For All My Sandusky County Kin Hunter Friends

I wanted to take the opportunity to thank everyone at the Sandusky County Kin Hunters who let me ramble on today about one of my favorite subjects, my Pomeranian roots. You each made it a thoroughly enjoyable experience for me. A special thanks to Dave Golden for inviting me to speak. Here are the links that I promised I would post. Enjoy! 

I. EAST OF THE ODER/NEISSE LINE A. Eastern Europe  1. http://www.kartenmeister.com/preview/databaseUwe.asp Kartenmeister “Database of locations are EAST of the Oder and Neisse rivers and are based on the borders of the eastern provinces in Spring 1918. Included in this database are the following provinces: Eastprussia, including Memel, Westprussia, Brandenburg. Posen, Pomerania, and Silesia.” Gives both German and Polish names of villages and towns.

Website in German, English and Polish 

2. http://feefhs.org/ The Federation of East European Family History Societies Resource for All of Eastern Europe – Maps, Links etc. B. 

Pomeranian Links 

Website in both German and English 

3. http://pom-wpru.kerntopf.com/index.htm Useful information about the counties along the border between former Prussian Provinces Pomerania and West Prussia. Counties include Butow - Pomerania Lauenburg – Pomerania Stolp – Pomerania Karthaus – West Prussia Neustadt – West Prussia Putzig – West Prussia 

Website in German with some English Subtitles 

4. http://www.ruegenwalde.com/pommern/index.htm Pommerninfo – Information and links for All Pommern Counties 

Website in German 

5. http://hinterpommern.de/ Pommern – Das Land am Meer Information and links for Pomerania East of the Oder-Neisse Line 

Website in German and some English 

6. http://pommerndatenbank.de/ Pommerndatenbank Searchable databases including 

A. Contact exchange between Pommern family researchers – Pommernkontakte

B. Search Family Names in various Address books from years 1869 -1938 

C. Search Church Books and Civil Records Database for availability of records and their location

Website in English and German 

7. http://www.bogenschneider.org/pomerania.htm Pomeranian Genealogy Resources - Excellent website for links! 

8. http://pomeranianews.com/welcome.html Die Pommerschen Leute Website for the Quarterly Newsletter devoted to the Duchy of Pomerania Published by The Immigrant Genealogical Society Pomeranian Special Interest Group Maps, Articles, and Links 

Website in English 

 9. http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~mnprgm/PRG.html The Pommern Regional Group of Minnesota Information on Pomeranian Culture and Links 

10. http://www.pommerschervereinfreistadt.org/Home/tabid/68/Default.aspx Pommerscher Verein Freistad Culture and History of Pomerania 

II. Pomeranian County Links

Website English and German 

1. http://www.hinterpommern-info.de/index.html Herzlich Willkommen im Landkreis Stolp i. Pommern Information about specific villages in Stolp Kreis Links to other information 

Website in German 

2. http://www.powiatslupsk.info/ Powiat Slupski Information about towns and villages of Stolp Kreis

Website in German and Polish 

3 http://belgard.org/ Information on Pommern - Kreis Belgard – Schivelbein 

Websites in German 

4. http://www.buetow-pommern.info/ Information on Pommern – Kreis Bütow 

5. http://www.cammin-pommern.de/ Information on Pommern - Kreis Cammin 

6. http://www.deutsch-krone.de/ Information on Pommern – Kreis Deutsch Krone 

7. http://www.lauenburg-pommern.de/ Information on Pommern – Kreis Lauenburg

8. http://www.naugard.de/ Information on Pommern – Kreis Naugard

9. http://www.netzekreis.de/ Information on Pommern – Netzekreis

10. http://www.rummelsburg.de/ Information on Pommern - Kreis Rummelburg

11. http://www.geocities.com/schlochau/index.html Information on Pommern –Kreis Schlochau 

Website in German and some Polish 

12. http://www.kolberg-koerlin.de/ Information on Pommern – Kreis Kolberg-Körlin 

Website in German and English 

13. http://www.schlawe.de/ Information on Pommern – Kreis Schlawe  

Website in English and German

14. http://list.genealogy.net/mailman/listinfo/stolp-l Mailing list for Researchers of the Pomeranian County of Stolp Instructions in German, English, French and Dutch 

III. GERMAN LINKS 

Website German but some on list read and write English 

1. http://www.genealogy.net/genealogy.html German Genealogy Portal

Website in German and some English 

2. http://immigrantgensoc.org/ The Immigrant Genealogical Society Collection of German and American Genealogy – Research Service from Library holdings.

