Kisielius Photos

I received a letter from Ronnie the other day with copies of some really great photos! Of them, this one really caught my attention.

Scottish Miners

One of them could quite possibly be my great-grandfather Kazimiras. I'm not certain how old the photo is, or if it is old enough to be from when Kazimiras was still in Scotland (pre-1917), but Ronnie didn't think it was her grandfather Jonas because he was a steelworker, not a miner. I see a resemblance to the guy all the way to the left, but it might just be wishful thinking. I will need to ask Chute when I'm back there next week. Hopefully she will be able to identify him. He was her father so she would know his face, of course, but her vision isn't the best, so I'm not certain she'll be able to see the detail.

Some of the other photos are very interesting too:

Jonas and Magde
(Ronnie's grandparents, Kazimiras' aunt and uncle)

This is the "Mrs Valaitis" that Chute has spoken of
before, with Ronnie's mother Ona.

The other thing Ronnie sent was a photocopy of her grandfather Jonas's Russian army passbook. It has some English translations, but I will need to get some help translating the rest. It is from a time before WWI, not from when the Lithuanians in Scotland were deported under the Anglo-Russian Military Convention. Jonas would have been old enough to be exempt by then.

Jonas's name in Russian was apparently "Ivan Peter Kisiel"
He enlisted in 1889 and served until 1904.

This page shows that he had checked in at the Imperial Russian Consulate
in Glasgow in June 1916. I wonder if this is a sign of the preparations being
made for the Anglo-Russian Military Convention that went into force the
next year.

I found the passbook particularly interesting because, had my great-grandfather had such documentation when he was deported, it would have been his ticket back to Scotland after the War.* After the Lithuanian immigrants were sent from Scotland to Russia, they weren't allowed to come back if they couldn't "prove loyalty". Some had been involved with the Red Army at the start of the Bolshevik Revolution. If they couldn't produce a White Army passbook, they were suspect.

Digital copies of the photos and passbook are here:

• https://www.dropbox.com/s/5h7ehrdtexjbfjr/from_ronnie_1.pdf?dl=1
• https://www.dropbox.com/s/jdhjlvuu3ffcqq4/from_ronnie_2.pdf?dl=1

* I should note that I don't yet have confirmation that Kazimiras was, in fact, deported under the 1917 Convention. But I am confident that he was.

Kisielius Connection

Things are really starting to come together with the Kisielius branch. Helen Peat, who I spoke to Wednesday, passed my letter along to her cousin Veronica (or "Ronnie"), who then emailed me. She is another second-cousin, twice-removed to me. And she also seems very interested to hear about the connection between us - a real delight. I didn't have her on the tree that I sent along to Helen because, it seems, her mother Ona (another child of Jonas and Magda) was born outside of Scotland. So I wouldn't have found a birth record.

Tree I sent to Helen. Ona was a sibling of John, Margaret, and Stanley.
Ronnie is the daughter of Ona.

According to Ronnie, her mother Ona was born in St. Petersburg. I know that Jonas and Magda were married in "Russia" in 1901, but I had been assuming that it was really Lithuania since Lithuania was part of the Russian Empire at the time. These are important pieces of information to get in order to track down where everybody has been. Ronnie also says she has Jonas's army passbook. I'm assuming that's why they were in Russia. It doesn't seem that it would have been from 1917 when Kazimiras would have been sent to Russia from Scotland, but I don't know yet. I'll be really interested to see more about that.

Ronnie mentioned that she only recently (7 or 8 years ago) moved back to Scotland from California, so she was asking about where we were based in the US. I explained the whole story that the family fled from Lithuania in 1944 (or 1945?) and stayed in a displaced persons camp in Germany until 1948, then went to New Hampshire, then Connecticut, and finally to the farm in East Schodack. And that's when it all started to come together.

