The Kildišas Brothers, Jonas and Adolfas, by Daina Pocius and Ann Tündern-Smith

The Kildišas family came from Joniškis, a town and a surrounding municipality of the same name in northern Lithuania. Of the four children in the family, two came to Australia, a married older brother with a 2-year-old child went to America with his family in 1949 and a sister stayed with her parents in Lithuania.

Jonas Kildišas

Jonas died too early, aged only 42, and 2 months after becoming an Australia citizen

Born on 11 August 1921 in Joniškis, he attended a trade school in Klaipėda.  According to the report of his selection interview for resettlement in Australia, this was after 6 years of primary school.  He was at the trade school for 4 years, learning to be a motor mechanic.  He also had worked as a farmer for 3 years, possibly after his arrival in Germany in May 1942.

At the time of his application for resettlement, he had been working as a mechanic and living at the 82 DPAC Voerde.  DPAC stands for Displaced Persons Assembly Centre — a DP camp — and Voerde was a town on the Rhine River, so in the far west of central Germany.   

Jonas Kildišas photo from his selection papers

Source:  National Archives of Australia

The languages in which he said he was fluent were Lithuanian and Polish, although he must have picked up some German and English since leaving Lithuania.

From the Bonegilla camp, he was one the many men sent to Victoria’s Goulburn Valley to pick fruit. In his case, he was working for Messrs Turnbull Brothers of Ardmona.  He was one of those who gave up early, returning to Bonegilla on 23 February after little more than 3 weeks away.

He probably was unwell, because he spent the period from 27 February to 5 March 1948 in the Albury District Hospital.

Jonas Kildišas from his Bonegilla card

Source:  National Archives of Australia

With another Lithuanian, Mecislovas Tutlys, he was sent to Dookie Agricultural College, near the Goulbourn Valley, on 24 June.  His Bonegilla card does not record that he was working in the Bonegilla camp from early March until then but, presumably, he was not left to his own devices after weekday English language classes.

At Dookie, they were joined by Borisas Dainutis in mid-July.   We’ve already described how hard Borisas worked to set up Lithuanian scouting in Australia.  Vytautas Sakalauskas arrived in early September and a fifth Lithuanian man, Jonas Asmonas, came three weeks later.

Jonas later worked in an electric motor workshop, married Eleonora Grabytė and settled in Melbourne.

One morning after breakfast, he thought about going for a walk, but while pulling on his jacket, he felt faint. His wife called the doctor, who diagnosed a heart attack and immediately sent him to the hospital. The attack passed, and he feel quite well. After a couple of weeks, one morning it got worse, and Jonas called a priest. Another attack had started.

Jonas died of heart disease in Prince Henry’s Hospital on 26 June 1964. He is buried in in Fawkner Cemetery.

He left his wife Eleonora and a 4-year-old son, Victor. Victor completed a Bachelor of Applied Science in metallurgy at the University of Melbourne in 1980. Now retired, he describes himself as a “self-taught, high-level, improvisatory pianist and chess player”. He is an internationally known chess player with a FIDE ranking.

Adolfas Kildišas

Adolfas was born nearly 3 years after Jonas, on 8 June 1924.  The report of his selection interview for resettlement in Australia says that he had 6 years of primary school and one and a half years in a trade school, training to be a mechanic.  That training may well have been interrupted by the Russian invasion in June 1940.

The period of time in which he had worked as a motor mechanic was 4 years, so either included some time in Nazi Germany or perhaps back home, in Lithuania.  He also had worked on a farm in Germany for 8 months.  

The application form gave Lithuanian as the only language in which he was fluent, although he must have picked up some German and English after his arrival in Germany in July 1944.

Like his brother, Jonas, Adolfas  was living at the 82 DPAC Voerde,  a Displaced Persons camp in a town on the Rhine in western Germany.   Clearly, they had been able to track each other down.

From the Bonegilla camp, he was sent to work for the South Australian Salt Company, at 191A Victoria Square West, Adelaide, along with 8 others, in January 1948.

