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SUWALK/SULWALKI


Research Suggestions and Sources

© copyright 1995-2001 by FEEFHS; all rights reserved
Latest Update: 1 February 2001 (Sonjaa Hoeke-Nishimoto, A,G.)

Editor's Note: The following thread of eMail messages over several days were prompted by a question to an AOL address of FEEFHS from a Rochester New York genealogist who is seeking Germanic ancestors from the Suwalki region of Lithuania, Poland and Belarus. It is a current example of how persons with diverse skills in several FEEFHS member organizations can cooperate to offer tangible assistance to even an experienced record searcher like Bob Eidschun.

From: Robert Eidschun of Rochester, New York
To: FEEFHS
Date: 21 December 1995, 16:23 EST

I am wondering what services your organization may offer to assist me in locating records of my immigrant ancestors?

My immigrant ancestors were ethnic Germans who came from the Vilkaviskis region (Polish - Wilkowyzski; German - Wilkowischen or Wilkowischki) in what is now eastern Lithuania. This region was part of the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth up until 1795; part of New East
Prussia from 1795 until 1807; and part of the Russian-administered Kingdom of Poland from 1807 - 1918. During all of these time periods this region was in the district of Suwalki (Polish name).

I have already found Lutheran Church registries in the Polish State and Lithuanian Historical State Archives containing birth records of some of my ancestors between the years 1843 - 1886. However, I would like to find additional records, if extant. Please inform me if and how your organization may be of assistance, either through membership or non-membership. Thank you.

Sincerely,

Robert Eidschun [bob@esm.rochester.edu]

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From: FEEFHS [feefhs@Wheel.dcn.davis.ca.us]


Dear Bob...FEEFHS might help you in these ways:

1) Open our URL on our WWW web site: http://dcn.davis.ca.us/~feefhs/

2) GoTo and ClickOn the FEEFHS Master IndexPage.

3) ClickOn the Ethnic, Religious and National Index.

4) GoTo "Lithuanian Genealogy" and open the Lithuanian Genealogy Society (LGS) HomePage. Contact them by snail mail in Chicago.

5) GoTo the AOL page and contact GFS David Zincavage [JDZ1@aol.com] He is the Co-SIG for AOL Genealogy Forum's East European SIG (Special Interest Group). He has lots of background on Polish and Lithuanian sources and is a great fund of knowledge in this part of the world. He would also know if LBKS of Vilnius, Lithuania, (a FEEFHS member organization) is likely to be helpful for you or not.

6) GoTo the FEEFHS Internet Journal. Read the article on the Ahnenstammkartei - you should use the nearest FHC to check it out. This may be one of the best ideas, as it covers all Germans, including Baltic Germans. It is said to be the largest German genealogy database in existence, except for the IGI itself. (Please see Infrequently Asked Questions - Ahnenstammkartei for the rest of this thread).

7) GoTo the "Polish Genealogy" section of the Ethnic Index and contact some of the Polish genealogy societies such as the Polish Genealogical Society of Michigan (Jan Zalkeski, A.G.) and the Polish Genealogical Society of the Northeast (CT) - (Johnathan Shea, A.G.). They are two of the 4 or 5 accredited genealogists with Polish specialties and represent two of over a dozen of FEEFHS Polish Genealogy Societies in our Polish Cross-Index that might help you.

Jonathan Shea is particularly expert in the northeastern part of Poland - see his background in the FEEFHS Professional Genealogists Database. You would need a membership in most FEEFHS member societies to get their attention, but both of theses and some others are likely to have good ideas for you. Shea also does client research in that area some summers. There may be others too.

8) GoTo "Russian Genealogy" in the FEEFHS Ethnic Index and consider the possiblity that RAGAS and also consider that BLITZ might help you too on a contract basis (US$50.00 minimum). This is especially true if you find a Russian or Belarus archive of interest in a town near the modern border with Lithuania when your ancestors came from, and if either of them have excellent contacts there - which is quite possible.

