Metadata: State Security Department of the Ministry of Interior
Collection
- Country:
- Lithuania
- Holding institution:
- Lithuanian Central State Archives
- Holding institution (official language):
- Lietuvos Centrinis Valstybinis archyvas
- Postal address:
- O. Milašiaus g. 21, 10102 Vilnius
- Phone number:
- +370 5 247 7830
- Web address:
- https://www.archyvai.lt/lt/lcva.html
- Email:
- Lcva@archyvai.lt
- Reference number:
- 378
- Title:
- State Security Department of the Ministry of Interior
- Title (official language):
- Vidaus reikalų ministerijos Valstybės saugumo departamentas
- Creator/accumulator:
- Lithuanian Central State Archive
- Date(s):
- 1917/1944
- Date note:
- 1917/1940, 1942/1944
- Language:
- Finnish
- French
- German
- Lithuanian
- Polish
- Russian
- Yiddish
- Extent:
- 36,653 files
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
This collection contains documents pertaining to the State Security Department of the Ministry of Interior. The following types of documents can be found in this collection: employee files, documents related to the Police and the Police chief's orders, documents from the Intelligence department (activity overviews and reports), monthly police summary of events in Lithuania, intelligence reports about various topics such as Polish military organisations, anti-government organisations, the Communist party, activities of priests and others, as well as overviews of foreign policies and economies. In addition, the collection contains correspondence with other organisations, documents pertaining to economic and financial questions, overviews of organisations and people deemed anti-government, protocols of investigations, searches and arrests, lists of forbidden literature, documents pertaining to prisoners and more.
In terms of specifically Jewish content, there are many relevant documents. Jewish names can be found among the personal files of Defence Ministry employees, such as the file of David Margolis (inventory 1, file 229), or the file of Emil Shneiderovich (inventory 1, file 363) containing all documents accumulated over the years of their employment with details about their lives, education, languages, families, work responsibilities and histories, illnesses and more.
Many documents relating to suspected activities deemed illegal can be found in this collection. For example, there are files on members of the Bund and on the activities of the Bund (inventory 2, file 508) and about the secret Jewish workers' union (inventory 2, file 515); letters that have been confiscated by the police; files of interrogations of Jewish persons (such as the questioning of Isaac Bas for the holding of illegal communist literature, inventory 2, file 1913) and a list of Jewish foreign citizens that have relocated to Lithuania.
- Archival history:
- In 1946 these documents were taken from the Soviet Lithuanian Republic’s Defence Department. The collection was supplemented in 1951, 1952, 1960, 1962, 1963, 1965, 1968, 1973, 1967, 1996, 2003. It was reorganised in 1957-1959.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The State Security Department and all its branches were established in 1918 with the establishment of the independent Lithuanian Republic. It operated independently until 1940 when it came under the jurisdiction of the occupying authorities.
- Access points: locations:
- Kaunas
- Subject terms:
- Bund movement
- Communism
- Crime
- Labour unions
- Law enforcement--Police
- Personal records
- System of arrangement:
- There are 14 inventories.
- Access, restrictions:
- Access to some of the documents is restricted.
- Finding aids:
- Detailed inventories are available for free online access on the website of the Lithuanian Chief Archivist Service.
- Links to finding aids:
- https://eais-pub.archyvai.lt/eais/faces/pages/forms/search/F3001.jspx
- Yerusha Network member:
- Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People
- Author of the description:
- Julija Levin, 2019