German Ancestor in Poland or Russia

[klt9751]

I've been told by family members that Grandma was Lutheran, so not likely a Jewish name.

I did find out a couple of things. I talked to my aunt, and she said she remembered my Grandma saying she was born in Alexandria, Russia, and that it was on the Germany/Russia border. They supposedly had to escape out of there under the cover of night and crawl under a fence before heading to the coast for their passage to the US. Does anyone know if there was an Aleksandrow on the border between countries? And I wonder what would have been happening in 1910 that would make such secrecy necessary.

I also confirmed the Alexandria when I was looking through Ancestry.com--one of Grandmas's siblings is listed as being born in Alexandria, Austria.

[HughC]

Transylvania [Siebenbürgen] and Galicia were then part of the Austro-Hungarian empire, and the Ukraine part of the Russian empire.  As far as I can make out from historical maps, the border ran from about Darabani near the north-easternmost point of present-day Romania (east of Chernovtsy [Tschernowitz]), heading roughly north to about Podvolochisk east of Tarnopol, then roughly north-west to the River Bug, and after that followed the eastern border of Poland, which was German.

You would need a large-scale map to find the villages along the way.

[klt9751]

Thanks, that's a helpful start. I'll see what I can find. I remember when I first looked up Aleksandrow, there were many towns with variations of that name. Perhaps one was on the border.

[JustinL]

Right, after 3 hours of research, I have nearly cracked it!!

Lydia Sommerfeld arrived in Philadelphia with her mother and 5 siblings on the SS Hannover on 5th October 1910 to join George. Lubomirka was recorded as the birthplace of all of them. The town was seemingly somewhere in the Kowno (Kovno) gubernia, which is modern-day Lithuania.

Five months earlier, Lydia's two half-sisters, Rosalia and Christina, had arrived on the SS Friesland on 29th May 1910. Alexandria was recorded as their place of birth.

When Rose Schmidt (formerly Heid born Sommerfeld) naturalised in 1939, she stated that she had been born in Alexander, Russia.

Incidentally, Henriette's maiden name was Jeske.

Justin

[JustinL]

Both the manifest of the SS Hannover and Lydia's Immigration card (https://familysearch.org/search/record/results?count=20&query=%2Bsurname%3Asommerfeld~%20%2Bbirth_place%3Alubomirka~) state 'Lubomirka Kustia Kowno'.

I cannot locate a Kustia in Kowno (i.e. Kovno/Kaunas gubernia) and I am increasingly convinced that Kustia is a red herring. A  few more Internet searches suggest very strongly that Lubomirka is the modern Ukrainian town of Nova Liubomyrka, which is next to Oleksandriia!! Both are less than 10 miles NE of Rivne.

See square F3 of this map http://wolhynien.de/images/Lueck1927_gr.jpg

This region of Russia, fomerly called Volhynia, had attracted German settlers in the 1830s.

Back in 1999, Robin Dobrowsky, a grandson of Tille Dombrowsky (born Summerfelt) posted the message to RootsWeb http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/POLAND-ROOTS/1999-04/0923448427:

'My grandmother's family left from around Lubomirka in 1910. If you look at a pre WWI map of Europe, it was very near the border with Austria-Hungary. My great uncle Bill said they couldn't get an exit visa from the Russian government, so they snuck across the border, made their way through Austria-Hungary to Vienna, took the train to Bremen and docked in Philadelphia to go to Benton Harbor, Michigan. My ggrandfather who left a couple of months earlier made his way to Rotterdam, took a ship to Halifax, Nova Scotia and took the Canadian Railway to Michigan. Took me a long time to find him.'

In 1910, Rowne (now called Rivne) was about 55 miles from the Austro-Hungarian border.

[JustinL]

I've had a good look at the map and wanted to explain of few things.

The legend shows that there was no German colony in Alexandrja itself, it was merely the seat of the local government. This part of Volhynia only became part of the post-war Polish state after the Polish-Soviet war of 1919-21.

50 - 80% of the population of Nowo Lubomirka were German protestants, although the church was in nearby Puchawa. The town had up to 25 German enterprises.

The population breakdown of Stara Lubomirka was similar. This settlement had Baptist prayer house. It was larger, with 25 to 50 German enterprises.

The lengthy note at the top of the map reads, 'The map shows some 400 settlements which, with the exception of three Haulaender villages which had been "Polish-ified", were pure German. The last [previous] German colonisation which had started at the beginning of the 19th century, resulted in a population of 5634 Germans in whole of Volhynia. The bulk of the immigrants came from Congress Poland [i.e. Russia-Poland] between 1863 and 1880 with a few hundred from Prussia and Galicia. The Russian census of 1897 recorded 171,331 Germans. According to Bujak, the population had risen to 200,000 before WWI, 120,000 of whom lived in the part of Volhynia governed by Poland. In this part of modern Poland, which is ethnically Ukrainian, the German colonists have made about 120,000 hectare of previously uncultivated land (marsh, forest) arable. About 70% of the German colonies were established on the estates of Polish nobles, who can be seen as the founders of the German linguistic enclaves. The population today [1927] numbers 51,000.'

[klt9751]

Justin,
I am utterly speechless. And in tears. I can't believe the work and time you've put into this--and such amazing detail. Thank you so very much.

I have been dreaming of finding my grandma's place of birth for at least a decade. I am going to print out what you wrote and study it. My dream is to visit this place one day and see where my grandma was born. Do you think it likely or possible that there would be a physical record of her birth, like a birth certificate or baptism record? Or were most births unrecorded during this time?

Thank you again. I am so grateful.

[JustinL]

Hello,

You are very welcome. It's always enjoyable to research something new.

Birth, marriage and death records were most definitely kept from the earliest days of the colonies. The real question is whether the registers (Kirchenbücher) have survived.

The link here (http://www.wolhynien.de/records/Rowno.htm) suggests that records for the period of interest to you have survived. However, I think you will struggle to find a marriage record for George and Henriette, let alone their baptism records. You will have to contact the State Archives of Rivne Oblast. See here http://www.archives.gov.ua/Eng/Archives/ra17.php

Have you managed to track down the various passenger lists for the numerous Sommerfelds?

Take care, Justin

[klt9751]

Hi,
Thanks for the links to the records. I'll take a look and hopefully find something. I'd love to find a copy of my Grandma's birth record (Lydia), but it's fine if I don't. Just knowing where my family comes from is enough.

I haven't looked for passenger lists yet, but I probably will as I start filling out the tree.

Again, I can't thank you enough for your help. I could stop researching now and be completely content.

Kelly