Mastodawn

Hey, so this is a strange question. I have been able to do genealogy on the patriarchal side of my family who were Dutch and European back to about 1100, where the records are hard to find and have delved into ancient forms of language I can’t read. (May I say here that amongst my regrets is that I am not the Duchess de Bitche, but gods I want that title. I promise to wear flowy black robes that swirl when I turn and everything!.)

But, do I know anyone, or anyone who knows someone that does genealogy in Eastern Europe and / or the Arabic speaking world? Not asking for free help, genealogy is not a hobby at this level, it’s a profession for which I am prepared to pay for knowledge workers.

DMs are open, so you’re not putting anyone’s name out in public if they prefer not. Thanks gang!

Aaron Brick — אהרן בריק 1d ago

@MissConstrue Professional genealogists usually work in the same place where they they specialize. My family has hired some from afar for different reasons. I would consider narrowing your search to those places where you think the records might exist. Often, national associations of genealogists put directories online including individual specialties.

I happen to have a tab open of Connecticut genealogists, who seem to like to address different aspects of the problem: https://www.fergusonlibraryarchive.org/genealogical-research

Genealogical Research · Ferguson Library Digital Archives

Digitized collections of archives at the Ferguson Library in Stamford, Connecticut.

Steve Gisselbrecht 1d ago

@MissConstrue
You can simply declare yourself the Duchess de Bitche. Who can stop you?

MissConstrue 1d ago

@stevegis_ssg Quite possibly the people of the region, who seem to have lost their taste for aristocracy, and who can blame them. 🤣

Dark Phoenix 🇺🇦🇨🇦🇬🇱🇵🇦🇵🇸🏳️‍🌈1d ago

@MissConstrue do you know any Mormons?

MissConstrue 1d ago

@Darkphoenix Only the poor babies who come melting past my doorway in the summer. Bless their hearts. I honestly keep bottles of water cold just for the poor folks who don't realize our houses are all two acres apart and it's 1000 degrees F out here.

Dark Phoenix 🇺🇦🇨🇦🇬🇱🇵🇦🇵🇸🏳️‍🌈1d ago

@MissConstrue Mormons are big on genealogy. (My ex MIL was a Mormon)
And I found this...
NGS Recommends...17 Important Free Websites for Genealogy Research https://share.google/Ui4DH3EEIOLnNMpN4

NGS Recommends...17 Important Free Websites for Genealogy Research

Anyone interested in researching their family tree will want to check out this list of free genealogy websites, including Family Search, Cyndi’s List, U.S. Census, Freedman’s Bureau, JewishGen, Find A Grave, and much more.

National Genealogical Society

MissConstrue 1d ago

@Darkphoenix Rock on with your bad self! Thanks!

Dark Phoenix 🇺🇦🇨🇦🇬🇱🇵🇦🇵🇸🏳️‍🌈1d ago

@MissConstrue NP

MissConstrue 1d ago

@Darkphoenix Ah, I just realized the connection between missionaries and genealogy. It's been a long day and I'm slower on the uptake than normal .

As far as I can tell, their work has primarily focused on Americans of western descent. I.e., I was able to use one of their public facing services to correlate public records with birth certificates, and they even enabled a lot of connections in the 1600s, where other people uploaded documentation that verified the family bible I've been using as reference. But beyond that, I had to use Dutch and British archives.

But, on the other side of the family, i can't find any documentation of family members that arrived in Ellis Island from *before* they arrived in Ellis Island. The entire family's surname was changed to the judge's surname, which seems weird, but maybe we can find out what their original name was? I dunno. And the other family name is so common in E.Europe it's like Smith in America.

Dark Phoenix 🇺🇦🇨🇦🇬🇱🇵🇦🇵🇸🏳️‍🌈1d ago

@MissConstrue good luck. It was common practice for immigrants to "Americanize" their surnames. Or, if they were from certain countries, to change it completely.

Dark Phoenix 🇺🇦🇨🇦🇬🇱🇵🇦🇵🇸🏳️‍🌈1d ago

@MissConstrue I also remember reading that they sometimes just translated to the American, so like Grau or Graun became Grey, etc.

Stéphane Charette 🇨🇦1d ago

@MissConstrue I would say the advantage here is once you're back to the year 1100, chances are good that all serious genealogist will have already done the work and published it somewhere.

MissConstrue 20h ago

@charette Yeah, the British and Dutch sides are pretty well documented because we’ve always been anti monarchist, and that has caused some historically relevant documentation to exist in many places. Example; one of my ancestors was the Prime Minister before William of Orange returned. He argued that William should not return, and that the Netherlands should not be a monarchy. Williams supporters murdered him and his brother, some say boiled them, other art suggests a significantly more violent end, but his tongue is still in a museum in Utrecht.
Situations such as these do make it easier to find records. :) We’ve apparently done similar things in France and England. Being burned at the stake seems to be a recurring theme in my paternal historical record. 🤣

@MissConstrue Eastern Europe is pretty hard because a lot of places switch countries and official languages several times. Also a ton of records were lost or burned. In general church records for births, marriages and deaths are your best bet.
Depending on the territory the books will be in archives that don’t match today’s country. So any part that was Prussian might be stored in Germany’s archives today

MissConstrue 20h ago

@jenni Mostly Poland and possibly Russia, although if I understand the records, the Russian side would have been there since the Tsars, and are probably only distantly related, so I haven’t really even considered them.
The only thing I really know is that they sent my grandfather and his sister to Ellis Island well before the Nazis got there, because he fought for the Americans in WWII. And apparently the women on that side all took up arms and became snipers, hunting Nazis. As one does when Nazis arrive.
But I don’t read or speak Polish, so I can’t really do much research. 🤷🏻‍♀️

@MissConstrue yeah I got stuck there slightly as well. I have some ancestors in the German parts of Poland and so I had to deal with where are these records anyway. This might be a place to start, it is digitized church records: https://metryki.genbaza.pl/ and this one: https://www.nac.gov.pl/en/digital-archive/szukajwarchiwach-pl-search-the-archives/

I know I had a different one also at some point. But there definitely are a handful that you can search in. Just very time intensive

Metryki GenBaza - Księgi metrykalne i USC. Genealogia.

Zdjęcia i skany ksiąg metrykalnych i USC z Polski. Księgi kościelne i parafialne. Polska genealogia. Znajdź i zobacz akt urodzenia, ślubu i zgonu przodka.

Metryki GenBaza

MissConstrue 18h ago

@jenni whoa, thanks!

John Carlsen 🇺🇸🇳🇱🇪🇺16h ago

Do you use wikitree?

I started building a family tree there and found help from relatives previously unknown to me. My tree got bigger very quickly.

MissConstrue 15h ago

@johnlogic I have not. I used….i want to say it was Geni way back in the day to verify some records, and the side that came to the US pre-revolution is pretty well documented there, it’s only the folks that came in through Ellis in the 19th century that I can’t trace because of language barriers and the fact that one family’s name was changed at the immigration court.
But I’ll give it a look, thanks!

Mx Verda 5h ago

@MissConstrue pssssssst...! You can absolutely still wear the flowy black robes. You can absolutely use a pen name, stage name, nick name, or anything else, too!