[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] census records from Volhynia

[Dave Obee]

The Zhitomir archives has census records from several different years from the 1870s to the 1890s. They are all bound together in book form.

Some things to bear in mind:

— They are not organized to help genealogists. They are not village by village, but rather in groups that are fairly hard to sort out.

— The Zhitomir archives has indexed many of the books. If your family is in the index, you are fortunate. If your family is in a book that has not been indexed, forget looking. I have gone through some of those books on two different visits there, with no luck at all. The people at the archives told me that it would be hopeless even for people who are comfortable reading old Russian handwriting.

— The census documents were compiled with the men on one side and the women on the other. Then other sheets were added, then more, then the whole works bound together. That means that if you find the males, you might then need to do major detective work to find the corresponding females.

— If you find a family, it could be terrific. Many of the early census returns show the precise village where the person was born. That can take you right back to Poland. The only catch of course is that you will need to decipher the Cyrillic handwriting and decide how the word would be spelled in Polish. The people at the archives can help on the first part, but not necessarily on the second.

I have taken photos of some census pages. I have shown them as part of my presentations at SGGEE and FEEFHS conferences in recent years. Odds are, they will be part of my presentation at SGGEE in Kelowna this summer.

Dave Obee



----- Original Message -----
From: Maria Mikolics <mikolicsm at westnet.com.au>
Date: Wednesday, February 27, 2008 14:33
Subject: [Ger-Poland-Volhynia] Fw:  Researching ancestry in Tscheremoschne
To: ger-poland-volhynia at eclipse.sggee.org, rakow at ifh.de

> Hi Paul
> 
> I first received the 1897 information from a researcher in 
> Ukraine based on 
> my great aunt's birth record. The researcher obtained the 
> information from 
> the Zhitomir Archives and the translation of the record is 
> "Family list of a 
> citizen of Horoshki volost, Zhitomir Uezd" so perhaps my use of 
> the word 
> "census" isn't correct, I'm not sure. This record provided 
> details of my 
> great aunt's mother and her parents and siblings.The researcher 
> also managed 
> to find in the records the actual birth entry for my great aunt 
> and a child 
> she and her husband had.
> 
> Late last year I visited Zhitomir archives with my mother and 
> aunt and with 
> the assistance of a translator managed to find the 1879 family 
> list for the 
> same family. Crazy of me, but I didn't end up getting a copy of 
> that record! 
> For sure, one day was nowhere near enough.
> 
> Whilst at the Zhitomir Archives last year, the archive records 
> manager (I 
> don't know her correct title) was developing an information 
> sheet in English 
> about the records collection at the archives. She and her staff 
> were 
> extremely helpful during our visit in terms of getting the 
> various books we 
> wanted, helping us work out which ones would be most useful to 
> go through. 
> She gave me a copy of the information sheet she was working on, 
> which I can 
> send to people if they think it'd be useful. Of course, there 
> may be a more 
> current version on the intranet somewhere.
> 
> So that's where I've managed to get to so far. I'm now trying to 
> find a 
> reputable researcher (the one who help me before is no longer 
> doing 
> research) who charges reasonable rates to continue the research. 
> I feel 
> quite sure that there's a lot more at the Zhitomir Archives in 
> terms of my 
> family.
> 
> Hope this answers your question...
> 
> Kind regards, Maria
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Paul Rakow" <rakow at ifh.de>
> To: <ger-poland-volhynia at eclipse.sggee.org>
> Cc: "Maria Mikolics" <mikolicsm at westnet.com.au>
> Sent: Thursday, February 28, 2008 3:53 AM
> Subject: Re: [Ger-Poland-Volhynia] Researching ancestry in 
> Tscheremoschne
> 
> >
> >  Maria,
> >
> >      I was interested to see that you 
> managed to get census information
> >  from the Zhitomir region for 1897 and 1879. Could you 
> tell us a
> >  little more about that - How did you get it? Do you know 
> which archive
> >  it was from, and how easy it is to find? I don't think 
> I've heard
> >  anything about 1879 census information before.
> >
> >           
> Thanks in advance,
> >
> >                 Paul Rakow
> >                 rakow at ifh.de
> >
> >  PS
> >      By the way, some of my ancestors 
> left Russia by a similar route
> >  to yours, emigrating to East Prussia just before the 
> First World War.
> >
> 
> 
> 
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