Yeah, a lot of work. I have so many branches shaking their leaves for attention right now–and, no, I don’t mean on Ancestry.
On top of that, my husband’s relatives are calling from their graves, too. My husband has shown increasing interest in his own family history, and I keep trying to encourage him into it as a personal hobby, even if it means he ties up the computer.
But, no. He doesn’t want to do it alone. He wants to do it with me. Sigh. And his relatives are a lot of work. His Ukrainian ancestors don’t have a WieWasWie website that is translatable to English and with all the Dutch Ukrainian documents available online! No, instead I am being passed on from one person to another in an attempt to find someone who is an expert on Tiraspol, the city my husband’s grandfather and his family came from. Tiraspol is the 2nd largest city in Moldova, which is a country that is in political turmoil today. But in the late 1800s, Tiraspol was sort of a satellite of Odessa, which is in Ukraine, not Moldova. Pretty confusing! The two cities are 65 miles apart. And hubby’s grandmother might have been from Odessa. Or maybe she was really from Tiraspol, too!
Oddly, we found a listing of possible birth records for the grandfather, Isidore Scheshko, and his siblings in Odessa, not Tiraspol. Maybe it has something to do with the way the government functioned in those days. Eastern European Jewish records are hard to find. I’ll keep you posted on what I find out when I have discovered enough to create a story of sorts.
I’ve also been trying to find the Prussian town or towns the Waldecks and Noffkes and Kuschs came from. I’ve found two estates/castles where Gottfried Waldeck worked before immigrating to the U.S. The last one, Finckenstein Palace, was quite well known.
That’s what it looked like when Gottfried worked there, probably as a farm laborer. This is what it looked like after WWII.
Kind of heart-breaking to see, although maybe it was no picnic to work there . . . .
Prussian towns and records are super hard to find. Many of them were destroyed after WWII. The areas of what are now Poland that were once the homes of ethnic Germans are now completely emptied of Germans. And nobody can agree on what Prussia even was. The boundaries were constantly changing. There was East Prussia and West Prussia, and they are used so oddly and sometimes even interchangeably that every article I read confuses me even more (sometimes places in West Prussia are farther east than East Prussia!). Although my Prussian branch was my maternal grandmother’s mother’s family, I saw the other day that my paternal grandmother had a Prussian ancestor. That area of Prussia was very close to the German area around Bingen (on the Rhine) where her other branches lived. So when my grandmother told me as a little girl hearing “the Prussians are coming” was very scary, I don’t have a clue what she was talking about!
Now I hope you’re as confused as I am!
Gottfried and Alwine (Noffke) Waldeck
and family
The Family Kalamazoo 
I am not confused at all… Genealogy starts by being confused, then little by little we see the light!
And I guess we move to the harder after accomplishing the easier!
Although it could take years…
Tell me about it, Pierre!
I feel your pain. Welcome to my world—at least with my maternal relatives. It’s amazing that I didn’t give up on genealogy since I started with that side. I’ve still not gotten any further than my great-grandparents in five years, and I only have US records for them, no European records at all. I am just thankful that my paternal side came from western Germany! And I dread doing my husband’s family—all from Ukraine. Maybe by then you will be an expert and can help me! 🙂
I didn’t realize your husband’s family was from Ukraine. Maybe they are relatives! Does he know what citiies/towns they are from? And haha on your last sentence. I highly doubt it. I’ve been talking to Tiraspol experts, and they all say it can take years to get one document. And you have to fork over some bucks, too, most likely. Remind me where your great-grandparents brick wall resides.
OK, first, Harvey’s maternal side is from Kiev; his paternal side is from Zbarazh. As for my great-grandparents, my mother’s mother’s parents were from Tarnobrzeg, Poland—they are the Brotmans. My mother’s father’s side are from Iasi, Romania—they are the Goldschlagers. I actually do have a few Iasi records, but nothing for the generation before my grandfather. And I have NO records from Poland. Zilch.
A real assortment of places! Do you know if people are finding records from Poland or not?
Oh, yes—many, many have been found. Just none for my great-grandparents or their European-born children or siblings. Only US records. The records are just not as complete as compared to Germany or the US (where they still are not really complete).
Amy, that would give me hope that something will turn up someday. No, US records are not “completely complete” haha. But they get better all the time. It’s astonishing how well organized the Dutch records are, but I guess it’s a smaller country than the US.
Same with the Germans, but because it’s divided into separate states like the US, there is a different archive for each state with different websites and rules. Some have nothing online. Some have some online. Some are more comprehensive. Sometimes Jewish records are separated out from general records; sometimes they aren’t. And there’s no central place to find links to all the various archives. But that’s true here also. But at least US records are in English!
I spit out a little iced tea at your last sentence. So so true! Why can’t they all be in English? 😉
LOL! Glad to make you smile, and sorry if your tea messed up your clothes!
Keyboard . . . . 😉
I am always amazed at the education I get from genealogy blogs…I think they should be included in school curriculum-dream on. Great post! My heart sank seeing the ruins of the palace. My paternal great grandfather was from Odessa, Ukraine with a move to Galati, Romania by 1898. I am at a total dead end on how to proceed with locating records and information on him. I do have his parents names. Any tips, information on where I could start looking?
As far as the palace and Prussia go, I had no idea what happened after the war to the ethnic Germans who weren’t in Germany. We never learned this stuff at all.