Website in English 

3. http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/about.cfm German History in Documents and Images Collection of Historical documents, images, maps pertaining to German History From 1500 -2006 (Note some sections still under construction) 

Website in German and English 

4 http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/RG/frameset_rg.asp?Dest=G1&Aid=&Gid=&Lid=&Sid=&Did=&Juris1=&Event=&Year=&Gloss=&Sub=&Tab=&Entry=&Guide=Ger_BMD_RefDoc_HandbookGermanResearch.ASP “A Genealogical Handbook of German Research” by Larry O. Jensen This can be downloaded as a PDF file from FamilySearch website.

Website in English

5. http://www.volksbund.de/ Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge e.V. Website of the German War Graves Commission with information on German Soldiers who died in World War I and World War II 

Website in German 

6. http://mki.wisc.edu/ Max Kade Institute for German American Studies Documents, Maps, Information, Resources, Links 

Website in English (some links in German) 

7. http://home.att.net/~wee-monster/germanlinks.html Links for Geman Genealogy on the Internet Joe Beine’s very useful German links recently celebrated it’s 10 year anniversary. 

IV. IMMIGRATION 1. 

Website in English 

1.http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=d21f3711ca5ca110VgnVCM1000004718190aRCRD&vgnextchannel=d21f3711ca5ca110VgnVCM1000004718190aRCRD Information on the US Citizenship and Immigration Services Genealogy Program Procedures and fees for requesting Index Search and Record Copy Request (Note you can now make these requests online) 

2. http://www.ellisisland.org/ Ellis Island Search Passenger Manifests for Immigrant Ancestors 1892-1954 

V. ONLINE LANGUAGE TRANSLATORS 

1. http://www.google.com/language_tools?hl=en Google Language Tools Can translate both text and websites into from approximately 30 different languages into English., including Polish. Muy Bueno!

2. http://babelfish.yahoo.com/ Yahoo Babel Fish Can translate both text and website from 12 languages into English. Does not include Polish. 

VI. INTERACTIVE MAPS 

1. http://maps.live.com/default.aspx?v=2&cp=44.023938~-99.71&style=h&lvl=4&tilt=-89.875918865193&dir=0&alt=7689462.6842358 Microsoft Virtual Earth Look at Earth in 3D 

2. http://www.google.com/intl/en/ Google Earth 3D view of the world and more.

© 9 November 2008, Desktop Genealogist Unplugged, Teresa L. Snyder  

The Kindness of Stangers

“I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.” What was true for Blanche Dubois is doubly true for me as a researcher of my German roots. For one thing, I don’t speak a word of German, (Verstehen?). For another, many of the records were lost during World War II. And finally, even if the first two issues could be overcome, there is a loss of collective identity for the place my family once called home. That home no longer exists and the inhabitants and their descendents have been scattered to the winds. (For a better idea of what I’m talking about you can read two previous posts – Pomerania - An Introduction and Part II: Pomerania - War and Consequences.) I was lucky to have started my research on this part of my family in the Age of the Internet. If I had attempted this twenty years ago, I wouldn’t have been able to make much headway. I was also very fortunate that my great grandparents had kept documents and letters that pointed the way to begin my search.

 A website, called Kartenmeister, lets you search for the names of German villages. My great grandmother Emma, for example, was born in the village of Klein Gansen. Here’s what my search told me about the village:

 

From this, I learned the province and county where she was born. A website dedicated to preserving the history of the county, Stolp, was extremely helpful. They also had a mailing list, which of course is in German, and I joined. With the mailing list, I use Google to do a quick and dirty translation, and while I am occasionally lost during some discussions, the members of this mailing list have helped me find a couple of key pieces of information. They found the baptismal record for my great grandmother and the marriage date for one set of great great grandparents. I won’t tell you how long I labored writing my query in German, but the point is I can communicate with other German researchers, and they can communicate with me. As long I get over the fear of looking stupid in another language, I am all set. 

 Google also helped me find an American family historian who was researching one of my family names. Even in Germany, the last name of Quetschke is not that common, so when I found Shirley Pawlowski’s home page I was ecstatic. Shirley had actually come across my family and she was kind enough to share what she had found with me. We still haven’t figured out the exact connection between our two families but because they came from the same area of Stolp, we are certain they are connected in some manner. 

