In June 1940, Lithuania was annexed to the Soviet Union and became a Soviet Republic. When the Red Army troops entered Mariampol, many Jews greeted them joyfully. This upset some Lithuanians, and for three days Lithuanian hooligans rampaged through the city. Many Jewish homes had their windows smashed, and many shop windows of Jewish stores were also shattered to pieces. An eyewitness reported that the city looked like it had been bombed. In fact, many of the rioters were arrested but were released after signing a debt obligation not to repeat such actions.

According to the new rules, most factories and shops owned by Jews in Mariampol were nationalized. All Zionist parties and youth organizations were disbanded, and several activists were detained. Jewish educational institutions were closed. The supply of goods decreased, and as a result, prices rose sharply. The middle class, mostly Jewish, suffered greatly, and the standard of living gradually declined. Several families, owners of nationalized factories or shops, were deported deep into Russia.

On Sunday, June 22, 1941, at dawn, Mariampol was bombed by German army aviation. The city center was destroyed. Twenty people, most of whom were Jews, were killed. Jews left homeless found shelter in Jewish homes that remained intact.

The German army entered Mariampol the next day, Monday, June 23, 1941, surrounding the city and blocking all roads leading east. Most Jews who fled the city had to return. Many were killed by Lithuanians who ambushed them. Only a few managed to reach Russia.

The Lithuanians welcomed the Germans with open arms and immediately began actions against the Jews. Already in the first days of the occupation, Jews were arrested on fabricated charges. All the arrested were killed in a ditch about 4 km from Mariampol in the direction of Vilkaviškis.

Jews were forced to go to work every morning: men were made to clean garbage, women had to engage in agriculture and household chores. Elderly people, including the city rabbi Avraham-Zeev Heler, were forced to sweep the streets.

Avraham Dembner, a native of the suburb of Tarpuč, returned to Mariampol from Russia in 1946, and former neighbors told him about several young people who resisted the Germans and their Lithuanian helpers after being sent to forced labor. 24-year-old Zeev Papirnik grabbed a rifle from one Lithuanian, shot one of them dead and wounded another. He was tortured and killed.

Mendel Agronitsky resisted the killers who came to take him to work and separated him from his wife and daughters. He was shot on the spot.

Several young Jews, including the Wilkožirsky, Palnitsky, and Ruzhnitsky brothers, were publicly hanged in the market square for resisting the Germans.

On July 15, 1941, the governor of the Mariampol district issued an order according to which: 1) Jews were forbidden to walk on the following streets: Vytauto, Čerč, Donelaičio, Petras Arminas, and Dariaus and Girėno; 2) Jews were forbidden to visit beaches, parks, cafes, restaurants, libraries, and similar places; 3) Jews were prohibited from buying food on streets, roads, in yards, and markets. They were allowed to buy food in special stores designated by the mayor or in regular stores at limited times; 4) Jews were forbidden to use the services of non-Jews; 5) all Jews, regardless of gender or age, had to wear a yellow patch on the front and back of their clothing in the form of a "Magen David" with a diameter of 8-10 cm. Any Jew caught without a patch would be imprisoned.

One day, a group of Jews was brought to the synagogue courtyard and forced to take out all the Torah scrolls and sacred books from the synagogues, pile them up, and burn them. Chanan-Muzikant—a musician and "badkhan" (comic) at weddings—jumped into the fire to retrieve a Torah scroll. The Germans pulled it from him and threw him back into the fire. He was brutally beaten.

There was also an order to greet every German soldier by removing hats and bowing low. Once, a former teacher of the Jewish secondary school, Ayerov, a very polite and calm man but thoughtful and somewhat confused, did not notice a German soldier and did not greet him. The German slapped Ayerov, who, without hesitation, slapped the German back. He was arrested and killed in prison.

In the same month, an order was published requiring Jews to leave their homes and gather in synagogues and several adjacent buildings. It was easier for the Germans to attack Jews in this crowded area, send them to forced labor, and abuse young women at night. From time to time, the Germans selected young strong men for so-called "work" and then killed them in places near the city.

