Rescuers of Jews
Naglytė-Vadauskienė Lidija
Lidija NAGLYTĖ-VADAUSKIENĖ
They were friends and looked somewhat alike – both were beautiful, of the same age, and of unusually noble posture: architect Joramas Peras' wife, Golda, and the tutor of their sons, Lidija Naglytė. In summer, the Perai liked to stay with Lidija in Plunge or at her home in the Telšiai region. When the war started and the Jews of Kaunas were driven to the ghetto, Lidija tried to help her friend's family. “During the war she helped us, she was our main contact,” G. Perienė wrote later. It was Lidija who took Golda's youngest son, Amosas, from the ghetto. It was she who found a place for Golda's husband and elder son with her brother-in-law, Tekorius. As much as she loved Golda and her children, she could not keep them in her own flat where she lived with a German woman and shared the same kitchen. Besides, she was very anxious herself – her husband Vadauskas left home once and never came back.
After the war Lidija worked as a nurse in the surgery department of the Kaunas clinical hospital. She lived alone, took care of the Tekoriai children, visited the Perai who resided in Totorių Street. Both friends would go for a walk in the park – very few people knew that it used to be a cemetery. They would not talk about it, both slim and still beautiful...
From Hands Bringing Life and Bread, Volume 2,
The Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum. Vilnius, 1999
They were friends and looked somewhat alike – both were beautiful, of the same age, and of unusually noble posture: architect Joramas Peras' wife, Golda, and the tutor of their sons, Lidija Naglytė. In summer, the Perai liked to stay with Lidija in Plunge or at her home in the Telšiai region. When the war started and the Jews of Kaunas were driven to the ghetto, Lidija tried to help her friend's family. “During the war she helped us, she was our main contact,” G. Perienė wrote later. It was Lidija who took Golda's youngest son, Amosas, from the ghetto. It was she who found a place for Golda's husband and elder son with her brother-in-law, Tekorius. As much as she loved Golda and her children, she could not keep them in her own flat where she lived with a German woman and shared the same kitchen. Besides, she was very anxious herself – her husband Vadauskas left home once and never came back.
After the war Lidija worked as a nurse in the surgery department of the Kaunas clinical hospital. She lived alone, took care of the Tekoriai children, visited the Perai who resided in Totorių Street. Both friends would go for a walk in the park – very few people knew that it used to be a cemetery. They would not talk about it, both slim and still beautiful...
From Hands Bringing Life and Bread, Volume 2,
The Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum. Vilnius, 1999