Showing posts with label Railton Tas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Railton Tas. Show all posts

11 September 2025

Napoleonas Butkūnas (1907-1983), Patriot, Photographer, Philanthropist, by Daina Pocius and Rasa Ščevinskienė with Ann Tündern-Smith

Updated 22 September 2025.

Napoleonas Butkūnas certainly and rightly believed in the future of Lithuania.

Early Life

He was born on 22 January 1907, a native of Telšiai, from a family of wealthy farmers. It was large family, as My Heritage genealogists list 5 brothers and 3 sisters.

He had only one year of primary school, but this was followed by three years of private tutoring. He graduated from Plungė Gymnasium (senior high school) in 1928, so at the age of 21.

He entered Lithuania's military school and graduated with the rank of Lieutenant, before being promoted to Senior Lieutenant. The graduation probably was in 1930. After the 1934 coup d'état, he left the Army and work briefly as a civil servant.

Napoleonas Butkūnas in military uniform
Source:  MyHeritage

The coup was an attempt by supporters of the former Prime Minister Augustinas Voldemaras to overthrow the government of President Antanas Smetona.

Napoleonas was not happy working as a civil servant, so he enrolled to study at the Klaipėda Trade Institute, from which he graduated in 1938. He would have been a contemporary of Algirdas Undzenas at the Institute, although 6 years older.

An older Napoleonas Butkūnas

With a World War Coming

Those 3 years of tertiary education mean that, like Algirdas, he was one of the most educated Lithuanians to later find themselves in Australia. Unlike Algirdas, he had not leapt directly into management but instead took on the role of bookkeeper in a textile factory.

He again served in the Lithuanian Army, perhaps as a reservist, from 1938 to 1941, meaning that he maintained his role during the first Soviet occupation of Lithuania in 1940-41.

His selection papers for Australia have an interesting variation on the usual ‘forcibly evacuated by the Germans’. They say that he was ‘shanghaied in the street by the Germans’. They also say that he had worked in farming and as a labourer, possibly with the German forces or once he parted from them in Germany.

Napoleonas's date of arrival in Germany is noted as a very precise 25 July 1944 on his application for Australian citizenship.  This was around 3 months before the last Lithuanians could flee their homeland as the Soviet forces invaded it a second time.

After the War

When the War ended, he lived in a DP camp in Memingen. Later, finding his brother Vaclovas Butkevičius and his family in Oldenburg in the British Zone, he stayed with them and taught for 2 years in that camp’s Lithuanian school. (The family name of Butkūnas which Napoleonas was using at the time and later is a shortening of their name, Butkevičius. He had changed his name in 1939.)

War separated Napoleonas from his wife, Marija, and daughter, Liucija, both of whom remained in Lithuania. Despite this great loss, Napoleonas remained outgoing and involved himself in many cultural pursuits in Australia.

Marija Butkūniene, Napoleonas' wife
Source: MyHeritage

and their daughter, Liucija Butkūnaitė, later Pečkienė 
Source:  My Heritage

He described himself as a widower during the selection process for resettlement in Australia. He arrived on the First Transport, on 28 November 1947. At the age of 40, he was among the oldest passengers.

Later, when he applied for Australian citizenship in 1954, he changed his marital status from  separated, which he then crossed out, to married.  Here was a loyal husband.

Life in Australia

His level of English at the time of the selection interview, probably in September or early October 1947, was described as ‘slight – learning’.  However, when the Lithuanians assembled in the Diepholz camp one week prior to departure from Bremerhaven on the Heintzelman, in late October, he was elected the interpreter for their committee headed by Jonas Motiejūnas and Povilas Baltutis.  

Moreover, Genovaitė Kazokas, in her 2003 book, Lithuanian Artists in Australia, having interviewed Napoleonas, reported that one of the subjects he taught in the Oldenburg camp was English.  It seems that the Australian interviewers got the strength of his English wrong.  If they asked him directly about it, perhaps he was being modest.

As he stayed in the Bonegilla camp until 29 January 1948, more than 7 weeks, he had the opportunity to improve his fluency by attending classes every weekday, and chatting with the Australian staff.

With one-quarter of the men, he was sent initially to pick fruit in northern Victoria. In his case, his employers were AW and JF Fairley of Shepparton. After more than two months of this, he returned to the Bonegilla camp on 7 April. He stayed for another two weeks, with the possibility of more English language classes.

Next, he was sent to work at Goliath Portland Cement company in Railton, Tasmania, on 22 April.

His cancelled Alien Registration Certificate, held by the National Archives of Australia in Melbourne, shows his first address as being in Melbourne as of 19 August 1949. That was more than one month before the date, 30 September 1949, on which he would have been released from his ‘two-year’ work contract. It has been recorded without further comment.

Active Lithuanian in Melbourne

In Melbourne, he worked initially as a storeman and became an active member of the diaspora community. By the time he applied for citizenship in May 1954, he was a self-employed professional photographer.

For a long time, he was the only photographer of Lithuanian events. He advertised in the Lithuanian press that, ‘Those important occasions such as weddings, name days, christenings, house warmings, need to be imortalised in photographs, so when you return to Lithuania you have something to show your relatives’.

Napoleonas Butkūnas, photographer, advertisement 

He became a long-time contributor to and distributor of the Melbourne press. He worked for some time for the printing house of Teviskės Aidai, the Melbourne-based Lithuanian Catholic newspaper.

For more than 20 years, Napoleonas ran a bookshop in the hall adjacent to the church adopted by the Lithuanians, that of St John the Evangelist on Victoria Parade, East Melbourne. He distributed thousands of Lithuanian publications, hundreds of plaques and Lithuanian signs.  He supported Lithuanian activities and the parish with the profits from these sales.

When Lithuanian organisations were being established, Napoleonas was active everywhere. He was a founding member of the Melbourne Lithuanian Club, held various positions in the board of Kariau Ramové (the Lithuanian branch of Australia’s Returned Services League) and was briefly its chairman. He was also a frequent member of the Australian Lithuanian Community National Council, as well as the founder of the Blaivininkų Draugia (Temperance Society) and an active member of the Christian Democrats club.

