trees from
the forester’s farm and planted them
all around the schoolyard. I took a
lilac bush and planted it behind the
school fence. Every morning I
would run over to see if the lilac
was blossoming. That day, I never
got to the lilac tree, because toward
morning, the soldiers arrived at our
home, and brought with them a Jew-
ish man to inventory our property…
In Alytus they put us in a cattle car.
Agota (Paškevičiūtė-Stukienė)
It was the end of spring in 1948
– the most beautiful time of the year,
full of white blossoms. I was sixteen,
on the border from childhood, when
the cruel winds of fate ripped off
the flower petals and brought me
into exile for eleven years. My par-
ents, Kazimieras and Agota Paške-
vičius, were farmers and raised four
children. I was the youngest.
 That evening all of the residents
of Gripkeliai gathered for a prayer
service after their work. Following
prayers, we separated and went
home. The village was shrouded in
nocturnal peace. At midnight we
were awakened by pounding on the
door. Father got up and opened the
door. Behind the door stood Pele-
grimas, the elder of the Saločiai re-
gion, some Soviet soldiers and a few
collaborators. They ordered father
and one of the children to go with
them to the neighboring Deveitoniai
village (today – the Pasvalys region).
They only returned at dawn: Father,
sister Joana and the Steponavičius
and Žemaitis families. They gave us
thirty minutes to get ready to
leave.…Mother ran over to the cross
standing in the yard, kissed it,
blessed herself.…As we drove
through Pasvalys, the sun was al-
ready setting, its last rays kissed the
earth. It was very painful for me to
leave the blossoming lilacs…the
Pensive Christ sculptures of the way-
side shrines along the way, the song
of the nightingale.…I wept a lot. It
seems I moved to tears the soldiers
sitting with rifles in the corners of
the vehicle. One of them…tried to
cover me with an overcoat, saying I
should not cry, that I would get used
to Siberia, would marry a Siberian. I
threw the coat off my shoulders and
cried even more.
It was already night when they
brought us to Panevėžys. In the
evening they opened the door of
the train car and told us to get some
water for the journey. I went, es-
corted by an armed guard. I saw hor-
rible scenes all around me. The area
had been fenced off. Beyond the
fence stood a mass of people who
were calling for their folks, and when
they saw them they threw packages
for them. The Soviet collaborators
forbade this and threatened to stuff
them into the wagons as well. After
we brought water, the doors of the
cars were shut and sealed, and the
long train of 63 wagons moved to-
ward the East. Screaming was heard
in the wagons, in other places, the
May hymn “Sveika Marija, Motina
Dievo” (Holy Mary, Mother of God)
rang out.
The Journey Eastward
Ignas (Požėla)
Thus, on June 24, 1941, my
complimentary trip to western
Siberia began. A Russian officer told
us to bring clothes and food, drove
us to the Linkuva train station and
put us into a train car. At Petrašiūnai
and other stations, more exiles were
seated in the car. In Šiauliai they
transferred us from narrow gauge
tracks to wider tracks and took us
to Nauja Vilnia, where trains were
being organized…. Men were sepa-
rated from their families. The desig-
nated trains took three weeks to take
us further, the last point of separa-
tion, Novosibirsk, which was situ-
ated by the great water highway –
the Ob River. It was easy to float
exiles on the Ob down to the Tym
River, to the Novosibirsk and Tomsk
Autos and even roads were rare in Siberia, and gasoline was nowhere to be found. This
truck was powered by burning logs; 1953.
May / June 2018
regions or up to the Altai territory.
From Novosibirsk they sailed us
along the Ob to Kolpashev, and then
along the tributaries of the Ob to…
the Zavodskaja village.…The fami-
lies brought here from Lithuania
were: Bagdonas, Brazdžiūnas, Galin-
skas, Gotlibis, Mekys, Pabilionis, two
from the Požėla family, Šalkauskas,
Šereivis, Švėgždas and Traškevičius.
The others I do not remember. Fam-
ilies were housed…in one-room
shacks.
Jonas (Stasevičius)
My parents were farmers. That
was the reason our family was de-
ported. Moreover, they insisted that
we help the partisan fighters.…Our
neighbors…had betrayed us.…Later
they [Soviet soldiers]…drove us to
the Pumpėnai middle school. From
there they took us in trucks to the
Panevėžys railroad station. The So-
viet soldiers perhaps were not as
cruel as the Lithuanians.…We trav-
eled by train to Arsenas in the
Tomsk region. Then we were trans-
ferred to sleds, which were pulled
by Caterpillar tractors. All of our
belongings were thrown into the
LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 17
tractors, and the children rode on
top. The journey was long because
the tractors broke down along the
way. We had to spend more than a
week in the cold in the forest.…
Most of the deportees did not reach
Siberia.
Famine and Bitter Cold on the
Train
Vida Teresė (Murauskaitė-
Galdikienė)
At the beginning of the trip they
let us get some water in the railroad
stations. From Novosibirsk on, they
gave us no more water. We grew
very thirsty, and Mother told us to Three young women who grew up in Siberian exile, Elvyra Končiūtė, Vanda Tarvainytė
and Kristina Grigaliūtė, hitching a ride to a school 6 km. distant in Juzno-Kurilsk; 1956.
lick the nails covered with frost. So
my brother and I licked. When the she could pour the gruel.… We saw died of hunger. The forced labor
train stopped, if someone tried to how he, not having gone very far camp was enclosed with a wire fence
get some snow, the soldiers would from the train, began to ladle it up and there were guard towers. There
start shooting. I remember when with his hand and eat without stop- were six dug-outs…. We lived in the
they herded us to bathe in Novosi- ping. dugouts for three days. Then they
birsk. At that time I did not under- began to take the families to the
stand why the soldiers were laughing Arrival in Siberia taiga. In the fifth mine 53 Lithuanian
so at the naked women and girls.… families stayed behind. In the other
In the steam bath we were all robbed Agota (Paškevičiūtė-Stukienė) dugouts lived Ukrainians who had
and returned to the train half- Finally, on June 7 [1948] they been deported in the fall of 1947.
naked.…At the beginning the adults brought us to the former mine out- The following people spent their
tried to hide the dead because every- side of Cheremkhovo in the Irkutsk youth in Cheremkhovo: the future
one wanted Christian burials. But region. They said that the former member of Lithuanian parliament,
later the soldiers inspected the train Japanese slaves of that mine had Vincė Vaidevutė Margevičienė, and
cars and usually threw the corpses
from the train.

