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As we celebrate Independence Day, February 16, 2020 and the start of the jubilee year of Alexandra Kazickas (6/17/1920-6/17/2011) our family matriarch, we would like to share her sentiments about her love of Lietuva, the country of her birth that was brutally taken away. She was a woman of strong character who kept her faith despite the uncertainty of life in those war-torn years.
She wrote these words as a displaced person with her husband Juozas and two year old daughter, Jurate, in Germany in 1945 in her treasured diary which the family found among her possessions after her death.
February 16th! What a beautiful spring day. Juozukas and I went to Cobourg. There were a lot of Lithuanians, refugees just like us. They were all worried because they could not get permits for residence, they were all sent to camps. Dear God, when will we solemnly, be free and joyfully celebrate February 16th?
February 16th was celebrated in Lichtenfelse… The day was beautiful. Alarms could be heard… planes flew overhead, the sound of bombings could be heard from far away. It is so sad and difficult to live with no hope.
Every evening I remember everything we have been through, and with the pain that rips my chest I long for my homeland, those blessed days in our dear place in Zverynas in Vilnius…
Dear God, I am unhappy that I was not able to go to church to say a prayer and ask you to keep my daughter healthy, let her grow up honorable and useful to You and her homeland!
Jurate and her three brothers Joseph, Michael and John are happy that they are able to further Alexandra’s legacy of patriotism and charity through the work of the Kazickas Family Foundation and Alexandra Kazickas Grant Program supporting Lithuanian Heritage Schools.
Photo: The Kazickas family archives
Jurate Kazickas with her parents, Alexandra and Joseph Kazickas, before arriving to America in 1946
Jurate Kazickas with her parents celebrating after Lithuania became a member of the United Nations, 1991
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