Frequently Asked Questions

These FAQ's (Frequently Asked Questions) are to help Germans from Russia (GR) Bessarabian researchers better understand this region and identify resources for researching family history.

If you have questions about GR research or history outside of Bessarabia, try the GRHS FAQ’s.

AC Area Coordinator (someone who specializes in researching specific areas of the U.S. or Canada where Germans from Russia settled)

CH Clearing House (GRHS volunteers that coordinate work on acquiring, translating, and extracting research resources)

FHC Family History Center (the LDS branch libraries located throughout the world)

LDS Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (commonly referred to as the Mormon Church)

OC Ort Coordinator (someone who specializes in researching specific German villages where Germans from Russia originated)

VC Village Coordinator (someone who specializes in researching specific German villages in Russia)

· Bessarabia is located in Eastern Europe. Its geographic boundaries are the Prut River on the west, the Dniester River on the east, and the Black Sea to the southeast. Bessarabia has never been an independent nation, but has always been included as part of other nations. Currently this region is located partly in Ukraine, and partly in Moldova. During most of the 1800’s, it was part of Russia.

My family tradition is that we’re German, but you say that Bessarabia is in Russia. Why were Germans in Russia?

· The history section describes this more fully, but in 1813 the Tsar of Russia invited settlers from other countries, especially Germany, to settle in this area.

My family information says we’re from South Russia. Is that the same as Bessarabia?

· Many Germans coming from the Black Sea area to the U.S. or Canada listed their birthplace as South Russia. You may come from Bessarabia, or you may come from one of the other GR areas around the Black Sea.

· Dr. Karl Stumpp, author of The Emigration from Germany to Russia in the Years 1763 to 1862, created a number of excellent maps to aid researchers. They are not online, but are available in paper format for purchase at the GRHS Book Store (Miscellaneous Items). The maps that would be of most interest to Bessarabian researchers are:

How can I find where my ancestral Bessarabian village is on a modern map? Is there any way to cross-reference the German name of the village with the current name?

· The Village Data Sheets include the present-day name of the German villages in Bessarabia.

Are there plat maps of the Bessarabian villages so I can see the street and house where my ancestors lived?

· Hand-drawn maps of many of the villages are included in the DAI Records on film T81-318. An index of T81-318 shows where on that film you can find the sketch for your village.

· Although most aren’t online, plat maps do exist for most of the Bessarabian villages. These maps are often included in the Heimatbuch for the village. Another option is to contact the Village Coordinator for your village to see if a map exists.

This is just a short overview of Bessarabia’s history, including the points most relevant to the GR Bessarabian researcher.

· Bessarabia’s history for German-Russians doesn’t start until 1812. Prior to that year, the Turks had occupied this region since 1484. Bessarabia was ceded to Russia by Turkey in the treaty ending the Russo-Turkish war.

· Prior to occupation by the Ottoman Empire (Turks) in 1484, Bessarabia had been part of the principality of Moldova for about a hundred years. This area was part of Wallachia for several decades in the 14^th century. The name, Bessarabia, comes from the ruling dynasty of Wallachia, the Basarabs. Prior to the 14^th century, the region was under the control of Romanian (Vlach) rulers part of the time. It was on the invasion route between Europe and Asia, so for centuries tribes of Goths, Mongols, Huns, Magyars, and many others periodically invaded this region.

· After Russia acquired the area in 1812, Tsar Alexander I issued a manifesto in 1813, inviting settlers to colonize this newly-acquired, thinly-settled vast expanse of land.

· Germans responded to this invitation to colonize from many different areas – Poland; Germany; German villages in the Grossliebental, Beresan and Glückstal areas; and Hungary.

· The heaviest period of immigration to Bessarabia occurred from 1813 to 1825. There were 25 mother colonies (land given to settlers by the Russian government) settled in Bessarabia between 1813 and 1842. As families grew, so did the need for land, and the Bessarabian Germans created daughter colonies by buying or leasing more land from Russian landowners and founding additional villages.

· In the 1870’s, many of the colonists’ privileges (exemption from military service, allowing schools to be taught in German, etc.) were repealed and the government began measures to “russify” the German colonists. From the 1870’s onward, Bessarabian Germans began immigrating to the U.S., Canada, and South America. Many Bessarabian Germans also immigrated to the Dobrudscha and the Crimea areas.

