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The partisan who sacrificed his life for the freedom of Lithuania will forever lie in the cemetery of the Cathedral of Christ the King of Panevėžys with the family members. It is symbolic that his remains are buried on August 16, the day before the 58th anniversary of the tragic death of J. Strike-Stumbras.
Born in the village of Pailgė, then Zarasai County, J. Streikus-Stumbras resisted the Soviets since 1941. Together with his father, a participant in the struggle for independence, Knight of the Vytis Cross, Antanas Streikus, participated in the June 1941 uprising. On June 24 of that year, together with other participants in the uprising, he liberated the city of Antazave from Soviet rule. From 1942 he was an active member of the Lithuanian Freedom Army and from 1944 he became a supporter of the Žalgiris platoon founded and led by his father.
About a year after his father’s death, J. Streikus became the deputy commander of the Vytiis company of the Vyties district, and in 1947 the commander of this company, and in 1949, the commander of the Džiugas homeland of the Lyti team. He worked with his colleagues in the current districts of Rokiškis and Zarasai, on the territory of Latvia.
According to the Lithuanian Center for Studies on Genocide and Resistance, large sums of money were offered to capture J. Strike. During his manhunt in 1950, up to two agents infiltrated the company, but their identities were revealed.
I couldn’t grab
Dr. Chief Historian of the Lithuanian Center for Studies on Genocide and Resistance dr. According to Darius Juodis, J. Strike did not hold high positions in the general resistance movement, he did not reach the level of leader of the national team. However, this partisan is often called legendary. In addition to guerrilla activity, it is very important that J. Strike, according to dr. D. Juodis is one of the longest surviving unarrested Lithuanian partisans.
After he became a partisan in 1944, it was legalized only in 1958. In other words, he was a partisan for 14 years and the Soviets couldn’t arrest him until he showed up. According to the historian, especially after the 1950s, huge forces were launched to catch J. Strike.
After guaranteeing the inviolability of the partisans by the president of the Soviet Lithuanian KGB Kazimieras Liaudis, on July 22, 1958, together with his younger brother Isidor Streikum-Girėnas, J. Streikus legalized.
However, the Strike brothers, like other partisans, were misled by the Soviet authorities. October 6 KGB arrested and sentenced: Izidorius Strikes-Girėnas – 15 years. camp, Joseph Strikes-Bison – the death penalty. The partisan was shot in 1962. August 17 in Vilnius.
Today, after regaining independence, J. Strikes is also famous for his court speech, which is believed to have been published ornately. However, the guerrilla speeches were really strong and inspiring.
Joseph Strike-Bison (right)
© LGGRTC
A family of fighters
The painful fate of the entire Strike family. Father Antanas Streikus-Tamošiukas is a volunteer soldier who received the Vytis Cross for fighting the Bolsheviks and Poles. He was wounded in the fight for independence. In 1944 he founded the Žalgiris partisan platoon, later he became the commander of the Vytautas district Lokis team. As far as is known, he died in the border forests between Lithuania and Latvia in late September 1945 in a battle with the NKVD army: he covered the retreating partisans with a machine gun and exploded when the ammunition ran out.
Mother Marcelė Streikienė supported the partisans, was convicted in November 1944 and transferred to Komi. J. Strike’s brother, Peter, was arrested along with his mother, convicted, and taken to a camp, where he died. Sister Ona Streikutė-Rūta was a supporter arrested in 1949. In Rokiškis Prison, the girl was brutally interrogated and fell ill. The body did not withstand the terrible torture: the partisan died in Rokiškis hospital only a couple of weeks later. Only J. Streikus’s brother, Izidorius Streikus-Girėnas, the commander of Team Bear’s Birut squad, sentenced to 15 years in the field, and his sister Valerija Streikutė-Piemenaitė, a legalized supporter in 1956, survived.
“The whole family was involved in the resistance. Studying the resistance of the partisans, the ties of the families are very visible ”, historian dr. D. Black.
Go back to mom
The funeral of J. Strike-Stumbras in Panevėžys was the wish of the relatives. Vilija Čereškienė, the daughter of Isidore Strike, who lives here, says that her mother saw her husband’s brother only a couple of times, during the wedding and then visited him once. At that time, the Soviets tried to track each step of both brothers.
“Uncle Juozas was handsome, he could learn to speak, he had many girls, he was a charming man, but he did not form a family. They told him that the “tail” was there. Perhaps he himself felt that something was wrong. And dad created a family, ”says V. Čereškienė.
