One heard of more and more frequent clashes between the Soviets and the Jews. It soon began to dawn on Moshe that his father was right, but he now no longer had any alternative. He was by now simply afraid to resign from his position, lest he be accused of subversive nationalism and be duly punished.
He heard from someone about train convoys which were on their way to Lithuania with empty cargo wagons, on whose walls were scrawled in chalk the words “The hungry Lithuania”. Once in Lithuania, the people were invited to eat meat, bacon, dairy and wheat products. They would then turn back towards Russia, the slogans deleted from their wagons. Moshe knew well enough that Lithuania had never gone hungry and there was no lack of food there; on the contrary, food was plentiful and often exported abroad. This caused him no end of anxiety. But one must not sit idle.
Moshe was involved with the town council (Selsovet) with whose members he sat till late in the evening. They had long debates over giving credit for building new houses in the village for the peasants, putting in plumbing and many other daily issues.
He got home late at night, exhausted and uneasy. He dropped into bed his heart pounding. He took a pill to settle his heart and so, fully dressed, fell asleep. Early next morning, he was awakened by the dreadful racket of engines. He jumped up and ran outside. The heavens were full of airplanes, black and huge. What did this mean? They had not come from the Russian side, but the opposite. He started counting them: 20, 30, 50 – his mind boggled. Then they flew over and all became quiet – an eerie stillness reigned.
Moshe did not yet know that last night’s meeting of the town council was to be the last one; that lying in his own bed as in the past would no longer be possible. He re-entered the house perturbed, quickly washed his face, left the family fast asleep and went out into the street. Were these indeed German planes? It just couldn’t be. We have a treaty with Germany. He decided to slip into Anton’s – the secretary of the council – a quiet man dedicated to Soviet power, a communist since the age of 18. Anton was a Veteran fighter for Soviet mastery since 1918, was imprisoned twice under Smetana’s rule, a skilled and indoctrinated politician.
At the entrance to Anton’s home, Moshe accidentally ran into Petrus, a past member of Shaulson. He eyed Moshe up and down from head to toe with a murderous look growling:
“Aha, you’re already in a fright, you pagan Jew, you’d like to flee. Don’t worry, we’ll meet again.” And made a rude sign into his face.
“Get away, you fascist, while the going’s good. If not you’ll come to a bitter end”, Moshe retorted boldly. But his voice rang hollow and held none of its previous confidence.
“So, we’ll see who will come to a bad end.”
At that moment, Anton appeared at the entrance of his home, and the Shaulist disappeared in a trice. Moshe stood as if rooted to the spot. He was bewildered and unable to comprehend what was going on around him.
“Good morning, Anton.”
“A good year, alas the morning is not a pleasant one.”
“Did you hear what happened at dawn?”
“Yes, indeed I heard it. But I can’t quite fully understand what it means … maybe…” Anton was afraid to finish the sentence.
“I feel an inner disquiet,” Moshe ceded to his friend.
All of a sudden, as if in response to his misgivings, a thunderous explosion rent the air, shaking heaven and earth as dozens of airplanes flew low overhead.
“My dear Moshe,” Anton barely let out a whisper, “this is a real war and no laughing matter.”
Anton dressed quickly and again turned to Moshe. “Let’s hurry to the District Committee; they will surely know what has to be done. We must organize a resistance of dedicated members. The Red Army won’t permit the Germans to enter Lithuania. Only the underground organizations can now raise their heads, so we must be prepared for all contingencies. Moreover, we must telephone Kedan, to learn what the county leaders have to say.”
Phoning Keidan was impossible, contact had already been severed. The activists then decided to organize the communists and volunteers of the workers’ institutions in order to evacuate the residents of the shtetl. It was agreed that some would remain in the shtetl, who could later lead under ground activity, until such time as peace and quiet were restored in the country. Should the Red Army retreat, a group of partisans would be organized from among the loyal members to supervise the fight. Anton was a good blacksmith. After entry into Lithuania of the Soviet forces, he had decided to forge a new life.