Adolfas Kildišas from his Bonegilla card

Source:  National Archives of Australia

Since South Australia has a number of places where salt has been mined historically, including places where salt production continues, we do not know where this group of 9 worked.

A likely place is Deep Creek, on the edge of suburban Adelaide, only 12 Km north of Victoria Square. Another possibility is that he was one of a party of an intended 10 about which the Adelaide Advertiser wrote on 10 January 1948. If they came by train to Adelaide, they would have to take another train back to Murray Bridge, where they were due at the nearby Mulgundawa salt works.

His Adelaide Alien Registration card has Langhorne Creek written on the back without any further information. Langhorne Creek is about 60 Km southeast of Adelaide, near Lake Alexandrina, and is best known now as the third largest wine producing region in South Australia. It is also near the Mulgundawa salt works.

However, the company working at Mulgundawa usually traded under the name of Mulgundawa Salt or Australian Saltworks, not South Australian Salt Company.

Adolfas later worked in the remote outback town of Woomera in South Australia.

He was released from his contract with the Australian Government, along with most of the others from the First Transport, on 30 September 1949.

The Alien Registration card records that he left for Melbourne in mid-1950, residing there for many years. He was a generous donor to the Melbourne Lithuanian Catholic Parish.  We don't know his occupation there but have to hope that it was something he enjoyed, perhaps work as a mechanic.

Later he returned to Adelaide where he passed away on 21 July 2021, aged 97, meaning that he lived for 55 years longer than his brother. His remains were cremated at Centennial Park Crematorium.

Four Lithuanians from the First Transport living in South Australia attended the commemoration of 70 years since the Heintzelman arrived at Adelaide's Lithuanian House on 28 November 2017
L to R:  Aleksas Saulius, Algis Pranckunas, Adolfas Kildišas and Juozas Donela

Photographer:  Daina Pocius

SOURCES

Advertiser (1948) ‘First Party Of Balts Here’ Adelaide, 10 January, p 1 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article43751686, accessed 19 January 2026.

Australian Salt Works, ‘Operations’ https://www.australiansaltworks.com.au/operations-development, accessed 19 January 2026.

Centennial Park Memorial Search, ‘Kildisas’ https://centennialpark.org/memorial-search/?firstname=&surname=Kildisas, accessed 18 January 2026.

‘Correspondence and nominal roles, done at Bremen-Grohn: transport by ship (USS GENERAL MUIR); transit countries and final destinations: USA’ DocID: 81660950, 3.1.3 Emigrations, ITS/Arolsen Archives, https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/en/document/81660950, accessed 18 January 2026.

International Chess Federation 'Victor Kildisas' https://ratings.fide.com/profile/3203352/statistics, accessed 19 January 2026.

Linked In 'Victor Kildisas' https://www.linkedin.com/in/victor-kildisas-85013a149/?originalSubdomain=au, accessed 19 January 2026.

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, 1947-1947; 475, KILDISAS [KILDISIS] Adolfas DOB 8 June 1924, 1947-1947; recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=5005735, accessed 18 January 2026.

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, 1947-1947; KILDISAS Jonas DOB 11 August 1921, 1947-1947; recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=5005736, accessed 18 January 2026.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, South Australia Branch; D4881, Alien registration cards, alphabetical series, 1948-1976; KILDISAS Adolfas - Nationality: Lithuanian - Arrived Fremantle per General Stuart Heintzelman 28 November 1947, 1947-1950; recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=9183330, accessed 18 January 2026.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria]; A2572, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla], 1947-1956; KILDISIS (sic) ADOLFAS, KILDISIS, Adolfas : Year of Birth - 1924 : Nationality - LITHUANIAN : Travelled per - GEN. HEINTZELMAN : Number – 851, 1947-1948; recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203625915, accessed 18 January 2026.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria]; A2572, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla], 1947-1956; KILDISAS JONAS, KILDISAS, Jonas : Year of Birth - 1921 : Nationality - LITHUANIAN : Travelled per - GEN. HEINTZELMAN : Number – 852, 1947-1948; recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203625914, accessed 18 January 2026.

