| | |  | LITHUANIA | Home » » Investigating History - Napoleon's Mass Grave | | | | | | | Product Details: | | | Format:
| Color, DVD, NTSC | | Language:
| English | | Number of Discs:
| 1 | | Studio:
| A&E Home Video | | DVD Release Date:
| May 02, 2006 | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 1 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
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Fascinating documentary outstandingly displaying an important recent archeological discovery in Vilnius, Lithuania.Jan 07, 2011
By Cynthia Danute Cekauskas, LCSW
"Lithuanian American Princess"
"Vilnius, Lithuania", as the narrator introduces this film, "is a city where history dates back nearly 700 years, where castles are perched on hilltops and ornate churches offer evidence of an illustrious past; but buried beneath the charming streets and parks Vilnius hides a history of repeated episodes of cruelty, and, like a spirit that can't be silenced, the city's painful past keeps surfacing."
According to this film, the most recent discovery of this painful past was uncovered beginning in November 2001 when a construction crew working on a new condominium project exposed one skeleton after another after another. In all the remains of over 3,000 people ended up being recovered. Who were these people? Where did they come from? How did they happen to come to this place? Initially Rimantas Jankauskas, an archeologist at Vilnius University was called to the scene. For Jankauskas and the scientists working with him the initial task was to find out who exactly had been buried in this place. Were they victims of the Nazis? After all as many as 100,00 Jewish Lithuanians had been murdered in the three years following the Nazi occupation of Lithuania in 1941. Were they victims of the KGB? After all just ten years prior to the making of this film more than 700 skeletons had been found in the Vilnius City Park, victims of Stalin's secret police, who had been murdered fighting the Soviet occupation of their country. (The photographs shown were those of the highly respected "partizanai" or the partizan resistance fighters that continued to fight the Soviets as late as 1953--nine years after the final occupation)The archeologist search for clues as to who these people were was assisted by local historians including Agnius Urbanavicius featured in this film. In the end the clue came in the form of rusted, corroded buttons--the people buried here were some of the best soldiers of Napoleon's Grand Army.
To those who are not as familiar as some this film is highly educational as to what became of Napoleon's Grand Army after they retreated from Moscow beginning in October of 1812. Many are aware that the Russians burned Moscow rather than allow it to fall into the hands of the French. First, however, the French Army had crossed the Nemunas River on June 23, 1812 into Russia expecting to launch a quick assault and gain a victory before summer's end. However, as the film points out, to Napoleon's surprise and dismay the Russian Army retreated into the countryside with the French Army in pursuit. Napoleon's Army arrived in Vilnius in late June 1812. Napoleon, charmed by the historic buildings is still quoted even today as having said he wanted to bring back the Church of St Anne to Paris in the palm of his hand. It is in Vilnius where Napoleon set up his headquarters. He then had defensive trenches built around the city. Ironically just six months later these very trenches turned out to be the graves of many a French soldier.
As the film continues disaster came for the French in the winter of 1812. After the Russians burned Moscow Napoleon waited for five long weeks for the Czar to surrender. When this did not happen in mid October Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of France, made a fatal decision. His invasion of Russia had failed and he decided to give up and leave Moscow returning with his Army to France. The retreat would take more than two months and along the way tens of thousands of his soldiers would die. While Napoleon blamed the weather, others claimed that the invasion was doomed from the start and now nearly 200 years later new evidence of what actually happened had been found in this enormous grave in Lithuania. A major question would be what killed these people? In the end the work of investigating the skeletons in the mass grave fell on a team of anthropologists headed by Rimantas Jankauskas. Their goal as to discover as much as possible as to who these people were in order to find out what happened to them.
I found it fascinating to learn just how much Jankauskas would discover about these people just from a careful inspection of their bones. After all there were so many of these skeletons buried in the same place. It was interesting to find out that from 3,000 skeletons there were 930 where the sex could be determiend and 27 of these were female. Additionally out of 365 skeletons where the age could be determined, more than 10 % (38) were under 20, several as young as 15. Evidence of compressed vertebral bodies indicated that these people had been carrying heavy packs for many days. After a very long retreat from Moscow, Vilnius had apparently become the place where they would at long last seek relief. Unfortunately the needs of 40,000 descending upon a city within a number of days was just too overwhelming. Chaos took over the city. Residents locked their doors and the streets filled with bodies. The main causes of death were to be starvation and enormous emotional and physical stress leading to exhaustion. There were so many bodies that the residents of the city had no place to bury them except for the defensive trenches they had dug themselves just six months before.
I found this to be an outstanding film, full of interestingly detailed, highly factual information about a horrible tragedy As stated previously a number of the victims buried in this mass grave were young, adolescent boys and women. The film points out that much was learned from diaries that were later found. Many of the 4,000 artifacts discovered in the graves have been cleaned and restored and can be seen at the National Museum of Lithuania.
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