Obj. ID: 50213 Holocaust Memorial in Malta, Latvia, 2004
Memorial Name
No official name
Who is Commemorated?
Jewish Holocaust victims in Malta
Description:
The monument stands near the House of Culture of Malta and near the main road crossing the settlement.
It is a black granite stele on a low granite pedestal standing in the center of a paved area. The stele bears the Star of David and three identical inscriptions in Latvian, English, and Hebrew.
Latvian
Maltas ebreju piemiņai,
kurus 1941. gada septembrī
noslepkavoja vietējie
policisti-nacistisko
okupantu brīvprātīgie.
English
In memory of Jews of Malta
who had been murdered here
by the local policemen –
the voluntary collaborators
of the Nazi occupants
in September of 1941.
Hebrew
לזכר יהודי מאלטה אשר נרצחו כאן
בידי שוטרי המקום
אשר התנדבו לסייע לכובש הנאצי
ספטמבר 1941
Commissioned by
The Council of Jewish Communities of Latvia
6 image(s)
The German Nazi troops entered Malta on July 4, 1941, and local police immediately started exterminating Jews. Part of Malta Jews were shot together with Jews from the vicinity – Silene and Pīgožņi – in the Baldene (Balda) Forest at the end of July 1941. The mass massacre of the Malta Jews took place at the end of September 1941 in the basement of a house at 76 First of May St., close to the House of Culture. About 200 Jews were shot there and buried nearby. The remains of the victims were dug out and burnt in 1944.
The monument on the place of the burial was erected by the Council of Jewish Communities of Latvia. The inauguration ceremony of this monument and the monument at the Baldene (Balda) Forest took place on December 19, 2004, with the participation of foreign diplomats and local officials. The President of Latvia, Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga, sent a letter to the inauguration ceremony.
"Holocaust Memorial Places in Latvia," a website by the Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Latvia, http://memorialplaces.lu.lv/memorial-places/latgale/rezekne-municipality-malta-the-house-of-culture/.
Meler, Meyer, Mesta nashei pamiati: Evreiskie obshchiny Latvii, unichtozhennye v Kholokoste (Riga: by the author, 2010), pp. 277-283.
http://memorialplaces.lu.lv/memorial-places/latgale/rezekne-municipality-malta-the-house-of-culture/