Agota (Paškevičiūtė-Stukienė)
During the trip they gave us
food twice over fifteen days. The
first time they gave each family a tin
of canned fish and soup; the second
time soup and millet gruel. The gruel
was curdled, putrid, and we were
afraid to get poisoned.…Once we
stopped.…It was raining. A wet
child came to the traincar. He sang
beautifully and stretched out his
hand for food. Mother offered him
the gruel – we would not eat it
anyway. But she did not have any-
thing to pour it into. The child un-
derstood and stretched our the lapel The Matur River, with a view of the Sayan mountains, 6,000 km. distant from Lithuania.
of his jacket and pointed to where Krasnoyarsk region; spring, 1949.

18 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018


Danutė Laužadytė, an exile who was studying mathematics, distributing drinking water to
residence halls; 1955.
the Lithuanian law historian, Vytau-
tas Raudeliūnas, a doctoral graduate
of Vilnius University. We lived in
Cheremkhovo for ten years.
One (Mačionytė Čirienė)
The beginning of life in Siberia
was very difficult. During the first
Easter holiday, we ate cabbage soup
made with a bone that Antanina
Mačionis took from a dog, rinsed it
and cooked it. Women had to work
in the forest industry. The work site
was more than eight kilometers away.
They had to cut trees with a hand-
saw and nail metal stakes into the
ends of the logs…. while working
the night shift, a Caterpillar tractor
crushed Ona Mačionis’s toes, but no
one hurried to take her to a doctor
because they had to load a vehicle
with logs and wait until her shift was
over… a day and a half later.
Ignas (Požėla)
The following summer…we
built our own little house with dou-
ble walls out of little staves. We filled
the space between the walls with
moss and covered the roof with turf
and birch bark peeled in the spring.
We dug a basement under the little
house to store potatoes.… In the
region where we lived [Zavodskaja
village] there was a small mill where
starch was made from potatoes.
Workers were permitted to help
themselves to some of the juices, a
kind of second-rate starch. From
these products, by adding flax seed
heads and small potatoes, they baked
bread or pancakes.
Zonė (Mituzaitė)
Only the strongest…were des-
tined to survive…. During the sum-
Lithuanian children who grew up in exile in the Krasnoyarsk region of Siberia. Instead of
going to school, from 13 years of age they were forced into work details; 1954.
May / June 2018
mer we picked grapes, collected
mushrooms, saved extra berries for
the winter. We pickled milk-agaric
mushrooms in the barrels made by
my father. Goose-feet plants and
nettle were introduced into our food
rations. Once… Father received a
small male rabbit… we were so
happy. We bought a doe, which had
babies. We had meat and fur for our
clothes… In the spring we prepared
a garden and grew potatoes, cab-
bage… the ghost of starvation was
retreating.
A Kind Hand
Vida Teresė (Murauskaitė
Galdikienė)
She [Mother] often went to the
market and tried to either sell or
trade something for food. One
day…a Jewish man approached her.
Mother had dark curly hair, and he
asked if she was Jewish. Mother
nodded, and he invited her to meet.
When Mother came to meet him,
she told him that she was not Jewish,
but Lithuanian, with two children
and nothing for them to eat. The
Jewish man, Daiksleris, was a scholar
from Moldova. He felt sorry for my
mother and helped her get a job in
LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 19
the bread bakery to deliver bread to
the stores and cafeterias…we no
longer starved.…After a while, we
could go home to Lithuania. …In
order to repay Daiksleris for his help,
we took with us Roza, a seventeen-
year-old Jewish girl who had no doc-
uments.
The Yenisei river basin, showing Krasno-
yarsk and the Angara river in Siberia. The
Ob river (not marked) is slightly to the west
of the Yenisei. (Wikipedia, Kmusser)
Labor Force
Mečislovas (Liutvinas)
The hands of the deportees
were needed everywhere…our men,
women and girls worked every-
where. We had to load boards into
nine-meter high stacks, and carry on
our shoulders those brought by the
lumber truck from the dock to the
barge. We mowed the hay and slept
in tents. Our kitchen was a bon-
fire.…They [men] had to drag the
logs from the Yenisei River and pile
them into stacks. The men worked
in three shifts…for little food…600
grams of bread per day. The exiles
managed to survive the harsh Arctic
cold… in Siberia and two-meter
thick ice of the Yenisei River. We
had to cross a three-kilometer wide
river to split the rocks of the cliffs
on the other side. They were boul-
ders of chalk, and when they were
20 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
burnt in the oven they turned to discrimination…I met some good
lime used for construction…Pijus people, one cannot measure every-
Mažėčis and I worked in the one by the same ruler.
Leningrad Institute for hydrotech-
nology expeditions mapping the Zonė (Mituzaitė)
New Maklakovsk and New Yenisei The deportations to Siberia and
as well as the Yenisei River. We, the Kazakhstan hardened our will, fos-
Lithuanian exiles, dug the first sign- tered the love of our homeland and
posts in these settlements…we our determination to reach our goal.
measured the depth of the river, and
the thickness of the ice…We dug
fire clay from the banks of the An-
gara River, from a depth of twelve
meters. There we met Lithuanians –
the 1941 deportees.
Release and Return
Jonas (Stasevičius)
The attempt to become accus-
tomed to a foreign land and the bat-
tle to return to one’s homeland
where no one was waiting.
Mečislovas (Liutvinas)
Those who were not…expect-
ing us, were those who signed their
names and accused us, those who Stanislovas Abromavičius. (XXI Amžius.lt)
carried…away…the valuable things
the deportees left behind, those who Editor's Note: Stanislovas Abromavičius, a
took over the homes of those exiled, writer from Kaunas, Lithuania, born in
who thought that we would never 1944, has published a large number of
books of essays, prose, poetry, and chil-
return and never look into their trai- drens stories. He has put together 4 books
tors’ eyes. dealing with the fate of children deported
to Siberia:
Zinaida (Skaringaitė-Svilienė) and –Tremties vaikai (“Children in Exile”). vols
Veronika (Skaringaitė-Jakienė) 1, 2, and 3 – Kaunas: Lithuanian Union of
I think that deep religion, love Political Prisoners and Deportees, 2012,
of homeland, and sincere prayers 2016, and 2017, respectively.
helped us endure all the hardships, –Vaikystė Sibiro toliuose: mažųjų tremtinių
starvation, humiliation, and loss. istorijos (“Childhood in distant Siberia: sto-
ries of children in exile”). – Kaunas:
During the big Catholic holidays, the Lithuanian Union of Political Prisoners and
Lithuanians would organize serv- Deportees, 2018.
ices…. During these events we sang
The stories and photos are reproduced
“Leiskit į Tėvynę, leiskit pas savus.” (Let from these books with permission.
us return to the homeland, let us re-
turn to our people). Unfortunately,
later, our own people did not want
us, they really did not want us, and
did as much as possible to hinder
our return home. …I felt constant
 Folk Art of Carved Distaffs
by Aušra Tallat-Kelpša Di Raimondo

