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One way to identify the spelling of a last name is to compare it with a list of common last names for that country.
It's always possible that the last name is not common, or the family intentionally spelt it in a unusual way, but a list of common names will often help.
For Poland, here's a ranked list of common last names in the 1990's.
There's also a list ...
10
Both towns are listed in Gesher Galicia's All-Galicia Database.
Gesher Galicia is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that promotes and
conducts Jewish genealogical and historical research for Galicia, a
province of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire, which is today part of
eastern Poland and southwestern Ukraine. Our major research initiative
— The ...
10
That Ellis Island changed immigrants' names is one of those family myths. Some people had altered their names prior to departure from Europe for various reasons and many more definitely changed their names after settling in their new residences. But it didn't happen at Ellis Island.
Many immigration agents were immigrants themselves.
Each person on staff ...
9
If polish spelling rules are applied to "Ko lo jay" it'd look like Kolodżej.
However, Kołodziej is more likely to be your answer as it is a real polish family name but it is NOT pronuced "Ko lo". But instead "Ko wo" with a soft ł, similar to the "W" in "Washington".
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A completely different direction - is it clear that the name wasn't written by that person themselves in cyrillic script?
The image can also be read as Russian cursive handwriting, spelling 'Одес', which can be interpretted as Odessa, a major city in current Ukraine.
8
Some small differences, especially in word endings:
Inter Josephum Wojnowski viduus de Bialybrod operanium et Hedwigem
Wojleckem de huba Lukowo non uxor atam ad contrahendum matrimonium
sacramentale benedictio Ecclesiae facta.
Translated, again small differences:
Between Joseph Wojnowski, widower of Bialybrod, laborer, and Jadwiga
(or Hedwig) ...
8
If they were catholic or protestant
Statistically (based location, given names and surname), as ethnic Poles and living in rural Upper Silesia, your great-great-grandparents were Catholic. (Catholics used a much broader range of given names than the Lutherans). This assumption would be confirmed or refuted in the microfilmed church records.
Dates and ...
8
I wanted to address a point that originally came up in the comments to bgwiehle's answer.
Places are known by different names throughout their history. If a place was called by a particular name during the time the Nazis were in power, it may not be acceptable to use that name in a social setting, for obvious reasons. However, as historians and researchers ...
7
I think it might be Kovel.
This link will also help. It says:
"Volinsky = Volhynia. Prior to WW I, this was a province wholly within Russia. Between 1921 and WW II, it was split in half with the west being in Poland and the east remaining in Russia. Today it is wholly in Ukraine."
http://boards.ancestry.com/thread.aspx?mv=flat&m=21349&p=...
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If you're trying to guess a proper spelling of a Polish surname, there are two useful resources to look at.
The more reliable is the PESEL database, which contains data about every living Polish national. Current data is confidential (there's a statistical summary available, but that only lists top 100 names), but there's an export from the '90 available. ...
7
It could be 'Szemiński' (that's male form, female would be 'Szemińska') but that's quite an approximate guess.
Things to consider is that 19th Century Warsaw had at different times, Prussian, Polish, Russian and again Polish local administration which along with it had different language and spellings. Also for consideration Warsaw at the time had only ...
7
I've left in my wrong turns below on purpose, to show the process of genealogical research and how to build evidence. This manifest is both correct and a red herring. It led me to some hypotheses that didn't pan out.
To read about the path that led to the answer, go down an entire section, to "I'm getting nowhere fast."
The full page is on FamilySearch (...
answered Jan 20 '19 at 0:25
Cyn says make Monica whole
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6
The basic premise in family history is to start with what you know, and work backwards and outwards from that point in small increments to discover more. You want to be able to say with confidence, when you recognize a record associated with your relative, that you are looking at something that was recorded about your relative and not someone else with the ...
6
I just checked Wikipedia and found that Wozniak is the "tenth most common surname in Poland (89,015 people in 2009)" and, as a result, I suspect you will find people of that name (and its variants) spread all over Poland.
Consequently, there will be a vast number of potential resources that you could use to try and trace people with this name (and its ...
6
First, look at records in Australia. The Australian National Archives would be the first place to try and track down some record of your grandmother entering the country - they are likely to have made some inquiries at the time.