Tėviškės Aidai (Echoes of the Homeland) (1964) ‘A†A Jonas Kildišas’ (‘In Memoriam, Jonas Kildisas’ in Lithuanian) Melbourne, 30 June, p 4, https://www.spauda2.org/teviskes_aidai/archive/1964/1964-nr25-TEVISKES-AIDAI.pdf, accessed 18 January 2026.

Wikipedia 'Voerde' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voerde, accessed 19 January 2026.

Borisas Dainutis (1918-1960): Always prepared, by Daina Pocius and Ann Tündern-Smith

Updated 15 August 2025.

This is the story of the founder of Lithuanian scouting in Australia. It is a story of commitment and persistence.

Borisas in Lithuania

Borisas Dainutis was born on 11 August 1918 in Vilnius, still the capital of Lithuania until 1920 after Poland seized it. Given the continued fighting from 1918, it was no surprise that the family moved to Panevėžys, in the cenre of Lithuania. Borisas grew up and finished high school there.

In 1939, he completed military training. In 1940, he commenced construction studies at the Vytautas the Great University in Kaunas, in the Technical Studies faculty. The German occupation closed the University in 1943 when Lithuanians refused to raise an SS battalion, so Borisas did not complete his studies there. He resumed them in Germany in 1946 but, again, they were interrupted by his departure for Australia.

Germany, Australia and Scouting

His Personal Statement and Declaration completed in Perth the day after his arrival on 28 November 1947 describes his occupation as “building engineer". For the Melbourne Age newspaper, which published a report on his scouting activities on 27 December 1949, he was a civil engineer.

Apparently, he left behind in Germany no documents that the Arolsen Archives could digitise, so we don’t know how he initially was describing his departure from Lithuania. The selection interview report for migration to Australia says simply that he “fled from Russian regime” and reached asylum in September 1944.

He had been a scout from school days and continued while in a displaced persons camps in Hanover, Germany. He was invited to be the head of the scouts in his camp.

Borisas Dainutis in scout uniform

Source:  Australian Lithuanian Archive

He worked in that position for half a year and devoted a lot of time and energy in this role. In 1948, he was awarded a scout medal, the Lelijos Ordinas (Order of the Lily). It is awarded to a scout leader who has shown great merit for at least three years and for being active for at least ten years at any scout level.

Borisas organises Scouts

The Lithuanian Scout Society appointed him as its representative in Australia. While on the USAT General Stuart Heintzelman coming to Australia, he organised the scouts on board. Given that there were 45 in addition to him, this would have kept him busy.

And while the Heintzelman was coming to Australia, on 7 November the Minister for Immigration honoured Borisas with a special mention in the press release in which he told Australians about the impending arrivals.

In Australia, Borisas had the difficult task of registering scouts scattered all over Australia and organising them into units. From the Bonegilla migrant camp, he was writing to Australian scout officials to establish how the Lithuanian scouts could operate in Australia as a distinct group.

First two jobs in Australia

Borisas was one of 187 men sent from Bonegilla to pick fruit in Victoria’s Goulburn Valley. He left the Bonegilla camp on 29 January. We’ve noted in another blog entry that he did not return to the Bonegilla camp until 5 May, nearly 4 weeks after the last of the other 186. His employer was Messrs Turnbull Brothers of Ardmona.

He had another 5 weeks in the Bonegilla camp in which to continue his scouting organisation until being sent to his next employer. On 16 July he set off on his own to the Dookie Agricultural College in Victoria. It is less than 50 kilometres east of Ardmona, where he had spent 3 months already.

He wasn’t going to be there on his own. Two Lithuanians, Jonas Kildisas and Mecislovas Tutlys had left Bonegilla for Dookie three weeks earlier. The three were to be joined by Vytautas Sakalauskas in early September and Jonas Asmonas three weeks later.