9) The Genealogical Society of Utah has microfilm crews active in a few places near your area of interest including Poland and Belarus. See our various status reports via the Cross Index of microfilm Status Reports

10) Be sure to check the latest LDS Family History Library Catalog (FHLC) at the nearest Family History Center - It came out earlier this year and has lots of new films of churchbooks.

11) GoTo the FEEFHS Professional Genealogists Database and look up Sonja Hoeke-Nishimoto. A.G. She is on-site (full time at the International Reference Desk - Level B1) at the Family History Library (FHL), living in Salt Lake City. She is accredited to deal with this part of the world (former Germanic parts of Poland and the Baltics)...A few hours of her reasonably priced time will likely unlock new treasures for you. She has a FAX, a telephone and an eMail address.

12) GoTo the "Pomeranian Genealogy" section of the FEEFHS Ethnic Index and ClickOn Die Pommerschen Leute. Then ClickOn Die Vorfahren Database and run your surnames thru this 3 Meg database with 89,000 listings of Germanic full names with stadt and kreis references. Chances are good you will find something of value because of its proximity to and its inclusion of some East Prussian Germanic surnames. The editor and publisher, Myron Grunewald, will provide details and has an eMail address [MyronDPL@aol.com]

13) Since you are looking for German Lutherans (not German Jews) I can't recommend the Suwalk-Lomza SIG, as it is set up to help Jewish record searchers, and is known to do a fine job helping them. However since you are in Rochester (NY?), Bruce Kahn [bkahn@servtech.com], President of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Rochester and past editor of the LANDSMAN (the excellent Suwalk-Lomza [Jewish] SIG Newsletter) lives there. He may have some ideas for you, as he has done research in this part of Eastern Europe.

14) Your last paragraph indicates you have had some success with both Polish and Lithuanian archives. I am sure that the current SIG for the AOL German chat hour (Wednesday at EST) plus Teresa [GFSTeresa@aol.com] and Carol [GFSCarol@aol.com] - who are co-SIG's for the new German nad East European AOL Chat hour at 2 pm Tuesday afternoons) would welcome your presence and be delighted to hear about the specifics of this success, if you have access to the AOL Genealogy Forum with its excellent message boards and weekly chat hours.

25) You might also want to go to the FEEFHS Map Room - see the Russian Empire Map Index for 1882 maps of the part of Poland and the Baltics to refresh your memory of the geography and major towns there.

Bob...most record searchers either do not know how to do what you have apparently already done or have not been successful in trying to do it. Thus FEEFHS will be interested in hearing and publishing your success story here. We hope one or more of the above suggestions will help with additional ways to answer your question.

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From: Bob Eidschun: [bob@esm.rochester.edu]

I can't thank FEEFHS enough...for your response...I've spent so much time in vain trying to get more than just that held by the Lithuanian State Historical Archives. I have already done some the things you suggested, such as contacted Bruce Kahn and David Zincavage, and viewed microfilms at my local Family History Center during the last five months, but your other suggestions are things I would have never thought of.

...I've spent literally 1,000 hours so far researching my family name (as did my father 20 years ago, but without much success), and have written hundreds of letters, made hundreds of phone calls, sent hundreds of email messages, viewed a thousand or more Web pages, and viewed over 50 microfilms at my local Family History Center Library.

My father wrote to the Polish State Archives in English in Warsaw in 1976 asking if Lutheran church records for Vilkaviskis (Polish - Wilkowyszki) were maintained by the Archives, and the response he got (in Polish) was a simple "no." I then wrote in August, 1995 and after posing the same question, the response I got was "no."

I then found microfilms of such records made by the Church of the LDS, and the first few pages of these microfilms state that the records were filmed at the Polish State Archives in Warsaw! I then wrote back to the Polish Archives (this time in Polish) informing them of this but have yet to receive a response.

Through the new (August, 1995) Family History Library Catalog (FHLC) I've recently discovered that the indexes to even more Vilkaviskis Lutheran Church records (more precisely, records of the Evangelical-Augsburg Church) were filmed by the Church of the LDS at the Polish State Archives in 1994. But the Lithuanian State Historical Archives claims that they have these. I have an inquiry in with them to search the records whose indexes only were filmed by the LDS, and I'm still waiting for the search results.

