Melnikaite Street
Where Melnikaite Street is located now, there was once a border of urban development, beyond which stretched the endless potato fields of the military unit of the village of Voynovka. On December 29, 1958, the planned street was named after Marita Melnikaite. In 1963, the first houses appeared there.
Marite Iouzovna Melnikaite was born on March 18, 1923 in the city of Zarasai, Republic of Lithuania, in the family of a blacksmith. Besides her, the family had four other children, her father was Lithuanian, her mother was Russian. She had to leave school because the family did not have enough money to make ends meet. She worked at the Avanti confectionery factory.
In 1940 Lithuania became part of the USSR, and from that moment on, Marite’s fate changed. Always distinguished from her peers by her strong-willed character, she becomes an active Komsomol member. With the outbreak of the war, she was evacuated to the rear along with other Komsomol activists.
That’s how Marita ended up in Tyumen. She worked on a collective farm, in logging, at the Krasny Oktyabr factory, and made crates for shells.
After the evacuation of the Kiev plant No. 762, she got a job as a turner at the Mechanic plant. She quickly mastered one of the most difficult projectile manufacturing operations — crimping a copper belt, a special recess in the projectile, to give it rotation.
She lived in a house that stood on the corner of Trade Union and Khokhryakov Streets, during the war it housed a dormitory. In the 1970s, the house fell into disrepair and was demolished.
Marite Iouzovna Melnikaite was born on March 18, 1923 in the city of Zarasai, Republic of Lithuania, in the family of a blacksmith. Besides her, the family had four other children, her father was Lithuanian, her mother was Russian. She had to leave school because the family did not have enough money to make ends meet. She worked at the Avanti confectionery factory.
In 1940 Lithuania became part of the USSR, and from that moment on, Marite’s fate changed. Always distinguished from her peers by her strong-willed character, she becomes an active Komsomol member. With the outbreak of the war, she was evacuated to the rear along with other Komsomol activists.
That’s how Marita ended up in Tyumen. She worked on a collective farm, in logging, at the Krasny Oktyabr factory, and made crates for shells.
After the evacuation of the Kiev plant No. 762, she got a job as a turner at the Mechanic plant. She quickly mastered one of the most difficult projectile manufacturing operations — crimping a copper belt, a special recess in the projectile, to give it rotation.
She lived in a house that stood on the corner of Trade Union and Khokhryakov Streets, during the war it housed a dormitory. In the 1970s, the house fell into disrepair and was demolished.
In 1942 Marita wrote an application to the military enlistment office: "I want to take revenge on the enemy with my own hands, to avenge all the suffering that he caused my beloved Homeland."
The request of the young Lithuanian girl was granted, and with a ticket from the Tyumen City Komsomol Committee, she arrived at the military unit. In May 1943, after completing demolition courses, Marite and a group of Lithuanian boys and girls were thrown behind enemy lines.
Marite participated in combat operations as part of the Kestutis partisan detachment under the name She Kuosaite, was the head of the Zarasai underground district Committee of the Lithuanian Communist Youth League.
The fragile 18-year-old girl was distinguished by her bravery and resourcefulness. She participated in many military operations to mine the railway and set fire to Nazi military depots. A reward of 200,000 marks was promised for the Komsomol member’s head.
German intelligence was hunting for the partisan, and one of the operations to undermine the enemy echelon became fatal for her.
The request of the young Lithuanian girl was granted, and with a ticket from the Tyumen City Komsomol Committee, she arrived at the military unit. In May 1943, after completing demolition courses, Marite and a group of Lithuanian boys and girls were thrown behind enemy lines.
Marite participated in combat operations as part of the Kestutis partisan detachment under the name She Kuosaite, was the head of the Zarasai underground district Committee of the Lithuanian Communist Youth League.
The fragile 18-year-old girl was distinguished by her bravery and resourcefulness. She participated in many military operations to mine the railway and set fire to Nazi military depots. A reward of 200,000 marks was promised for the Komsomol member’s head.
German intelligence was hunting for the partisan, and one of the operations to undermine the enemy echelon became fatal for her.
On the night of July 7−8, 1943, not far from Dukshtas station on the Berlin—Daugavpils railway, Marite Melnikaite’s group blew up an echelon with enemy soldiers and equipment heading towards Leningrad.
Marite and her friends, congratulating each other, walked away from the explosion site. It was getting light. They didn’t manage to get far — the July night was short. We decided to wait out the day in a small birch grove. They didn’t know they were under surveillance.
Early in the morning, following a denunciation, the police found the patriots and, approaching unnoticed, opened fire. The battle continued until the evening. The punishers captured two seriously wounded partisans and immediately finished them off. The third still managed to escape from the encirclement. But he was soon caught and shot.
Marita was left alone. The machine gun and pistol ran out of bullets. Marite threw two grenades at the enemy. She pressed the third grenade to her face. But the grenade failed her — it didn't explode.
She was interrogated and tortured for five days, but her pleas for mercy were not heard. July 13, 1943 Melnikaite was shot.
March 22, 1944 by decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR Marita Melnikaite was posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union.