Borisas continued his scouting campaign from Dookie. He would write drafts of his scouting correspondence on Dookie College letterhead and then get someone to correct his English.

Borisas' use of Dookie College letterhead

                Source:  Australian Lithuanian Archive

He would apologise for his errors and not understanding the culture as well as he would have liked. He persevered, writing to Australian scouting officials and even the Chief Scout in Britain to get a Lithuanian branch of scouting in Australia.

First Pan-Pacific Scout Camp, Yarra Brae, Victoria

Algirdas or Algis Liubinskas, left, and Borisas or Boris Dainutis, right,
at the First Pan-Pacific Scout Jamboree, Yarra Brae, Victoria, 1948-49

Source:  Weekly Times, Melbourne, 5 January 1949

After just over a year in Australia, Borisas organised a Lithuanian scout troop to attend the first Pan-Pacific Scout Jamboree on the Yarra Brae property in Wonga Park, Victoria. It commenced on 29 December 1948 and continued for 12 days. The Melbourne Age of 27 December reported that Borisas with 29 other scouts had moved in already on Christmas Day. He would have had his 45 fellow scouts on the Heintzelman as a starting point for this, but all would have had to seek successfully some leave from their employers.

A souvenir of the Yarra Brae camp

                                    Source:  Australian Lithuanian Archive

After the Government contract

After completing his work contract as a medical orderly at the Dookie Agricultural College at the end of September 1949, Borisas settled in Melbourne.

He actually was selected in Germany for employment as an urgently needed builder’s labourer. It’s not clear, therefore, why he finished up working as a medical orderly instead, except that he probably had first aid training from his scouting activities. Also, the Bonegilla cards are notable in not showing any of the selected builder’s labourers actually been sent to work with builders.

He was interviewed by the Good Neighbour magazine in 1950. The magazine reported that “After two years in Australia, 31-year-old Boris Dainutis has seen more of the country than many Australians. In his native Lithuania before the war Boris did his travelling by cycle. He finds Australia much too big for that and has bought a motorcycle. On it he tours Victoria at weekends; he visited Sydney from Melbourne on his holidays and next Christmas hopes to tour Tasmania … Boris worked as a fruit picker and medical orderly under contract. Now he has chosen a job with a dry-cleaning company …”

Lithuanian Scouts in Australia

From 1949 to 1953 he was head of Lithuanian scouts in Australia and, later the head of its press department. He led another Lithuanian troop to the 1955-56 Pan-Pacific Jamboree at Clifford Park in Victoria, and also to the 1958-59 National Camp at Mornington, Victoria.

He attended many other scout camps, assisting at them as an instructor or official. One of these activities made it into the press in March 1949, when the Kyabram Free Press reported that Borisas had been the special guest at a cub camp at the Kyabram Scout Hall. He had led the cubs in a number of games and in play-acting.

Borisas becomes an official Australian

Borisas was one of those keen to become an Australian citizen. The two required advertisements appeared in newspapers in November 19, less than five years after his arrival. He had to wait another 6 months though before he took his oath of allegiance before a magistrate, on 12 May 1953.

Work, Study, Marriage

At the time of his application for naturalization, Borisas was working as an assistant to a surveyor. Both were employed by the Victorian Lands Department.

Given his tertiary education in Lithuania and Germany, it was not surprising that he thought to at least work as a draftsman in Australia. To prepare, he studied surveying and drawing at the Royal Melbourne Technical College (now the RMIT University). He then found work as a draftsman with Victoria’s State Electricity Commission.

In 1952 married Elena Šteinartaitė and purchased a house in the Melbourne suburb of Heidelberg. A daughter and son were born to the couple.

Illness and Death

As his first decade in Australia ended, Borisas was feeling more and more ill. In hospital it was found that his kidneys were damaged and inoperable. This was in the days before kidney transplantation was available in Australia and when dialysis was still in its infancy.

