Vitas Juozas Tomovic

(Years of life 1899 - 1943)

Vitas Juozas Tomovitch - 1-st secretary of Vilnius city committee of the underground Communist Party of Lithuania. Born on 8 January 1899 on the farm Dzunija of the Alytus district of Lithuania in a peasant family. Lithuanian. He graduated a rural primary school. Participant of I World War.

Participant of the Civil War since 1919. In the same year he became a Communist. In 1920, he was recruited into the Lithuanian Army. He conducted outreach work among soldiers at 7 Infantry Regiment. He was sentenced to be shot for communist propaganda, but on the eve of execution like-minded soldiers attacked the guardroom and freed Juozas Vitas. He managed to cross the borders illegally.

Since 1921 he lived in Moscow. He studied at the Communist University in Moscow and Electrotechnical Institute in Leningrad. He worked as an electrical engineer.

In 1940, after restoration of Soviet power in Lithuania he worked as chairman of Vilnius Mayor, then deputy chief of People's Commissariat of energy control utilities of Lithuanian SSR.

During the Great Patriotic War, living on the territory occupied by the Nazis, he formed an underground organization "Union of liberation of Lithuania", liaised with the Union of Polish Patriots, headed by Jan Pshevelskij and anti-fascist group ghetto, led by I. Vitenbergas. In May 1943, he organized Vilnius committee of the underground Communist Party of Lithuania and became the 1 st Secretary of the newly created city committee. He recreated party organizations in Kaunas, Alytus and other cities, organized delivery of weapons and literature. Under the leadership of the underground city committee illegal printing and publication of three anti-fascist newspapers were established. By mid-1943 anti-fascist organizations in Vilnius had over 500 people.

On 19 June 1943 Vitas was betrayed by a provocateur, was tortured, but did not mention his name nor the names of members of the clandestine organization. He died in a Nazi torture chamber.

The honorary title of the Hero of the Soviet Union Juozas Tomovic Vitas got on 8 May 8 1965 posthumously.

Some streets and factories in Lithuania bear his name. In Alytus there is his bust.