An Original Source Interview with / Interviu su:

Felicija Nijolė Sadūnaitė

2006

Interviewer / Interviu Ėmėjas: David O'Rourke, OP
Transcriber / Vertėjas: Zita Petkus
Interviews Producer / Interviu Prodiuseris: Czesłav Jan Grycz
Subtitles Editor / Subtitrų Redaktorius: Arnas Palaima, PhD
Subtitles Producer / Subtitrų Prodiuseris: Viltė Minkevičiūtė

Shot on Location in Lithuania / Filmuota Lietuvoje 2006

Translation text

Felicija Nijolė Sadūnaitė, born July 22,1938, in Kaunas, baptized in the town of Dotnuva.

Could you tell us something about yourself and how it was you came to be a prisoner, in this prison?

On Aug 27, 1974, in Vilnius, 14 KGB agents broke into my apartment and found me at work retyping an underground publication, the “Chronicle of the Catholic Church in Lithuania.” I had barely completed six pages. After their search I was arrested and brought here to these cellars. The “Chronicle of the Catholic Church in Lithuania” contained factual documentation of the persecution conducted by the atheist Communists against believers purely for practicing their religion—be it baptisms, taking Holy Communion, going to Mass, sometimes even for wearing a concealed cross around one’s neck or for distributing prayer books. A religious press was strictly forbidden. It was considered anti-Soviet. All religious publications, even catechisms and prayer books, were outlawed. It was forbidden to circulate them. Officially, no religious publications were permitted. Meanwhile, Soviet propaganda abroad trumpeted that we had full religious freedom. They said we no longer had a need for churches since we’d rejected our faith. They said we had no need for religious press, but they said, if we wanted it, it would, of course be allowed. In short, it was sheer propaganda and we were powerless to contradict it because we weren’t permitted to travel abroad. Only the liars were allowed to leave Lithuania. And so, our underground publication was intended to disclose to the world the truth of the situation in Soviet-occupied Lithuania.

Who wrote them?

Many priests and nuns contributed articles to the “Chronicle,” but at its basis there were the facts. Facts about persecution in Soviet schools, persecution in the diocese—the harassment of priests and bishops, and the persecution of believers. Essentially, the “Chronicle” was steeped in the language of facts. That meant that it was a most powerful witness to truth. On that day of a particular year at a specific location, such-and-such an injustice or persecution was committed against so-and-so in contravention of the rights and freedoms as guaranteed under the Soviet constitution. So it served as an unmasking of the Soviet lie; that is, our rights existed and were guaranteed on paper, but the reality was that we were being punished and persecuted for exercising them. People would be expelled from school, from university; they’d lose their jobs, especially the intelligentsia who attended church. After the cessation of the Stalinist deportations, there was this great shift in the nature of persecution, and people still lived in fear.

Could you describe more what kind of persecution people suffered for their beliefs, not just prison, but economic and social, and things like that…What happened to people who were known to be publicly religious?

Persecution manifested itself in this way: If a person who practiced his religion held a well-paying job—perhaps he was a graduate of higher education—he was fired and had great trouble finding work afterwards. They’d make an entry in your file, not actually stating that you were let go for religious practices, but they had their special notations well understood. In the last years of the Occupation, a dismissed teacher would not even be able to get a janitorial position; “You’re overqualified”. “You’re a teacher, go get a teaching job,” they’d sneer. ‘We don’t need a janitor or a cashier with advanced education.” As for families, when parents lost their jobs, obviously the children suffered greatly. Scared of getting fired, people avoided practicing their religion in public. People would travel to distant towns to observe the major holy days. They tried to disguise themselves, somewhat, to avoid being recognized. For example, women would dress up as old ladies to attend Easter services. Also, religious education was conducted in secret. Christenings were performed in secret. First Holy Communions would be arranged in rural villages where the grandparents lived. And then, God forbid that the children talk about it afterwards in school! We used to call this, the struggle with the atheist bulldozer. Especially in the last few years, students who attended church were not allowed to take their final exams. Their grades for conduct would be dropped to a “D” or an “F” just for having gone to church with their parents or grandmother. Teachers would watch their pupils. Those observed going to church were warned to stop doing so. If they continued, various repressions were enacted. Of course, there were physical consequences, as well. The poor student would be stood in front of his class, or even in front of the whole school, and would be jeered at. They’d say, “You’re unenlightened.” “You’re stupid.” “Your parents are stupid.” This was very painful for the child. Sometimes, in cases when the child was viewed as being particularly unyielding, the teacher would even hit the child, push him around and pull his hair. After being arrested and brought to this location, I was incarcerated in my own cell, as was the case with other inmates. Women inmates were strip-searched by a female paramedic. All sharp objects, wristwatches, and religious items such as crosses or rosaries were confiscated After this very detailed search they’d lock you up in a cell and eventually summon you for interrogation. A high ranking interrogator, Colonel Petriuškevičius, demanded to know where I got my copy of the “Chronicles” and said they would release me once I told them. I responded rather sternly that they, and not we who were arrested were the ones in violation of Soviet laws and the Soviet constitution which guarantees freedom of religion. I said that the facts in the “Chronicles” documented their unlawful activities, and that they were in violation of their obligation to uphold the human rights declaration ratified by the Soviets. I said I refuse to answer any questions in regard to these charges because I don’t deal with criminals. I wasn’t going to provide them any assistance in the conduct of their illegalities. So, from the very first day they became very angry with me and threatened to lock me up in a psychiatric hospital where life would be a hundred times worse than in the most difficult prison. This is the type of intimidation that commenced.

