Daugavpils Prison “The White Swan”

An imposing white brick building rises four stories high in the center of Daugavpils City. It is surrounded by an equally imposing white brick wall lined with razor wire with a square watchtower at one corner. Despite its sinister impression, it has been nicknamed “The White Swan”. This is Daugavpils Prison. Built in 1863, it was originally known as “The Red House” since the brick in those days was red. Today it is whitewashed and has a weathervane at the very top of the main facade in the shape of a white swan. It has remained an active prison for over 160 years and still houses very serious offenders today.

In the 19th century, the prison consisted of only the main building and a few out buildings. It had its own laundry, bathhouse, stables and farm. It housed 500-800 prisoners (it holds 400-500 today). The entire prison was evacuated twice during WWI and was reinstated under the brief German occupation in 1918/1919. When the Bolsheviks had their short occupation in 1919 the prison became a place of torture and execution. After Latvian independence in 1920, the prison building was in very bad condition but slowly repairs and restorations were made and the prison started functioning once again. In the 1920s, more facilities were added such a carpenters shop, a peat factory and a brick kiln. In the mid to late 1930s there were many more improvements such as a women’s psychiatric ward, offices, central heating & water and a modern sewage system. When the prison reopened in 1920, it only had 20 employees, but by 1939 it employed more than 140.

Throughout the 1920s, Daugavpils Prison was the scene of many workers’ strikes and socialist demonstrations. In 1929, one of the largest demonstrations took place just near the prison. After this demonstration, there was a crackdown on arresting political prisoners with many of these prisoners being beaten by police and guards. There was so much violence and unrest that prison authorities called in military troops to help quell the protesters. These types of demonstrations and arrests of Communist sympathizers continued unabated through the 1930s, culminating in the Soviet takeover of Latvia in 1940.

Sometime in the 1920s, Teodors Zekants started working at the prison as a warden, a type of guard. We aren’t sure what level of warden he was as they had several levels. But his name is not on the 1939 list of higher ranking wardens so maybe he was a lower ranking one. He would undoubtedly have been involved in these political actions which would have created an important reason later for Socialists and Communists to have a grudge or even hatred against him and everything he represented. Working at the prison did not come without its risks.

We believe Teodors must still have been working there in June of 1940 when the Soviets took over the Latvian government, leading to the ‘Year of Horror’. On June 17th, 1940 Red troops marched triumphantly up the road through the city, right past the prison gates. Was Teodors there along with the rest of the terrified staff wondering what this meant for their immediate future? For 48 hours after the Soviet takeover, Latvian police filled the prison with as many Communists as they could find. But it was all in vain. Within days of the Soviet takeover, 50 political prisoners were released from Daugavpils Prison and celebrated by the new regime for their Communist ideals. These were people who just days before, Teodors had been guarding. Teodors, along with most of the prison staff, would have been immediately dismissed from their positions as the Soviets quickly replaced all members of the old regime with Russian and Latvian Communists and Communist sympathizers. Teodors must have known his life was now in danger. Having been a warden at Daugavpils prison was now a grave liability.

He could easily have ended up a prisoner in the White Swan himself but somehow he managed to lay low. Probably by moving his family out to the countryside. By the end of June 1941, the Germans were on the cusp of kicking out the Soviets and ‘liberating’ Latvia. They didn’t ‘liberate’ it soon enough for Teodors however. We will never know exactly who killed him or why, but we know he was dragged out of his house by Russian soldiers and shot. Did they know of Teodors’s anti-Communist activities during WWI? Did they know he had been a guard at Daugavpils Prison and so was a target? Was he seen as being part of the ‘old regime’? Those details are lost to time.

Sitting today at the juncture of bus, car and tram traffic, the prison is located at 18 Novembra Street in the centre of Daugavpils. It was designated a ‘protected monument’ in the 1990s and has stood as a ominous sentinel decade after decade. It has survived its fair share of wars, witnessed the emergence of Latvian independence, been the backdrop to protests and violent uprisings and still today is one of the biggest prisons in Latvia.