Ronnie recalls that when she was about 8-12 years old they had visitors that came from "Belsen", who they called aunt and uncle. Presumably "Belsen" is the Bergen-Belson displaced persons camp. I don't really know much about it, but I'm going to look into it. Ronnie says, though, that they were called Sophie and Charlie. That's Zose and Kazimiras!! My great-grandparents! I knew already that they had passed through the UK on the way to the US because I found a transit record.

Transit record of my great-grandparents to USA.

I always wondered why they didn't go back to Glasgow at that time, but it appears that they did, at least briefly. Perhaps they continued to the US because there seemed to be greater opportunity. The postwar era in most of Europe was really challenging. It's interesting to hear that they might be been in Belsen because I thought, from Chute, they had been in a camp near Munich. Maybe they were in different places. I will need to get more information from Chute next month.

Ronnie also explained that her mother kept up correspondence, and she even still had the addresses, leaving little doubt about the connection! They were:

Mrs Jessie Kisielius
105 South Willow St
Manchester NH

and

Mrs M Musulis  (Jessie's daughter)
101 Pleasant St
New Britain - Conn.

"Jessie", I know, is another name that was used by Sophie/Zose (see also here). And I know that there were other family connections South Willow Street in Manchester. "Mrs M Musulis" is, no doubt, Marija Matulis, Chute, my grandmother! The connection from me to Ronnie, Helen, and the other Cassells is closer than I thought. A "second-cousin, twice removed" is pretty distant, but to learn that my grandmother's address was in their address book somehow makes it feel much closer.

Encouraged by this, I asked Ronnie if she knew Helen Tracy, who is a descendant of Marijona Kisielius (Kisieliute/Valaitiene), the sister of Kazimiras. I've tried several times to make contact, but have been unsuccessful. Sure enough, Ronnie knew her!! She even referred to her as "cousin" (technically they were second cousins). Everything is finally coming full circle. "Helen Tracy [and] Louis" were the first people that Chute told me to look for when I was leaving for Scotland.

This is all that Chute gave me to go on.

It's taken three years, and I've already uncovered more than I ever expected that I would, but it seems that I'm finally getting close to having the full story.

A Phone Call

On Monday I sent a letter to one of the descendants of Jonas and Magda, Helen, a "second-cousin, twice-removed", explaining the connection between us. She called me back this morning. I was really pleased to find that she seemed quite interested in the family history! And it sounds as though she knows a good bit more information. She remembers Magda, and she said her father even spoke Lithuanian. She also said she has Jonas's identity card from his time in the White Army. I'll be really interested to know more about that, since it could be relevant to why his branch of family was able to remain in Scotland. I believe my great-grandfather Kazimiras was denied re-entry to Scotland after being sent away to the north of Russia during WWI (those that couldn't "prove loyalty" using such documents weren't allowed back in). It is, I believe, the reason my branch of the family left Scotland and re-settled in Lithuania.

Helen is getting in contact with some of her relatives that, she thinks, know more. Hopefully I'll fill in even more of the story.

Anna Sviatek / Matuolis

I got confirmation today that Anna Sviatek is my grandfather's aunt. I found her marriage certificate from 1912 in New Hampshire. Her maiden name is listed as "Matuolis" (which I know, from relatives in Lithuania, is a misspelling of our name that even one of my grandfather's brothers had). She, of course, wouldn't have been Matuolis or Matulis (the male version of the name), but rather Matuolyte or Matulyte (the female version).

Marriage of Jozef Sviatek and Anna Matuolis, 1912

Also listed on the marriage certificate are her parents, my 2x-great-grandparents. I already knew from Juozas that my 2x-great-grandfather was Mykolas (or "Mikulas" as it is misspelled on the certificate), but I didn't know my 2x-great-grandmother was Katrina "Milasziawicziuke". I can't image that's spelled correctly. The certificate, of course, says that they are from "Russia", as Lithuania was, at that time, under the rule of the Tsar.

I was actually quite surprised to find their marriage certificate in the US. I would have thought they'd have married in Lithuania and then come over together. It would have been unusual in those days for a woman to travel over by herself. The certificate gives her address as 339 Chestnut Street in 1912, and I know from the 1920 census that she arrived in the US in 1909. I'll need to check the 1910 census to see who she was living with when she arrived.