There are two sets of records relating to two persons who arrived on the Orama in 1939. One is a young woman born 1920 (...
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I think it might be Sudlikov. There's a Sudilkov, Ukraine, which gets more matches on Google (see http://grossmanproject.net/sudilkov_jewish_history.htm). But Sudlikov shows up too (eg http://www.antiquejewishbooks.net/522.html). So I'm not sure if they were the same place.
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You have the wrong administrative description of Grudziądz in 1879, which is possibly contributing to your difficulty in finding records. Per Wikipedia, "Following the First Partition of Poland in 1772, the city was annexed by the German Kingdom of Prussia. ...Until 1920 Graudenz belonged to the administrative district of Regierungsbezirk Marienwerder in the ...
6
According to Familienforschung in Westpreußen, which maps German and Polish names in West Prussia, Friedrichsbruch today is Bruki Unisławskie.
Checking with Google Maps shows it's a bit over 7km from Kokocko (formerly Kokotzko), an absolutely feasible distance for the christening of a newborn. In fact, according to the source above, the Protestant church ...
6
"Ostroweic" doesn't seem like a plausible name in Polish language, very likely it is "Ostrówiec" or "Ostrowice". There is dozens of villages all over Poland with that name, including one relatively large town in Belarus which was Polish before the second world war.
There is also a surprisingly large pound of small villages called Ostrów, in both Poland and ...
6
Not sure about the town, but the locality is "pow. Kamień Koszyrski" - powiat Kamień Koszyrski.
Here's the list of "powiaty" (counties) in 2nd Polish Republic (1918-1939) : https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podzia%C5%82_administracyjny_II_Rzeczypospolitej#Wojew%C3%B3dztwo_poleskie
Current name of the county town is (English spelling) Kamin'-Kashyrs'kyi (Ukr. ...
5
The answer could be Jatołtowicze.
From Google maps it looks to be a very small village.
5
The document is a registration card issued by Central Committee of Polish Jews - Division of Records and Statistics.
Line 1 gives the last name of the person (although both are given on this line), in this case Elka Fleker;
Line 2 is supposed to be the first name;
Line 3 is the birthdate and location - only the year 1914 and town appears to be Mir;
Line ...
5
A good resource is The Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavic Countries
Looking for names similar to Soodlikov, one finds Sudilowka on p 550 of volume XI which tells one to look at the entry Sudylków. Sudylków is found on p 553 of volume XI where it is described over a two columns. Sudylków is on the river Kosecka. In 1870 there ...
5
The site serwis heraldyczno-genealogiczny has a searchable database of names from the book "Słownika nazwisk współcześnie w Polsce używanych" (Dictionary of names in use in Poland) by well-known Polish philologist Kazimierz Rymut. This link should take you directly to the search page. Typing in Thillmann, Tilman and Tillman gives back numerous variants: ...
5
If he was Jewish, try searching the All Galicia Database or the JRI-Poland Database under his mother's maiden name. Many Jews in this area of Galicia were assigned their mother's maiden name on official documents -- including birth certificates, marriage certificates, passports, Polish draft lists, etc. -- because the local authorities didn't recognize ...
5
This is a common question for beginning genealogists. However, the emphasis on the correct spelling of a name is a relatively recent phenomenon. Even if you could determine a preferential spelling for your husband's family, that wouldn't help you find his ancestors -- and it might make it less likely.
Most of the material we use for studying genealogy and ...
5
The name appears to be written as "Dovgirdeli" or "Dowgirdeli".
However, this will have been an attempt to render a Russian/Polish/Lithuanian name into English so we shouldn't expect that the spelling will necessarily exactly match the original place-name!
I found this List of inhabited places of Suwalki governorate which includes the following place ...
5
You need to consult a historical gazetteer of Poland that takes into account the boundary changes with other countries over the years.
https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/Poland_Gazetteers is a good starting point to identify a suitable gazetteer. Your document is from 1945 , so you're looking for a relatively recent gazetteer.
I haven't checked in any of ...
5
It does seem that the province shown in your document for both the birthplace and the desired destination is "Śląsk". That is the polish word for the Silesia region of Poland which existed between 1742 and 1945. It is located in what now is southern Poland bordering with Germany and the Czech Republic.
The town is likely Chorzów, which is not ...
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