Did they use the psychiatric hospitals, was this a part of the Soviet torture?

Yes, that was the most terrifying method of torture practiced by the Soviets: incarcerating a healthy human being in a psychiatric institution; subjecting him to electric shock, which is a process that destroys one’s body in a very short period of time. Before my arrest, this is what happened with my neighbor poet MindaugasTamonis. He was arrested and locked in Vilnius in a psychiatric hospital. After a few months, he lost his ability to speak. He gained 80 pounds. They used shock therapy and also injected him with all sorts of chemicals. His wife Aldona said that after four months of incarceration, during one of the rare times she was allowed to visit him, he no longer had the capacity to communicate. In other words, one by one, his organs—the liver, the kidneys—were affected. The process weakens the body such that if the person doesn’t die from the various ailments resulting from the treatment, he dies while in hospital. Or, as in the case of Mindaugas, who liked to go for walks, he was hit and killed by the Vilnius-Moscow train after the KGB dumped him on the railroad tracks. That happened on Nov. 7, a day known among us as the Soviet Devil’s Holiday (anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution) They, of course, claimed that he, himself, was responsible for being on the tracks, but that was an unadulterated lie. He had been dumped quite a distance down the tracks. The KGB showed his wife a note purportedly written by Mindaugas. They harassed his family, the two children, his elderly father. As a matter of fact, I had just recorded his story when my arrest took place 1974.

Did they use threats of torture? Did they threaten you with torture?

For 6 months they threatened to pack me off to the same kind of psychiatric hospital as Mindaugas Tamonis was taken to, where it would be a hundred times worse than being in prison. I was incarcerated on these premises in cell #4…the same one where you were just filming Balys Gajauskas. Adjoining that corner cell was another tiny cell that had been “remodeled,” so to speak. Much later on, with bishop Tamkevičius, when it was possible to visit these premises officially, we discovered two X-ray machines concealed in that niche. The machines were aimed at the very narrow cell where I had spent 19 days. During the time I was in that cell all my hair fell out and I lost about 50 pounds. My own brother wasn’t able to recognize me! Afterwards, when they saw that I couldn’t even walk any more they transferred me to cell #1 where I had a cellmate. Typically, cellmates were criminals and collaborators who were planted to watch our every move and gather information about us, because the soldiers who walked these corridors weren’t able to maintain constant surveillance through the peepholes. After a time, your cellmate would try to convince you that you were acting unwisely; that you’re heading for a harsh punishment. Basically, they were in cahoots with the interrogators and assisted in trying to break the prisoner, to get the prisoner to sell out. That’s how they acted with all prisoners at that time, during 1974-75. As far as I know, this was a practice dating back to Stalin’s time.

And that was their purpose, to get you to collaborate with the KGB?

The means of interrogation was devised to frighten the prisoner into thinking he was going to die. Since no living thing wants to die, the intent was to weaken the prisoner’s resolve so he would be ready to bargain for his life. Perhaps he’d begin by answering questions that he didn’t think were particularly relevant. He’d trip himself up and get into a tangle—and the interrogators certainly knew how to spin their webs! Sometimes the talk would be about seemingly innocuous things, but the interrogators knew how to go about extracting information they were looking for. And the fear? Well, once a person becomes frightened… the longer it goes on, the more the interrogators know how to work it!

So they were using trick questions ...?