UPDATE:  I checked the 1910 census for 339 Chestnut, and Anna wasn't there. It appears to have been some kind of boarding house for Lithuanian immigrants though. Anna must have moved in later. Joseph lived just around the corner, at 143 Manchester Street, according to their marriage record. I'll need to search the census records by name to figure out where she actually was in 1910, but for that I'll have to go back the Genealogy Centre because I don't have subscription to ancestry.com so I can't do index searches.

339 Chestnut Street, Manchester, NH

Et Cetera

There are a few last remaining things that I made notes of while in Lithuania. I'll just list them here with comments without any real organization. First, Juozas Matulis gave me the following notes. I'm not entirely clear about everything he was saying because everything was being translated, but I'm pretty sure he was telling me that Konstantinas Kemešis and Ona (Kemešite?) were both originally from Žemaitiškių. His note suggests that this is a neighborhood in Panevežys or a town in Panevėžio county, but I can't find it on google maps. The only thing that comes up is Žemaitiškės in the Dzūkija region (southeast of Vilnius), and I'm pretty sure that's not right. It might be that Žemaitiškių was a small village that no longer exists. That was the fate, Raimundas explained, of the other town that Juozas identified, Kurgulai.

Notes made by Juozas Matulis
(the question mark could be because he wasn't certain which county
Kurgulai was in, it is right near the boundary between two)

Kurgulai, Juozas said, is where his grandfather (my 2x-great-grandfather), Mykolas Matulis was born. Raimundas explained that Kurgulai is also where Tevuk was born, but that the house and village don't exist anymore. It was replaced by Mitriunai, where the Soviets built the collective farm. Mitriunai is where the Matulis family was moved to when Kurgulai was demolished. Indeed, Valiukas (Tevuk's brother) still lives there. Raimundas believes all of the records for people that were living in Kurgulai should be in the Počiuneliai book, since that was the closest church. But he said Krekenava is also not far and there could be records there too (particularly marriage records since it is a bigger church).

When I met Valiukas, he was saying that Ona Matuliene/Kemešite, his mother, had 6 sisters. I know one of them was Peturnelia Žukauskiene/Kemešite from Phyllis in New Hampshire. Another, I think, was Veronika ?iene/Kemešite because of what I gathered from photos that were in Phyllis's possession. The others I know nothing about. Some or all of the sisters were actually half-sisters, though, because Konstantinas Kemešis was married three times.

Regina Matulyte, daughter of Vincas, told me that Veronika Kemešite was married to somebody with the name Romeika, which would have made her Veronika Romeikiene. He might have been Latvian because the inscriptions on the back of the photos from Phyllis say they were living in Riga. Regina drew the following tree.

From Regina Matulyte

Another thing I was told by several people was that one of the Matulis brothers (Adolis, I believe) actually spells his name Matuolis. Nobody seemed to know why, exactly, but they all emphasized that he is blood related. Perhaps it was simply because literacy wasn't always what it is today. It could have just been a mistake that ended up sticking. Or maybe it got recorded that way on an official document somewhere along the way and just propagated through. Who knows.

Finally, when I visited the Museum of Genocide, I brought a copy of the photo that Chute has of her brother, and asked if they could help me find information. They explained that they will conduct research on a person, but they need proof of identity. For me that would require documents from me, my dad, Chute, and her brother. But if Chute makes the request directly, there is far less that needs to be submitted. She only needs to write a letter requesting the information and include a copy of her passport, her marriage certificate showing her maiden name, and a birth certificate. Since her birth certificate doesn't exist (as I've mentioned, the Vilkaviškis are incomplete) they said it should be okay without it. The letter she sends them, though, must be notarized - they're taking privacy really seriously. All of it should be sent to:

Lietuvos Ypatingasis Archyvas
LT-01110 Vilnius, Gedeminio prospektas 40/1
Lietuva

