The beginnings of the Russian Empire Kaunas Fortress were started in the 18th century, after the third partition of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, when the Russian Empire began to make a lodgement in the occupied territory. The first project of Kaunas fortification made by de Witte remained unfinished. After the Russian – Turkey war in 1877-1878, when intervention of the German diplomacy withdraw from Russia fair winnings for the benefit of Turkey, the relationship between Russia and Germany became complicated. Russia resumed the construction of fortresses at its western borders for defence against a potential invasion from Germany in the West. On the 7th of July, 1879 the Russian Emperor Alexander II approved of a proposal from the Russian military leadership to build Kaunas Fortress.
The general layout of the Fortress was configured the city’s encirclement with a ring of eight forts and nine interjacent stationary artillery batteries, equipping the central fortification lines with artillery lunettes, laying of roads, erection of a military railway station, workshops, food warehouses and ammunition magazines. The Forts and artillery batteries of the Fortress extended in a circle at the approaches to the city at more or less even distances (every 2 – 2.5 km.), almost in a regular oval shape.
A large number of military barracks and different military warehouses were erected in the city area. New buildings were built in newly designed city districts: Commandant Palace, headquarters, gendarme and engineer administrations, intendant office, telegraph, telephone and radio stations and Garrison Church. Defence installations and complexes of other buildings, deployed in a territory spanning an area several times bigger than that of the city itself, determined the formation of the road and forthcoming street network. About 200 brick and 250 wooden military buildings were built in the territory of the Fortress. The cost of the construction of the Fortress was eleven million of Russian rubbles.
At the end of the 19th century, when the construction of the Fortress was completed, it established Kaunas as a Military Fortress city. Kaunas Fortress was a totally independent military system with a formidable and extensive line of defence constructions and was one of the strongest and the most modern fortress system in Tsarist Russia. But the development of military technique was faster than construction of the Fortress. The newly built fortress required to be modernized. Seeking to strengthen the defence of the Fortress from North East side, the Eighth fort and later the Ninth fort of concrete construction were built. A new plan for the further development and rebuilding of the Fortress was approved in 1912. The plan scheduled 12 more new forts, 9 redoubts, new fortification ramparts, the airport with hangars for aero-planes and airships, warehouses and shelters, and partial reconstruction of previously built forts and fortifications. New defence ring had to encircle the entire city together with old defensive fortifications. Thus its area expanded from 25 km2 to 65 km2. The number of forts grew from 8 in the first ring of forts to 21 in both rings.
When the frontline approached during the First World War, the expansion and strengthening work of the Fortress were interrupted. During the War, the Kaunas Fortress garrison consisted of about 90,000 men, comprehensively provided with artillery and military paraphernalia. German General Karl von Litzman who commanded the attack of Kaunas Fortress selected the strip between the Nemunas and the Jiesia rivulet for the attack, against the first three outdated brick forts. He brought powerful 42 cm calibre howitzers for the attack. Separate Fortress units persistently struggled against the Kaiser Army. However, during the attack which lasted 11 days, the fortification ring was broken. The Kaiser’s Army crossed the Nemunas and occupied Kaunas on the 18th of August, 1915. During the Fortress attack over 4,000 defenders and 4,343 German troops were killed. 20,000 Tsarist soldiers were taken captive, together with 1,358 different pieces of artillery and much other stock earmarked for a long-term Fortress defence.
After the War, part of the forts’ constructions, fences and other defence buildings were disassembled, but most of them were used for military and municipal needs. The Central Archive was established in the Seventh fort, a military prison in the Sixth fort and prison divisions of hard labours were located in the First and Ninth forts. The campus of military barracks and the headquarters retained their old mission – the command of the Lithuanian Army and military units were disposed here, together with the workshops of artillery and aircrafts.
During the Second World War Kaunas Fortress was not used for military purposes anymore. The Sixth, Seventh and Ninth forts were converted into concentration camps. Thousands of war prisoners and civilians were imprisoned and killed there. A monument for the Holocaust victims was erected after the War at the Ninth fort.
After the War, the Soviet army were established its military bases in five forts, but these forts were used as military depots. Soviet soldiers were settled in the former military barracks of Kaunas Fortress. The old military fortress buildings were not protected, they were reconstructed and demolished, huge buildings of little value were built instead of them. After withdrawal of the Soviet army, the military bases in the forts were eliminated. Now, after the expansion of city, some of the forts are already situated within the city – they are surrounded by residential buildings, and new streets have been constructed along the defence trenches.
History of Kaunas Fortress has been investigated very little. Both for the Republic of Lithuania and for Soviet Union it was an alien heritage. The value of Kaunas Fortress is also controversial in present times. Many people associate these buildings with the occupation army; considered them as not worth of the researchers’ attention and protection. Despite the fact that since World War I the complex of Kaunas Fortress was improperly used and ruined, it still retains a huge historic, urban, architectural, and recreational potential.
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