About Ukrainian and eastern European genealogy: I am completely ignorant about how to proceed with these records. Have you done a DNA test on Ancestry, BTW? There is an ethnic group for Jews of Moldova, Ukraine, and part (eastern?) of Romania. All of my husband’s ancestors seem to be from that area (Odessa/Tiraspol and then also Kamanets-Podilski). What I did was contact someone on JewishGen who wrote about traveling in the area and she led me to someone else who led me to someone else, etc. I think where I am at now is that I need to start with ship manifests and naturalization papers and work backwards EXCEPT that I probably need to hire someone to locate those Odessa birth records. It’s unlikely that there will be someone to communicate with in English otherwise. Apparently it wasn’t unusual for Jews to register the birth of their children in a big city nearby. Have you read about the history in this area (Ukraine/Moldova/Romania)? We had no idea at all that the area had so many Jews in the 19th century. I am wondering if hubby’s family or some of it got out of Odessa when things really got bad–or not. Once you start to open your eyes, the more you know, the more compelling it is to find out. We found the birth list on “Odessa births” on JewishGen. Did you find that source and locate anything?
I have done my test with Ancestry with it uploaded to GEDmatch & ftdna. I definitely need to get back to JewishGen and take a look at the Odessa births.I have before and nothing jumped out at me that indicated it could be a match. Going back on- my interest is stirred again. I have read about the history of Ukraine/Moldova/Romania and boy it can get confusing. I can hardly keep it straight…need notes, lol. One of my biggest obstacles in locating the ship manifest or any immigration records for this ‘family’ I have been searching and re-searching and re-searching for years. It is my brick wall. I did find a naturalization record for him, Samuel, that could fit but again I can not be certain about it. I blogged about this under Samuel Haimowitz Revisited – if you google that it will take you right to the page. If you had a time maybe you could take a peek and see if you think signatures match up..it would be appreciated. I can use all the input I can get 🙂 TY
I think thePrussian armies were pretty ruthless sometimes even against their own people, esp. Ethic minorities.
Genealogy is a lot of work – but it also sounds like you are embarking on a fun new adventure as you begin to explore your husband’s family.
Fun and aggravating!!!! haha, It’s going to be difficult, and I have to find the time somehow.
Alas – I know exactly what you are referring to. I have similar issues working through Greek backgrounds. But at least I am focused only on Greece. You have a much more difficult and confusing historical background to work through. I greatly admire your commitment though. I know how much time I spend, yours must be much more. Your final family picture and history will be amazing and probably mean a lot to your family. Thank you. Spyro
Spyro, thank you so much for the vote of confidence! It must be really rewarding to feel that you get to know Greek history and the Greek people of the past through your research. As an aside, the Greek heritage is one of the earliest heritages that I really recognized as having an identity when I was a little kid, in part because my parents took me to the amazing festivals at the Greek church (with the yummy baked sales)!
Say what?? It’s a good thing you’re doing this and not me! LOL! I wish I had the money to hire a genealogist since there’s not one in my family! So, I really need to get back to it. That brick wall I hit a while back has probably crumbled online by now! Good luck with your search! 😀
Yeah, we’re trying to decide how to approach this. We are going to see what we can do on our own first and go as far as we can. Then if we still need those specific documents we will ask the genealogist to get those specific documents for us. No random searching as that would be a MONEY PIT. I heard that someone paid $150 for a document from Ukraine. That gave me pause, let me tell you. And, YES, get back to it, Linda. New things are popping up ALL the time!
Best of luck in your searches. Ouch on the $150 for a document. At least I have easier (I think) countries to pursue my lines — Ireland and Scotland!
And the records might be in English!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh boy, Luanne! Super confusing. I wish you lots of luck and good help along the way. My tree is so geographically, ethnically, and religiously diverse that I feel like I am constantly learning about a new place/time period. Every so often I just shut out the noise and focus solely on one place and go crazy for a while so I can revel in feeling like an expert. 😉
Yes, it’s pretty amazing how diverse your genealogical travels are! While mine is opening up more now, I was first surprised by the opposite–how homogeneous 3/4 of my mother’s side and 1/2 my father’s side were. People living in the small town in Netherlands/Germany for generations! I’m so sorry about your grandmother, Amberly. What a shock it must have been to you to lose her so quickly. xo
Thank you, Luanne. It was definitely a big shock, but also a very tender time to be with as she died. I’m glad she didn’t have to suffer long. Diagnosis on Thursday, death on Sunday. So fast. Her mother died of cancer and was sick for an entire year. That was so hard on everyone in the family. This was much better. She was 85, a good long life. 🙂
I enjooyed reading your post, the comments and the struggles. I am largely researching my Irish ancestors and while records in Australia are usually great, much of Ireland’s records have been destroyed. My other frustration is that I’d love to go to Ireland but it’s so expensive from Australia. I’m still waiting for that magical pot of gold to appear at my front door instead of the end of the rainbow.
Rowena, I had no idea Ireland’s records had been destroyed!!!!!!! I am wondering how I never “noticed” that before. Not that my ancestors are from there (while my DNA shows lots of British Isles, that’s because they don’t know how to categorize the Dutch yet haha), but I have read so many genealogy blog posts that I guess I didn’t pay enough attention! We were supposed to go on a trip to Ireland two years ago and never made it. We still hope to go someday!
I wouldn’t give up. There are some records and it’s worth a try. It might be some of the census records and some counties are more affected than others.
I’d love to get to Ireland and have a pot of gold to spend there! xx Rowena
Good with that pot of gold and the trip ;)!
Hello,
I stumbled upon your posting and have a question regarding your ancestor who lived at the Finckenstein palace. My maternal great-grandfather immigrated to the US from Breslau (Wroclaw) Lower Silesia. We can trace the family back to the 1750’s where it says they were born in FInckenstein, Germany. I can’t find any place except the castle. Did you know your ancestor lived on the estate via your research or family history past down through the generations?
Thanks
Oh wow! It was through research only. And the assumption is that the husband or the couple worked on the estate.
If you have any other questions, please email me at mlmmcastle[at]gmail.com.