 One of my other great finds was a German researcher who was researching the surnames, Gliewe and Gleffe. Jörg and I communicated via the Google translator, which created some, um, interesting conversations. He translated into German a number of letters that were done in Plattdeutsch (Low German), so I could get a rough translation from Google. He also was able to find out what happened to some of Emma’s family, and sent me family trees on them. There are people living in Germany today, who descend from Emma’s siblings. All that survived, had lived in East Germany. Jörg interviewed their descendents, and sent me some of the information. I know for example that young Karl who had missed his little nephew, Willi, in a letter that I included in my post, Pomerania - An Introduction, had lost three sons in World War II. His wife, hearing that a third son had died, was so grief stricken that she ran from the house. They found her the next day dead and lying atop the grave of one of her sons. A database search on Volksbund der Deutschekriegsgraberfursorge, the website of the German War Graves Commison, confirmed this information and added more details. 

 Another website, Pommerdatenbank, run by Gunther Stubs, inputs data from local directories into a database so that you can locate family living in the area prior to 1945. This is ongoing project, but has already yielded results for me. Though the information on my German ancestors tends to trickle in drip by drip, it is a wonderful time to be involved in this type of research. With persistence, a good search engine, some translating tools and a lot of help from friends, I continue to make progress – a little at a time. 

 Until Next Time – Happy Ancestral Digging!  

This was written for the Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy

© 16 July 2008, Desktop Genealogist Unplugged, Teresa L. Snyder 

The Berlin Connection

Last week I spoke about the homeland of my Great Grandparents. I spoke in generalities. Today I indulge in some specifics. 

As a child, my sister and I would be play a game we made up called, “Berlin Wall.” I was eight when the wall between East and West Berlin was built. Television shows, quick to see the compelling drama that stories centered on this subject would have, proved to be ample fodder for our young minds. It never occurred to me or my younger sister that for some of our relatives, this was not make-believe drama, bur rather a fact of every day life. At the time, we didn't know that our grandmother had aunts, uncles and cousins she had never met living in Berlin and East Germany.

In a November post, I wrote about a box that my younger sister had “inherited” that contained precious clues to our German relatives. 

“The box went from my great-grandparents' house to their eldest son, William. Upon William's death, his widow, Louise, gave the box to my parents. Because the papers in the box were all in German, my parents gave the box to my sister, who had taken two years of high school German. My sister dutifully stored the box of German papers on a shelf in the closet. And there the box sat half-forgotten gathering dust.” 

Among the items in the box was a letter written from Leo's sister Minna. The letter, written in 1907 has not been translated, but the address is easy to read — the letter came from Berlin. It was signed Paul und Minna, and the reason I know she was Leo's sister is because of another item that was also in the box. 

Only two things in the box were placed there after World War II. One was a German bible that my great grandmother Emma had carried with her every week as she walked to Sunday church service at St. Paul's in Clyde. The bible was added to the box after her death in 1952. The other was a copy of a funeral notice for Minna von Malottki, who died May 31, 1958.

Among other things we learn from the notice is that she outlived her husband by a year and a half, her survivors include a daughter Kathe Corsten and her husband Dr. Walter Corsten. Also surviving are Kathe's two children, Manfred and Wolfgang Corsten, a daughter-in-law Charlotte von Malottki and presumably Charlotte's two children, Victoria and Sylvia von Malottki. No son is mentioned, but Charlotte is listed with a maiden name of Karl indicating that there was probably a son who predeceased Minna. 

Part of the opening lines “unsere über alles geliebte Mutter, Schwiegermutter, Oma, Schwester und Schwägerin,“ refer to Minna as being a mother, a mother-in-law, grandmother, sister and sister-in-law . This leads to speculation that perhaps some of those siblings who remained in Germany were still alive. 

Leo, my great grandfather, came to the United States in 1906. Another sister, Hulda Kollat, emigrated in 1904 along with her husband Carl and her children. Carl Kollat acted as a sponsor for Leo and Emma. It is known that another brother, Franz, had died before my great grandfather was born, but two sisters, Ida and Emma, are unaccounted for as well as two brothers Carl and Paul. I suspect that either Ida or Emma was married to a Tuschy because in 1910 a letter arrived from Budow. The letterhead read, “Albert Tuschy, Gastwirt.” Gastwirt means innkeeper. 