Yes, they knew how to do that very well. My salvation was that I refused to talk to them. My adamant silence served me well, but it infuriated them. That is why the team of interrogators (who changed off every two months) threatened me on a daily basis with psychiatric incarceration. They kept saying how awful that was going to be for me. In short, they tried to manipulate me with fear but never actually carried out their threat of moving me to a psychiatric institution. After 6-months’ incarceration I wrote a letter of protest, saying I’d rather they beat me physically—because one can heal from physical abuse—than continuing traumatizing me morally, which is what I accused them of doing. I called them “moral thugs”. I stated I would no longer attend their interrogations if they continued in that vein. The KGB employed various methods during the course of my interrogation in 1974-75. Although they did not use physical force on me, they had their devious ways of inflicting suffering: for example, the cells were either very hot or very cold. Without being aware, I was subjected to prolonged X-ray radiation. Another prisoner, Vladas Lapienis, whose 100th birthday we commemorated last week, developed massive rashes from what may have been various chemicals that were sprinkled near his cell whenever he was taken out. He also had high blood pressure and experienced many nose bleeds, in particular when fear was exacerbated by indirect things like doors slamming very loudly. Eventually his blood pressure dropped to the other end of the scale and he began asking them, “What will you do with my body when I die? Will you release it to my wife?” Then they transferred him to a different cell and everything ended. It is hard to pinpoint precisely, but all sorts of subtle tortures were being carried out.

It must have been unusual for the KGB to be interrogating a woman. Do you think they were extra difficult on you? 

In an effort to break the prisoner, they used their indirect torture techniques on those detainees who succeeded in maintaining strict self-control during interrogation. Prisoners who opted to compromise themselves by engaging in conversations with their interrogators and possibly divulging some less-important information, even though they didn’t think they were actually betraying anyone, were clearly treated somewhat better—even their punishments were less harsh. As for those who maintained an iron resistance, the interrogators showed no mercy in their campaign to break the prisoner.

In our title, as Jūratė said, we’re calling our documentary, “Red Terror on the Amber Coast.” How do you look at the Red terror that was used here in the Baltics and Lithuania? How would you describe it?

I called the KGB to their faces “Satan’s Mafia,” who strove to suppress God, religion, and truth. They acted outraged: ‘What, are we devils, then?’ I replied, ‘No, you’re not devils, but you are working for the Devil! You support terror and violence. Mend your ways, and you can still become “children of God.” Lithuania lived through a very cruel terror: Out of population of 3mil, nearly a million underwent enormous suffering. A huge number of people were tortured to death, shot, or died of starvation in the frozen wastes of Siberia. Those left behind in Lithuania were terrified for their lives, and a portion managed to flee to the West. I view it as a type of physical and spiritual Lithuanian genocide; an atheistic darkness that struggled against God for 50 years. But as we all know, God is more powerful. When they were trying to intimidate me by saying ‘We’ve got you now, we can do whatever we please with you,’ I’d reply: “A million of you is like zero before the power of God!” They were taken aback by my answer. They really didn’t like it when you spoke the truth fearlessly to their face. Trust in Almighty God, was your greatest power. Prisoners who had faith in God were truly the strongest, because they had that great power to fall back upon. For those without faith, it was obviously extraordinarily difficult. Faith sustained us. If you believed in God, God was with you. 
What was the worst thing that happened to you? What were your worst moments during this time?

The worst moments were when my loved ones were threatened that they would be shut up in a psychiatric hospital. In my case, they threatened to my brother whom they eventually placed in a psychiatric hospital. It is easier to overcome this just by yourself. I was myself very sanguine about it and held a somewhat romantic notion. I thought of it as the holy ground of many martyrs, my friends among them. Just as Rome had its Coliseum, Vilnius has its KGB prison. I considered it a great honor to have been brought here. My parents were deceased, but I still had an older brother who was in poor health. So when they started threatening to harm your loved ones, that is absolutely the hardest thing to bear. Even during those times, faith sustained me. I believed very deeply that both I and my brother were in the hands of God and that God would take care of us. As for the KGB, they’re nothing but liars. They say one thing, do another, while thinking something else altogether. They’re unfortunate people who never deliver the good things they promise.

You mentioned genocide. Could you describe how you see the genocide that the Soviets committed against Lithuania?

The Communists, or, if you prefer, the Bolsheviks, the KGB, the Soviet Occupiers—acted in Lithuania as they did in other nations. First they set out to annihilate the intelligentsia: practicing Catholics, patriots who loved their country, leaders of various organizations, and all honorable and hard-working people. If they couldn’t be broken and compromised through torture, people would be deported to Siberia to a life of hard labor and death by starvation. That’s why so many young Lithuanians fled to the forests to join the resistance against the horrific scourge of the Occupation. This resistance was unlike that in any other nation. It continued for well over ten years, into the mid 1950’s, around 1957. Throughout all world history no other tiny nation had carried on their struggle against a goliath of an empire for such a long a period of time. If we were to look at numbers, the Partisan forces were outnumbered a hundred times over. They were inadequately armed and poorly prepared. Nevertheless, they observed strict military discipline among themselves and tried to behave with honor: to free the imprisoned, and to defend those being deported. They held a firm belief that the West would come to their aid upon seeing the horrendous Terror being promulgated by the Occupant.

