Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2023 3:22 pm
Post subject: Prussian Deportations - 1885 to WWI
Looking for some specific help on where to look next in order to possibly shed light on the Prussian deportations (rugi pruskie). I'm intrigued by the fact that my 2xGGP decision to emigrate from West Prussia just happen to have coincided with Prussian decrees to deport Austrian- and Russian Poles and Jews from West Prussia and to colonize the region with more Germans.
Background: My 2xGGF left in 1887 and then his wife, children and parents in 1890. He, his wife (my 2xGGM) and their children at the time moved from her birthplace (Turzno) outside Toruń to his birthplace (Miesiaczkowo) in Brodnica County less than a year before he left -- maybe to save money to go to the US. These were both largely Polish-speaking areas according to the 1910(?) census, and Turzno's estate owners, at least, were Polish.
Although I have candidate birth records for my 3xGGP I do not have enough information yet to say with any certainty they were all born in "Prussian Poland" by which I mean West Prussia here. (The status of some records I still need to comb through are currently "in progress" on genealogiawarchiwach.pl; others I need are at the Family History Centers in the US -- the pandemic has upended access times in my area, so its has been difficult to research there lately). Such information would be useful to know since if they were subjects of Russia or Austria -- no matter how many generations or years they had lived in Prussian Poland -- they would have been forced to leave their homes.
I suspect that the deportation and the colonization decrees of the 1880s directly or indirectly prompted my ancestors to leave West Prussia. While I continue to look further down the tree to determine whether my 2xGGP's were officially rooted in Prussia, Russia or Austria, I wonder whether the Prussians maintained a list(s) of Polish families they forced out of the country prior to WWI, and if so, whether such a list is still extant. If extant, where do I start hunting?
Thanks.
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SophiaPO Top Contributor
Joined: 05 Oct 2014
Replies: 1545
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Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 9:38 am
Post subject: Re: Prussian Deportations - 1885 to WWI
| SPG wrote: | Looking for some specific help on where to look next in order to possibly shed light on the Prussian deportations (rugi pruskie). I'm intrigued by the fact that my 2xGGP decision to emigrate from West Prussia just happen to have coincided with Prussian decrees to deport Austrian- and Russian Poles and Jews from West Prussia and to colonize the region with more Germans.
Background: My 2xGGF left in 1887 and then his wife, children and parents in 1890. He, his wife (my 2xGGM) and their children at the time moved from her birthplace (Turzno) outside Toruń to his birthplace (Miesiaczkowo) in Brodnica County less than a year before he left -- maybe to save money to go to the US. These were both largely Polish-speaking areas according to the 1910(?) census, and Turzno's estate owners, at least, were Polish.
Although I have candidate birth records for my 3xGGP I do not have enough information yet to say with any certainty they were all born in "Prussian Poland" by which I mean West Prussia here. (The status of some records I still need to comb through are currently "in progress" on genealogiawarchiwach.pl; others I need are at the Family History Centers in the US -- the pandemic has upended access times in my area, so its has been difficult to research there lately). Such information would be useful to know since if they were subjects of Russia or Austria -- no matter how many generations or years they had lived in Prussian Poland -- they would have been forced to leave their homes.
I suspect that the deportation and the colonization decrees of the 1880s directly or indirectly prompted my ancestors to leave West Prussia. While I continue to look further down the tree to determine whether my 2xGGP's were officially rooted in Prussia, Russia or Austria, I wonder whether the Prussians maintained a list(s) of Polish families they forced out of the country prior to WWI, and if so, whether such a list is still extant. If extant, where do I start hunting?
Thanks. |
Hi,
I was looking for something else, and came across this interesting set of films on FamilySearch. It is not quite the right location in Prussia for what you are asking about, but I want to mention it to you anyway. It is from Marienwerder, West Prussia, and the film notes say it is a record of Polish and Russian workers and immigrants, and intriguingly, "includes those expelled."
https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/457631?availability=Family%20History%20Library
Some of the films have titles that include the words "Ausgewiesene Verbrecher" (expelled criminals) and others say "Polnische Flüchtlinge" (Polish refugees). I am saying this because these might not be obvious search terms for you to choose when trying to find your ancestor's records, but that might be how they were characterized by the people doing the deporting. Maybe you can look through some of the records and see if it they are the type of thing you are looking for, and then see if you can find similar records closer geographically to where you are searching.
Hope this line of thought makes sense.
Sophia
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