rescuers of jews

Birutė FEDARAVIČIENĖ Petras FEDARAVIČIUS Petras Fedaravičius’ acquaintance and friendly relations with the family of the doctor Ovsejus and Gita Portnovas began in prewar Kaunas. The Portnovas lived with their younger daughter Dina; the elder Roza had got married before the war and had moved to London. At the start of the war, Dina Portnovaitė fled from Kaunas with the retreating Soviet army, without even being able to inform her parents in the confusion. Ovsejus Portnovas and his wife soon found themselves in the Kaunas Ghetto; the doctor died of cancer there in the first autumn of the war. On 28 October 1941, in the so-called Great Action, people were “sorted” to the right or to the left in Democrat Square in the ghetto. Gita Portnovienė found herself on the right, and that meant being put to death by shooting. Thousands of the condemned were driven to the Ninth Fort. People cried, wailed and pleaded for mercy. In the commotion before the killing, Portnovienė managed to run away and reach the Fedaravičius’ home in Petrašiūnai in Kaunas. With no thoughts of themselves, Birutė and Petras Fedaravičius let in and sheltered the hungry and exhausted woman. Later, the Germans brought Ukrainians from occupied Kiev to work in the Petrašiūnai paper factory. Seizing the opportunity, the Fedaravičius decided to obtain false documents for Portnovienė. With the help of a Kaunas inhabitant called Nekrošius, Fedaravičius got the documents in the name of Nina Solovyova. However, before long somebody reported that the Fedaravičius were hiding a Jewess. Trustworthy people informed the Fedaravičius about the report, and advised them to hide Portnovienė in a safer place as soon as possible. At first, shelter was found in the nearby Capuchin monastery; later, Gita was settled in a summer cottage, where she had to look after Ukrainian workers’ children and to do the cooking. However, a rumour went round among the children that their carer was Jewish, and a new place had to be found. At the request of the Fedaravičius, Gita was again hidden temporarily in the Capuchin monastery. A safer and secluded place had to be found. The Fedaravičius asked their acquaintance Julija Biliūnienė- Matijošaitienė and her daughter Meilė Lukšienė to hide Gita in their out-of-the-way farm in the village of Paapsuonis near Kruonis. The Jewish woman was taken secretly to the new place and passed off as a housekeeper and nanny. Petras Fedaravičius often visited the farm. At last, in the summer of 1944, the front line moved on westwards and the German army retreated once and for all. Without delay, Gita Portnovienė went to Vilnius. There, to her great surprise, she unexpectedly met her daughter Dina, safe and sound after returning to Lithuania from Leningrad, where she had survived the blockade of the city. In rescuing Gita Portnovienė, the Fedaravičius had succeeded in finding solutions in the most hazardous of situations. As Birutė Fedaravičienė says: “We did not even think that we could act against our conscience.” On Petras Fedaravičius’ death, Dina Portnovaitė sent a telegram of condolence to her mother’s rescuer, Birutė Fedaravičienė. Gita Portnovienė could not offer her condolences: she had died in Vilnius in 1953.

From Hands Bringing Life and Bread, Volume 3,
The Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum. Vilnius, 2005