Monument to the defenders of Jelgava against the Soviet occupation in 1944 in Gröbner Park
Memorialinis vieta

The memorial site to the participants of the July-August 1944 Jelgava defense battles against the second Soviet occupation at the intersection of Rūpniecības and Tērvetes streets was opened on May 8, 1995. In honor of this event, a service was held in Jelgava St. Anna Evangelical Lutheran Church and a flag-draped procession through Jelgava. An irregularly shaped granite stele stands at the memorial site, in which a cross is carved, which grows into the point of a sword. Next to it, to the left, a truncated parallelepiped-shaped granite block with the text “To the defenders of Jelgava 1944.28.VII-8.VIII” is placed in a gull-like manner.

The war in Jelgava began after Soviet troops captured Šiauliai in Lithuania on 27 July 1944 and continued their offensive northwards. In an effort to repel the Red Army, the newly appointed military commander of Jelgava, Lieutenant General Johann Flugbeil, declared it a “fortress city” and all available forces were to be used for its defense. Initially, the core of Jelgava’s defenders consisted only of soldiers from the 15th Latvian SS Weapons Division Training and Reserve Brigade under Lieutenant Colonel Herman Jurko and a few small German units. On the afternoon of 27 July, the Soviet 3rd Air Army began bombing Jelgava, attacking not only strategic military targets in the city and its outskirts – the railway station and roads – but also setting fire to some of the residential buildings. The city's buildings and civilians suffered from Katyusha rocket systems, artillery, and mortar fire fired at each other by both warring sides.

On July 28, units of the Soviet 3rd Guards Mechanized Corps launched an attack on the southern outskirts of the city, but were unsuccessful. On the morning of July 30, the attack was reinforced by the 279th and 347th Rifle Divisions of the 51st Army. Although Moscow Radio reported the capture of the city the next day, the USSR troops with reinforcements had managed to break into the city center, but not completely capture it. The right bank of the Lielupe River and the fortified bridgehead at the Driksa Bridge remained unoccupied by the Red Army. Fierce fighting also took place in Jelgava Castle, which came under Soviet control in early August. The Red Army moved cannons into the castle and fired from its windows at the positions of German and Latvian soldiers on the Kalnciema Road. Counterfire from German heavy artillery followed, which thoroughly destroyed the castle. On August 4, with reinforcements from Riga, the defenders of Jelgava temporarily managed to take control of the city. However, a massive Soviet offensive forced the German and Latvian soldiers to abandon Jelgava three days later.