Kelmė

Kelmė's name may come from the Lithuanian "Kelmynės", literally "the stubby place" because of the forests that were there at the time of its founding.[1]

Kelmė was first mentioned in 1416, the year that Kelmė's first church was built.[1]

Prior to World War II, Kelmė (Yiddish: Kelm‎) was home to a famous Rabbinical College, the Kelm Talmud Torah.

According to an 1897 census, 2,710 of Kelme's 3,914 inhabitants were members of the town's Jewish population, the vast majority of whom were merchants and traders and lived in the town.

Most of the Jews in Kelmė rural district were murdered during a mass execution on July 29, 1941. On August 22 a second mass execution occurred. On October 2, 1941, some Kelmė and Vaiguva Jews were murdered in Žagarė. The executions were committed by Lithuanians nazis, auxiliary police and Germans soldiers.[2] In total, the number of victims is 1250-1300 people.

• 
  Kelmė Manor, dates to the 15th century
• 
  Kelmė Manor gates and church in the distance
• 
  Evangelical Reformed Church, built in 1615
• 
  Roman Catholic Church
• 
  Kelmė Jonas Graičiūnas Gymnasium
• 
  Municipality building

• Antanas Mackevičius[1]
• Bronius Laucevičius-Vargšas (1884–1916), writer.
• Aryeh Leib Frumkin, Rabbi
• Icchokas Meras, writer
• Zvi Yaakov Oppenheim, Rabbi 1883–1926
• Simcha Zissel Ziv, the Alter of Kelm

Kelmė is twinned with:

City	COA	Country
Biłgoraj		Poland
Hódmezővásárhely		Hungary
Egerszalók		Hungary

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Kelmė.

• Official site of Kelmė district municipality