Ksaveras Antanaitis (1911-1948), An Earlier Work-related Death, by Rasa Ščevinskienė

Even before Miervaldis Indriksons was killed by a workplace accident in South Australia (see previous entry) another First Transport man had died there when being driven home from his work.

Ksaveras Antanaitis was born in 4 February 1911, in the village of Dabitai, in the Sakiai district of Lithuania. Like many Lithuanians, he left his homeland during the Second World War.  Ksaveras is the equivalent of Xavier in English or Spanish.

From an Arolsen Archives document, we know that Ksaveras lived in Rotenburg in the British zone of Occupied Germany. He was married in Lithuania but his wife stayed there.

He left Bremerhaven for Australia with 842 other Baltic refugees on the USAT General Stuart Heintzelman on 30 October 1947 and 28 November he arrived to Australia.

Ksaveras Antanaitis' ID photo from his Bonegilla card

Source:  Bonegilla Identity Card Lookup

Ksaveras Antanaitis’ first job in Australia was with Engineering & Water Supply, Adelaide, SA. He was one of a group of 65 who left the Bonegilla camp on 7 January 1948 for Adelaide. The average age of the was 24 and the wage they were offered was £5.12.6 per week. This was the first group of men sent by the Commonwealth Employment Service to work outside the camp.

A 2006 brochure, "SA water – celebrating 150 years", recorded their arrival as the major event of 1948. ‘An influx of migrant labour (particularly from Baltic states) brings a partial solution to chronic labour shortages’, it said.

‘“At last — freedom!” That was the first reaction of 65 Balts when they reached their new home in Bedford Park, Adelaide, yesterday’, the Mail newspaper wrote on 10 January 1948. Their first job was to be a new water main from the Happy Valley Reservoir into Adelaide, about 20 Km north.

The Mail of 14 February wrote, ‘Sixty-five eager young Baltic migrants camped in a paddock at Bedford Park are waiting for responsible authorities to teach them’.

The Mail of 21 February reported that, ‘While nothing was done officially this week to help the Balts, private citizens called on the strangers in their Bedford Park camp, invited them to their homes, offered to help teach them English’.

Ksaveras Antanaitis had started a new life in Australia, but an accident happened. In the Advertiser newspaper of 30 June 1948, we can read the sad notice: “A Balt labourer, K. S. Antanaitis, employed at the Engineering and Water Supply Department's Camp at Bedford Park, was fatally injured when he fell from a truck on Marion Road, Marion, yesterday afternoon. He was taken to the Royal Adelaide Hospital in a civil ambulance and was dead on arrival.”

The report to the City Coroner by a police sergeant adds the detail that the rear wheel of the truck had passed over Ksaveras after he fell. The accident happened at about 4.40 pm so, quite likely, he was travelling back to the Bedford Park camp after a day’s tiring work.  It's like that there were other passengers so, all involved, down to the police and ambulance men, would have had another trauma added to their Second World War experiences.

There was an obituary in the Lithuanian-language newspaper Mintis, published in the US Zone of Occupied Germany on 2 August 1948. Translated, it reads, “In Adelaide (Australia) on June 29, Ksaveras Antanaitis, who came from the Rotenberg camp on the First Transport and was from Sakiai district, was killed in an accident in the workplace. He was buried on 1 July in Adelaide Cemetery with all the Balts in Adelaide and a large number of Australians. 

"The belongings left by the deceased were taken by the police for protection. Relatives are asked to contact the Australian Lithuanian Society, 5 Hampden Street, Hurlstone Park, Sidney (sic), NSW, Australia, for inheritance and compensation matters, which is informed about the event and will be able to help with the inheritance issue.”

Ksaveras Antanaitis was buried in West Terrace Cemetery, Adelaide. His exact burial place in cemetery is Road 3, Path 21, Aspect W, Site Number 22.

Sources:

Adelaide Cemeteries, Record Search https://aca.sa.gov.au/aca-records/accessed 24 April 2024.

Advertiser (1948) ‘Balt Killed In Fall From Truck’ Adelaide, SA, 30 June https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/43772724 accessed 22 April 2024.

Ancestry ‘Ksaveras Antanaitis in the South Australia, Australia, Supreme Court Criminal Records, 1837-1918; Reports to the Police Coroner, 1842-1961’ https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/62316/images/62316_b1111323-00096?treeid=&personid=&usePUB=true&_phsrc=oIs490&_phstart=successSource&pId=16360 accessed 23 April 2024. [May require free Ancestry guest account to access.]