You speak about the Partisans, so I would gather that for you and for other people the Partisans were very important.  The fact that there were people in the woods fighting for your freedom had symbolic importance for you?

The Partisans had the most powerful and inspirational impact on us. Their resistance, their courage, their self-sacrifice. As a 7-8 year-old child, I remember seeing the desecrated semi-nude corpses of Partisans and the women who were their couriers, dumped to lie in the streets for weeks. We’d have to go by with quiet composed faces. Cruelty revealed the true character of the Soviets. Our family would have been deported, but someone gave my parents an advance warning. We escaped and traveled from Dotnuva to the city of Telšiai. Then, later, we went to Anykščiai, about 150 miles away. Incidentally, the folks who helped us were very devout people, later to be tortured, shot or incarcerated for their beliefs. My father got work on a very large Soviet farm in an agronomy lab. The lab’s director, Antanas Šlamas, was a very good man. The Partisans would come at night and would ask very courteously if they could have some grain or perhaps some flour. They’d leave a note for the director stating, “We were armed, there were many of us, and we took what we needed.” The people truly loved them; after all, they were our young people, from our families. Then the collaborators would come ‘round to guard the lab, and, of course, the Partisans would stay away. Later on, when the coast was clear, word would reach the Partisans and they’d make another foray. People helped them even though they risked punishment of death, torture, or Siberia. If the 90% of Lithuanians who were for the Partisans had withheld their support, they could not have held out as long as they did. They’d have died from starvation and cold.

Process of collectivization of farms and that. Did you have any experience with that, or did you know people who did, or what was it like, if you know, being forced off your farm, and then the collectivizations?

Forcible removal to a collective farm was not an issue for my family. We had already left our farm at the start of the second Soviet Occupation. At first my father went to Telšiai where we received sanctuary from Bishop Borisevičius. For a year he worked as a math sciences teacher in the seminary. Then the KGB started checking into why a married man with children had a teaching post in a seminary for priests. When they came for him we were already gone. We traveled the length of Lithuania to get to Anykščiai, where my father’s friend, Antanas Šlamas, lived. He worked as the director of a horticulture lab. Incidentally, collaborators used to refer to it, not as a “horticulture lab” but an “outlaw-culture lab”, because there were no Communist workers. Officially, my father was a senior agronomist. His work had practical application. He conducted soil-testing on ten plots of land to determine what to grow; how to get a better harvest, and so on. Collectivization was mandatory, and people who refused to participate were disenfranchised and deported to Siberia, even if they were only small landowners, and even when they had large families. I read a very interesting book, “Our Daily Bread,” by a Russian author, Alekseyev. He describes the existence of a master deportation plan for the Baltics, especially in Lithuania. He cites how many people were projected to be deported to Siberia. He claims the plan was upped each week in order to meet the numbers needed to stuff the cattle cars for deportation. Stalin’s right-hand man, Suslov, was known to have remarked quite candidly, “Lithuania will be left without Lithuanians.” As for collectivization, it provided a process for destroying the culture, wiping out established traditions, taking away everything that was most precious to a human being—in effect, a human mockery. Control of the masses was facilitated through the crowding of people into close living quarters. The possibilities for spying and betrayal one another was enhanced. Single owner homesteads were eliminated. By the same token, ethno-culture was being destroyed, as were precious Lithuanian monuments. The Soviets attempted to wipe out the historic memory of Lithuania.

How do you feel about life today?

One can’t feel content in our “independent” Lithuania because our very same “brother Communists” who shored up the Soviet monolith through 50 years of Occupation have stayed on and adapted. They have appropriated much of the nation’s wealth. They’re to be found in the media. The Procurator’s Office is in their hands. There are so many here who still operate under a Kremlin mentality—in Putin’s spirit! Russia’s President Putin has said that there are no former KGB or Communists. He said “Once you’re KGB, you’re KGB until you die! In other words, you can pretend otherwise, but your spirit is still loyal to your Red leader. The situation in Lithuania is quite complex, but we hold onto the brightness of hope. After all, we know we’re in God’s hands and that Lithuania is the Land of Mary. The predictions they made as they were deporting us to Siberia, that we would never return, did not come to pass. We believe in the future. We’re in God’s hands. We know that it will all work out. That we would never return! They threatened me personally also, claiming they would finish me off. I got six years for typing those six pages. It was the politics of intimidation to scare me from participating in the resistance. But we are truly in God’s hands. Alleluia!