Nauja prieverpstė The New Distaff

Ratelio verpstėje On the spinning wheel
Dainuoja siūlas, The thread is singing,
Jis veja Motinų svajas, It spins a mother’s dream,
Kada užaugs dukrelė For when daughter will be grown
Ir dūzgės staklelės, Then the loom will hum,
Pavaduos motulę, She’ll replace her mother,
Šypsosis saulėje The sun will smile
Ir prieverpstė nauja... And a new distaff...
Toks šio gyvenimo The great advantage
Didysis privalumas, Of this life is,
Kad ratas apvalus, – That its wheel is round, –
Kaip motinos delne... Like the mother’s palm
Sūneliui pasaga – A horseshoe for the son –
Tegu joja ristūnu, Let him ride a swift stallion,
Bet ne į karą, Tik pas mergeles... But never to war; just to the girls...
O iš viršaus saulutė žiūri And from above the sun looks down
Ir rašo vieną žodį: „Lietuva.” And writes a single word: “Lietuva.”

poem by Ona Baliukienė for Albinas Šileika

(translation by A. Tallat-Kelpša)

I n the last few months, master

craftsman and police officer Al-
binas Šileika has been exhibiting
his carved distaffs to the Lithuan-
ian-American community, and teach-
ing young and old alike, how to carve
them. Abandoned as a baby and
raised in orphanages, Albinas began
carving at age ten. After completing
his education in furniture making,
farming equipment technology, and
serving in the Lithuanian armed
forces, he graduated from the Vilnius
Police Academy and has served as a
police officer since then. The beauty
of his work is evident in the photos
of his work accompanying this arti-
cle. For the first time, Lithuanian-
Americans were able to enjoy them
in person, and learn about this very
old Lithuanian folk art. Albinas Šileika teaching children in Lemont, Chicago, how to carve a distaff. (author photo)