The greeting in the letter is “Lieber Onkel und Tante!” or Dear Uncle and Aunt. I have not found any more information on Albert or the Tuschy connection to the Schröder family. Minna's funeral notice gives the place for the burial service as the chapel at Wilmendorfer Cemetery. Wilmendorfer was in the British Sector of Berlin. It is quite likely that Minna was living in the British Sector. Of course, she died before the Berlin Wall was erected in 1961, but she would have been living in Berlin in 1948 when the Soviets decided they wanted the Allied Forces out of Berlin. 

As I wrote last week, after the war, Berlin was divided into four occupied zones. The Eastern section of the city was under Soviet occupation, while the western portions of the city were under either France, American or British rule. The problem was that Berlin itself was situated in what was to become the German Democratic Republic, more commonly known as East Germany, which was entirely under the control of the Soviet Union. The Soviets decided the best way to get rid of the Allied Forces was to impose a blockade so that no Allied trucks could go into or out of Berlin. The effect of this blockade would be to keep food and fuel getting to the American, French and British troops in Berlin. It would also keep 2 million Berliners from getting these same items. 

Because Berlin's two airports were in the British and American sectors, and because in 1945 a 20-mile wide strip of free air corridor had been agreed upon by all parties INCLUDING the Soviets, the British and American forces launched the Berlin Airlift to supply the troops and the people of Berlin. It seemed at first an almost impossible task, but with ingenuity and the help of the West Berliners themselves, the operation was a success. The Airlift lasted from June 1948 until September 1949. Approximately 2.3 million tons of goods were delivered in that time. A very interesting account of the Berlin Airlift is here http://www.spiritoffreedom.org/airlift.html. Be sure to read the paragraph labeled, “OPERATION LITTLE VITTLES” which tells the story of one Air Force Pilot's efforts to go the extra mile for the children of Berlin. 

Minna's funeral notice was sent to Hulda's family and someone from the family copied the notice and sent it to Leo. It is the only tangible proof we have that a member of Leo's family survived the war. The upside of being a genea-blogger is that I can put my unsolved riddles out here on the Internet. You never know — someone out there may Google the Tuschy or von Malottki name and find this post. Stranger things have happened.

Until Next Time! 

Note this post first published online, May 6, 2008, at Desktop Genealogist Blog at The News-Messenger Online http://www.thenews-messenger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=BLOGS02

© 6 May 2008, Desktop Genealogist Unplugged, Teresa L. Snyder 

Part II: Pomerania - War and Consequences

Note: In my previous post, I talked briefly about the County Stolp in the province of Pomerania. This is where my Germanic roots lie. Today I conclude with the end of the war and its aftermath. 

The people of Pomerania knew that the Russian Army was rapidly advancing on them. Hitler had made sure that everyone heard of the horrors that had happened in Nemmendorf when the Russians had overtaken that village in the fall of 1944. Women crucified on barn doors, children murdered, old women shot as they sat in their homes. 

Anxiously the people of Stolp waited for the required permission to evacuate to the coast — some would be taken in ships to Mecklenburg and others to Denmark. Finally, at the beginning of March the word came to evacuate the villages in the Southwestern point of Stolp. Budow, Muttrin and Klein Gansen were ordered to evacuate on March 6. Klein Nossin, Nippolglense, Gross Gansen and Gaffert were ordered to leave the following day. But had the evacuation orders come too late? 

The Russian Army moved quickly and some of the refugees were overtaken by the army and were forced to retreat back to their homes. Others, not overtaken, found themselves behind enemy lines, making it perilous to continue. On March 8-9, the county of Stolp was the site of fierce fighting and the danger to those who journeyed to the coast was increased even more. The net effect of all this was that most of those who set out to leave were still in their villages when the Russian Army took control.

Yet, some managed to make it to safety and boarded refugee ships. An interesting collection of letters and recollections of the events of March 1945 were edited and published by Heino Kebschull in 2002. Called, “Klein Nossin, Flight and Expulsions Recollections,” and translated by Leslie and Martha Riggle, you can read a more detailed account of the experiences of those who lived in Klein Nossin during those fateful days at http://www.klein-nossin.de/dateien/flight.pdf.

There are also recollections about what was to happen next. The redrawing of borders was finalized at the Potsdam Conference in July and August of that year. Germany and Austria were divided into four occupied zones, as were their respective capital cities, Berlin and Vienna. The land that Hitler had “annexed” would no longer be a part of Germany. Russia added to its territory by taking a chunk of what had been East Prussia and by grabbing 70,000 square miles of Poland along what was known as the Curzon line. The Poles who had lived in the area east of the line were to be expelled, but would be given land elsewhere in compensation. 

