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 ANTANAS
BALTRUSAITIS, (1865-1949), booksmuggler, born in the hamlet of
Papartynai, county of Sakiai, on June 10, 1865. The date of his birth
almost coincides with the phohibition of the printing of Lithuanian
books and periodicals in Latin characters (1864). In spite of being an
invalid, he became one of the well-known distributors of prohibited
Lithuanian books, the so-called book-smugglers. The books were printed
in neighboring East Prussia and in the United States and smuggled over
the Russo-German border. Baltrusaitis set up secret stores of books
and a network of agents. About 40.000 rubles' worth of smuggled
Lithuanian books passed through his hands. He was often searched by
the Russian police but on the few occasions when he
was arrested and jailed (1890 and 1892), he avoided exile to Siberia,
where other
booksmugglers used to be sent. When the prohibition of the printing of
Lithuanian in Latin characters was lifted in 1904, he made a living as
a storekeeper. He left Lithuania in 1944 because of the second
Bolshevik invasion, and died in Germany on December 15, 1949.
Literature:
ENCYCLOPEDIA LITUANICA I-VI, 1970-1978, Boston
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