Jurgis Damarodas: accepted his fate with grace
Jurgis Damarodas was born on March 15, 1897 in the village of Sargine, Lithuania, in the Plustishky district of Marjampole County. Towards the end of the 1st World War, Jurgis completed his studies and graduated from the Veiveriu State Teachers College in Sorochintsy (now Ukraine).
He returned home to Lithuania in the early spring of 1918 and immediately began working as an information officer within the Press Bureau of the Lithuanian State Department of Information („Propaganda“). In that role, he was charged with helping „underwater“ communities to reorganize and get back on their feet financially. This required him to drive from town to town within the newly liberated border regions, organizing municipalities and distributing loans (vouchers) to assist them with their recovery efforts. To maximize his efforts, Jurgis worked closely with the local R.C. churches, encouraging congregants to contribute money to help fund these loans and then following up to ensure these pledges were honored. Through this and other creative tactics, and much hard work, young Jurgis was able to distribute thousands of loan notes, thereby playing a pivotal role in the successful reemergence of the newly independent nation of Lithuania.
Once post-War Lithuanian life began to normalize, Jurgis was finally able to work in the profession for which he had formally prepared – as a school teacher. However, his peaceful life of teaching and raising his family was fated to be short-lived when Jurgis was imprisoned following the Soviet Union’s 1940 occupation of Lithuania. He was released a year later after the Germans broke the non-aggression pact and declared war on Russia (in June 1941), ousting the Soviets from Lithuania on their march towards Moscow. However, instead of being able to celebrate his freedom, the deceased was to suffer the biggest blow of his life here: tragically, only one week before being freed by the Germans, Jurgis’ family (his wife and three sons) was forcibly deported to Siberia by the fleeing Soviets, along with thousands of other Lithuanian women and children. Despite all efforts, he was never able to learn where his family was sent and whether or not they survived the deplorable conditions the deportees had to endure to reach their new destinations.
In addition to losing his family, the Soviets had dispossessed him of his home and all of his other property, ultimately forcing him into exile to the West as a „displaced person“ (DP) in advance of the Soviets’ return to Lithuania three years later (in 1944) as Germany retreated from Eastern Europe during the final phase of WWII. By the end of the War, Jurgis found himself in a resettlement camp in Butzbach, in the Allied sector of Germany. While there, Jurgis was able to link up with other displaced Lithuanians and once again work at his beloved teaching job before emigrating to America in 1949. In his new homeland, Mr. Damarodas was forced to accept a number of unskilled jobs that required heavy physical labor. Despite all of this, Jurgis accepted his fate with grace, always remaining pleasant and patient, never complaining to anyone. However, as a direct result of all of the difficult blows in his life, the deceased’s health began to break down.