In her book on Australian Lithuanians, Luda Popenhagen pinned down one of his many committees as that which founded Melbourne’s Lithuanian Club, registered with the Government in 1957. Another committee has been pinned down in the photograph below.

We think that Napoleonas is seated at the right of the front row in this photograph
of a Melbourne Lithuanian community committee

As a journalist, he wrote articles on various topics. As an artist, he used to paint in oils and donate his paintings to raffles organised by Lithuanian groups.

Genovaitė Kazokas wrote that art was Napoleonas' favourite subject in high school. She added that, “His oil paintings show a sense of composition and competent brushwork. His themes are Australian landscapes rendered realistically and with conventional perspective …”

A landscape in oils by Butkūnas

What of Lithuania’s future?  This was the type of question that Napoleon raised in conversations. ‘It is important that the Lithuanian consciousness of the diaspora lasts as long as possible, so that there are close and sincere relations between the homeland and the diaspora’, he wrote.

Napoleonas' Legacy

On 13 March 1983 at the age of 76, Napoleonas died in a Melbourne hospital. The funeral service was held at St. John's Catholic Church in East Melbourne, which had become the Lithuanian parish church. The Lithuanian choir, men's choir and a soloist, his nephew, Jurgis Rubas, sang. From the Church, a long convoy of cars escorted the casket to the Fawkner Cemetery, and from there a crowd of about 80 returned to the Melbourne Lithuanian Club for the wake.

Napoleonas bequeathed $30,000 to the Australian Lithuanian Fund. It was about half of his estate and, at that time, the biggest contribution to the Fund. It had been created through donations to develop and nurture Lithuanian cultural activities institutions around Australia. Napoleonas had said in his will, ‘Use my savings for the Lithuanian cause according to your wisdom’.

The Reserve Bank of Australia estimates that the $30,000 in 1983 would have had a buying power equivalent to nearly $118,000 in 2024. The interest it would have earned since 1983 could be taken into account too, although clearly some of the money has been spent on worthwhile projects – from the interest earned, rather than Napoleonas’ capital.

Also, in the immediate aftermath of his death, 16 people and organisations had donated a total of $125 to the Fund in his memory. The Reserve Bank estimation of the modern buying power of this amount is $490.

Discovering Australia

We know that he also cared about his new homeland, Australia, as he became a naturalised Australian citizen on 26 September 1955.

His niece, Dana Baltutienė wrote about him in the Mūsų Pastogė issue of 12 March 1984.

“My memories of my uncle Napoleon from the time in Lithuania are rather vague. I was still too young. I got to know my uncle more closely in the German camp in Oldenburg, where he then taught at a school for Lithuanian fugitives and deportees. Our family lived in a neighbouring camp, and Napoleonas visited us often.

“My uncle and I came to Australia in 1947.* He was sent to Tasmania for contract work, leaving my parents in northern Victoria. In 1951, uncle bought a house in Melbourne, in the suburb of St Kilda. At first, my parents also took shelter under that roof.

“At that time, the Lithuanians of Melbourne had already started organising community life, and our family actively got involved. Uncle, of course, had become a member of the family. We went everywhere together to dances, plays, to church on Sundays.

“When he bought a car, a new period of traveling around Victoria began in my life. Whenever my uncle was able to get away from work and I from school, we would travel together. During five years of living together in St Kilda we drove across Victoria. We travelled very simply, without any amenities. When the evening came, uncle would park the car away from the road, tie his own a hammock between two eucalyptus trees and sleep. I, meanwhile, made my bed in the bushes. As soon as the sun came up, we continued our journey. Uncle was never looking for conveniences.

“Later, after I got married, he bought a tent and a spirit stove. He extended his travels even to northern Australia. After returning, he shared his impressions with us, showing photos and slides from the trip.

“Uncle was a friendly person, a bright face in Melbourne's Lithuanian community. He lived a modest and simple life. He neither smoked nor drank nor ate meat. He had loved books since he was young, and as he got older, he became even more attached to them.

“He often wrote about various topics in our press. He nurtured the Esperanto language, submitted essays to their publications.

“After falling ill with arthritis in his legs, he returned to his youthful hobby of painting. His drawings, dominated by nature, Australian eucalyptus trees and the sun, decorate the rooms of his wife, daughter and grandson in Lithuania.”

In Conclusion

To be buying his own house in 1951, maybe less than 4 years after arrival in Australia, is amazing. Someone who did not drink alcohol, smoke or eat meat, however, would have had much lower living expenses than someone who did.

The photograph of Napoleonas used with his Teviškės Aidai obituary
Source:  Teviškės Aidai

Thanks to that large donation from his estate, Napoleonas’ legacy lives on in literature as well as his art. For instance, one of the first steps after Lithuanian freedom from Soviet control in 1991 was the publication of an anthology called Po Pietų Kryžium or Under the Southern Cross.

Money from the Australian Lithuanian Fund, including from Napoleonas’ estate, was used to print this anthology in Lithuania, at a price much less than the cost of preparing and printing a book in Australia. This was organised through the efforts of Napoleonas’ niece, Dana Baltutienė, now chairing the Lithuanian Cultural Council. When the anthology became available to Australian purchasers in 1991, it was possible to offer it for sale at only $10 a copy, a price of about $23 in 2024. Of course, it also had offered business to a newly independent Lithuanian printing house and its employees.

Footnote

* Her uncle certainly came to Australia in 1947, but Dana was hazy about her own date of arrival. A Bonegilla camp identity card has Danuta Butkevicius arriving on the Svalbard, which reached Australia on 28 June 1949. Although Dana was already 11 years old, the signature on the card is V. Butkevicius or her father, Vaclovas, who came with his wife and Danuta on the same voyage. Also on that voyage was another Butkevicius, Jonas. If he was related, there were now 3 brothers in Australia. And, for there to be a nephew with a different family name, at least one of his sisters probably reached Australia too.

CITE THIS AS:  Pocius, D, Ščevinskienė, R and Tündern-Smith, A (2025) 'Napoleonas Butkunas (1907-1983), Patriot, Photographer, Philanthropist'

Sources

Australijos Lietuvis [The Australian Lithuanian] (1951) ['Advertising'] Melbourne, 29 October, page 14 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/280320837, accessed 8 September 2025.