May / June 2018 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 21

 Renowned in Lithuania, this
much awarded and beloved artist has
been exhibiting and teaching his
craft throughout Lithuania since
1988. His distaffs have been gifted
to President Grybauskaitė and other
notable persons, and also have been
given as trophies. Šileika’s deep con-
nection to and love for Lithuania
and its traditions are the foundation
of his work. In 2016 the Ministry
of Agriculture awarded Albinas with
the title of Master of National Her-
itage and designated his distaffs, as
well as his boxes and other carved
pieces, as treasures of Lithuanian
national heritage.
A brief introduction to Lithuanian
distaff carving
As long as 4,000 years ago, the
Baltic tribes were making fishing
nets from spun linden fibers. Ac-
cording to archeologist prof. Ramutė
Rimantienė, spinning has been prac-
ticed in the Lithuanian region since
the Stone Age, as evidenced by
stone, clay, and amber spindles that
have been found in women’s burial
sites. Archeological data prove that
spindles used in Neolithic times in
the region of modern-day Lithuania
were shaped similar to 18th and 19th
century tools: whirl drop spindles
with long, tapered shafts and small
whorls secured by a notch at the
bottom of the shaft. Some of these
tools can be seen at the Lithuanian
National Museum in Vilnius at its
exhibit on spinning and weaving that
spans a period from the first settle-
ments in the 11th century BC to the
13th century AD.
Over the centuries, wool and
linen were spun and woven into tex-
tiles for clothing and household
needs. Spinning, weaving and the
tools used for these tasks became
central to Lithuanian mythology, cul-
ture and society, and an essential part
of life for every woman. Women’s
status and prestige depended on
22 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
Distaff, 19th century, Klaipėda. (news.lt)
Distaff, 19th century, Telšiai. (news.lt)
their ability to spin fine yarn, and
their dowry consisted of their spun
and woven materials.
Until ca. 1533, when the spin-
ning wheel began to appear in Ger-
many, women in Lithuania used
spindles, with the exception of
Samogitia, where they were used
more rarely. With the advent of the
spinning wheel came the use of
distaffs, traditional wooden tools
used in the spinning of wool, flax
or cotton. Distaffs were used well
into the 20th century. A distaff had
two parts: a head used for wrapping
the fiber, a handle, and a flat hori-
zontal board connected to the han-
dle. Attached to the spinner’s belt, it
provided for freedom of movement.
Later, distaffs were permanently at-
tached to spinning wheels. Distaff
heads have complex shapes in order
to hold the fibers better: pointed,
broad, and leaf shaped. One side of
the distaff, attached to the tow, was
plain except for the part not hidden
by the tow, and the other was deco-
rated with traditional patterns. Ac-
cording to Samogitian expert Juzefas
Perkovskis, Lithuanian distaffs were
historically elaborately carved,
pressed, or burned, with folk-art de-
signs consisting of geometric de-
signs inspired by pagan symbols, and
less frequently, animal and plant
forms.
The composition of the orna-
mentation took its inspiration from
nature and the world as it was un-
derstood at the time. Traditionally,
distaffs contain one to six segmented
stars. These are placed within bands
of parallel lines and increase in size.
Ornamentation includes rosettes,
half-moons, circles, S-shaped orna-
ments, rhombuses, triangles, and
even animals and plants. The domi-
nant motif is the sun in different
variations. Large disks represent the
rising and setting sun, and small
discs represent the sun at her high-
est, originating from the observation
of the sun’ s motion during the year,
and associating it with the solar year.
Spinning was associated with deities
who decided human fate, and
likened to the act of creation,
whereby a thread appears from
chaos (unspun wool). The thread it-
self represents life, and the woven
cloth, the world. Once the wool is
spun, the distaff ’s surface represents
balance.
Lithuanian women worked dur-
ing a major portion of their day at a
spinning wheel or a distaff. During
this time they passed stories, legends,
Various forms of distaffs, showing the predominance of circular design often with a sun motif.
riddles and proverbs on to their chil-
dren, often functioning as clandes-
tine instructors in Lithuanian during
the time when Lithuanian books
were banned by the Russian tsar.
Distaff by Albinas Šileika.
The distaff also represented the Klaipėda, and of course in Albinas
unity of the sexes. It was a signifi- Šileika’s home city of Utena.
cant gift to brides and women.
Young men would carve distaffs for
Editor’s note: For those readers like me
their sweethearts, and if the young who don’t have the faintest idea of what a
lady accepted the distaff, she would distaff is or how it is used, please view the