Arolsen Archives, Doc ID: 2735688 https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/en/search/person/66434156?s=ksaveras%20antanaitis&t=2735688&p=0 accessed 22 April 2024.

Australian Cemeteries Index  https://austcemindex.com/?family_name=Antanaitis accessed 24 April 2024.

Bonegilla Migrant Experience, Bonegilla Identity Card Lookup, 'Ksaveras Antanaitis', https://idcards.bonegilla.org.au/record/203674046 accessed 24 April 2024.

Government of South Australia, SA Water (2006) 'SA water – celebrating 150 years' https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/read/34412631/150-years-commemorative-book-sa-water accessed 22 April 2024.

Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild, 'USAT General Stuart Heintzelman', https://immigrantships.net/v10/1900v10/generalstuartheintzelman19471128_01.html accessed 29 April 2024.

Mail (1948) ‘Balts feel free after prison camp horrors’ Adelaide, SA, 10 January https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/55903813 accessed 22 April 2024.

Mail (1948) ‘English Classes For Balts Arranged’ Adelaide, SA, 21 February, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/55905295 accessed 22 April 2024.

Mail (1948) (1948) ‘No English Lessons For Eager Young Balts’ Adelaide, SA, 14 February https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/55909057 accessed 22 April 2024.

Mintis [The Thought] (1948) ‘Tragiskai zuvo K. Antanaitis [K. Antanaitis died tragically, in Lithuanian]’, Memmingen, US Zone Germany, 2 August, p 4 https://www.spauda2.org/dp/dpspaudinys_mintis_memmingen_vasaitis/archive/1948-08-02-MINTIS-MEMMINGEN-VASAITIS.pdf accessed 22 April 2024.

National Archives of Australia, Department of Labour and National Service, Central Office; MT29/1, Employment Service Schedules (1947-1950); Schedule of displaced persons who left the Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla Victoria for employment in the State of South Australia - [Schedule no SA1 to SA31] [page 106] (1948-1950) https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=23150376 accessed 24 April 2024.

Miervaldis Indriksons (1918-1948): Fatal Workplace Accident by Ann Tündern-Smith

We have learned already that Miervaldis Indriksons was killed by a workplace accident at Naracoorte, South Australia, while working as directed for the South Australian Railways (SAR).

Miervaldis Indriksons, ID photo from his Bonegilla card

Source: NAA: A2571, INDRIKSONS, MIERVALDIS

He was using a front end loader to fill in a dam at the railway station. The machine toppled over the edge of the dam and rolled several times. As the Border Chronicle put it, “capsized and somersaulted”. Miervaldis tried to jump clear, but caught his foot in the steering wheel. He was dragged into the dam and his back was broken.

Another newspaper report (in the Adelaide Advertiser) of the accident says that he was thrown clear, but then the machine rolled onto him.

He was taken to the local hospital but died less two hours after the accident, half an hour after reaching the hospital, from his internal injuries, on 15 September 1948. The report of the Australian interviewing panel in Germany has added to it, ‘Deceased, 11.30 am, 15/9/48’ – although the person who added the exact time did so more than 8 years later.

The coroner had decided that an inquest was unnecessary, perhaps because the cause of death was so obvious, no matter what the discrepancies in the details. These days, one is much more likely to be held in order to work out ways of such a horrible accident happening again. How about installing roll cages on all SAR earthmoving equipment or, better still, enclosed drivers’ cabins?

Miervaldis might have been driving a machine like this 1956 Ford tractor
with front-end loader attachment and no protection for the driver

Source:  Tays Auctions

Lutheran Pastor K Hartmann of Bordertown conducted the funeral the next day. The SAR arranged transport to allow his fellow countrymen to attend. The funeral also was attended by the Engineer in Charge of the broadening, EL Walpole, the man who was to speak to the Mount Gambier Rotary Club eight days later on what the broadening project involved (see previous entry).

His fellow countrymen must have been the ones who told the Border Chronicle reporter that Miervaldis had been the only surviving member of a family of eight, his parents, brothers, sisters and wife all having been killed during the War. There was believed to be a small son still alive in Europe.

Miervaldis had been born in Helsinki, Finland, on 16 January 1918. Finland had been part of Tsarist Russia, along with his family’s Latvian homeland, until declaring independence on 6 December 1917. Russia’s new Bolshevik Government recognised that independence on 31 December, only 16 days before Miervaldis was born into a time of great change.

His parents were the former Lavize Balodis and Mikelis Indreksons.