Baltrukonienė, Alisa (1983) ‘Mirusieji, Anapilin Iškeliavo Napoleonas Butkūas’, ‘The Dead, Napoleonas Butkūnas has set off for Anapilis’ Mūsų Pastogė [Our Haven] Sydney, 4 April, p 2 https://www.spauda2.org/musu_pastoge/archive/1983/1983-04-04-MUSU-PASTOGE.pdf accessed 13 March 2025.

Baltrukonienė, Alisa (1991) ‘”Po Pietų Kryžium”’ [‘”Under the Southern Cross”’] Mūsų Pastogė [Our Haven] Sydney, 15 April, p 7 https://spauda2.org/musu_pastoge/archive/1991/1991-04-15-MUSU-PASTOGE.pdf accessed 11 March 2025.

Butkevičiūtė-Baltutienė, Dana (1984) ‘Dėdė Napoleoną Prisimenant’ [‘Remembering Uncle Napoleonas’] Mūsų Pastogė [Our Haven] Sydney, 12 March, p 6 https://www.spauda2.org/musu_pastoge/archive/1984/1984-03-12-MUSU-PASTOGE.pdf accessed 12 March 2025.

Find a Grave, 'Napoleonas Butkunas' https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/212474059/napoleonas-butkunas accessed 9 September 2025.

Kazokas, Genovaitė Elena (1992) ‘Lithuanian Artists in Australia 1950-1990, Volume II’, Hobart, University of Tasmania, thesis. https://figshare.utas.edu.au/articles/thesis/Lithuanian_artists_in_Australia_1950-1990_Vols_I_and_II/23205632/1, accessed 8 September 2025.

Kazokas, Genovaitė (2003) Lithuanian Artists in Australia, 1950-1990 Melbourne, Europe-Australia Institute, pp 187-8.

My Heritage, 'Napoleonas Butkūnas(Butkevičius)' https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-1-OYYV6P5EABRTJ4FB3EB2WUN4XXQXZKY-1-16/napoleonas-butk%C5%ABnasbutkevi%C4%8Dius-in-myheritage-family-trees, accessed 11 September 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, Central Office; A446, Correspondence files, annual single number series with block allocations, 1926-; 1955/3672, Application for Naturalisation - BUTKUNAS Napoleonas born 22 January 1907, 1954-1955; recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=8838788, accessed 10 September 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria]; A2571, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla],1947- 1956; BUTKEVICIUS DANUTA, BUTKEVICIUS, Danuta : Year of Birth - 1938 : Nationality - LITHUANIAN : Travelled per - SVALBARD : Number - [UNKNOWN], 1949-1949 recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203671692 accessed 8 September 2025.

Reserve Bank of Australia, 'Inflation Calculator', https://www.rba.gov.au/calculator/annualDecimal.html accessed 11 March 2025.

Popenhagen, Luda (2012) Australian Lithuanians Kensington, NSW, University of New South Wales Press, p 127.

pv (1984) 'Pašventintas Napoleono Butkūno Antkapis' ['Napoleon Butkunas' Tombstone Consecrated'] Teviškės Aidai [The Echoes of Homeland] Melbourne, March 23, p 7, https://www.spauda2.org/teviskes_aidai/archive/1984/1984-03-23-TEVISKES-AIDAI.pdf, accessed 8 September 2025.

Wikipedia, ‘1934 Lithuanian coup attempt’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1934_Lithuanian_coup_attempt accessed 14 March 2025.

Zubras, A (1984) ‘Jis tikėjo Lietuvos ateitimi’ [‘He believed in Lithuania’s future’] Mūsų Pastogė [Our Haven] Sydney, 12 March, p 6 https://www.spauda2.org/musu_pastoge/archive/1984/1984-03-12-MUSU-PASTOGE.pdf accessed 11 March 2025.

08 September 2025

Vaclovas Kalytis (1918-1967): An Escape, and a Murder, by Daina Pocius and Ann Tündern-Smith with Rasa Ščevinskienė

Vaclovas was one of 22 men from the First Transport who found themselves assigned to the Goliath Portland Cement Company in Railton, Tasmania. He and the others claimed to be unsure of how long they were meant to work to repay the Australian Government for their resettlement in Australia. After they had been undertaking the hard, dusty work there for 14 months, he, and others decided to find the answer.

Vaclovas wrote an article in the Australijos Lietuvis [Australian Lithuanian] newspaper about the experience, titled Kaip mes pabėgom … [How We Escaped …].

Vaclovas Kalytis photograph from his Bonegilla card

Escaping from Railton

“We [Vaclovas and Kazimieras or Kazys Vilutis] each packed a suitcase, left the factory, took a taxi to the nearest airport, caught a flight to Melbourne and hurried to catch the express train to Bonegilla. Along the way, two more compatriots join us in the same direction.

“After straightening our ties, we stood before the highest officer of the Commonwealth Employment Service (CES), to plead our case.

“The young officer looked us over from head to toe for a long time and, after thinking for a long time, said, ‘You First Transporters want to change your jobs?’ He looked at his watch and said ‘I give you gentlemen 30 minutes to disappear from Bonegilla, if you are still here, I will call the police. Goodbye, you are free to go’.*

“I wasn’t sure if that meant, we were ‘free’ or just free until the police arrived. We didn’t wait around and in ten minutes were on a bus out of there. Returning to Melbourne, we encountered some countrymen who told us about the Dunlop factory. We started the next day.

“The Dunlop factory was very large, employing over 4000 men and women. The wages were good and plenty of opportunity for overtime. Soon there were 15 Lithuanians working there.

“Later we went to the Immigration Department, registered and now, like real Australians, we live as if we were free.”

He ended the article by providing his address and stating that compatriots could get in contact with him if they needed any assistance. The article caused some angst in the community, as his fellow Lithuanians began to think anyone, even recent arrivals, could shorten their working contract by doing the same.

Return to Railton

Vaclovas wrote a follow up letter from Railton, dated 2 May 1949 and published 6 weeks later, stating that his How We Escaped article applied only to the Lithuanians of First Transport, who all were single. In Germany, the First Transporters had signed a contract for one year only, the argument they were using with Australian officials. He asked his compatriots not to ask him about this anymore, as he did not know what his future held.