After the collapse of the USSR, nationalists in Lithuania gave a completely different interpretation of events: "Melnikaite created a gang that was distinguished by a special brutality: people had their eyes gouged out and their bodies mutilated. And finally, the Nazis managed to capture and execute the leader of the gang."
A memorial plaque has been erected in Masharov Square near the former Machine Tool factory where Marita Melnikaite worked. In August 1986, a bas-relief in memory of Marita Melnikaite was unveiled at the intersection of Republic and Melnikaite streets. The authors of the memorial sign: Tyumen sculptor G. Vostretsov, V. Zolotukhin, A. Burtsev; architect — V. Ginkul. In creating the image, the team of authors, in addition to two fuzzy photographs, was helped by a young employee of the district committee, who strikingly resembled the heroine and agreed to pose for the sculptor. There is a sign that if you stand under Marita’s left palm, you can feel the warmth that comes from the palm. There is definitely energy and power hidden there.
During the war, soldiers who died of wounds in Tyumen hospitals were buried at the old Tekutyevsky cemetery located near Melnikaite Street. Back in 1954, the Tyumen authorities noticed that the graves had fallen into disrepair. In 1955, the remains of the soldiers were reburied in a mass grave, architect V.A. Beshkiltsev designed a monument that represented a kneeling soldier with a banner in his hands. It was the first monument in Tyumen dedicated to the Great Patriotic War.
In 1968, the monument was reconstructed by sculptor V. M. Belov — now it depicted figures of a grieving mother and a young soldier with a bowed banner in his hands.
Tyumen veterans wanted to erect a monument to all the fallen countrymen, not generalized like the Victory Monument, but such that those who died for their Homeland would be named on it. On May 8, 2002, the grand opening of the memorial complex "Memory" took place at the Melnikaite site near the Tekutyevsky necropolis. The eternal flame was lit by Semyon Malygin, a participant in the Great Patriotic War, Hero of Socialist Labor. In the center of the memorial there is a Candle stele twenty meters high and five meters in diameter. The names of 6058 warriors are carved on marble slabs. The authors are Tyumen architects Ravil Sakhabutdinov and Valery Anisimov.
Marite and her friends, congratulating each other, walked away from the explosion site. It was getting light. They didn’t manage to get far — the July night was short. We decided to wait out the day in a small birch grove. They didn’t know they were under surveillance.
Early in the morning, following a denunciation, the police found the patriots and, approaching unnoticed, opened fire. The battle continued until the evening. The punishers captured two seriously wounded partisans and immediately finished them off. The third still managed to escape from the encirclement. But he was soon caught and shot.
Marita was left alone. The machine gun and pistol ran out of bullets. Marite threw two grenades at the enemy. She pressed the third grenade to her face. But the grenade failed her — it didn't explode.
She was interrogated and tortured for five days, but her pleas for mercy were not heard. July 13, 1943 Melnikaite was shot.
March 22, 1944 by decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR Marita Melnikaite was posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union.
After the collapse of the USSR, nationalists in Lithuania gave a completely different interpretation of events: "Melnikaite created a gang that was distinguished by a special brutality: people had their eyes gouged out and their bodies mutilated. And finally, the Nazis managed to capture and execute the leader of the gang."
A memorial plaque has been erected in Masharov Square near the former Machine Tool factory where Marita Melnikaite worked. In August 1986, a bas-relief in memory of Marita Melnikaite was unveiled at the intersection of Republic and Melnikaite streets. The authors of the memorial sign: Tyumen sculptor G. Vostretsov, V. Zolotukhin, A. Burtsev; architect — V. Ginkul. In creating the image, the team of authors, in addition to two fuzzy photographs, was helped by a young employee of the district committee, who strikingly resembled the heroine and agreed to pose for the sculptor. There is a sign that if you stand under Marita’s left palm, you can feel the warmth that comes from the palm. There is definitely energy and power hidden there.
During the war, soldiers who died of wounds in Tyumen hospitals were buried at the old Tekutyevsky cemetery located near Melnikaite Street. Back in 1954, the Tyumen authorities noticed that the graves had fallen into disrepair. In 1955, the remains of the soldiers were reburied in a mass grave, architect V.A. Beshkiltsev designed a monument that represented a kneeling soldier with a banner in his hands. It was the first monument in Tyumen dedicated to the Great Patriotic War.
In 1968, the monument was reconstructed by sculptor V. M. Belov — now it depicted figures of a grieving mother and a young soldier with a bowed banner in his hands.
Tyumen veterans wanted to erect a monument to all the fallen countrymen, not generalized like the Victory Monument, but such that those who died for their Homeland would be named on it. On May 8, 2002, the grand opening of the memorial complex "Memory" took place at the Melnikaite site near the Tekutyevsky necropolis. The eternal flame was lit by Semyon Malygin, a participant in the Great Patriotic War, Hero of Socialist Labor. In the center of the memorial there is a Candle stele twenty meters high and five meters in diameter. The names of 6058 warriors are carved on marble slabs. The authors are Tyumen architects Ravil Sakhabutdinov and Valery Anisimov.
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