Hero of the Week 72

Welcome back viewers

This week we will honor a team of heroes

They are...

Janis and Johanna Lipke

Janis and Johanna Lipke were a married couple from Latvia. Much of their early lives is not available. But what is known, is that when the time came, both of them did things that made the difference for many of their countrymen.

Part 1

In the summer of 1941, the German army invaded the Soviet Union and occupied Latvia. To their surprise, most of the Latvian people welcomed them as liberators. After years of brutal oppression by the Soviet Union, many Latvians viewed the Germans as great anti-communist heroes from the West. They (including many of Latvia's Jewish population) believed that they would be given back their independence through the armies of Nazi Germany. However, it was not long before the Nazis began to show their true colors. What followed would be a nightmare for Latvia's Jews. 

After the German Army moved on from Latvia, the infamous Einzatsgruppen arrived and began to arrest the country's Jewish population. It was especially bad in the country's capital, Riga. By the end of July, a ghetto had been constructed within the city and more than 35,000 Jewish people were forced into an area that was only 16 blocks. To the astonishment of the Nazis, the vast majority of Riga's population were quick to aide them in rounding up their Jewish neighbors. Many of them joined the an infamous police unit called the, Arajs Kommando. It wasn't long before thousands of the Jews in the Riga Ghetto began to die.

At the time of the occupation, the Lipkes were living in Riga. Janis worked as laborer down at the docks in the port. His compensation was so poor that he turned to the black market and became a smuggler of goods. Little did he know that his skills would become very useful after the ghetto had been constructed. Unlike most of their neighbors, Janis and Johanna were horrified and disgusted by the treatment of the Jews in Riga. They decided that they were not going to stand by and look the other way.

Part II

Janis was able to get a job as the foreman of a civilian unit that worked for the German Luftwaffe. He chose Jews from the ghetto as his workers. Everyday he would take a couple workers out of the ghetto and work on fortifications and repairing airplanes. However instead of sending the Jews back to the ghetto he would take them to a safe house where Johanna would make arrangements for them to get out of the city. Janis would then have some loyal friends put on a yellow star and enter the ghetto to convince the guards the Jews were being returned (his friends also had a way out).

However, within a two weeks, the Nazi guards and their Latvian collaborators began to actively pull Jews from the ghetto, transfer them into the Rumbala forest, and execute them on a daily basis. Two of the most horrifying massacres took place on November 30 and December 8, 1941. On those two days alone, more than 25,000 Jews (mostly women, children, and elderly men) were taken from the Riga ghetto by the Nazi Einsatzgruppen and the Latvian Arajs Kommando. Once they were inside the Rumbala Forest, they were shot. It was the second worst two-day massacre of World War II (the other was the massacre at Babi Yar).

Upon hearing this, the Lipkes decided to speed up their efforts to smuggle Jews out of the Riga ghetto. One day, Janis successfully smuggled 10 Jews out by hiding them in a log truck. As soon as they reached the safe house, they were sent to a small village outside of Riga (Dobleh) where Janis owned a small farm and had friends willing to hide the refugees and masquerade them as hired hands. Whenever he wasn't smuggling people, Janis was smuggling food and clothing to the prisoners inside the ghetto (which was fast turning into a concentration camp). In one instance he met a woman named, Sofia Stern who was imprisoned with her daughter, Chana. When he learned they were about to be transported to a death camp he personally oversaw their escape from the ghetto and hind them in a shelter under his barn (along with 12 others). When the refugees offered to pay the Lipkes money in recompense, they declined saying, that they were not doing this for financial gain.

Epilogue

On October 19, 1944 the Red Army drove the Germans out of Latvia and recaptured the city of Riga. By then, the Riga ghetto had been completely burnt down. Tens of thousands of Jews were slaughtered across the country as the Nazis retreated from Eastern Europe. By the time the Soviets arrived, nearly all of Latvia's Jewish population had been wiped out. It is believed that out of Latvia's 94,000 Jews, just over 200 survived World War II.

For their part, Janis and Johanna had successfully rescued 44 people. Even after the war, they stayed in contact with them for many years. On June 28, 1966, both Janis and Johanna were recognized as Righteous among the Nations by the state of Israel. Janis passed away on May 14, 1987. Johanna followed him on January 1, 1990.

Most people remember the holocaust in Latvia to a be a horrific example of betrayal and horror. The small number of survivors is evident that most Latvians either turned a blind eye to it or took part in it. Janis and Johanna Lipke truly were a major exception to this. Their courage and kindness made the difference for more than 40 people who would most certainly have been killed. Their story should serve as both a warning and an inspiration to people around the world. It is people like the Lipkes who make the world a beautiful place to live in. 

https://www.yadvashem.org/yv/pdf-drupal/en/education/jewish_world/righteous-2.pdf

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/latvia

https://www.mfa.gov.lv/en/usa/embassy/honorary-consuls-in-the-u-s-and-mexico/789-ministry/briefing-papers/5259-the-holocaust-in-german-occupied-latvia

https://righteous.yadvashem.org/?searchType=righteous_only&language=en&itemId=4022619&ind=NaN

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/riga