store it in her hope chest. Once mar- YouTube video featured on the inside back
ried, it would remain a treasure in cover of this issue.
her home until she gifted it to her
daughter, or daughter-in-law. The
gift would be coupled with a story
about love and community. In this
way tradition, folk art, and stories
were handed down from generation
to generation.
Over time, the practical use of
distaffs has decreased but they re-
main an integral part of Lithuanian
folk art and tradition, created for
gifting, awarding and treasuring for
births, weddings, baptisms, confir-
mations, and other major celebra-
tions and life milestones. Permanent
historical and modern-day exhibits
of distaff art, from 1804 to the pres-
ent, can be seen in Telšiai, Plungė,
Mažeikiai, Skuoda, Šilalė, Akmenė,
May / June 2018 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 23
Book Review:
Waiting for Stalin to Die (by Irene Guilford)
reviewed by Daiva Markelis
I rene Guilford’s “Waiting for
Stalin to Die” is a wonderful
novel about four refugees who
attempt to rebuild their lives in
Toronto after fleeing Lithuania in
advance of the Soviet army. They’ve
left behind family, romantic relation-
ships, friendships, and promising ca-
reers. Their sense of societal dislo-
cation is heightened by the lack of
information about loved ones in the
occupied homeland. Through her
gorgeous prose and deft characteri-
zations, Guilford describes what war
does to people; she also explores the
sustenance that immigrants find in
family, community, and church.
The main characters in the novel
navigate the often unrelenting waters
of exile in a variety of complex ways.
Some cling to ghosts from the past,
some, to immediate family. The ret-
icent Maryte is highly protective of
Dobilas, her intellectually disabled
but loving and sensitive brother; in
her eagerness to be his perpetual
guardian, she is as dependent on him
as he is on her. Others marry, mostly
unhappily. The young doctor Vytas
Priziura is seduced by Danguole, the
obstinate and self-centered daughter
of his scheming landlady. He weds
the pregnant girl and ends up direct-
ing his energies into ministering to
his Lithuanian patients.
The problematic personal lives
of the Lithuanian characters are ag-
gravated by the attitudes of resident
Canadians, many of whom refuse
to rent to Eastern Europeans. The
Canadian men (and women as well)
attempt to take advantage of the
new arrivals. For example, the tal-
ented Justine, a classically trained pi-
anist in Lithuania, auditions for the
24 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
Royal Conservatory of Music, only
to be sexually harassed by her well-
connected auditioner. Guilford is
skillful with her depictions, avoiding
stereotypes such as the good/bad
immigrant or good/bad Canadian.
There are subtle and pleasing sur-
prises; characters that one might ini-
tially dismiss as emotionally weak or
foolish turn out to be strong and in-
sightful.
Although the world of the
Lithuanian immigrants in “Waiting
for Stalin to Die” is a difficult and
often bleak one, the novel is far from
depressing. We see individuals rise
above their challenging circum-
stances – Father Geras works tire-
lessly to raise money for a Lithuanian
cemetery on the outskirts of group. It’s no wonder that many
Toronto while agonizing over the contemporary works of fiction deal-
future of his sister, the feckless ing with the immigrant experience
Birute. There is humor as well. We utilize a linked stories format; ex-
laugh at the sexual peccadillos of amples include Jhumpa Lahiri’s “In-
Mrs. Moynahan, the landlady who terpreter of Maladies,” Junot Diaz’s
does rent to Lithuanians, especially “This is How You Lose Her,” and
young, good-looking ones. We smile Birute Putrius’s “Lost Birds.” Such
at the dueling Lithuanian mother- an approach underscores the multi-
in-laws in the first section of the faceted and fragmentary nature of
book. We chuckle at Guilford’s use displacement, and suits Guilford’s
of names; Father Geras is very good, prose style, which is sometimes
indeed. sparse, sometimes expansive, and al-
Structurally, “Waiting for Stalin ways beautiful.
to Die” is more a novel-in-stories I loved Irene Guilford’s first
than it is a traditional work of fic- novel, “The Embrace,” which also
tion. Here the emphasis is not on a deals with the Lithuanian experience.
central plot with strict chronology, “Waiting for Stalin to Die” is even
but rather on recurring themes that better, more daring and complex.
serve to highlight different aspects The novel is published by Guernica
of a larger collective experience. Editions as part of its Essential
Characters who appear as major Prose series: https://www.guernicaedi-
players in one story may make minor tions.com/. The book is also available
appearances in another; the connect- on Amazon and Barnes and Noble,
ing thread is often a specific neigh- both in paperback and e-book for-
borhood or a particular ethnic mat.

