The town is situated in ethnographically
Baltic Lithuanian territory and was historically a territory of
Lithuania Proper situated close to a capital city Vilnius. In the 19th century the
Polonization of
Eastern Lithuania started thus the city started to become multilingual. In the 18th Century, the city of Lentvaris, was within the
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was populated by Poles, Lithuanians and Jews and belonged to the estate of the Polish-Lithuanian
House of Sapieha. Following the partitions of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth the town became part of the
Russian Empire. In 1850 the town was owned by Izdebski and then sold on to another Polish-Lithuanian
magnate clan, the
Tiškevičiai family. In 1885 they had a
Tudor-style palace built with a park, designed by
Édouard André. In 1869 an industrial nail factory was established in the city. After the
Żeligowski's Mutiny in 1920, Lentvaris was annexed by Poland and was part of
Poland in the Wilno–Troki District of the
Wilno Voivodeship. In September 1939,
Nazi Germany attacked Poland simultaneously with the
Soviet Union. The town was taken over by the Soviets on September 19, 1939. Local Polish soldiers, who had fought in the
September Campaign, were attacked and interned by Lithuanians in the city of Kretinga. Between 1942 and 1943, a Jewish partisan unit headed by
Abba Kovner operated in the area. They blew up a train bound from
Warsaw to
Vilnius, near Lentvaris station, on the stretch between
Vilnius and
Grodno. Twenty one carriages carrying German troops and supplies were derailed. ==Demography==