He was only 41 years old when he died on 29 March 1960 at the Prince Henry Hospital. As his daughter had been born in December 1958 and his son in December 1959, they both were babies still at the time of his death.

He was interred in the Fawkner cemetery, Melbourne. His funeral was attended by Lithuanian scouts, who formed a circle about the grave to sing the traditional evening song, Ateina Naktis.

It is sung at the end of every day at scout camp as a prayer. The words mean, “The night has come, the sun has set from the hills and forests, from all the land. Sweet dreams, go to sleep, God is here”.

Russian, Ukrainian and Estonian scouts attended too, no doubt grateful for the precedent in ethnic community scouting set by Borisas for Lithuanians. His grave was decorated with many wreaths and several farewell speeches were given by community members and family.

Elena was buried with him 58 years later. Their grave is marked by the Australian version of their names, Boris and Helen.

Australia has gained through the training and discipline still acquired by those involved in the Lithuanian branch of scouting here.

Sources

Age (1948) ‘Canvas Tent City Rises at Wonga Park’ Melbourne, 27 December, p 4 https://www.newspapers.com/image/124518561/ accessed 15 June 2025.

Age (1952) ‘Advertising, Public Notices’ Melbourne, 13 November, p11 https://www.newspapers.com/image/123319339/ accessed 15 June 2025.

Ancestry.com ‘Boris Dainutis in the Victoria, Australia, Marriage Index, 1837-1962’ https://www.ancestry.com.au/search/collections/61649/records/2214455?tid=&pid=&queryId=8c597349-35d6-48c7-8922-61ee55dda6e4&_phsrc=lkA14&_phstart=successSource accessed 15 June 2025.

Baltutis, V, Poželaitė-Davis, II, Jonavičius J, Mockūnienė B & Pusdešris, P (1983) 'Australijos Lietuvių Metraštis II [Australian Lithuanian Yearbook II (in Lithuanian)]' Adelaide, Australijos Lietuvių Bendruomenė ir Australijos Lietuvių Fondas, pp 325 – 328.

Context Pty Ltd (2005?) ’Yarra Brae, Place No 262’ in Manningham Heritage Study pp 687-9, http://images.heritage.vic.gov.au accessed 14 June 2025.

Good Neighbour (1950) ‘Meet a New Australian’, Canberra, 1 October, p 3 https://www.newspapers.com/image/901721676/ accessed 15 June 2025.

Krausas, A (1960) ‘Vyr. Skaut. Borisas Dainutis’ (‘Chief Scout Borisas Dainutis’, in Lithuanian) Mūsų Pastogė, Sydney, 29 April, p 2 https://spauda2.org/musu_pastoge/archive/1960/1960-04-29-MUSU-PASTOGE.pdf accessed 15 June 2025.

Kyabram Free Press and Rodney and Deakin Shire Advocate (1949) ‘Scouts and Cubs' Kyambram,10 March, p 15 , http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article270432677 accessed 15 Jun 2025.

Popenhagen, Luda (2012) 'Scouting' in 'Australian Lithuanians' Sydney, New South Publishing, pp 251-53

Queensland Times (1948) 'Pan-Pacific Jamboree Great Gathering of Boy Scouts in Victoria', Ipswich, 20 December, p 3 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article117112254 accessed 15 June 2025.

Sun News-Pictorial (1952) ‘Advertising, Public Notices’ Melbourne, 13 November, p 22 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/279921260 accessed 15 June 2025.

Weekly Times (1949) 'Scouts at Jamboree', Melbourne, 5 January, p30 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/224886070 accessed 9 July 2025.

Zalys, B. (1996) ‘Pėdsekys, LSS Australijos rajono 50-meciui artejant’ [‘Footprints, As the LSS Australian District approaches its 50th anniversary’, in Lithuanian] Mūsų Pastogė, Sydney, 18 November, p 5 https://spauda2.org/musu_pastoge /archive/1996/1996-11-18-MUSU-PASTOGE.pdf accessed 19 Jun 2025.