Cooking
Lithuanian
by Ona Daugirdienė
T he iconic fruit of summer in
Lithuania is the forest blue-
berry. Unlike the behemoth
watermelons associated with Amer-
ican summers, it’s small and humble,
It doesn’t arrive via cargo planes
from Chile, but requires a destination
trip to the forest, with long hours of
stooping and bending to collect the
berries, one by one. After the berries
are gone, instead of a plastic box, it
leaves behind a gentle purple kiss on
fingers, lips and tongues.
A blueberry by any other name
Like most of you, I have always
called blueberries mėlynės. As it turns
out, that is not completely accurate.
In both English and Lithuanian, the
correct name of this little blue berry
depends on whether it’s wild or cul-
tivated, and whether it’s native to
North America or Europe.
A blueberry is a šilauogė
What we buy in the supermar-
kets and call blueberries is Vaccinium
carymbosum, a berry native to North
America. They are called šilauogės
in Lithuania and refer to the com-
mercially grown blueberries that
originated in Northeast U.S. in the
1920’s. At that time, two agricultural
specialists made advances in culti-
vation that yielded the highbush
blueberry – a tall-growing specimen
that could be planted in quantity,
and yielded larger, harder, tougher-
skinned berries that could be har-
vested by raking and transported
without injury.
BLUEBERRY
SUMMER
In contrast to the wild blue-
berry, these cultivated blueberries
grow in clusters, making them effi-
cient to pick. They have a matte or
dusty dark blue skin with a white or
greenish fruit pulp. The blossom
end is distinguished by a circular
crown of triangular sepals. Their
taste is sweet, but mild. These culti-
vated blueberries slowly made their
way around the globe and for sev-
eral decades have been found even
in Lithuania.
A mėlynė is a bilberry
What is called a mėlynė in
Lithuania is actually a bilberry in the
English-speaking world. Its botanic
clasification is Vaccinium myrtillus
and it is native to northern Europe
and Scandinavia. It grows wild in the
acidic, nutrient-poor soils of pine
and fir forests. Lithuania, apparently,
is a hospitable habitat – about 25%
of its forest land is labeled mė-
lyniniai, that is, growing bilberry
bushes. Thankfully, the bilberry has
remained uncommercialized, per-
haps because it is difficult to grow –
natural spread occurs by rhizomes
or underground runners. In addi-
tion, harvesting is a challenge since
as a lowbush, it grows very close to
the ground, requiring a determined
picker to work in a fatiguing crouch.
There are other laborious factors:
the berries are tiny and grow singly
or in pairs, so they have to be picked
individually, and they are soft and
juicy, necessitating a delicate touch
and making transport difficult.
May / June 2018
These wild berries also look a
little different from their cultivated
cousins. They are small, and have a
smooth circle instead of a “crown”
on the blossom end. Their skin is
shiny and nearly black with a slight
shade of purple, and the pulp inside
is red or blue. They have an intense
flavor and when handled, will
quickly stain hands and mouths.
In summary: If it’s North Amer-
ican, cultivated and large, it’s a blue-
berry or šilauogė. If it’s European,
wild and small, it’s a bilberry or
mėlynė.
The time is (always) right
In Lithuania, folk wisdom held
that blueberrries were to be picked
when the rye was ready for harvest.
There is an old saying: “Prisirpo mė-
lynės, prinoko rugiai” – the blueber-
rries have ripened, the rye is mature.
Today, berry hunters in the beautiful
forests of our homeland watch the
calendar instead of the rye. Blue-
berry picking commences on July 1st
and continues into the first part of
September. We can have cultivated
blueberries anytime, so don’t wait to
enjoy them!
Blueberry Lemon Tea Cake
Gently sweet, with cream cheese
for moistness, this cake is studded with
blueberries and glazed with a tangy
lemon syrup. It can be made with fresh,
frozen or dried blueberries.
3 oz. cream cheese
½ cup (1stick) butter
1¼ cup sugar
LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 25

