Pinkas Hakehillot Lita: Raudondvaris

“Raudondvaris” - Encyclopedia of Jewish
Communities in Lithuania
(Lithuania)
56° 09' / 23° 02'

Translation of the “Raudondvaris” chapter from
Pinkas Hakehillot Lita

Written by Dov Levin

Published in Jerusalem, 1996

Acknowledgments
Project Coordinator
Barry Mann

Our sincere appreciation to Yad Vashem
for permission to put this material on the JewishGen web site.

This is a translation from: Pinkas Hakehillot Lita: Encyclopedia of Jewish Communities, Lithuania,
Editor: Prof. Dov Levin, Assistant Editor: Josef Rosin, published by Yad Vashem, Jerusalem.

This material is made available by JewishGen, Inc. and the Yizkor Book Project for the purpose of
fulfilling our mission of disseminating information about the Holocaust and destroyed Jewish communities.
This material may not be copied, sold or bartered without JewishGen, Inc.'s permission. Rights may be reserved by the copyright holder.

JewishGen, Inc. makes no representations regarding the accuracy of the translation. The reader may wish to refer to the original material for verification.
JewishGen is not responsible for inaccuracies or omissions in the original work and cannot rewrite or edit the text to correct inaccuracies and/or omissions.
Our mission is to produce a translation of the original work and we cannot verify the accuracy of statements or alter facts cited.

(Page 624)

Raudondvaris

In Yiddish, Roiter Hoif (Red Estate)
Written by Dov Levin
Translated by Shimon Joffe

A county town in the Kaunas district, 9 km from Kaunas city. It lies on a hill near the confluence of the Nevezys and the Neman rivers and on the Kaunas-Yurbarkas highway. From the middle of the 19^th century connection with Kaunas was, (except for the winter months), by steamer boats on the Neman river. During the summer months the town served as a vacation place for Kaunas residents.

Raudondvaris had its beginnings in an estate and castle belonging to aristocratic families, the Radziwill, Tishkevich and others. Until the First World war 25 Jews lived there. According to a census conducted by the independent Lithuanian authorities in 1923, it had 382 inhabitants including 55 Jews, (23 men and 32 women). A year later a number of Jewish families were added from the neighboring village Salomenka which was formally joined onto Raudondvaris. The Jews lived off trade and farming. They owned a few workshops, a saw mill and a flour mill. The inn owner (Shimon Kveskin) served also as the local postmaster. The doctor and the pharmacists were Jewish too. In 1939, the town had 25 telephones, four of these in Jewish hands. The Slobodka rabbi served this community as well. A Shokhet (ritual slaughterer) visited the town twice a week. During the High Holy Days and Festivals, Jews from the vicinity came to the town to fill a Minyan for prayers in private houses. The children attended schools in Kaunas.

When the Soviet Union annexed Lithuania in the autumn of 1940, there were still a few Jewish families in the town. After the German invasion of Lithuania in June 1941, the town Jews shared the fate of their compatriots of the vicinity; all were murdered in the autumn of that year.

Yizkor Book Project JewishGen Home Page

Yizkor Book Director, Lance Ackerfeld
Emerita Yizkor Book Project Manager, Joyce Field z”l
This web page created by Jason Hallgarten

Raudondvaris

In Yiddish, Roiter Hoif (Red Estate) Written by Dov Levin Translated by Shimon Joffe

In Yiddish, Roiter Hoif (Red Estate)
Written by Dov Levin
Translated by Shimon Joffe