Metadata: Trakai District Police Administration, Vilnius Governorate
Collection
- Country:
- Lithuania
- Holding institution:
- Lithuanian State Historical Archives
- Holding institution (official language):
- Lietuvos valstybės istorijos archyvas
- Postal address:
- Mindaugo 8, 03107 Vilnius
- Phone number:
- +370 5 219 5320
- Email:
- istorijos.archyvas@lvia.lt
- Reference number:
- 432
- Title:
- Trakai District Police Administration, Vilnius Governorate
- Title (official language):
- Vilniaus gubernijos Trakų apskrities policijos valdyba
- Creator/accumulator:
- Trakai District Police Administration, Vilnius Governorate
- Date(s):
- 1863/1915
- Language:
- Russian
- Extent:
- 541 files
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
The collection contains records of the Trakai District Police Administration which refer to a wide range of criminal, judicial, economic, political and administrative issues. The materials include orders and circulars of various government institutions; the police administration’s correspondence on operational issues; financial documents; reports of the local police chiefs; materials on surveillance of wanted persons and alphabetical lists of these individuals; requests and complaints submitted to the police by individuals; the police staff’s lists and personal documents.
The collection includes many Jewish-related materials. Some of these records are personal requests of Jews from 1910-1914 on issues such as: permission to reside in the district; issue of documents on the right to leave the Pale of Settlement; issue of certificates on the right to do business; and granting privileges on compulsory military service. The collection also includes lists of Jewish residents in the district from 1913 and correspondence between the police in 1914-1915 and the Vilnius Governorate Board regarding the settlement of Jewish families in rural areas (inventory 1, file 181a). Furthermore, the materials in the collection make it possible to understand how the emigration of Jews from the Russian Empire was organised and carried out. For example, a few files in the collection deal with accusations against Jews who secretly transferred emigrants across the Russian border. The collection also contains files dealing with collecting of fines from Jewish families for evading conscription. In addition, the collection includes numerous materials regarding Jews who were wanted by the police or those under police surveillance for criminal or illegal political activity.
- Archival history:
- After Russia's entry into the WWI in 1914 the records of the Trakai District Police Administration were evacuated to Moscow. In the 1940s the materials were kept at the Central State Historical Archive in Moscow, and in 1948 they were handed over to the Central State Archive of the Lithuanian SSR. In 1957, together with other pre-revolutionary materials, these documents were included in the Central State Historical Archive of the Lithuanian SSR, predecessor of the current Lithuanian State Historical Archives.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The Trakai District Police Administration was established in 1863 in accordance with the police reform of 1862. The single District Police Administration controlled all the cities, small towns, villages and communities in the district. The Police Administration was entrusted with various functions, including surveillance of the district population, fight against crime, maintenance of public order, suppression of strikes, demonstrations and the revolutionary movement, administrative supervision, registration of the population, and control of the implementation of court verdicts. The District Police Administration continued to operate until 1915, when German troops entered the territories of the Vilnius Governorate.
- Access points: locations:
- Trakai
- System of arrangement:
- The collection consists of one inventory.
- 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:
- Ilya Vovshin, Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, 2019