Out of the 32- man activists and members of the District Committee and Council, eighteen gathered. Of the rest, two were ill, the other twelve were not at home. Some had managed to flee to the surrounding villages, others went into hiding in the village itself. The traitors soon revealed their true colors.
Several of these who met advised sending a representative to Keidan to ascertain what should be done. Some felt it unnecessary to evacuate the people, since obviously the Red Army would prevent entry of the Germans into Lithuania.
In the hours, while the meeting was still in progress, it was announced on the radio that Germany had broken the treaty and without any prior warning or declaration of war had bombed Soviet towns and crossed the boarder in many directions as well a into Lithuania.
Soviet airplanes also appeared in the skies, but not for long. In their stead, there now appeared black clouds from the German side. When the skies had quietened down, the pounding of cannon artillery fire became increasingly powerful. The front kept on moving nearer and nearer to Krek.
In the evening, a directive was received from Keidan to make a quick evacuation of the inhabitants. Moshe’s family, too, grabbed their most important belongings and packed up to move out. According to the instructions, 18 persons, including Moshe, remained behind in order to conduct an underground partisan battle. The treachery of the fascist and nationalistic elements was fearsome and savage. They were like mice crawling out of their holes and immediately began to loot the abandoned Jewish homes.
It was far to the railway station from Datnova. To drive there by car was not at all convenient. The good cars had been requisitioned by the traitors and hidden outside the village. Those that remained were in a bad state of repair. There was no lack of horses to take everyone out in a cart. Moshe’s family took this course. He loaded them onto a wagon and bid them farewell.
“Have a safe journey, my dearest ones. I hope we’ll be freed soon and you’ll be able to return home safely.”
Late at night battalions of the Red Army appeared, but their direction was not against Germany but a retreat to Russia. En route, military vehicles with soldiers intermingled with the evacuees. Those who had not succeeded in procuring a wagon pushed their packages in prams, wheelbarrow or loaded on their backs. It was a motley crew – old and young, women and men, children and the sick, a mass of humanity streaming in the same direction.
A part of the Jewish community remained behind in the shtetl.
“There’s no need to run from the Germans. We remember them in Lithuania after WWI, they did the Jews no harm… On the contrary, they behaved decently and in a civilized manner…”
Their thoughts were in confusion. No one could quite believe that the Nazi Germans would torture and slaughter Jews. It did not even occur to them that the Lithuanians too could do this – those with whom the Jews had been friendly for hundreds of years… The first disaster struck/unexpectedly soon.
Early the next morning, even before the entry into the village of the German battalions, the Lithuanian nationalist – “the death squads” – encircled the secret headquarters with all 18 members, including Moshe, and brought them into the center of the village. On the same day, armed with machine guns and rifles, they led all of them outside the town and shot and killed each and everyone. When this gruesome deed became known, everyone was dumbstruck. The Jews realized that disastrous days lay ahead. Shortly after, the escape routes of most of the evacuees were cut off and they were brought back to the shtetl. The German army units took many Russian soldiers prisoner.
For two whole days, the bodies of the murdered committee members lay unburied. On the third day, they were all buried in a mass grave.
The Lithuanian National-Socialist Organization called itself “totininkai”, but the Jews called them by their true name: “Teitininkai”, that is , beasts who spread death and spill innocent blood.
Most of the Jews of Krok, like in many similar towns and villages in Lithuania succumbed at the hands of the Lithuanian murderers.
When I visited Krok after the war in order to ascertain the fate of the local Jewish community, I found not one Jew left there. The old Jewish cemetery was in it’s original place , but there was no new cemetery for those murdered during that war. The whole of Lithuania was in fact a graveyard of the vanished Jewish communities which had lived there for over six centuries and were brutally slaughtered by the coldest blooded barbarians of the twentieth century.
