Germany occupied Kovno, Lithuania on June 24, 1941. Within six months, German Einsatzgruppe detachments and Lithuanian collaborations had murdered half of the city's Jews. Between July and August 15, 1941, German authorities concentrated some 29,000 of Kovno's Jews into a ghetto.
Learn about the experiences of Jews in Kovno after Germany occupied the city.
![Chaia Gurvitz [LCID: 3287]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/1ce6e2ff-db7f-4a6e-9f16-e5a899777985.gif "Chaia Gurvitz [LCID: 3287]")
From a Jewish family, Chaia lived outside Kovno, a city with a large Jewish population that was renowned for its Hebrew school system. Chaia ran a grocery store with her husband, a retired shoemaker, and their daughter Yenta.
1933-39: Chaia is expecting her daughter Feiga, Feiga's husband, Josef, and her grandson, Abraham, for dinner. Feiga works so hard all week in her beauty shop, Chaia is glad she can help out by preparing the big Sunday meal. She has baked a special cake for Abe. Chaia hopes the family get-together isn't marred by talk of politics. There's been so much disturbing news on the radio about what's happening to Jews in Germany now that the Nazis are in power.
1940-44: The Germans have occupied Kovno. They've forced all the Jews to wear the Star of David and to relocate to a fenced-in ghetto. Every day the guards take people away, never to return. This morning--a cold, drizzly autumn day--everyone in the ghetto, including Chaia, has to report to Democracy Plaza for an inspection. They have to comply or risk being killed. Chaia wonders where they will take her and what will happen to everybody. They march to the Plaza over streets lightly dusted with snow--Yenta and Chaia, and Feiga, Josef, and Abe.
On October 28, 1941, Chaia was taken with 10,000 other Jews to the Ninth Fort, outside Kovno. There they were killed by Lithuanian guards acting under Nazi orders.
Item View![Feiga Malnik [LCID: 3363]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/5fcfa226-214e-4462-b771-6ca066a5c755.gif "Feiga Malnik [LCID: 3363]")
Raised in a Jewish family, Feiga lived with her husband, Josef, in Kovno, a city with a large Jewish community of 38,000. Kovno was situated at the confluence of two rivers, and with its opera company, chic stores and lively nightclubs, it was often called "Little Paris." Feiga was a beautician and Josef was a barber, and together they ran a shop in downtown Kovno.
1933-39: Every day Josef and Feiga walk to their shop, which is near their house. It's hard work, being a beautician--Feiga is on her feet most of the day and her fingers are swollen from the harsh chemicals she uses to give permanents. It'll all seem worth it to Feiga, though, if she can help her son, Abe, have a better life as a doctor or a lawyer. He's a good boy. He works hard at school and helps his parents out at the shop sometimes, sweeping the floor.
1940-44: The Nazis have occupied Kovno. They've forced all the Jews to wear a Star of David and to relocate to a fenced-in ghetto. Every day the guards take people away, never to return. This morning--a cold, drizzly autumn day--everyone in the ghetto has to report to Democracy Plaza for an inspection. They have to comply or risk being killed. Feiga wonders where they will be taken and what will happen to them. They march to the plaza over streets lightly dusted with snow--Josef, Abe and Feiga, her 66-year-old mother and Feiga's sister, Yenta.
That October 28, 1941, Lithuanian guards under Nazi orders killed 10,000 Jews. Feiga escaped. In 1944 she was deported to the Stutthof concentration camp, where she perished.
Item ViewWorld War II began in September 1939. Brigitte and her family moved to Kovno, hoping to secure visas and passports for travel to North America. In July 1941, Brigitte and her family were forced to move into the Kovno ghetto after the Germans occupied Lithuania. Brigitte's family survived the "Great Action," but her mother died of illness in the ghetto. After a roundup targeting children in March 1944, Brigitte escaped from the ghetto with the help of a former employee of her father. Soviet forces liberated Kovno in August 1944.
Item ViewHenny was born into an upper-middle-class Jewish family in Kovno, Lithuania. She and her brother attended private schools. In June 1940 the Soviets occupied Lithuania, but little seemed to change until the German invasion in June 1941. The Germans sealed off a ghetto in Kovno in August 1941. Henny and her family were forced to move into the ghetto. Henny married in the ghetto in November 1943; her dowry was a pound of sugar. She survived several roundups during which some of her friends and family were deported. Henny was herself deported to the Stutthof concentration camp in 1944, when the Germans liquidated the Kovno ghetto. She was placed in a forced-labor group. The Germans forced Henny and other prisoners on a death march as Soviet troops advanced. After Soviet troops liberated Henny in 1945, she eventually reunited with her husband and moved to the United States.
Item ViewAbraham came from a wealthy family that was ordered into the Kovno ghetto after the Germans occupied Lithuania in 1941. Abraham's mother urged his father to flee, but he returned for them. Begging for mercy, he was able to save them from a massacre in the Ninth Fort, one of several forts around Kovno. Abraham and his father survived internment in five camps before they were finally liberated in the Theresienstadt ghetto. Abe's mother perished at the Stutthof camp.
Item View![Hersh Gordon [LCID: 6912]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/55250454-4034-4fb0-9282-2160a45791f4.gif "Hersh Gordon [LCID: 6912]")
Hersh was born to a Jewish family in Kovno, the capital of independent Lithuania. Hersh's father was a mechanic in a textile factory, and his mother had worked as a hat designer until he was born. The Gordons lived on the first floor of Hersh's grandfather's apartment building. Eight-year-old Hersh was in the third grade at public elementary school.
1933-39: In the summers Hersh and his mother would go to his Aunt Ettel and Uncle Abraham in a small town not far away. They'd take a boat down the river to get there. From May to September they operated a small restaurant and motel, and Hersh's mother would help out with the cooking. His father would come out on the weekends. Hersh talked his uncle into buying a ping-pong table and used to win money playing table tennis with the tourists.
1940-44: Hersh was almost 16 when the Germans occupied Kovno and forced all the Jews into a fenced-off ghetto. One day the door of their ghetto apartment flew open and two Germans with guns told them to run to a nearby bridge. As hundreds of Jews from the ghetto walked along the bridge, people began saying prayers and wishing each other goodbye. Germans with heavy rubber clubs started beating everyone over the head. Then they sorted them out as if they were animals, inspecting them to see how fit they were. Hersh was put with others his age.
That day the babies and elderly were killed. Hersh was returned to the ghetto. In 1944 he was deported to Auschwitz, then Dachau. After the war, he immigrated to the United States.
Item ViewUpon her father's death, Judith and her family moved to Kovno. Soon, they were confined to the ghetto, which the Germans formed in 1941. Judith, her mother and sister were deported to Stutthof, where her mother died. Judith and her sister escaped from a death march out of Stutthof. They posed as non-Jews, found farm work and eventual refuge in Denmark. Their brother survived Dachau.
Item ViewIsrael was raised in Kovno, Lithuania, and graduated from law school there in 1933. Because of anti-Jewish discrimination, he was unable to practice law. The Germans invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, occupying Lithuania. The Kovno ghetto was established that August. By claiming to be a mechanic, Israel escaped several massacres. He was forced to work on a wooden airport runway outside the ghetto. After he escaped, Israel, his wife, and son hid in a potato pit for 9 months until liberation by Soviet forces in 1944.
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