have remembered their mother and their earliest memories would have been of travelling to Germany with their father, grandmother, uncle and stepbrother.
This is the story of the Kaitinis family. When they arrived in Australia, Ansas was 17, Mikas 16, Jonas 15, Adomas, 13 and Hilda was 11. They were all born in the village of Voveraiciai, a farming family. The family left Lithuania in 1941, after the father had been persecuted by the Bolsheviks. He arrived in Germany illegally and the rest of the family followed. They resided in Schneidemuehl until after the war when they resided in several DP camps in Germany where their father died in a traffic accident in 1946. Their mother passed away in 1941.
Their uncle, Martynas barely out of his 'teens himself, emigrated to Australia the previous year to work, on the hydro-electric projects in Tasmania. As soon as he was able to support his aged mother, Barbora Svikytė-Kaitienė, he sent for her. She came to live in Tasmania with him. Their stepbrother, then aged only 19, had already arrived in Australia, and was working on a farm at Pyramid, Victoria.
For the children there seemed little hope for them leaving the D.P. camp, for neither their uncle, grandmother nor stepbrother in Australia could support them, and they could not be accepted as migrants to Australia unless they were sponsored.
Their plight attracted the attention of I.R.O. officials who, noticing the strong family affection between the orphans and their relatives in Australia, were reluctant to send them to different countries of the world. An effort to secure Australian sponsors for the children was successful, the eldest boys have joined their stepbrother on the Pyramid property of Mr. John F. Wilson. The two youngest boys are at Dhurringile, the Presbyterian farm school near Tatura. Hilda was sent to Kildonan, the Presbyterian Home at Burwood, a suburb of Melbourne. Although they were not together, they were in one State and able to see each other periodically. The Welfare Department were unable to find accommodation to cater to them all. The Matron at Kildonan stated in the newspaper, that the children shouldn’t be separated and she was worried about Hilda who spoke no English at the time.
Hilda’s predicament appeared in the newspaper and the Presbyterian Home was inundated with requests to adopt 11-year-old Hilda. The Secretary of the Child Welfare Department stated that none of the children could be adopted.
Most of the family later gathered in Hobart while their grandmother Barbora was still alive. Jonas and Hilda moved to Sydney.
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