4 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1½ cups flour
1 tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt
zest of 1 lemon
1-1½ cups blueberries*
lemon syrup
juice of 1 lemon
¼ cup sugar
1. Preheat oven to 350º. Grease
and flour a 8½” x 5” loaf pan.
2. With mixer, beat room tem-
perature butter and cream cheese
until pale. Beat in sugar.
3. Add in eggs, one at a time,
beating after each addition. Don’t
overbeat and remember to scrape
the bowl. Mix in vanilla.
4. Now remove mixer and con-
tinue mixing by hand. Combine
flour, baking powder, salt and lemon
zest, and add to batter. Mix until just
blended (overmixing results in a
tough cake).
5. Gently fold in blueberries.
Don’t worry about perfect distribu-
tion (you’ll see why in Step 6).
6. Spoon batter into prepared
pan. Berries, especially fresh ones,
tend to sink as the cake bakes, so
put the batter with fewest berries in
26 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018
the bottom of the pan, and the
denser berry distribution on top.
The blueberries will even out nicely
as the cake rises.
7. Bake for approximately 1
hour. The cake should be golden
brown and the testing skewer come
out clean. Cool for 10 minutes in
the pan, then evert.
8. Toward the end of baking
time, make the lemon syrup. Heat
lemon juice and sugar in a small
saucepan until slightly syrupy. Brush
warm cake (top and 4 vertical sides)
with lemon syrup. Cool completely
before serving.
*Notes about blueberries for bak-
ing: If using fresh blueberries, pick
out the smallest ones in the con-
tainer. Today’s enormous berries are
not the greatest for baking, so leave
the largest ones for fresh eating. If
using frozen or dried blueberries,
buy the wild ones – they are avail-
able at most grocery stores. Wild
blueberries are much smaller and
more flavorful than the cultivated
ones (and bluer!).
When baking with frozen wild
blueberries: 1) Do not defrost the
blueberries, keep frozen until you
mix them into the batter. If they
thaw, you will end up with a purple
cake from the seeping juices. 2)
There is no need to adjust baking
time ‒ the wild berries are small
enough not to affect the temperature
of the surrounding batter very much.
(Baking with frozen cultivated blue-
berries, however, is risky – because
of their large size, you may end up
with pockets of underbaked cake)
Blueberry Peach Medley
Mėlynių mišrainė
A refreshing accompaniment for
pork or chicken, dip for tortilla chips,
or topping for goat cheese or Brie.
1½ cups fresh blueberries
1 peach, peeled
1 shallot
1 jalapeno pepper
3 Tbsp. chopped fresh basil
3 Tbsp. chopped chives
1 Tbsp. olive oil
zest and juice ½ lime
¼ tsp. sugar
salt and pepper
Chop blueberries, finely dice
peach, mince shallot. Remove seeds
from jalapeno and dice very finely.
Chop basil and chives. Combine all
ingredients. Add a bit of salt and
pepper to taste. That’s it!
Note: Don’t hesitate about com-
bining fruit with onions. The flavors
are actually very complimentary and
delicious together. And don’t fear
the jalapeno (much of the heat is
discarded with the seeds) – the pep-
per adds an entire layer of complex-
ity to the sweet and savory profile.
Some years, peaches are flavorless –
sub them out for a nice ripe mango.