The Immigration Department had contacted them and threatened to have the five men deported to Germany if they did not return to Tasmania. They did return. Vaclovas’ follow up letter indicates that he was back in Railton, so his escape had failed.

Staying in Tasmania

He stayed in Tasmania, but he moved around between residences and jobs. Signs of this is advice in the Launceston Examiner newspaper, in October 1952, that W Kalytis was in a group of 5 presenting a ‘hula dance’ at a fundraiser on Flinders Island. Two months later, Mrs W Kalytis of Whitemark, the one town on Flinders Island, had been a passenger on a trip to mainland Tasmania with her baby daughter. We assume that the Examiner’s Country News reporter or a typesetter had problems separating V’s from W’s.

Vaclovas' Youth

Vaclovas was born on 15 September 1918. His selection papers for Australia say that he was born in Leningrad, in Russia. He spent his youth in the village of Norkūnai near Utena, however, where he finished 4 years of school. When he grew up, he moved to Ukmergė and Kaunas and worked as a sales clerk. During the war he served in the anti-aircraft unit.

He also had worked on farms. The selection papers say that he had done this for four years in Lithuania, and that it was his present occupation in Germany as of mid-October 1947.

By the 1944 northern summer, he must have been working in a factory, however, because the record of his selection interview for Australia says, “Moved with his factory to Germany”.  After the War, he found accommodation in one of 5 Displaced Persons camps in Lübeck, which together housed almost 10,000 refugees.

Early Days in Australia

From there, he arrived in Australia in the First Transport. More than 7 weeks in the Bonegilla camp, included 2 days in January when a health worry was checked at the Albury General Hospital. Shortly after, on 28 January 1948, he was assigned to pick fruit for Messrs Turnbull Brothers in Ardmona.

He returned to Bonegilla after 3 weeks and soon after found himself working as a kitchen hand at Bonegilla for just over one month. It was not until 8 April that he was sent to Railton in Tasmania and the Goliath Portland Cement Company with 8 compatriots.

Vaclovas the Singer

As soon as he arrived in Tasmania, he organised a Lithuanian choir at the cement factory. His obituarist wrote that, “He sang to anyone who would listen”.

We have already read that the Burnie newspaper on 2 October 1948 reported a Railton function to celebrate one of Lithuania's national days. Tarvydas writes that the singing was led by Vaclovas Kalytis and the women joining in the national dances were locals who had been taught the steps by Railton’s Lithuanian men. Kalytis kept the music going at other gatherings with his piano accordion.

The next year’s public Lithuanian national day celebration is described in more detail by Genovaitė Kazokas in her PhD thesis on Lithuanian Artists in Australia 1950-1990. She wrote, "In September, 1949, the fifteen Lithuanian men working in Railton celebrated Lithuanian Day by organising a Lithuanian folk-art exhibition, the first ever held in Tasmania, and by performing national songs and dances. Invited guests included local clergy and Mr. Davies-Graham, the manager of the Railton Cement Works where the Lithuanians were employed.

"Young local Tasmanian women, trained by the Lithuanians, partnered the men in folk dancing and the small male choir was trained and conducted by Vaclovas Kalytis. The programme also included a talk on Lithuanian history by Napoleonas Butkunas.

"The male choir was invited to sing at several Catholic churches in the district. The official Catholic newspaper published a complimentary report on the men's cultural abilities and activities."

After moving to Hobart, Vaclovas was one of the founders of the Lithuanian community there, but was more famous for forming the Hobart Lithuanian Quartet. In addition to Vaclovas, (second tenor), it included Bronius Bukevičius, (first tenor), Karolis Maslauskas (baritone), and Juozas Ilčiukas (bass).

In December 1950, the quartet sang carols and folk songs at the Hobart City Hall for the Christmas function for New Australians. (Arthur Calwell, the Minister for Immigration, had asked the press and public to call the Displaced Persons New Australians instead of the universal “Balts” or “reffos”.)

For several years the quartet sang Lithuanian songs in Hobart, sometimes on stage, sometimes on the radio, and introduced Lithuanians to the Australian public. When the quartet disbanded, Vaclovas’ voice was still heard whether it was in the community commemorations or ceremonies.

As money was always short, Lithuanians would help each other with building their houses on weekends. Vaclovas assisted his friend Antanas Viknius build his house in Orchard Lane, Hobart. At the end of work on Sunday, the workers would sit down for a meal and drinks. Vaclovas would take out his accordion. According to Ramunas Tarvydas, the sound of the singing would be so loud that it would carry almost one kilometre to Kenbrae Avenue, Glenorchy, to another group of Lithuanians. They would hurry over and join the party.

Life and Death

He married Rita had two daughters and a son. When he was fulfilled all requirements for Australian citizenship on 4 June 1963, the family was living in Kingston, an semi-rural area 10 kilometres south of Tasmania’s capital, Hobart. (It was 11 minutes by road north of Electrona, about which we have written recently.)

They were neighbours to Margot Paterson, who wrote in detail about their life there. She reveals that, on 11 September 1967, Vaclovas was murdered in Hobart, only days before his 49th birthday. It seems that his likely killers were known, but never arrested or charged.

He had been working with Electrolytic Zinc at Risdon, upriver from Hobart.  He had become a cyanide specialist, which was a one-man job.  He seldom had contact with fellow workers except during the brief handover at the end of the shift.  He had a 40-minute wait in Hobart for the bus south to Kingston.  So it was natural to have a couple of drinks in the nearby pub while he waited, which gave him a spot of adult male company.  Unfortunately, he also had become very generous is shouting rounds at this pub.

One evening, two young men insisted on giving him a lift home instead of letting him take the bus.  After he failed to arrive home, he was found the next morning on Sandy Bay Beach, with many injuries and near death after a bashing.  His recovery took many weeks but, eventually, he was able to return to work.  His English was much improved by his many weeks in hospital.

The two young thugs were jailed, as they had been identified by Vaclovas' fellow drinkers at the pub.  They were released on parole two years later.  On that day, Vaclovas failed to come home and family and a neighbour spent fruitless hours searching for him.  The phone call to say that he had been found dead came the next morning.  The inquest found that he had been killed by a single blow to the head.

This time, no-one was arrested as likely to have been involved in his murder.