In August, the Germans forced young Jewish men to dig large trenches behind the barracks by the Šešupė River. The men found out that the trenches were intended for Jews. When the young people told their parents about this, the parents were so alarmed that they ran to try to cancel the order, but they failed.

At the end of the same month, Jewish community workers were summoned to the governor of the Lithuanian district, who informed them that soon a large ghetto would be created near the cavalry barracks and the adjacent territory. To deceive them, he promised that as long as the war continued, the Jews would manage their community and economic affairs independently.

The Jews gathered their belongings, prepared food for several days, and set off in a long cavalcade to the barracks. Upon arrival, the men were separated and herded into overcrowded stables. In the following days, the men were subjected to merciless violence, forced to do "sports exercises," as the Germans called it. Jews from Kazlu Ruda, Ludvinava, and other nearby villages were brought to the barracks. On the 30th of the same month, Jews from Kalvarija were brought to the same place. Similarly, men from these groups were herded into overcrowded stables. After that, they were ordered to join the "sports exercises."

On Monday, September 1, 1941, the Jews of Mariampol, together with Soviet officials, communists, and Komsomol members, were killed. About 7,000–8,000 Jews and about 1,000 people of other nationalities were shot. They were all buried in 8 pre-dug ditches, each 70 meters long, 3 meters wide at the top, and 2 meters wide at the bottom. The ditches were located near the Šešupė River, on the right side of the bridge on the road to Kalvarija. The mass killings began at 10 a.m. and ended at 4 p.m. The killers were mostly Lithuanians, including university students and high school students who volunteered for the "work."

Jewish men were brought to the ditches in groups of 100–200 people, completely naked. They were forced to lie down in the ditches in rows. Machine guns fired on them from above. When it was the turn of women and children, a terrible and violent agitation began, while drunken killers started pushing the victims into the ditches, smashing children's heads with clubs and shovels. Due to the violent commotion, many victims were wounded but did not die, so they were buried alive. Lithuanian eyewitnesses said that most victims were in deep depression, as if in a fog. Other Lithuanians, who were brought to the site the next day to fill the graves, said that the ground under the graves moved for a long time after the massacre.

After the killings, the bandits divided the loot taken from the victims and returned to the city, singing drunkenly and celebrating all night.

Two families committed suicide. Dr. David Rosenfeld administered poison to himself, his wife, and daughter. Cantor Lansky also took poison himself and gave poison to his wife and three children.

After the war, the surviving members of the Mariampol Jewish community erected a tombstone at the burial site. In 1992, a new monument was built. The mass burial site near the military barracks and the monument at this site bear an inscription in Yiddish and Lithuanian: "Here the blood of about 8,000 Jewish children, women, men, and 1,000 people of various nationalities was shed, who were cruelly killed by the Nazis and their local collaborators in September 1941." In the same year, a monument was erected in the Šunskas Forest near Mariampol.

The site of the mass grave and the monument on it bear an inscription in Yiddish and Lithuanian: "Here the blood of 200 Jews, children, women, and men was shed, who were cruelly killed by the Nazis and their collaborators in 1941. May the memory of the martyrs be eternal."

In the same vicinity, in the Rudžiai Grove, another monument was erected at the site of a mass grave with a memorial. The inscription in Yiddish and Lithuanian reads: "At this place, Hitler’s murderers and their local collaborators killed Jews from Mariampol in July 1941."

In the "Hall of Holocaust" on Mount Zion in Jerusalem, a memorial plaque was installed in honor of the Mariampol community.

In 1992, a monument was erected on the site where the Jewish cemetery once stood.

Sources:

https://kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/mariampol/maria2.html

http://www.holocaustatlas.lt/EN/#a_atlas/search//page/1/item/14/

https://kvr.kpd.lt/#/static-heritage-detail/1cf2838f-6615-491b-898d-6a7962ab501a