Sviatikis

As I already mentioned, when I was in Lithuania I got some help from Raimundas translating the inscriptions on the photos I received from Phyllis. I sent those translations back to Phyllis, along with copies of some photos that were in Juozas's album. Those photos were clearly from the United States because of the cars pictured in them (no such cars were available in the Soviet Union), but Juozas wasn't certain who they were of. My hope was that Phyllis would be able to identify them. I suspected that they had come from her grandmother (Peturnelia Žukauskiene/Kemešite), since her grandmother had received copies of some of the photos that were also in Juozas's album. It must have been the case because she was able to identify most of them as the Žukauskas family.

left to right: Albert Rock (husband of Aniceta Žukauskaite),
Sylvester Žukauskas, and Andrew Žukauskas

left to right:  Andrew Žukauskas, Peturnelia
Žukauskiene/Kemešite, and Sylvester Žukauskas

left to right:  Eva Rock, Aniceta Rock/Žukauskaite,
and Peturnelia Žukauskiene/Kemešite

left to right:  Andrew Žukauskas, Peturnelia
Žukauskiene/Kemešite, and Sylvester Žukauskas

But one of the photos, Phyllis thought, was of Annie "Sviatek". I immediately thought of what Tevuk told me, way back:  his father had two sisters, one of which married somebody by the name of Sviatikis. Annie "Sviatek" may well be his aunt! I had no idea that they gone to the US.

Annie "Sviatek" (Sviatikiene/Matulyte?)
(sister of Silvestras Matulis?)

Phyllis also mentioned that the "Sviatek" family had lived on South Willow Street in Manchester, NH. I had a look in the census records, and sure enough they were there. It shows that Joseph and Anna "Sviatek" were born in Lithuania! He must actually be Joseph (or more likely, Juozas) Sviatikis, and she must be Anna Sviatikiene/Matulyte. That's the first I've seen the problem of having different endings on names solved by dropping them all.

US Census, 1940

Now I'll just need to trace backwards in the US records to see approximately when they arrived, and then have a look in the Lithuanian records to confirm the connection. Hopefully they'll turn up in the Pociuneliai book.

Mykolas Kisielius

Last April I wrote about some information I received about my Kisielius family from a contact in Lithuania. He had sent me a transcription of a death record after I had located an entry for Mykolas Kisielius, my 2x-great-grandfather, in a set of photos he had posted online. The information he sent me was just a transcription of the record, not an image of the record itself. Since I always like to see the record myself before being sure about anything, I planned to have a look during my visit to the Lithuanian archive. And so I did.

Mykolas Kisielius, death 26 Feb 1938
(full page view)

All of the information he gave me checks out, including the fact that Mykolas (supposedly) had two sons named Jonas! I actually still suspect that this is a clerical error (and one of the sons was actually called Juozas) but the mistake must have been made by the person creating the original record, not my contact who passed the information along to me. Of course, there is also a chance that they are both called Jonas but only one of them is a son (the other being, perhaps, a nephew).  There is, after all, a 12 year gap between the second Jonas and the next youngest child.

Now that I have this record, I am able to confirm the names of my 3x-great-grandparents: "Petras and Ona Mikulyte Kisieliai" - that is, Petras Kisielius (note that Kisieliai is the plural form of Kisielius) and Ona Mikulyte. This means that the theory I laid out here might actually be true, "John Kiselius" who died in Bellshill Scotland might have been a relative. It all depends on whether or not you're convinced that "Piotras Kiselius" is actually Petras Kisielius and "Ona Mikoliute" is actually Ona Mikulyte (see record here). It's a fairly safe bet.

If it is true, it means that the things I wrote here and here are also true, and more descendants of my Kisielius family are here in Scotland, in fact right here in Edinburgh!

I'd like to find more evidence to support this theory (e.g. a Lithuanian record showing that Petras and Ona did, indeed, have a son called "John" born in 1867), but the trouble is only a very limited number of records for Vilkaviškis survive. Almost nothing is from before 1922.

