Earlier arrivals and post-WW2 migrants

When the USAT General Stuart Heintzelman docked at Fremantle in November 1947 with the first transport of displaced Balts to Australia those on board had little or no knowledge of what lay ahead for them. Contacts with earlier arrivals, in particular from their own countries, undoubtedly often helped ease the transition; here are a few glimpses into the experiences of the post WW2 Lithuanian migrants.

Even before the first arrivals had reached Australia some preliminary contacts had been established by mail.  Australijos Lietuviu Metrastis (Sydney, 1961, p16), the Australian Lithuanian community's chronicle, records that the Australian Lithuanian Society - established in Sydney in 1929 - had begun receiving enquiries from displaced people in Europe in 1946: at least 11 in 1946, 31 in 1947, 177 in 1948.  The letters generally sought information on immigration requirements and skills recognition, occasionally contact details for long-lost relatives or friends who had migrated much earlier.

Metrastis also notes that from 1947 the Australian Lithuanian Society made a practice of meeting all Sydney-bound migrants ships with Lithuanians on board.  Elsewhere, initial contacts were left to individuals to arrange.  Kazys Mieldazys ('First steps in Australia', Metrastis, pp24-28) records a  few of these first contacts:

We disembarked at the port of Fremantle in Western Australia, on the 28th November 1947.  Our temporary accommodation was at two army camps as our final destination was Melbourne.  We were visited by some early Lithuanian migrants.  One came from 300 miles away.

On the 2nd of December we left Fremantle on the Kanimbla. .... [At Port Melbourne] we were visited on the ship by Mr Paliokas, originally from the Klaipeda region.  Also we were met by Mr and Mrs Jakovlevas (who had arrived 20 years ago from Kaunas) who later sent some parcels to us at Bonegilla and also let us use their apartment [in Melbourne] for singing and musical rehearsals and helped the Lithuanians in many ways.

.... A large surprise came from the President of the Australian Lithuanian Society, Antanas Bauze.  He had already greeted us by letter at Fremantle.  [At Bonegilla, late December 1947]  he visited us with Mrs Bauze and Mr Kuodis.  A meeting of all the Lithuanians was called, at which Mr Bauze greeted the newcomers, provided some details about life in Australia, and invited all to become members of the Australian Lithuanian Society.  The invitation was warmly embraced and Mr Bauze left with a list of about 400 new members.   

NAA: A12111, 1/1947/3/5. HMAS Kanimbla arrives at Melbourne with the first group of displaced persons (Dec 1947) from where they will join the train bound for Bonegilla Migrant Camp. They had travelled from Europe to Fremantle on the GENERAL HEINTZELMAN and transhipped to the KANIMBLA

NAA: A12111, 1/1947/3/5. HMAS Kanimbla arrives at Melbourne with the first group of displaced persons (Dec 1947) from where they will join the train bound for Bonegilla Migrant Camp. They had travelled from Europe to Fremantle on the GENERAL HEINTZELMAN and transhipped to the KANIMBLA

   

Victoria

The 1933 Australian Census recorded 37 males and 22 females in the state of Victoria who stated that their birthplace was Lithuania. As noted in previous posts and comments, given the changing jurisdictions in that region during and after the First World War, others born there may have recorded their birthplace as Russia, Germany, or Poland.

As with the other states, the early Victorian migrants included a mix of pre-World War One arrivals and those who arrived in the 1920s and 1930s. The earliest arrivals to Victoria were probably Lithuanian Jews (Litvaks) fleeing persecution in czarist Russia in the 1880s.  Some of their stories are well documented elsewhere, for example:

• the PHILLIPS (FIVOVSOVITCH) family from Salantai and Skuodas; see  http://www.judelmanfamily.com/forum_detail.aspx?ID=7; and

• the OBERMAN family from Kedainiai; see http://www.oberman.org.au/lithuania.htm

An economic depression hit Victoria in the 1890s and may have temporarily put a brake on further migration, but in the early twentieth century a steady stream of mainly single men - Litvaks, ethnic Lithuanians, and others born in the region of Lithuania - started arriving and settling in Victoria. Many of them enlisted in the 1st AIF and served at Gallipoli, Egypt or the Western Front during the First World War and have been described in previous posts:

• Samuel BRITAIN from Vilnius (see my post of 7 May 2015);
• Harry COOPER from Kaunas (7 May);
• Joe IPP from Kaunas (14 May);
• Adolph MISHKINIS from Zarasai (30 April);
• Reuben ROSENFIELD from Raseiniai (2 April);
• Emerick SCHIMKOVITCH from Zarasai (21 May); and
• Nathan WATCHMAN from Navarėnai (19 March).