According to her, Uncle J. Strike had completed a few classes, but looking at the footage, it was obvious that he had calculated it. It was a strong will, a strong personality. Out of his love for Lithuania, he appeared before the Soviet court at the last meeting and asked him to release his brother Isidore, saying that he had started a family and that he would not take up arms.
V. Čereškienė has heard the story that a high-ranking soldier said in court: “I graduated from military school, but I would only believe this man as a non-commissioned officer.” In this way he praised the courage and dedication of partisan J. Strike-Stumbras.
The family did not know where J. Strike, who had been convicted in the shooting, was buried. Relatives still do not know where the remains of their grandfather Antanas Streikas are. According to V. Čereškienė, people only say that his grandfather blew up a grenade. Others said it blew it up.
After many decades of uncertainty, J. Streikus-Stumbras will be buried in Panevėžys, in the Ramygalos street cemetery, where his mother Marcelė, his brother Isidorius and his sister Valerija will rest.
“The third son returns to his mother. We really wanted the uncle to return to the family after being in a shelter for so many years. It is on the remains of our mother that we will be buried,” says V. Čereškienė.
© LGGRTC
Accompanied by bullying
The history of the whole family of strikes is marked by a line of loyalty to Lithuania and tragedy. According to V. Čereškienė, when their parents met, love was born at first sight. Unfortunately, former partisan Isidore Strike’s family life is filled with pain and suffering.
V. Čereškienė says he heard that he dropped the ring during the wedding. The people who saw the prophetic sign said that the newlyweds would not have life. And in fact. Although I. Strike, unlike his brother, the Soviet court pardoned and did not send myriop, sentenced him to 15 years in a camp.
According to V. Čereškienė, the mother was waiting for her husband for 15 years. I attended camp every year. According to Panevėžys, she started the camp herself.
Dad came home when his daughters were over a year old. The former partisan was released when he already suffered from an incurable disease.
V. Čereškienė says he did not know much about the family’s past before regaining independence. However, women in the family have repeatedly heard bullying: the son of a bandit, the wife of a bandit. The children in the yard, and then the schoolmates, stabbed with their fingers the girl that Dad was sitting in jail.
“He said at school that I was the son of a bandit. I cried a lot. I didn’t understand what was going on “, – V. Čereškienė will never forget the senseless difficulties she experienced as a child.
Calculated the location of the remains
Last fall, archaeologists unearthed the remains of J. Streikas-Stumbras in the Vilnius orphanage cemetery; they opened another test of inhuman Soviet brutality.
Dalius Žygelis, a historian at the Lithuanian Center for Research on Genocide and Resistance, says it was not very difficult to find the remains of J. Streikas; Before that, a lot of research work had been done in the orphanage cemetery.
“We knew it had to be there,” says Žygelis.
The remains of political prisoners shot between 1956 and 1969 were also hidden among the legal graves marked in the orphanage’s cemetery. The remains of Adolf Ramanauskas-Vanagas were registered in the orphanage’s cemetery and, upon discovery, it became clear that there must have been other remains of dead partisans in the KGB execution cells after 1956.
Historians, based on previous research, have calculated where the legendary partisan J. Strike might be buried.
The twists and turns of fate are unpredictable
According to historians, in 1962. On August 17, two people were shot in Vilnius: Kazys Riauba and Juozas Streikus.
“It is a very interesting neighborhood. K. Riauba is also a former supporter. He was then arrested and crushed to become a KGB agent. It is known that as an agent, the smuggler K. Riauba was cruel, he helped deal with former colleagues and was later sentenced to death himself. What is the irony of fate? Two former supporters: J. Strike, whom contemporaries refer to as extremely human, extremely virtuous, a fighter of exceptional integrity, and K. Riauba, a complete antipode ”, the historian considers.
According to D. Žygelis, it has not been scientifically proven that there were remains of K. Riauba in the same well, because DNA tests were not carried out without finding relatives. Still, other data is available, anthropological measurements suggest that historians are probably right.
“J. We had a lot of DNA samples to identify the attack. The strike family really took great care in discovering his remains. There is the daughter of Joseph’s brother and his sister’s children. One even came from England to give a DNA sample and we had as much comparative material as possible, ”said the historian.
According to D. Žygelis, although more than 200 people were secretly buried in the orphanage’s cemetery, most were criminals. The task of historians is to find the remains of the partisans, of which there are about 10. So far, the remains of A. Ramanauskas-Vanagas, J. Streikas-Stumbras, Antanas Kraujelis-Siaubūnas have been found. So far, the work has been suspended for quarantine, but news is expected again in the fall.
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