Juozas Purickis (sometimes Juozas Puryckis; often used pen name Vygandas; 1883 – 1934) was a prominent diplomat and journalist in interwar Lithuania and served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs from June 1920 to December 1921, as well as the acting Prime Minister of Lithuania for two months at the end of 1921 during the leave of absence of Prime Minister Kazys Grinius
Purickis studied at the Kaunas Priest Seminary and Saint Petersburg Roman Catholic Theological Academy. He was ordained a Roman Catholic priest, but never practiced or performed pastoral work. He married in 1926 and was officially defrocked in 1929. He continued his studies at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland and in 1916 earned his doctorate of theology with a thesis on the Reformation in Lithuania. During World War I, he joined the efforts to establish independent Lithuania – he worked at the Lithuanian Information Bureau established by Juozas Gabrys, raised money for the Lithuanian prisoners of war and war refugees, attended the Lithuanian conferences in Switzerland. Together with Konstantinas Olšauskas, Purickis attended Vilnius Conference and presented on the German proposal to establish Kingdom of Lithuania. In 1918–1920, Purickis worked as Lithuanian diplomatic representative in Berlin, first as a deputy of Jurgis Šaulys, and played a key role in the election of Wilhelm Karl, Duke of Urach, as King Mindaugas II of Lithuania, and was co-opted by the Council of Lithuania. Purickis as a delegate of the Lithuanian Christian Democratic Party was elected to the Constituent Assembly of Lithuania which convened in May 1920. Next month, he became Minister of Foreign Affairs in the government of Prime Minister Kazys Grinius. He had to deal with the issue that shaped the entire interwar foreign policy of Lithuania – the loss of Vilnius Region to the Second Polish Republic in the Żeligowski's Mutiny in October 1920 and the subsequent ineffectual mediation efforts of the League of Nations. During his tenure, Lithuania gained international recognition and became a full member of the League of Nations.
On December 12, 1921, Purickis resigned due to a corruption scandal, the so-called saccharin case. Lithuanian counterintelligence had seized three train cars that had been traveling under a diplomatic exemption heading to the Soviet Union, and investigated their cargo. Two cars contained donated food (sugar and flour) for the victims of the Russian famine of 1921–22, but the third contained various black market items, including almost of saccharin, to be sold for profit. Purickis and three other men were investigated, put on trial, and acquitted in February 1925. While the case was ongoing, Purickis lived mostly in Germany helping the Lithuanian government with the Klaipėda Revolt and trade negotiations with Germany and Sweden. He also started contributing articles, mostly on economic developments and current political affairs, to the Lithuanian press. After the acquittal, he returned to Lithuania and rejoined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as director of the Economic Department and later Law–Administrative Department, but resigned when his party withdrew from the government in May 1927. Purickis then devoted his life to journalism and other public work. He was editor of the official daily Lietuva (1925–1930) and magazine on economy Tautos ūkis (since 1930) and author of numerous articles in Lietuvos aidas, Trimitas, Vairas, Mūsų Vilnius. He was chairman of the from its establishment in 1929 to his death. He was an active member of the Lithuanian Riflemen's Union and a board member of the League for the Liberation of Vilnius as well as of many different societies, often working on international integration and collaboration.
Early life and education According to his baptismal records discovered in early 2000s, Purickis was born on 19 April 1883 in about east of Semeliškės in the present-day Elektrėnai Municipality. Earlier works provided that he was born on 12 November 1883 in nearby where his father later bought a farm. It appears that his family was of noble origin, but their property was confiscated by the Tsarist authorities for their participation in the failed Uprising of 1863. Purickis' uncle served 25 years in katorga in Siberia; his parents rented various farms to make a living. Purickis had four other brothers.
In 1891, Purickis began his education at the parish school in Stakliškės that he attended with Liudas Gira (they remained close friends for life). Local priest Vincentas Butvydas, who was implicated in a book smuggling operation set up by bishop Motiejus Valančius, took care of the boys and encouraged them to pursue priesthood. After a year, Purickis transferred to a Russian government school in Jieznas and graduated in 1895. He showed an aptitude for learning, but due to financial difficulties could not pursue further education for three years and helped his family with farm work. With the help from a relative and Butvydas, Purickis moved to Kaunas in 1898 to study privately. He passed four-year school exams in Moscow in 1902 and enrolled into the Kaunas Priest Seminary in 1904. Many clerics would not graduate from the seminary. Out of 48 students admitted in 1905 only 13 graduated. The seminary was a center of Lithuanian culture with professors such as Juozapas Skvireckas, Kazimieras Šaulys, Adomas Jakštas. Purickis got acquainted with Juozas Tumas-Vaižgantas and belonged to a student group that was interested in Lithuanian history, language, culture.
