[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] AGAD archive in Warsaw

[Paul Rakow]

  Thanks Paul, for all your tips.

        The South Prussia records were one of the things I'm interested
  in - I know I had some ancestors in the town Zaniemysl before the
  Prussians took it over.

        I have been looking in the Polish archives web-site for
  interesting Fonds. Do you have any good Polish search terms to
  recommend?

                 Paul Rakow
                 rakow at ifh.de

On Thu, 2 Sep 2010, pnswork at aol.com wrote:

> Hi Paul,
>
>     I visited the AGAD archive in 2001 and managed to find some very useful
> information.  However, based on that experience, I have the following
> recommendations for you:
> 
> 1. Review the archive holdings on their web site and identify collections
> that you want to search before you go.  Any on-site listings will be in
> Polish, but the web site may have some of the indexes translated for you. 
> AGAD does nothave a card catalog like we are famliar with in US libraries.
> 
> 2. At least one month in advance (preferably two months or more), contact
> the AGAD archvive via email or letter to inform them that you plan to come,
> and list the dates that you plan to be there.  AGAD may require that you
> receive a confirmation letter, guaranteeing you a spot in their reading
> room.  Without this confirmation letter, you may not be granted access to
> the reading room and the documents you are interested in.
> 
> 3. Plan to have an interpreter with you for at least the first part of the
> first day.  When I visited in 2001, no one could (or would) speak English,
> so I had to muddle through as best I could until I could arrange for an
> interpreter.
> 
> 4. Review the costs published on the web site for copies and fees if you
> plan to get copies.  I recommend the full-size copies of a scan (on CD). 
> The scans are high resolution and excellent quality.
> 
> BTW, AGAD also has the original settlement records for many German villages
> for the 1795 - 1806 time frame, including the Lodz area (referred to as
> South Prussia in many documents).  If you know the exact village, you might
> find something there also.  During my visit, I found original settlement
> documents from several villages in the area between Plock and Warsaw north
> of the Visla River.  These documents are all in German because Prussia
> controlled the area at the time.
> 
> Good luck!
>     -Paul Work
> 
>