Butrimonys is a small town in Alytus County in southern Lithuania. In 2011 it had a population of 941.[1]

Butrimonys
Town
Central square in Butrimonys
Central square in Butrimonys
Flag of Butrimonys
Coat of arms of Butrimonys
Butrimonys is located in Lithuania
Butrimonys
Butrimonys
Location in Lithuania
Coordinates: 54°30′10″N 24°15′10″E / 54.50278°N 24.25278°E / 54.50278; 24.25278
Country Lithuania
County Alytus County
MunicipalityAlytus District Municipality
EldershipButrimonys eldership
Capital ofButrimonys eldership
Population
 (2011)
 • Total
941
Time zoneUTC+2 (EET)
 • Summer (DST)UTC+3 (EEST)

Butrimonys massacre

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Farewell letter written in 1941 by Khone Boyarski.

On 9 September 1941, shortly after the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, the Jews of Butrimonys were massacred by Einsatzgruppen and Lithuanian collaborators. Rounded up and marched along a road, they were lined up beside a mass grave and machine-gunned. According to the Jäger Report, 740 Jews were murdered in one day: 67 men, 370 women, and 303 children.[2]

What distinguished Butrimonys from hundreds of similar crimes in the Baltic region was the survival of a detailed record left by a local Jew Khone Boyarski. Hiding with his son, Boyarski described the events in a farewell letter to his relatives abroad. Boyarski was later killed by the Nazis; the letter was discovered by accident by a graduate student in the archives of Yad Vashem.[3]

Notable people

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References

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  1. ^ "2011 census". Statistikos Departamentas (Lithuania). Retrieved August 2, 2017.
  2. ^ Austin, Ben (1997). "The Einsatzgruppen -- Mobile Killing Units". Middle Tennessee State University. Archived from the original on 2010-06-19.
  3. ^ Cohen, Nathan (1989). "The Destruction of the Jews of Butrimonys as Described in a Farewell Letter from a Local Jew". Holocaust and Genocide Studies. 4 (3): 357–375. doi:10.1093/hgs/4.3.357. ISSN 1476-7937.
  4. ^ Hult, Joan S.; Trekell, Marianna (1991). A Century of women's basketball : from frailty to final four. Reston, Va: National Association for Girls and Women in Sport. p. 33. ISBN 9780883144909.
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