Upon graduation in 1908, Purickis was sent for further studies at the Saint Petersburg Roman Catholic Theological Academy. He was ordained as subdeacon in June 1909 and deacon in his final year of study. He graduated in 1912 with a master's degree in theology and a gold medal for academic excellence. He returned to Kaunas and was assigned as a teacher to the Kaunas Priest Seminary. At the same time, he collected data for his thesis on the Reformation in Lithuania and published his first studies in Draugija. It appears that Purickis traveled to Switzerland to study at the University of Fribourg without the proper government permits. His letters to Liudas Gira show that he was already in Fribourg in March 1913 and spent the summer in Rome collecting information for his thesis. According to a note by rector of the university, Purickis was officially registered as a student in June 1914. He defended his thesis on the reasons for the failure of the Reformation in Lithuania on 25 July 1916 and was awarded a doctorate. The thesis was mostly a historical work based on many archival documents and the first extensive study on the subject. His contemporaries often disagreed with Purickis' harsh criticism of the Roman Catholic Church, but he took a rather novel approach at evaluating the Reformation in the larger political, social, and economic context.
War relief efforts In Switzerland, Purickis joined Lithuanian cultural life and became a member of Rūta and Lituania student societies. In December 1915, he became the secretary of the Central Committee for the Relief of War Victims in Lithuania, chaired by Bronisław Piłsudski. A number of Polish nobles belonged to the committee and soon Lithuanian representatives began clashing with them over the political issues of future independent Poland and Lithuania. A particular issue was 50,000 Swiss francs raised by a Polish committee led by Henryk Sienkiewicz and Ignacy Jan Paderewski and sent to Vilnius. At least a third of the sum was supposed to be given to Lithuanian-speaking residents, but according to Swiss Lithuanians all of the money were used for Polish refugees. Therefore, Lithuanians decided to separate from the Central Committee and establish their own. They collected about 10,000 francs and sent to the Lithuanian Society for the Relief of War Sufferers.
In November 1915, Purickis expanded and reorganized the Lituania student society into a society that provided support to Lithuanian prisoners of war in Germany, Austria, and elsewhere. In December 1916, after breaking up from the Polish committee, the society's mission was further expanded to encompass relief for all war victims and refugees. Purickis became secretary of a six-person committee that organized the world-wide donation drive on the Lithuanian Day – 20 May 1917 as declared by Pope Benedict XV. Purickis traveled to Marseille to mail the appeal for donation to bishops around the world and personally visited French bishops and priests promoting the donation drive. In early 1916, Lituania joined the Lithuanian Information Bureau established by Juozas Gabrys and Purickis became bureau's collaborator. The bureau published two monthly magazines, Pro Lituania in French and Litauen in German. Purickis wrote many articles for these journals and edited Litauen as well as published three separate booklets with his thesis on the Reformation, about Lithuania's economy to encourage foreign trade and investments, and about the ethnic composition of the Grodno Governorate to substantiate Lithuania's territorial claims in the region. He also attended the Lithuanian conferences during World War I that were held in Switzerland.
Work for Lithuania's independence Unofficial diplomat Lithuanians in Switzerland established contacts with Matthias Erzberger, an influential German politician of the Centre Party and an alumnus of the University of Fribourg. While on his way to Rome to meet the pope, he met with Lithuanian representatives on 22 August 1917 in Brunnen and proposed to establish a constitutional monarchy in Lithuania and elect a German monarch to prevent the German plan for a personal union between Lithuania and the Kingdom of Prussia. Three Lithuanian representatives – Purickis, Konstantinas Olšauskas, and Antanas Steponaitis – traveled to German-occupied Lithuania to report on the proposal to the Vilnius Conference held on 18–22 September 1917. To avoid the police, they had to use fake passports (Purickis used Pietaris last name). They were held up in Berlin and arrived only on 20 September. Purickis delivered a speech in which he argued that Lithuania should politically align itself with Germany and United States. It was not well received as Lithuanians suffered from harsh policies of German authorities and felt no interest from the United States. After the conference, Purickis briefly visited his relatives and then departed to Stockholm to attend the Lithuanian conference of 18–20 October that included Lithuanian representatives from Lithuania, Russia, United States, Scandinavia, and Switzerland. The conference approved the resolution adopted by the Vilnius Conference, recognized the Council of Lithuania as the legitimate representative of the Lithuanian nation, and reiterated Lithuania's desire for full independence.
On their way back to Switzerland, Purickis and Olšauskas again met with Erzberger who promised to ease German military occupation and replace it a civilian administration, reopen Vilnius University (closed in 1832), and help replacing Kazimierz Mikołaj Michalkiewicz, the administrator of the Diocese of Vilnius, with a Lithuanian bishop. Erzberger further helped Purickis and Olšauskas to arrange a meeting with Eugenio Pacelli, then an Apostolic Nuncio to Germany and future Pope Pius XII. Pacelli received them coldly and asserted that after the war the Vatican envisioned Poland and Lithuania as one state. They also traveled to Colmar to meet with Wilhelm Karl, Duke of Urach, the proposed monarch for Lithuania. Upon return to Switzerland, Purickis and Olšauskas participated in the second conference in Bern which discussed strategies for securing Lithuania's independence, issues of future state borders of Lithuania, proposals for forms of government, etc.
Official representative in Berlin