Blue Blue Herbal Salad
Sweet blueberries and salty blue
cheese combine with lettuces and fra-
grant herbs: basil, tarragon, parsley
and chives, for a delectable summer
salad.
5 oz. package mixed salad greens
2 cups blueberries
¾ cup crumbled Gorgonzola
1 cup Italian (flat) parsley leaves
1 cup basil leaves
½ cup chives
½ cup tarragon leaves
¾ cup roasted, salted almonds
vinaigrette dressing
The heavier ingredients usually
fall to the bottom of the bowl if
everything is tossed together, so
make the salad in two steps. First,
in a large serving bowl toss all the
greens and fresh herbs: tear individ-
ual parley leaves from stems, leave
basil leaves intact (unless large), cut
chives into 1-in. pieces, strip tar-
ragon from stems. Then top with
blueberries, Gorgonzola and al-
monds. And don’t skimp on the
herbs and blueberries – in this
recipe, they are not a garnish, but a
main ingredient. Serve with your fa-
vorite vinaigrette dressing.
Note: Feta cheese can be used
instead of Gorgonzola blue cheese,
but in that case, try to get real feta
made from sheep’s milk, it’s the best
(and usually French...). The recipe
makes a large salad – 5 ounces of
salad greens fluff up to a big bowl.
Blue-nose dumplings
Šaltanosiai
These traditional summertime
dumplings are filled with fresh blue-
berries and served with sour cream,
butter and a sprinkle of sugar.
2 cups flour
1 egg
½ cup warm water
2 Tbsp. sour cream or oil
½ tsp. salt
1½ cups fresh blueberries
1. Dump flour into mixing bowl.
Make a well and add egg. With a
fork, start mixing from the center.
Mixture will be dry and crumbly.
2. In a larger measuring cup
combine warm water, sour cream or
oil (for a more tender dough) and
salt. Add slowly to flour while mix-
May / June 2018
ing in a circle with the fork. Dough
will start to come together. You may
need just a bit more liquid, but it
will be less than you think, so add
extra water only a teaspoon at a time.
3. Don’t worry about about a
perfect dough yet. If the flour is all
incorporated, just wrap the dough
in plastic and let it rest for 30 min.
Then unwrap and knead until it is
soft and elastic.
4. Roll out thinly and cut rounds
with a 2 inch cutter (after re-rolling
scraps, you will get approx. 36
rounds). If the dough fights you,
cover with a dishcloth for 5-10 min.,
let it rest, and roll again. You’re the
boss, you will win.
5. Place some berries in the cen-
ter of each round, bring up edges
to make a semi-circle or crescent
and pinch closed. Boil in salted water
for about 7 minutes. Serve with
melted butter, sour cream and a
sprinkle of sugar.
Note: Some šaltanosių recipes
want you to sprinkle the filling
berries with flour – unnecessary.
Others say to sprinkle with sugar.
This may be good advice if you are
using the more tart wild blueberries.
However, the sugar will cause berries
will start oozing juices, it will be hard
to keep your fingers clean while
working, and then your edges won’t
stick. Perhaps it’s best to leave the
berries alone. Instead, once you’ve
plated the dumplings, dolloped the
sour cream and drizzled the butter,
give everything a nice generous
sprinkle of sugar.
P.S. I reviewed about a dozen
recipes for traditional Lithuanian
dumplings and they were all quite
similar. However, I keep thinking
the basic dough could still be better.
Perhaps next time, I’ll give ravioli
dough a test run... If any of our LH
cooks beat me to it, let us know how
your dumplings turned out.
LITHUANIAN HERITAGE 27
 ANTANAS V. DUNDZILA
MEMORIAL FUND FOR SOVIET OCCUPATION RESEARCH

The VYDUNAS YOUTH FUND, Inc. (VYF) is a not-for-profit

organization, which supports various educational projects. In his
will, Antanas V. Dundzila requested that part of his estate be
donated to the VYF and used to establish a fund within the VYF
to support research into and preservation of historical data
related to the Soviet occupation of Lithuania. – especially:

during the periods from 1940–1941 and from 1944–1990;

documenting the harsh life and suffering of massive groups of forcefully deported Lithuanians
forced to live in the Siberian gulags and;
documenting the valiant efforts and armed resistance of the freedom fighters/partisans
(partizanai) against the Soviet occupiers during and after World War II.
Educational research centers and institutions, organizations, authors and others doing research and
work related to the above-listed topics are encouraged to connect with the VYDUNAS YOUTH
FUND, Inc. for further details. If you have questions or are looking for clarifications about projects
that this fund will support, please e-mail them to
VYDUNAS YOUTH FUND, Inc. at: vyduno.fondas@sbcglobal.net.
Please fill out the financial support form found on the VYF website,
www.VydunasYouthFund.org, and send it with all supporting documentation, samples of
the content or media you have prepared, plus additional information to:
Vydunas Youth Fund, Inc. - 14911 E. 127th Street, Lemont, IL 60439, USA or
vyduno.fondas@sbcglobal.net

28 LITHUANIAN HERITAGE May / June 2018

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 Lithuanian
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