This death, of course, was a great shock to his wife and children. His two daughters were studying at high school and his son was still in primary school.

In Vaclovas’ obituary he was described as a typical ‘Aukštaitis’ (eastern highlander); cheerful, a singer, friendly, active and energetic but with an easy and carefree manner. He left behind an aging mother and many relatives in Lithuania, as well as a brother in the United States of America.

The children have become achievers, with one an artist, another a published author, music and film director and producer who has become a therapist, while the third became the head of an information technology company. However, the middle child, artistic Diana, died of cancer on 6 March 1983, aged 30.

Margot Paterson's "The Road to the Farm" is well worth reading, especially its Chapter Chapter 3, which covers her view of the Kalytis family's life as her neighbours.

Footnote

* Povilas Niaura’s son Stephen has obtained copies of documents prepared by Ramunas Tarvydas (see Sources) and amended by staff of the Railton company now known as Cement Australia. One amendment shows that Vaclovas Kalytis and Kazimieris (Kazys) Vilutis both ‘absconded’ on 14 February 1949. Two more absconded on 28 February 1949: Antanas Viknius and Endel Uduste, an Estonian. Another Lithuanian who ‘absconded’, on 16 March 1949, was Edmundas Obelevicius. Perhaps there was some hanging around Melbourne for at least two weeks until a group of 4 had enough courage to present together before the CES official in Bonegilla.

By the time Ramunas wrote up his notes, he had changed the group which ‘absconded’ from Railton to Kalytis, Vilutis, Viknius, Endrius Jankus and Vytautas Stasiukynas. The typed note against Endrius’ name says ‘Explosives Engineering’, the name of the company he had founded. Vytautas Stasiukynas ‘left of own accord’ rather than ‘absconded’ on the same date as Antanas and Endel.

We know in some detail what then happened to Endrius, who is not known to have found employment with Dunlop. That detail is reported on page 32 of Ramunas Tarvydas book’ and in this blog, in the entry on the life of Endrius.

On the other hand, those who have reported on the life of Vytautas Stasiukynas, a veterinarian who left Australia for Colombia in 1950, have avoided the detail of his 1949 interactions with the CES.

As far as Arthur Calwell, Minister for Immigration was concerned, the official should have found members of the group employment in areas of reported need somewhere else. This certainly is what happened in the cases of Adomas Ivanauskas, Rasa’s grandfather, and his friend, Domas Valancius, when they returned to Bonegilla on 12 April 1948. Did the official react differently to Vaclovas and his companions because they had waited until February 1949? Had the official not been advised what he should have been doing should a case like this occur?

Sources

Advocate (Burnie, Tas), 'Migrants celebrate national day', 2 October 1948, p 3, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/69190232, accessed 13 July 2023.

AK (1967) ‘AA Vaclovas Kalytetis’ [‘RIP Vaclovas Kalytis, in Lithuanian] Mūsų Pastogė, Sydney, 11 November, p 2 https://spauda2.org/musu_pastoge/archive/1967/1967-11-06-MUSU-PASTOGE.pdf accessed 28 March 2025.

Examiner (1952a) 'News from the Country' Launceston, 18 October, p 16 trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/52918517, accessed 8 September 2025.

Examiner (1952b) 'Country News' Launceston, 23 December, p 7 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/52927170, accessed 8 September 2025.

Kalytis, Vaclovas (1949a) ‘Kaip mes pabėgom …’ [‘How we escaped …’ in Lithuanian] Australijos Lietuvis [Australian Lithuanian], Adelaide, 11 April, p 9 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/page/31542465 accessed 25 March 2025.

Kalytis, Vaclovas (1949b), ‘Kaip Mes Ten Iš Tikruju "Pabėgom”’ [‘How We Really "Escaped" From There’, in Lithuanian] Australijos Lietuvis [Australian Lithuanian] Adelaide, 23 May, p 11 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/280321227 accessed 25 March 2025.

Kazokas, Genovaitė (1992) 'Lithuanian Artists in Australia 1950-1990, Vol 1, p 328 https://figshare.utas.edu.au/articles/thesis/Lithuanian_artists_in_Australia_1950-1990_Vols_I_and_II/23205632?file=40902071, accessed 8 September 2025.

DPCamps.org ‘DP Camps in Germany – L’ http://www.dpcamps.org/dpcampsGermanyL.html accessed 25 March 2025.

Mercury (1950) ‘Lithuanian Quartet’, Hobart, 9 December, p 6 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/26744818 accessed 28 March 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, Central Office; A11772, Migrant Selection Documents for Displaced Persons who travelled to Australia per General Stuart Heintzelman departing Bremerhaven 30 October 1947, 1947-47; 391, KALYTIS Vacslavas (sic) DOB 15 September 1918, 1947-47 https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=5005687 accessed 28 March 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria], 1947-56; A2571, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla],1947- 1956; KALYTIS VACSLAVAS, KALYTIS, Vacslavas : Year of Birth - 1918 : Nationality - LITHUANIAN : Travelled per - GEN. HEINTZELMAN : Number – 775, 1947-48, https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203640629 accessed 28 March 2025.

Paterson, Margot (2020) ‘The Road to the Farm, Chapter 3’ https://alexpaterson.net/anecdote/TRTTF_3.htm accessed 7 September 2025.

Tarvydas, Ramunas (1997) From Amber Coast to Apple Isle: Fifty Years of Baltic Immigrants in Tasmania 1948-1998. Hobart, Baltic Semicentennial Commemoration Activities Organising Committee, p 64.

17 August 2025

Žilinskas three, by Daina Pocius and Ann Tündern-Smith

Updated 28 August and 2 September 2025.

Green is a common enough family name among English speakers. Its Slavic equivalents include Zelinski, Zelinsky, Zelenskii, Zelenskiy and so on. In recent years, the whole world has become familiar with a Ukrainian version, Zelinskyy.  The Lithuanian equivalent is Žilinskas.

Onomasticians, people who study names, say that this is a toponym, a name derived from a place. The families which carry this name originated in a place which was known for its greenness.

There are over twenty people with the name Žilinskas who came to Australia from Germany after World War II, but only three who arrived on the First Transport. Later arrivals were family units but, in this instance, two men of that name were brothers.