In the 1920s and 1930s a new generation of migrants arrived, for example:

Jonas JAKOVLEVAS, born in Kaunas in 1897.  Naturalisation records at the Australian National Archives state that his father was Russian and Jonas had spent his youth in Russia, serving as a pilot in the Russian airforce in World War One before returning to Lithuania in 1921. He married a Lithuanian girl from Telšiai in 1924 and a son Alex (Aliekseij) was born in 1927. Jonas arrived in Australia alone at the end of 1929 and his wife and son followed 3 years later. By the mid 1930s Jonas was operating his own photographic business 'Ivan Studios' at 190 Bourke Street, Melbourne.

Kazys ZAKAS, born at Lygumai, Šiauliai county, on 8 November 1898.  His Lithuanian passport shows that he was an agricultural worker, single and was issued a visa for Australia by the British consulate in Kaunas in May 1930. He arrived by the Oronsay in June 1930; his naturalisation records state that by the mid 1930s he was operating his own business as a 'knitting manufacturer' in Melbourne. Kazys had married in Australia but died suddenly in Melbourne in 1950.

Metraštis No.1 (1961) records that when the first ship carrying World War Two DPs (Displaced Persons) arrived in Melbourne in 1947 the Lithuanians on board were greeted by two early migrants; Jonas Jakovlevas and a man identified only by his surname, Paliokas, who had been born in Ventė and lived in Australia since 1928 (p.10). That publication also records a story by one of the first DPs (Kazys Mieldažys) that that they were visited on the ship by Paliokas and also by Mr and Mrs Jakovlevas who subsequently sent parcels to some of the Lithuanians when they were at the Bonegilla migrant camp and later allowed them to use their apartment in Melbourne for music and song rehearsals as well as helping the newcomers in many other ways (p 24).

More arrivals from Memel/Klaipeda

Last week's post looked at some examples of people from the Memel/Klaipėda region who arrived in the nineteenth century.  Arrivals into Australia from this region continued into the 20th century, including after the establishment of Lithuanian independence after the First World War and the incorporation of Klaipėda as part of the new state:

Frederich WEDRAT: a family history posted on Ancestry.com shows him as a seaman born in 1890 in Memel, arriving in Sydney on the ship Worms from Emden, Germany, in 1910.  He married in 1921 and died in Chinchilla, Queensland in 1963.

Max LIPSCHUS:  Metraštis No 1 records Maksas LIPŠIUS, born in the Klaipėda region, as having been elected to the audit committee of the Australian Lithuanian Society in 1948.  His notice of intention to seek naturalisation, published in The Sydney Morning Herald of 7 March 1939, states that Max Lipschus was born in Kretinga (about 25km north of the town of Klaipėda), was of Lithuanian nationality, had been living in Australia for 15 years, and was then resident at 373 King Street Newtown (Sydney);

PALIOKAS:  Metraštis No 1 also mentions this man, born in Vente  (about 50km south of the town of Klaipėda), but does not reveal his first name.  He had apparently arrived in Australia in 1928 and was present at the docks in Melbourne when the first shipload of Lithuanian DPs arrived there in 1947;

Bruno GREITSCHUS: his notice of intention to seek naturalisation, published in Brisbane's The Courier Mail of 4 August 1937, states that he was born in Memel, was of Lithuanian nationality, and had been resident in Australia for 12 years.  He was then living at Goolburra Station, Offham siding (western Queesland);

Rahel HANEMAN; his notice of intention to seek naturalisation, published in The Sydney Morning Herald of 10 November 1936 states that he was born in Klaipėda, was of Lithuanian nationality, and had been resident in Australia for 7 years.  His residence at the time was 278 Bondi Road, Bondi (Sydney).