“Elsewhere” turned out to be German lands east of the Oder and Neisse Rivers. Two-thirds of Pomerania was east of this line. A plan of “humane” expulsion of the Hinterpommern, West Prussia, Silesia and the remaining portion of East Prussia took place between 1945 and 1949. They were joined by ethnic Germans who had lived in Czechoslovakia, Poland, Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Romania. Depending on whose numbers you believe, up to 12 million Germans were expelled from their homes, an estimated 10 percent died or went missing as a result of their flight from the Russians or the expulsions. In a world weary of war, and in the wake of uncovered atrocities of the Germans, no one raised a syllable of protest when the Polish citizens were expelled from the new Russian territory, nor did they protest the followed expulsions of the Germans. 

Those in the Hinterpommern were allowed to take one suitcase — sometimes not even the suitcase arrived at their new destination. And the destination — a war-ravaged Germany that had little room for them. 

Karl-Heinz Pagel, in his book, “The District Stolp in Pomerania,” gives the following statistics. He reports how many wanted to live in the occupied zones controlled by the British, American and French forces. This area was commonly known as West Germany. The fourth zone was under Soviet control and was commonly called East Germany.

Budow - 310 to West Germany, 122 to East Germany, 31 killed in war, 20 civilians dead, 41 missing

Gross Gansen - 193 West Germany, 186 East Germany, 23 killed in war, 22 civilians dead, 63 missing

Klein Gansen - 244 West Germany, 98 East Germany, 21 killed in war, 26 civilians dead, 44 missing

Klein Nossin - 129 West Germany, 54 East Germany, 17 killed in war, 11 civilians dead, 41 missing

Muttin - 465 West Germany, 126 East Germany, 26 killed in war, 36 civilians dead, 75 missing

Nippoglense - 150 West Germany, 125 East Germany, 15 killed in war, 9 civilians dead, 25 missing

Gaffert - 153 West Germany, 59 East Germany, 7 killed in war, 9 civilians dead, 42 missing 

The Soviet controlled German Democratic Republic or East Germany had closed borders, restricting travel between the “two” Germanys. While West Germans were permitted limited access into East Germany, most East Germans were not allowed to cross over into West Germany.

In 1990, the two halves of Germany were reunited. One of the conditions of reunification was that they agreed to make permanent the Polish Border at the Oder-Neisse Line, thus officially ending any German claims to the Hinterpommern.

Should I choose to visit the former homeland of my great grandparents, the Baltic Sea would still be there, as would the deep green forests, and the gentle countryside, but the signs would not be written in the language of my ancestors, nor would the faces searched be those of any distant relative. But as I looked for information about the village of Budow, now known as Budowo, I found a journal entry mentioning an old church there. 

I remembered seeing a picture someone had taken of the church on Google Earth. It was labeled, Budowo Ko_ció_ zabytkowy z XIV w, which roughly translated means “antique church in Budow.” Could it be the same church where my great-grandparents and their two oldest boys had been baptized? Anxiously, I looked for the picture again, this time comparing it to an old picture I had found online a few years ago. It was the SAME church — it still stands, and the thought that it still stands there, surviving both time and war, seems somehow right. 

Until Next Time!

Note this post first published online, May 2, 2008, at Desktop Genealogist Blog at The News-Messenger Online http://www.thenews-messenger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=BLOGS02

© 1 May 2008, Desktop Genealogist Unplugged, Teresa L. Snyder 

Part I: Pomerania - An Introduction

In February 1945, as World War II was drawing to a close, the leaders of the Allied “Big Three” — Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill — met in Yalta to discuss, among many things, the realignment of borders after the war. Of the four proposals given for the partitioning of Germany, three of them would have kept the province of Pomerania as part of a partitioned Germany. The fourth proposal, pushed by Stalin and eventually agreed upon, did not.

It is in the province of Pomerania where my German roots lie. Pomerania's northern border is the Baltic Sea. To its west lies the province of Mecklenburg, to the south Brandenburg and to the East, Poland. The part of Pomerania that lies west of the Oder River is known as Vorpommern, while the land to the east is called Hinterpommern. In 1939, at the beginning of World War II, Pomerania was comprised of 32 counties. In German, a county is called a Kreis. The Kreis Stolp was one of the northern most counties, and the second farthest eastern county, and it was this county where my great grandparents, Leo Schröder and Emma Gleffe Schröder, were born.