Aleksandras Žilinskas

Aleksandras was named after his father and born on 17 June 1928 in Šiauliai. He was a farmer but recorded as a barber when in Germany, where he had arrived in 1943.  As he would have been only 14 or 15 at the time, it looks like he may have been rounded up from whatever he was doing in Lithuania to provide youthful labour for the Germans.

After the War, he had wanted to return to Lithuania if independent but indicated that he would migrate to Canada as second preference.

Aleksandras Zilinskas' ID photo from his Bonegilla card

Instead, he was part of the First Transport to Australia. He would have been only 15 when he left Lithuania, and no family is indicated in the records. Now aged only 19, he was sent to pick fruit at HE Pickworth’s orchard in the Goulbourn Valley as part of his two-year employment contract. Once the harvest was finished, he returned to Bonegilla on 1 April 1948 and was transferred to Tasmania a week later.

Initially in Tasmania he picked fruit again, maybe apples instead of pears given that Tasmania was renown then for its apples.  He worked for EG Lees for one month before transferring to the  Goliath Portland cement company at Railton from May 1948.

It is reputed that Aleksandras was seeing two girls at one time, which caused some rivalry with the local lads. He was challenged to a fight, which he won. The local policeman needed to intervene when the local boys marched into camp seeking revenge.

That's Aleksandras, second from left, joining others for a smoke before a concert during his time in Railton; left is Endrius Jankus, on the right we have Kazys Vilutis and Vaclovas Kalytis
Source:  Collection of Endrius Jankus

On another occasion Aleksandras wielded a toy pistol after an argument, hitting a local who had to have seven stitches in his head. Aleksandras pleaded guilty to assault and was fined £2, with 2/6 costs.  Given the date when he was before the court, this incident probably occurred when Aleksandras worked for the Hydro Electric Commission in Tasmania’s Central Highlands from 1950 to 1951. Here he most likely helped build dams, power stations or accommodation. 

He then worked at the Electrolytic Zinc Company at Rosebery from 1951 to 1955.

Aleksandras didn’t stay in Tasmania but moved to Queensland in 1956.  The National Archives has a file which records him first making contact with the Department of Immigration in Brisbane in August 1969.  He had applied to become an Australian citizen and was living already with Thelma Daphne Pike, known as Mrs Zilinskas.  He was working as a gardener at the time.

On 23 January 1970, before the long-serving Lord Mayor of Brisbane, Clem Jones, Aleksandras took the oath of allegiance and became an Australian citizen.

After 75 years in Australia, Aleksandras passed away on 1 November 2023, aged a respectable 95.  His ashes are interrred in the Bribie Island Memorial Gardens, Woorim, Moreton Bay Region, Queensland.

Clearly no-one proofread this plaque for Aleksandras' birthplace before it was cast

Juozas Žilinskas

Juozas Žilinskas was said to have been born in 1907 in the Lithuanian village of Jaunai, Kalvarija township, Marijampolė district, into a family of a wealthy farmers. According to his death certificate, his parents were George (probably Jurgis) and Marie (possibly Marija, née Cejinskas, which would be Cejinskaite in Lithuania).

He had five brothers and two sisters. One brother, Jurgis, also came to Australia on the General Stuart Heintzelman.

Juozas studied in Kybartai and Marijampolė. He later studied humanities in Kaunas and continued his studies at the universities of Rome and Paris. He taught at the Marijampolė gymnasium (senior high school) and was the director of the Kybartai gymnasium during the last years of Lithuania’s independence and the German occupation. In exile, he organised and directed the Lithuanian school in his DP camp. By this time, he could speak 8 languages.

He was 40 when he arrived in Australia, although it is suspected he was at least five years older. (The age of 40 had been specified as the maximum for those refugees lucky enough to be selected for the First Transport.)

Juozas Zilinskas' ID photograph from his Bonegilla card

He was sent to pick fruit at the HE Pickworth orchard on 28 January 1948, returning to the Bonegilla camp on 1 April after 2 months away. The camp administration then employed him as a kitchen hand for more than 3 months, from 6 April to 25 July.

Next, he was sent to Canberra on 3 August to work for the Department of Works and Housing. In practical terms, he was making bricks at the Canberra Brickworks. If he was released from the terms of his two-year employment-where-sent contract at the same time as most others, on 30 September 1949, this would have meant 13 months of more labour for the former senior high school principal.

He remained in Canberra and found employment with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in its stores, where he worked until his death. He had a very good reputation in CSIRO due to his diligence and honesty.

One of Ann’s informants, Estonian Galja Mägi, had come to Australia on the General Stuart Heintzelman too, but on a later voyage which left Naples on 31 March 1949 and reached Melbourne on 20 April (which must have been a record time). She said that Juozas had been the first Baltic refugee to buy his own house in Canberra.

Galja Mägi and her 12-year-old son, Tõnu (later Tony) had lived with Mr and Mrs Zilinskas for the nine months before 20 December 1951, when they had been able to move into their own home. Mrs Mägi’s husband and Tony’s father, Johannes, had preceded them to Australia and was living in Canberra hostels for working men at the same time.

Galja learnt that Juozas was the eldest son in his family, so his father had wanted him to become a priest, as was a custom in those days. Try as he might, he could not commit himself to the priesthood. He nearly had a nervous breakdown over the matter. In the end, he was allowed to leave home and continue to study.

Galja said that Mrs Zilinskas, Wanda, had been a primary school teacher. She had been married before World War II to another teacher, but he had been killed by the Russians. She had fled to Germany with her sister and parents. Her father had died of typhus in one of the Displaced Persons camps. Juozas, who knew her before the War, located her and sponsored her entry to Australia.

Away from his home and work, in the Lithuanian community, Juozas could be seen everywhere and often. He did not neglect a single commemoration or community gathering. He was chairman of the very first committee for the Lithuanian Community in Canberra. From then on, he was on every committee and board.

When Juozas was a little bit over 50 years old, he developed a bad pain in his back. The doctor prescribed tablets for him and told him that he was not to go to work, or even drive, for three weeks. At the end of this time, he went back to the doctor, who wrote him a medical certificate for the period. Juozas took the certificate home and looked up the word the doctor had written for his condition in a medical dictionary. What he found there stopped him in his tracks. The dictionary said, “incurable”.

