Vilkaviškis

The names of the city as it is called or was formerly called in other languages spoken by non-Lithuanian ethnic groups which have lived or live in or around the town include: Polish: Wyłkowyszki; Yiddish: Vilkovishk; German: Wilkowischken. Other spelling variants include Vilkavishkis and Wilkowyszki.[1]

Early 20th-century view of the Vilkaviškis Manor, place of stay of Napoleon in 1812

The city was granted city rights in 1660 by the King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania, John II Casimir Vasa.[2] The coat of arms was granted by King Augustus II the Strong in 1697.[2] It was most likely borrowed from the Pac family, as the owner of the village at the time, Krzysztof Zygmunt Pac, was also the Chancellor of Lithuania.[3][4]

During the Kościuszko Uprising, in 1794, it was the site of a battle between Polish insurgents and Prussian troops.[5] It remained in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth until 1795 when, in the Third Partition of Poland it was annexed by Prussia. In 1807, the city was incorporated into the short-lived Polish Duchy of Warsaw. On 19–23 July 1812, Napoleon Bonaparte stayed in the city.[6] After the duchy's dissolution in 1815, the city became part of Russian-controlled Congress Poland, as part of the Augustów Voivodeship, and later Suwałki Governorate. In 1856, the vast majority of the city's population was Jewish, with 4,417 Jews and 834 Christians.[7] During the January Uprising, on October 30, 1863, it was the site of a skirmish between Polish insurgents and Russian troops.[8]

City centre in 1916

During World War I the city was captured by German forces and held until 1918, when the place became part of independent Lithuania. An American-Lithuanian wrote of his observations when returning to the city in 1919:

I saw that Lithuania is more devastated than Belgium. The Germans crossed through Belgium once only, while Lithuania had been the regular battlefield for the German and Russian armies. It was alternately captured and recaptured by the contending armies. When the Russian army was fleeing it destroyed whatever opportunity afforded, likewise the German army in its retreat carried everything in its wake, pillaged, burned and destroyed whatever it could not take. I noticed in particular one village which had been, only a few trees were visible. Numerous farm houses had been destroyed and burned to the ground. People now live in huts made partly of straw, old boards and clay. Not only the war, but nature has made changes in Lithuania. Rivers, such as the Šeimena and Širvinta, are only brooks. As we approached Vilkaviškis, my native city, the passengers called my attention to the station. My imagination failed to picture the rudely constructed hut as the same station of former years, which had been entirely destroyed by the invading army.[9]

During the interwar period a rail line was constructed running through nearby Marijampolė which caused that town to become the regional centre, replacing Vilkaviškis in its traditional role.[3]

German units in the city during World War II

Shortly after the outbreak of World War II the control of the area fell to the Soviets, between 1940 and 1941, on the basis of the Molotov–Ribbentrop pact. In 1941 Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union, invaded Lithuania, and occupied the city. Between June and September 1941, the Germans, along with Lithuanian collaborators, destroyed almost all the houses in the city and murdered more than 3,000 people, most of them Jews. Many of the males were shot on 28 July, and the women and children following on the Fast of Gedalia on 24 September.[7] In March 1942, several Polish priests were imprisoned in the local seminary by the Germans, and then eventually deported to other camps in December 1942 (see Nazi persecution of the Catholic Church in Poland).[10]

The city was the scene of a successful counter-attack by the German Panzer-Grenadier-Division Großdeutschland in the autumn of 1944 and the aftermath of the fighting was the scene of several propaganda photographs in which the name of the city was prominently featured.[11] The city was captured by the Red Army in August 1944. After the war, it was part of the Lithuanian SSR within the Soviet Union.[3]

When Lithuania regained its independence in 1991, the city became the capital of the newly established Vilkaviškis district municipality.[12]

In 2020, Vilkaviškis won the Lithuania Village Flower Show, as voted by the board of Pakruojis Manor.[13]

The town and the surrounding district.

• Aharon April (1932–2020), a distinguished Israeli artist and sculptor.
• Jonas Basanavičius (1851–1927), an activist of the Lithuanian National Revival.
• Sonia Gaskell (1904–1974), dancer and choreographer.
• Leon Kamaiky (1864–1928), American newspaper owner and publisher.
• Vincas Kudirka (1858–1899), author of the Lithuanian National Anthem (born in nearby Paežeriai).
• Marian Lalewicz (1876–1944), Polish architect.
• Miriam Markel-Mosessohn (1839–1920), Hebrew writer and translator.
• Galina Shurepova (1939–2017), the first female diver in the Soviet navy, trainer of military dolphins.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Vilkaviškis.

• Short history (in Lithuanian)
• History of the Jewish shtetl in Vilkovishk, Lithuania
• The murder of the Jews of Vilkaviškis during World War II, at Yad Vashem website.

• Галина Александровна Шурепова