I do know that "John" married his wife Magde Pausziute in November 1901 in "Russia" (Lithuania was under Imperial Russia at the time), and a marriage record would list his parents, but again the Vilkaviškis records are limited. There's a small chance that the 1911 Scotland census would show where they are from (though it usually isn't more specific than "Russia"). Transit records sometimes list next-of-kin, either in the destination or the origin, so I could search both for their transit or those of Kazimiras Kisielius or Marijona Kisieliute (though these records are partial, at best). My best hope might be a Lithuanian death record for either Piotras or Ona, but the odds that either died after 1922 are slim.

The search continues.


UPDATE (25 Sept 2013): I had another thought. If I could match addresses across records and show that "John" lived with people I know to be my relatives, there's a good chance that he is family. I haven't found an exact match yet, but I did find that "John" lived right nearby my great-grandfather's sister, Marijona. He lived at 3 Pitt Street in Mossend in 1913, and she lived at 8 Pitt Street in 1915 (note that "Kisieliute" is her maiden name and the -te ending is just how maiden names are signified in Lithuanian). And in 1921, "John" is still living in the same place. In fact, I've even got a record that shows he was there in 1915 as well. It's hard to imagine they didn't know each other. And it's also hard to imagine that two people with the Kisielius name ended up just a couple doors from each other just by chance. I know from my great-aunt Kitty Kisieliute that Marijona was brought to Scotland with the help of other Kisielius relatives that were already there. Might that include "John"? I'm becoming more and more convinced.

She Borns There

When my grandmother first told me that the Kisielius and Raulinitis branches of our family had been in Scotland, I was really surprised. I had never heard that until a few days before I was about to move there. Somewhat taken aback, and uncertain I was understanding her less-than-perfect English, I turned to my uncle and he explained that my great-grandmother had spoken with a Scottish accent until the day she died. To which my grandmother added, "yeah, she borns there".

When I arrived in Scotland, I dug into the records at the family history archive and, sure enough, they had been here. In fact, as I've explained extensively elsewhere on this blog, many of them remained and still live here today. The only thing I wasn't able to confirm, though, was that my great-grandmother was actually "borns" here. There was no record of her birth in the Scottish archive. Her marriage to my great-grandfather was here, and she appears on the 1911 census, but there was nothing else. Contradicting what my grandmother believed, the census showed that she was born in "Russia" (Lithuania was, at the time, occupied by Imperial Russia).

1911 Census
Note that "Raulinitis" had already been changed to "Rolwich".

It appeared that she may have just immigrated at a young age. Perhaps she wasn't even aware that she hadn't actually been born in Scotland. When I was in Lithuania, I decided I'd have a look and see if I could find something. The records there are not indexed, so without knowing some fairly specific information, the odds of finding anything are very very slim. What I did know was that her parents, my 2x-great-grandparents, Motiejus and Eva had been married in "Wilna, Russia", modern day Vilnius, in 1900.

Scottish Birth Record of Annie Raulinitis
(my great-grandmother's younger sister)

I began by searching their marriage. I had to get some help for this since the records from that period were, of course, kept in Russian. No luck. I didn't know which church it was, and Vilnius is not a small place. We looked through all the records twice. The person helping me suggested that they probably weren't from Vilnius because of their names (they are more southern Lithuanian names) and it was possible the marriage was actually elsewhere. Since the Vilnius birth records were on the same microfilm roll, however, we decided to have a quick look through. Incredibly, we found her!!

Birth of Sofija Raulinitis, 17 Aug 1901
(microfilm 604-20-289, pg333v-334z, no 757)

It's all in Russian and I can't read of word of it. But the person helping me translated the following. She was baptized in the Church of All Saints, and born to Motiejus Raulinaitis and "Jeva" (Eva) Gureviciute on 17 August 1901 on Naugarduko Street.

As it turn out, she wasn't borns in Scotland afterall. She borns in Lithuania! She did, however, grow up in Glasgow, and lived there until about 20 years of age, when she returned to the village where my grandmother was born, Vilkaviškis.

