About the rescuer and the rescue

Vladislavas Montvilas lived in Paragaudžiai village near Kvėdarna. He was an Adventist, a member of a Christian community emphasizing faith, love of one’s neighbour and responsibility for one’s actions. These values apparently shaped his determination to help persecuted people. Vladislavas farmed, owned land and had a home where guests visited.

The Montvilas couple had no children, so Vladislavas devoted much of his life to work and caring for others. In late October 1943, a young Jewish man from Telšiai, Jakovas Gurvičius, who had escaped from the ghetto, was brought to their home. Although both understood the risks, Vladislavas and his wife Halina agreed to shelter him. They introduced Jakovas to neighbours as a relative’s son under the surname Albinas Gudžinskas, providing him with a cover identity.

Jakovas lived almost openly in the Montvilas home, helped on the farm and later, with their support, even became head of the Kvėdarna district’s civil registry office. Such a rescue was mortally dangerous, but despite the threat, Vladislavas accepted responsibility for protecting a human life.

Vladislavas died in the postwar years, around 1950, when Lithuania was already under Soviet occupation. As the Montvilas couple had no children, their precise birth and death dates are unknown; this information was not preserved. Local people remember him less clearly than Halina because he died earlier, but both are remembered for the noble humanity they showed during the war.

On 28 September 2006, Vladislavas Montvilas and his wife Halina Montvilienė were recognized as Righteous Among the Nations.