Obj. ID: 52431 Old Holocaust Memorial at the Fish Processing Plant in Liepāja, Latvia, 1960s(?)
Memorial Name
No official name
Who is Commemorated?
Liepāja Jews murdered near the Fishing Harbor and lighthouse.
Description:
The memorial marks the area where about 1,200 Liepāja Jews were murdered in July 1941. According to the book by Meyer Meler, the killing took place “in the area of the Fishing Harbor, to the south of the lighthouse, on the beach” (Meler 2010, 246).
A memorial plaque is affixed to the concrete wall of the fish processing plant. A short path paved by bricks and flanked by trees leads to it from the sidewalk. A high step in front of the wall allows for the placement of flowers and wreaths.
According to a photograph published by Meyer Meler, the original plaque was made of white marble; a five-pointed star was placed in a circle, and identical Latvian and Russian inscriptions were divided by a depiction of a garland (Meler 2010, 254; Meler 2013, 214). Judging by stylistic features, this plaque could have been produced in the 1960s.
Sometime in the late 1990s or early 2000s, the original plaque was replaced by a new one made of black marble. The new plaque retained the original texts in Latvian and Russian, but they are now divided by a stylized line. The five-pointed star appears above the Latvian inscription. A smaller rhomboid black marble plaque with a depiction of three flowers is affixed to the wall beneath the main plaque.
In the 1990s, the old memorial was supplemented by a new one, placed on its right side.
Inscription:
Latvian:
Šeit vācu fašistiskie okupanti
laikā no 1941.–1945. gadam
noslepkavoja daudzus
padomju patriotus
Translation: Here, between 1941 and 1945, German Fascist occupants murdered many Soviet patriots.
Russian:
Здесь немецко фашистские
оккупанты в период
с 1941 по 1945 год убили
много советских патриотов
Translation: Here, between 1941 and 1945, German Fascist occupants murdered many Soviet patriots.
Commissioned by
Probably, the authorities of the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic
5 image(s)
Liepāja fell to the Nazi German hands on June 29, 1941. The first mass-scale killings of Jews took place in July 1941 in the vicinity of the fishing port – at the lighthouse and at the fish cannery. About 1,200 Jews were shot there.
According to the Liepaja Jewish Heritage Foundation, “Researchers of the exact place of execution of the Jews of Liepāja in the lighthouse area, consider that the trench, which may still contain human remains, ran parallel to the seashore along the fortresses that are now located on both sides of Roņu Street. The assumption is based on the fact that during the war there was no Roņu street and the fortifications located on both sides of the street were connected.”
Judging from the style of the original memorial plaque of white marble, it was installed in the 1960s. In the late 1990s or early 2000s, it was replaced by a similar plaque of black marble with the same inscriptions. In the 1990s, the old memorial was supplemented by a new one, placed on its right side (see here).
"Holocaust Memorial Places in Latvia," a website by the Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Latvia
Liepaja Jewish Heritage Foundation, http://liepajajewishheritage.lv/en/the-lighthouse-2/., http://liepajajewishheritage.lv/en/ (accessed October 28, 2023)
Meler, Meyer, Jewish Latvia: Sites to Remember (Tel-Aviv: Association of Latvian and Estonian Jews in Israel, 2013), pp. 206-208, 212, 214.
Meler, Meyer, Mesta nashei pamiati: Evreiskie obshchiny Latvii, unichtozhennye v Kholokoste (Riga: by the author, 2010), pp. 246, 252, 254.