By this stage, he was having difficulty in reading. There was no nerve specialist in Canberra, only someone who came from Sydney once a month. He did not have anyone with him he could discuss his condition. He spent the evening quietly, lying on his back, staring at the ceiling. That night, he did not sleep. We need to understand how much pain he might have been experiencing despite the treatment already received.

The next day he returned to work, in the stores at the CSIRO. The stores contained sodium cyanide among many other chemicals. That day, 5 April 1961, he was found deceased in a CSIRO storeroom about 1.40 pm. The Canberra Police were notified, and the body was taken to Canberra morgue where an autopsy was carried out.

At 2.30 pm, someone turned up at Wanda’s workplace to tell her that her husband was dead. He had poisoned himself in his storeroom and collapsed on the floor. Wanda was so devastated that for six months she could not return home. She spent this time boarding with other couples.

This news of his death shocked not only his wife, other relatives and friends, but the entire Lithuanian community of Canberra and, undoubtedly, the wider Lithuanian community. 

Canberrans and Australians in general would have been shocked by the circumstances also – so much so that Juozas’ death and some others like it are the reason why Australia now has a Telephone Interpreter Service. Had it operated in 1961, Juozas might have had someone with the language and technical skills to connect him to a medical person with whom he could have discussed his situation, day or night.

Juozas was buried in Woden Cemetery, Phillip, Canberra. He was survived by Wanda, who lived another 36 years, until 1997. They had no children.

Juozas' grave
Photograph:  Ann Tündern-Smith

Wanda Zilinskas (left) with a First Transport arrival, Birute Tamulyte Gruzas
Source:  Collection of Birute Tamulyte Gruzas

At the time of his death, Juozas and Wanda had moved from the original house in Ebden Street, Ainslie, up the hill to a home closer to his Black Mountain workplace, in Cockle Street, O’Connor. This very house was celebrated in a book prepared for Canberra’s centenary in 2013 by Tim Reeves and Alan Roberts, 100 Canberra Houses.

The authors wrote that the house had been built in 1960 by a Polish Displaced Person, who had cleared a rocky, hillside block himself and ordered a Women’s Weekly plan from a local department store. He also had built the whole house himself apart from the brickwork and stonework. Perhaps because of Juozas’ recent death, the first buyer was recorded as Wanda Zilinskas, who paid just over £5,000 for it.

This was much to the builder’s satisfaction. However, it also was the home where Wanda could not stay for 6 months after her husband died.

2001 watercolour by an unknown artist of the house in which the Juozas and Wanda Zilinskas
were living at the time of Juozas' death.
Source:  Reeves and Roberts, 100 Canberra Houses

Jurgis Žilinskas

Juozas Žilinskas’ brother Jurgis, was born in 1910, also in the village of Jaunai, Kalvarija township, Marijampole district.

Jurgis finished his studies at the Marijampolė school and the Technical School in Kaunas, from which he graduated as a mechanic.

After the War, he lived in the Hanau displaced persons camp in Germany. The record of his interview with the Australian selection panel records him as one of those to have been “forcibly evacuated by the Germans”.

Jurgis Zilinskas' photograph from his selection documents

He arrived in Australia on the First Transport in 1947. Like his brother, he left the Bonegilla camp on 28 January 1948 to pick fruit at the HE Pickford orchard. Together they returned to Bonegilla on 1 April, and together they worked as kitchen hands in the camp for 6 weeks until 25 July 1948. Then, together yet again, they set out for Canberra to labour at the Brickworks.

Jurgis is on the far right of the row of 11 Bonegilla camp employees with a 12th in front
Who are the others?  Who took the photograph?  Was it the versatile Gunars Berzarrins?
Source: this copy from the Collection of Galina Vasins Karciauskas; also in the Australian Lithuanian Archives

Like his brother, he was one of the first Lithuanians to settle in Canberra. He also was one of the first to buy a house and he provided assistance to many Lithuanians. He was a supporter of the Canberra Lithuanian Club, of which he served as President in 1954, and participated in many Lithuanian gatherings.

Here he met and married Bronė Rubikaitė. She had arrived in the middle of 1948 on the Svalbard, the Fifth Transport, and been sent from the Bonegilla camp to work as a domestic in the Cooma Hospital in southern New South Wales. As Cooma is some 90 road minutes from Canberra and there was a train service at that time, perhaps she was in Canberra to mix with more fellow Lithuanians.

Jurgis was a passionate chess player, known locally as by the translation into English of his first name, George. Ann has counted 20 reports of his chess competition results in the Canberra Times, so suggests to any readers interested in the detail that they search the National Library’s Trove digitisation service themselves.

In late 1949, he was one of 8 Lithuanians who participated in a New Australians versus the Canberra Chess Club tournament, along with 2 Latvians, a Hungarian, and Estonian geologist, Professor AA Öpik. The New Australians won resoundingly, which probably led to invitations to join the Canberra players, as George played for them later.

He was Canberra’s champion player in 1951.

Jurgis, seated second from left, playing chess

Ann has been told that Jurgis was “a bit of a gambler”. He probably gambled with his health because, aged 63, he died suddenly of a heart attack on 3 August 1973. He had been working at the Canberra Brickworks for 25 years at the time of his death although, according to his death certificate, he had risen to the skilled occupation of bricklayer.

His funeral took place at St Christophers Cathedral before the cortège left for the Woden Cemetery. He was buried near his brother Juozas, who had died 8 years earlier.

Jurgis' grave with his wife, Bronė (see below)
Photograph:  Ann Tündern-Smith

A laughing Jurgis, his grave image
Photograph:  Ann Tündern-Smith

Neither of them lived to see the freedom of the Motherland, for which both had yearned.

Bronė was buried besides her husband on 5 June 1996, having died one month earlier. Her mental health must have deteriorated badly in the twenty and more years after her husband’s death. Ann has been told that she used to wander around the local shops talking to herself. Another informant has told of how she was scammed by 2 men who made use of her vulnerable state. As this is Jurgis’ story, the details of his wife’s life are better shared by someone focussed on those who came on the Second Transport.