The Church of All Saints is on Rudininku Street in Vilnius. We went there to have a look. It's your typical Lithuanian church. I had a look around for the baptismal font, but there wasn't one to be found.

Church of All Saints, Vilnius

Rudninku Gatve

Visu Šventuju Bažnyčia

Church of All Saints

Church of All Saints

Lithuanian State Historical Archive

The first few days I was in Lithuania, I went into the State Historical Archive. It was less fruitful than I had hoped, but I did get some important information. Mostly, I just figured out how the place worked. Next time I go I'll be much better prepared, including having some basic knowledge of Russian (e.g. an understanding of the Cyrillic alphabet). Many of the documents I need are written in Russian.

Sadly, there are almost no surviving records for Vilkaviškis**, so I'll be hard pressed to find out much more about the Kisielius lineage. On the upside, there appears to be quite a lot of documents for Počiuneliai (the church closest to my grandfather's childhood farm near Mitriunai), so I should be able to get a fair bit about the Matulis and Kemešis groups. I didn't look into Krekenava yet because I wasn't aware that the families sometimes went to this larger church.

The information that I did get at the archive will have to be posted later because I don't have the time right now. But below are the lists of records that exist for Počiuneliai. I'll need to come back to these later when I'm planning what to look at on my next visit.

Počiuneliai
Births 1865-1915
Marriages 1909-1915
Deaths 1800-1801; 1865-1915

Počiuneliai
Births, Marriages, and Deaths 1916-1923

Počiuneliai
Births, Marriages, Deaths 1924-1939

Records have to be order the day before you wish to look at them. And I believe 10 books can be requested at once. There is a small form that must be filled in there to request the books, but they may also be request by emailing either of the address on the card below.

** the archive does have the following Vilkaviškis records:

• deaths 1922-1938
• marriages 1922-1938
• births 1810-1812; 1922-1938

** some of the index pages are listed here: https://www.facebook.com/pajevonys.wizajny/photos_albums.

Vacys in Lietuva

I've been "friending" distant Matulis relatives on Facebook since my visit over there. Yesterday Sandra, a second cousin, sent me this photo. It is from 1992 when my grandfather visited there.

Tevuk (center) with nephew, also called Vacys, and his
family. The girls are Laura (left) and Sandra (right). Their
brother Benas wasn't born yet. I'm not sure of their
mother's name.

Reunion

I've just returned from Lithuania, and it was an incredible trip. My Matulis relatives made a real fuss over me. I'm the first to make a trip over there other than my grandfather, and I got lots of questions along the lines of "why didn't you come sooner?!". I didn't have a good answer. Mainly it was because it always seemed too important to just make a quick trip and because I always imagined going with my cousins. I'm so glad I finally went though. Everybody was so incredibly welcoming. They gave me places to stay, took me around to see the sights, and drove me to the villages where my grandparents are from (as it turns out Tevuk is not from Pasvalys, but rather the countryside near Mitriuniai).

There's really far too much to write about the trip itself, and I couldn't possibly do justice to it in a description here. Instead, I'll stick mainly to things concerning genealogy. The Matulis family is HUGE. I mentioned previously that I wasn't certain the information my grandfather gave me was accurate. He had a foggy memory at the time and the way he relayed it to me was quite uncertain. I know now he was 100% correct, confirmed by living relatives in Lithuania. He had 5 brothers and a sister. Most of them had families, so that means there are just loads of Matuliai (that's the plural of Matulis) over in the father country.

Matulis family, circa 1940ish. Silvestras and Ona.
Children in order of age: Brone, Vacys, Petras, Vincas,
Adolis, Juozas, Valiukas

Mainly I stayed with Raimundas & Reda and Arunas & Loreta. I also relied on Elena for some much needed translation. Arunas and Raimundas are cousins of my father, and Elena is my second cousin.

Arunas & Loreta on the roof of the Prisikėlimo Bažnyčia church in Kaunas.