Their families lived in the southernmost area of the county, very close to the Rummelsburg and Butow counties of Pomerania. Stolp was one of the least populated of the counties and it was dotted with many small villages whose names I now recognize. Names such as Budow, Gross Gansen, Klein Gansen, Wundichow, Gaffert, Muttrin, Klein Nossin, and Nippoglense have become like familiar friends. 

Budow, for example, was the village in which my great grandparents were living when their oldest son Wilhelm, or Willi, was born. The village is mentioned in a document dated 1340 but it is thought to be older than that. Slavs settled first in the area and later Germans moved in and coexisted peacefully with their Slavic neighbors. According to one legend, the village was moved after a particularly devastating plague killed many of the villagers. They shoveled under the old village and rebuilt it in another location not far away. 

While the village was once a part of the Holy Roman Empire, and as such a Catholic village, a local priest by the name of John Stojentin began to follow the doctrine of Martin Luther, and the villagers became Lutherans by default. This did not set well with their Polish neighbors and once, in the early part of the 16th century, Polish raiders came and burnt the village along with the church as the people who had been worshiping watched in horror. The word of the burning of the church spread, and donations from all across the Pommern came, enabling a wonderful new church to be built. 

During the Thirty Years War, once again, the church went up in flames and once again, it was rebuilt. The church burned a third time in September 1815 when a house next to the church caught fire and the straw roof of the house blew onto the wooden roof of the church. The church that was rebuilt this time was the same church in which my great grandparents had their sons Willi and Max baptized in 1903 and 1905, respectively.

In Gross Gansen, where my great-great-grandfather Gleffe lived, the population numbered 362 in 1905. It was this village that Emma and Leo listed as their home on the ship's manifest in March of 1906. The county Stolp, had as its largest city, a city also named Stolp with slightly more than 31,000 people in 1905. A letter from Stolp arrived in Clyde, Ohio in 1908. The language spoken in Pomerania was Plattdüütsch or Low German, which is still spoken in parts of Northern Germany and it is a separate language from High German, the official German language.

An Internet friend from Germany, Jörg Gliewe, translated the letter into High German for me, so that I could get an approximate translation from my online translator. The letter is from Emma's brother Paul and his wife, Bertha. Karl who is also referred to in the letter was Emma's youngest brother, who was 10 years older then his nephew Willi. Below is an approximate translation of the letter: 

Dear brother and sister

We have gotten your letter and the picture. We have always asked if you still think of us. Karl has always talked about Willi. He says he remembers quite well how he and Willi drove to Gross Gansen in the wagon. He was very pleased about the picture. We will also send one. We now have 3 (2 boys and a girl) The smallest boy is 1.5 years old. Dear Sister, write us whether you still want to come back. Or don't you? Or do you think you do (in America) better than in Germany? I like it in Stolp and it is also quite good. I deserve also very beautiful. I am here also in the Steinsetzern. I will make 4 Mark each day. I still learn and I only receive about 6 Mark each day. Then I will be ready. Write us, whether the work is also very difficult and how long you have to work. We work here 10 hours from 6 to 6. Tell us whether you also live in the city or in the countryside. And if you live in the country, do you have cows and pigs and chickens -- Just like here, too? Do you have grain and potatoes? And is it also expensive as here? Or is it cheaper? Write us again exactly how it for you. What else I do not know to write. Now you as well and send us back soon. Karl says to say hi to Willi. He says: Willi should come back again. Now you write to us soon.

Best Greeting Paul and Bertha 

An address directory in 1938 confirms that Paul and Bertha were still living in the city of Stolp at that time. As far as we know, because the letters stopped coming from Germany at the start of World War II, all the remaining family were living in either the city of Stolp or in the villages of Stolp as the Russian Army approached from the East in early March 1945. 

Tomorrow I will continue this series with a look at end of the war and its aftermath. 

Until Next Time - Happy Ancestral Digging! 

Note: At http://pomeranianews.com/pomerania_map.html you will find these maps of interest. Pomerania – Mid 19th Century 

The German Empire – 1871 – 1918

Pomerania – 1938 

At this website, you can see the villages and towns of Stolp. Most of the villages mentioned can be founded at the southern most tip of the map. http://www.stolp.de/images/Stolp-Kreis/Kreiskarten/Kreis-Stolp-72-2.jpg

© 30 April 2008, Desktop Genealogist Unplugged, Teresa L. Snyder