Bronė also told this informant that she had nothing to do with Juozas or his wife as they did not like her. Juozas’ wife, Wanda, who died after Bronė, on 21 July 1997, is not buried with the others. She chose cremation, so her ashes are stored in the Sister Kenny Wall at Canberra’s Norwood Crematorium.

CITE THIS AS Pocius, Daina and Tündern-Smith, Ann (2025) Želinskas three https://firsttransport.blogspot.com/2025/08/zilinskas-three.html.

Sources

Advocate (1951) ‘Toy Pistol with a Wallop’, Burnie, Tas, 25 May, page 9 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/69286430, accessed 16 August 2025.

AEF DP Registration Record, 'Aleksandras Zelinskas', 3.1.1.1 Postwar Card File / Postwar Card File (A-Z) Names in "phonetical" order from SI, ITS Digital Archive, Arolsen Archives https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/en/document/69061784accessed 16 August 2025.

Australian Capital Territory Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages 1961, Death certificate: Jouzas Zilinskas, Canberra, certified copy held by Ann Tündern-Smith.

Australian Capital Territory Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages 1973, Death certificate: Jurgis Zilinskas, Canberra, certified copy held by Ann Tündern-Smith.

Australijos Lietuvis (Australian Lithuanian) (1949) ‘Mūsų šachmatininkai Canberoje’ (Our Chess Players in Canberra, in Lithuanian), Adelaide, SA, 19 December, p28 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article280322235, accessed 14 August 2025.

Canberra Times (1961) ‘Man Found Dead in Storeroom’, Canberra, ACT, 6 April, p 3 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article133976454, accessed 13 August 2025.

Canberra Times (1973) ‘Return Thanks’, Canberra, ACT, 16 August, p 18 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article110743068, accessed 3 August 2025.

Canberra Times (1973) ‘Funerals’, Canberra, ACT, 6 August, p 10 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/110741343, accessed 16 August 2025.

CŽB (1961) ‘Canberros Naujienos, Staigi Mirtis’ (‘Canberra News, Sudden Death’, in Lithuanian), Mūsų Pastogė (Our Haven), Sydney, 18 April, p 4 https://spauda2.org/musu_pastoge/archive/1961/1961-04-18-MUSU-PASTOGE.pdfaccessed 16 August 2025.

Examiner (1951) 'Struck by Toy Pistol' Launceston, Tas, 26 May, p 7 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article52816810, accessed 16 August 2025.

Find a Grave, ‘Brone Zilinskas’ https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/230145727/brone-zilinskas, accessed 16 August 2025.

Find a Grave, ‘Joozas (sic) Zilinskas’ https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/230151971/joozas-zilinskas, accessed 16 August 2025.

Find a Grave, ‘Jungis (sic) Zilinskas’ https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/230148732/jungis-zilinskas, accessed 16 August 2025.

Find a Grave, ‘Wanda Zilinskas’ https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/263471913/wanda-zilinskas, accessed 16 August 2025.

J (1973) ‘A A Jurgis Zilinskas’ (RIP Jurgis Zilinskas, in Lithuanian), Tėviškės Aidai (Echoes of the Homeland), Melbourne, 21 August, No 32, p 3 https://spauda2.org/teviskes_aidai/archive/1973/1973-nr32-TEVISKES-AIDAI.pdf, accessed 16 August 2025.

JŽ (1954) ‘Canberros Lietuvių Bendruomenė’ (‘Canberra Lithuanian Community’, in Lithuanian), Mūsų Pastogė (Our Haven), Sydney, 15 December, p 2 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/259360319, accessed 14 August 2025.

Mägi, Galina (Galja), Personal communication with Ann Tündern-Smith, 13 August 2021.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, Central Office; A11772, Migrant Selection Documents for Displaced Persons who travelled to Australia per General Stuart Heintzelman departing Bremerhaven 30 October 1947; 344, ZILINSKAS, Aleksandras DOB 17 June 1925 https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=5118126, accessed 16 August 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, Central Office; A11772, Migrant Selection Documents for Displaced Persons who travelled to Australia per General Stuart Heintzelman departing Bremerhaven 30 October 1947; 344, ZILINSKAS Jurgis DOB 2 April 1910 https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=5118048, accessed 16 August 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, Central Office; A12508, Personal Statement and Declaration by alien passengers entering Australia (Forms A42); 37/666, ZILINSKAS Juozas born 7 December 1907; nationality Lithuanian; travelled per GENERAL HEINTZELMAN arriving in Fremantle on 28 November 1947 https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=7249369, accessed 16 August 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, Tasmanian Branch; P1183, Registration cards for non-British migrants/visitors, lexicographical series; 20/595 ZILINSKAS, Aleksandras born 17 June 1928 - nationality Lithuanian https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=60159309, accessed 16 August 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria]; A2571, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla]; ZILINSKAS ALEKSANDRS (sic), ZILINSKAS, Alexandrs (sic), Year of Birth - 1928, Nationality - LITHUANIAN, Travelled per - GEN. HEINTZELMAN, Number – 1082 https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203726182, accessed 16 August 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria]; A2571, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla]; ZILINSKAS JUOZAS, Year of Birth - 1907, Nationality - LITHUANIAN, Travelled per - GEN. HEINTZELMAN, Number – 1225 https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203726183, accessed 16 August 2025.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria]; A2571, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla]; ZILINSKAS JURGIS, Year of Birth - 1910, Nationality - LITHUANIAN, Travelled per - GEN. HEINTZELMAN, Number – 740 https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203726184, accessed 16 August 2025.

Reeves, Tim and Roberts, Alan (2013) 100 Canberra Houses: A Century of Capital Architecture, Canberra, Halstead Press, pp 106-7.

Tarvydas, Ramunas (1997) From Amber Coast to Apple Isle: Fifty Years of Baltic Immigrants in Tasmania 1948-1998, Baltic Semicentennial Commemoration Activities Organising Committee, Hobart, Tasmania, p 48.

V (1951) ‘Lietuvis-Australijos Sostines Sachmatu Meisteris’ (‘Lithuanian-Australian Capitals Chess Master’, in Lithuanian), Mūsų Pastogė (Our Haven), Sydney, NSW, 28 November, p 4 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article259360595, accessed 14 August 2025.

Wikipedia, ‘Zelinski’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zelinski, accessed 14 August 2025.