Montvilas First name unknown & Montvilienė Halina

Mr. Montvila Halina Montvilienė Yakov Gurvich was a native of Telšiai. His father Haim was murdered by the Germans together with other Jewish men at the beginning of the occupation of Lithuania. Together with his mother Rachil and older sister Ruta, Gurvich survived the liquidation of the Telšiai ghetto in December 1941, and went to work for local villagers in the area, posing as a local Lithuanian. The Gurvich family owned a large clothing store and was well-known in the area, and this represented an enormous obstacle for someone trying to live a clandestine existence. Gurvich was forced to change hiding places often for fear of denunciation. At the end of October 1943, 18-year-old Gurvich found himself in the vicinity of Kvedarna, at the home of the Montvila family. Halina Montvilienė and her husband (whose first name is unknown to Yad Vashem) were Seventh Day Adventists; their brothers-in-faith, the Johanson family, had asked the Montvilas to help Gurvich after his mother Rachil had stayed with them, posing as a Russian war refugee. Since Gurvich possessed an authentic birth certificate in the name of Albinas Gudžinskas (his former classmate), the Montvilas presented him to their neighbors as a distant relative, whose parents had been deported by the Soviets to Siberia in 1941. It is not known whether the neighbors believed the story, but rumors spread that "Gudžinskas" was in fact Montvilienė's illegitimate son. The Montvilas did not rebut the rumors; while they compromised Montvilienė's good name, they also made Gurvich's position safer. Gurvich felt quite comfortable at the Montvilas. Nobody knew him in Kvedarna, a town 70 km south from his own birthplace. The Montvila family provided him with all his needs, so he spent time meeting contemporaries, going to parties and courting young ladies. One of his new friends, a municipality employee, issued an identity card, with his photo, to him. Soon Gurvich was offered a decent job at themunicipality registry office. The Montvilas were concerned at the idea of Gurvich working in a public place that had so many visitors, one of which might recognize him. Nevertheless, with his new identity card Gurvich felt confident, and successfully held his job there for the last three months before liberation. Soviet troops entered Kvedarna at the beginning of October 1944. Gurvich then returned to Telšiai, where he was reunited with his mother and learned about the tragic death of his only sister Ruta, shot by a traitor on the eve of liberation. Gurvich settled in Telšiai, and established a family. Until his immigration to Israel in 1972, he maintained close contacts with Halina Montvilienė, now a widow. On September 28, 2006, Yad Vashem recognized Halina Montvilienė and her husband Mr. Montvila as Righteous Among the Nations.