Tamašauskas Kazys & Tamašauskienė Jadvyga

Tamašauskas, Kazys Tamašauskienė, Jadvyga When the Germans invaded the USSR in June 1941, Kazys and Jadvyga Tamašauskas were living with their two children in the Panemunė neighborhood of Kaunas. Kazys was a foreman at a building site in the Petrašiunai neighborhood where Jews from the ghetto worked under his supervision. Among them was Leiba Chaitas who feared for the fate of his small son, particularly after the children's murder operation (Kinderaktion) in the ghetto on March 27, 1944. After that Aktion, during which the Nazis deported for extermination some 1,200 Jews, mostly children, Leiba Chaitas asked Kazys to hide his small son. In consultation with Jadvyga his wife, Kazys agreed to take two-year-old Benyamin Chaitas into his home. On April 20, 1944, the child was taken out of the ghetto in a sack and delivered to Jadvyga Tamašauskienė who was waiting near her husband's place of work, who took him home. Little Benyanin was hidden in the Tamašauskas home for two months and cared for lovingly by the family. When the front drew near to Kaunas, Jadvyga transferred the child to her friends in the countryside, in order to distance him from the fighting. Benyamin remained there until the liberation of the area. Later, the child, who was thought to be an orphan, was placed into the care of the Jewish community. However, before the child could be given up for adoption, his parents, Leiba and Genya Chaitas, who had survived the Stutthof and Dachau camps, returned and recuperated their son. The Chaitas family remained in contact with their son’s rescuers. In time, Benyamin Chaitas immigrated to Israel. On November 28, 2000, Yad Vashem recognized Kazys and Jadvyga Tamašauskas as Righteous Among the Nations.