By the time he found himself in the American Zone of Germany after World War II, he was admitting to being married, with two dependents. At the time of being interviewed for possible resettlement in Australia, he was in a camp for Latvians in Lübeck, northern Germany.

His usual occupation was šoferis or chauffeur/driver and mehāniķis or mechanic. His level of education, according to the report of the Australian interviewing panel, was 6 years of elementary school. That interviewing panel recorded that he had 3 years of experience as a mechanic in Latvia.

His Bonegilla card has ‘None’ typed into the Next of Kin space: presumably the marriage had broken down since declared on 3 April 1946.

Sources

Valentinas Dagys (1927 – 1972): My father, by Jedda Barber

My father was passenger number 137, Valentinas Dagys, on the USAT General Stuart Heintzelman that arrived in Fremantle, Australia, on 28 November 1947. He was called Vili by his Lithuanian friends and Bill by his Aussie family and friends. He left his parents and sister in Lithuania at the age of 17 and arrived in Australia aged 20.

An identity card dated 30 March 1943, when my father was 16, and valid until 30 September 1943:  His father's name was Jonas, he was a student and
he lived in Biržai at 6 Agluonos Street

If you click once on this map, you can enlarge it in a separate window of your browser to read the details:  each of the red circles shows places where my father stopped on his journey from Lithuania during the War, while each of the black ovals to the west shows placeswhere he stayed in Germany when the War was over

The details of my father's flight come mostly from letters that were sent from Germany back home to family.

A bundle of letters was hidden in a door frame of the family home and discovered when the new owners renovated around 2010. They gave the letters to the Biržai Regional Museum, Sela.

I assume the letters were hidden because they came from Germany and this would not look good if seen by the occupying Russians.

I learned of their existence when I wrote to a neighbouring address in 2015 after looking at the home through online maps. I noticed an old timer in the garden next door so decided to write to him.

These two images show the front and back of a postcard my Dad sent successfully
from Magdeburg to Biržai while Hitler was still in power, on 5 February 1944

The family home in Agluonos Street, as it looked in 2016

Source:  Collection of Viltis Šalyte Kružas

Scouting and Guiding groups were active among all three nationalities on the First Transport.  They had been set up in the camps in Germany, they formed again on the ship to Australia and remained active in the Bonegilla camp.

Here a clipping from the Lithuanian language weekly newspaper in Australia records those who were part of the first Lithuanian Scouts groups at Bonegilla fifty years previously.

Source:  Tündern-Smith, Bonegilla's Beginnings

This photo is of the Sea Scout group on the ship to Australia;
the grey line in the middle of the left-hand side points to my Dad

Dad was listed as a Sea Scout on the USAT Stuart Heintzelman.  In his home town of Biržai (northern Lithuania), he was part of the crew of the Biržiečių Sea Scouts' yacht "Diver" built in 1938 that reached the Baltic Sea.

Dad at the Blue Lake, Mount Gambier, South Australia, 1948

Vili left the Bonegilla camp on 9 January 1948 for his mandatory two years' work.  He was part of a group of at least 32 sent to the SA Department of Woods & Forests in Mount Gambier for employment as a labourer.

Edward Kurauskas, the former representative player for Lithuania, had arrived in Australia on the Second Transport, the USAT General Stewart, on 13 February 1948.  No doubt he was glad to find the cluster of at least 23 Lithuanians already in Mount Gambier
at the Woods & Forests camp. 

Source:  Border Watch (Mount Gambier) 8 July 1948 via Trove

Vili pretending to play the piano accordion;  he could play the harmonica

After moving to Adelaide, he was involved with the amateur Lithuanian theatre group that performed plays at the Lithuanian House, Norwood, during the 1950s and 60s.

My parents, Bill and Cynthia, on their wedding day in 1958,
at Rosefield Methodist Church, Highgate, South Australia

In Adelaide, Bill had various jobs, including manufacturing electric engines and selling land.

Dad's boat on the Murray River, with his friend William on board

The home that my parents built in 1960 in Secombe Heights, South Australia,
faced west with ocean views and was one of the first houses on the hill: 
we lived there until Dad's death in 1972

REFERENCES

Border Watch (Mount Gambier, SA), 'Want to teach men's basketball', 8 July 1948, p 1, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/78588215, accessed 8 July 2023 (yes, exactly 75 years later).

Tündern-Smith, Ann, Bonegilla's Beginnings, 2nd ed, Triple D Books, Wagga Wagga, NSW, 2014, p 93.