To initiate a search with the Lithuanian State Historical Archives, you must pay a fee of U.S. $70. They charge $18 for a photocopy of each record found, and provide a paraphrase-like translation. To engage their services, I recommend writing to them first (in English) to inquire about their "current procedure." They will respond quickly with their latest fees and how to pay them, etc. (Bruce Kahn of the Jewish Genealogical Society went there in October and paid them in person on my behalf). The address is:

Lietuvos Valstybinis Istorijos Archyvas
Gerosios Vilties 10, 2015 Vilnius
LITHUANIA

Robert Eidschun (Polish - Eidzun; Lithuanian - Eidziunas) [bob@esm.rochester.edu]

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To Bob Eidschun
From: FEEFHS

Bob...Pat Eames of the U.S. National Archives also serves as the Washington D.C. volunteer base for RAGAS in her spare time...here are her thoughts on the Belarus archive I was thinking about, in response to her copy of our suggestions to you.

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To: FEEFHS
From: Pat Eames, Russian-American Genealogical Archival Service, U.S. [ragas@DGS.dgsys.com]

Thanks for sending me a copy of your message to Robert Eidshun. It is interesting information and another example of the miracle of the Net for communication. What Mike Miller has accomplished in 2 short weeks is another miracle.

Suwalk is 117 km from Bialystok; many records for towns in the vicinity of Bialystok are kept at the regional state historical archives in Grodno, Belarus. It is worth a try, however the Grodno archivists are very busy with archival work and are at least 4 - 6 months behind in answering genealogical inquiries (these requests do not rank very high on their list of work to do).

Pat Eames of RAGAS U.S.

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To FEEFHS
From: Bruce Kahn Jewish Genealogical Society of Rochester, NY [bkahn@servtech.com]:

I was pleasantly surprised that you two were in communication. Bob is amazing...very industrious and intelligent. I have been in communication with him for quite a while. I gave him a few leads and he went...after them. It is very gratifying to work with someone like that.

He wrote: "To initiate a search with the Lithuanian State Historical Archives, you must pay a fee of U.S. $70. They charge $18 for a photocopy of each record found, and provide a paraphrase-like translation."

...this part is not exactly correct, although you would never know it from communicating with them. The $70 research fee is correct. The way that the documentation fee works is as follows.

$ 5 per document (page, I think)
$13 for translation
$18 for both

My personal recomendation is to only pay the $5 for the copy, and get it translated yourself (particularly if it is not in Lithuanian!). I found several ommissions and errors in the (Polish) translation that I had them do a year and a half ago.

This policy is relatively new, and a real boon for genealogists. When I first started working with the LVIA, it was $20 per document. I like the current policy much better. Although, as Bob found, they don't really tell you all of the options.

Bruce Kahn, JGSR Jewish Genealogy Web Pages http://www.memo.com/jgsr/

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To FEEFHS
From: David Zincavage [GFSJDZ1@aol.com]

(Suwalk)...is Southwestern Lithuania, near the border with Northeastern Poland. Vilkavishkis, "the place of the wolf or wolves" is a town which has been the seat of a county (powiat) in the Government of Suwalki.

Actually, corresponding with Mr. Eidzun, I have come to prefer the theory that his surname is, in fact, Lithuanian in origin: probably "Eidzunas" from _Eidys_ a diminutive form probably coming from the ancient pagan Lithuanian name _Eidvydas_. There was a 13th century notable of that name, which would mean: "one who goes in pursuit."

His letter indicates contact with both the Lithuanian Archive in Vilnius and the Polish Archive in Suwalki already. The specificity of the dates he cites probably is juat what survives. This area was fought over in both WWI and WWII, and records have been destroyed.

There is some possibility of boldly going where -to date- no non-sophisticated-Jewish- researcher has gone before and hunting in notarial records and court records. These sources are alluded to in LANDSMEN. If Mr. Eidzun's ancestors were in the gentry, some cousin may have confirmed nobility, and St. Petersburg might have some records.

Dave


Postscript: This is the end of this particular thread for the moment. BVut maybe it will give you a better idea of
Happy hunting!

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