Eating blynai prepared by Loreta

Raimundas was very helpful in translating the inscriptions on the photos I received from Phyllis. There's some important information in them that I still haven't had time to fully investigate. Many of them are of the Kemešis family, especially photos sent from Veronika Kemešite to her sister (or half-sister) Peturnelia Kemešite / Žukauskiene in the United States, the grandmother of Phyllis. I'm eager to piece together that branch of the family. All the photos with translations are available here.

While visiting Juozas Matulis, a brother of my grandfather, in Pasvalys we looked through some more old photos. It was incredible to be able to recognize people from the photos I'd already seen (the ones from Phyllis mainly). They were impressed with how I recognized people I'd never actually met. I was also quite amused to find photos of myself in their albums!

Looking at photos - me, Juozas, Elena, Vygintas, Povilas, Loreta, Arunas.

Me and Lacy in their photo album.

Elena, Vygintas, Danute, Loreta, Juozas, Arunas, Jessee, me, Povilas, Ada.

Danute, me, Juozas

Ada, me (wearing Povilas' Soviet police uniform), Povilas

On the way to Pasvalys, Arunas showed me Počiuneliai, where the family church is located, and Mitriuniai which is the Soviet-era village that replaced the community where my grandfather was born (when the farms were collectivized, the residents were required to move to the new village there. In fact, my grandfather's brother Valiukas still lives there). This is important information for my genealogy research because the family records will be found mostly in the Počiuneliai books at the State Historical Archive in Vilnius. Some will also likely be found in the books for Krekenava, where there is a somewhat larger church that was just a couple kilometers more distant than the one in Počiuneliai.

Marriage of Ona and Silvestras, recorded at Krekenava.
It appears to say Ona Remešyte, but it's actually
Kemešyte. It's also the first I've seen of my 2x-great-
grandfather, Mykolas Matulis.

We stopped in Počiuneliai at the church, an old wooden building painted bright yellow, and visited the grave of my great-grandparents Ona and Silvestras. It was something to see the grave of my namesake. I was later shown a photo of my grandfather standing in the same place during his visit in 1992. Immediately behind their grave is an unmarked grave that is said to be that of my 2x-great-grandparents. Inside the church there was a mass in progress ("mass" being used generously as it consisted of about 10 or 12 people), but we stood briefly and had a look. Arunas explained that when my grandfather visited in 1992 he wasn't happy with the condition of the seats and made a donation to have the pews built. I believe they were actually made by someone in the Matulis family.

The church in Počiuneliai.

At the grave.

Tevuk in the same place in 1992.

2x-great-grandparents? Mykolas Matulis or
Konstantinas Kemešys?

Inside the church.

Along the way from my grandfather's old church to Mitriuniai we passed field after field. It is really farming country. I imagined my grandfather walking these same areas and even working in the fields. The potato harvest was actually taking place as we passed through and, it was explained to me, that it's still happening the way it did when my grandfather lived there. It's a family affair, apparently, and they all go out at once to dig the potatoes. One family was even still using a horse-drawn wagon!!

Family potato harvest.

There's a lot of history on this land.

Mitriuniai is just a few kilometers from Počiuneliai. It's not precisely where my grandfather is from, but the house where he was born no longer exists. Raimundas explained that when the Soviets collectivized the farms there they showed up and gave notice to the residents that they were building a home for them and that they should be ready to move in a year. This was after Tevuk had already left Lithuania. I expected that this was very traumatic for the rest of the family that remained, but Raimundas explained that it was more complicated than that. The new home was a solid and modern structure and, most of all, it had electricity and plumbing. Life on the collective farm, however, wasn't as easy as that might suggest. Valiukas, the youngest of the Matulis brothers who remained on the farm, is quite ill and frail from a tough life. His older brothers, Juozas and Adolis, who didn't work on farms, are doing considerably better.

Soviet village near where Tevuk was born.

Tevuk's youngest brother, Valiukas, looks just like him!

Aldona and Arunas

Laimas and his mother, Aldona

Soviet housing in Mitriunai

There's loads more to write about, but I'm going to have to do it in stages.