· At the end of WWI, Bessarabia became part of Romania, and remained a part of Romania until 1940.

· In 1940 during WWII, Russia prepared to annex Romania. Due to a secret pact Hitler and Stalin had made earlier in the war, those with German ethnic backgrounds were allowed/forced to leave Russian-governed areas and were resettled in German territories.

· In the fall of 1940, the Bessarabian Germans left their homes of over a century to return to Germany. After documenting their German ethnicity (leaving us valuable family research records in the process), they settled first in refugee camps in Germany. Then they were re-settled onto farms in German-occupied Poland.

· In 1945 as the Russian army advanced through Poland, the ex-Bessarabian Germans fled westward to escape the onslaught. Many made it to Germany and settled there after the war. Some were killed. Some were re-captured by the Russians and disappeared into the Soviet Union.

· The introduction to the Koblenz records has a more detailed explanation of the resettlement of the Germans from Bessarabia back to Germany.

· Allen Konrad’s Korner has a number of very interesting reports (translated to English) from the DAI Records that give more detail about how the Bessarabians were registered for the resettlement and evacuated.

· The Suggested Reading section of the FAQ’s for books that more fully describe the history of the German-Russians.

· A more detailed timeline of GR history in the Black Sea area and key historical reference books are available in the Black Sea Historical Tutorial.

· A sample of a document outlining a land transaction between GR colonists and Russian landowners, will soon be available at Elli’s Korner (see Neufall contract when it becomes available).

When were the villages of Bessarabia founded?

· The mother colonies of Bessarabia were mostly founded between 1814 and 1825, three in 1834, and the last in 1842. See page 85 of the Stumpp book.

· Many different areas – Poland; Germany; German villages in the Grossliebental, Beresan and Glückstal areas around the Black Sea; and Hungary.

· Bessarabian Germans coming from Poland and Hungary generally had left their original homes in Germany many years before, settling in Poland or Hungary for one or more generations before coming to Bessarabia. Often the Bessarabian records will list their origin as only “Polen” or “Ungarn” making tracing these families back to Germany somewhat tricky.

· GRHS also has Ort Coordinators to assist with researching the original German villages your ancestors came from.

· Many voluntarily left their Bessarabian villages to immigrate to the United States (primarily North and South Dakota and Washington State), Canada, South America, the Crimea, the Dobrudscha.

· Those forced to leave Bessarabia in 1940 during “Die Umsiedlung” (The Resettlement) settled primarily in Germany.

· GRHS has a Regional Interest Group for the Crimea to assist if your ancestors went to that region.

· GRHS has Area Coordinators to assist with researching your ancestors in the U.S. and Canada.

· For more information about researching families that left Bessarabia and are in Germany, the Koblenz records and EWZ/DAI records are helpful.

· Albert Kern’s book, Homeland Book of the Bessarabian Germans, has histories on each of the mother and daughter colonies in Bessarabia. This book includes village histories up to the 1940 Resettlement. It is available at the GRHS Store.

· The Heimatbuch for Kulm, Bessarabia has been translated and is available online in Allen Konrad’s Korner. Even if you are not from Kulm, this book will give a lot of insight about life in Bessarabia.

· GRHS has published a journal called the Heritage Review since 1971. The index will help you locate articles about your village. Past issues of the Heritage Review are available for sale. A CD including all issues from 1971-1982 is also available at the GRHS Store.

· The Bessarabian Newsletter, published since 1997, has included many articles on specific villages. The index will help you identify articles about your village.

· Many of the Bessarabian villages have a “Heimatbuch” written about the village. Since these are generally written by those who left in 1940, they are usually written in German. Some Heimatbücher contain a lot of family-specific data that is easy to use for even a non-German speaker. Others contain stories and articles that make it a challenge if you don’t speak German. Sources of these books include: the GRHS library, sending out a query on the Bess-RIG Listserve, or purchasing from the Bessarabien Heimatmuseum in Stuttgart.

· The Landsmannschaft has published an annual journal called the Heimat Kalendar der Bessarabiendeutschen for the past 50 years. This index includes all the articles relating to specific families. The Heimatkalendars have been indexed from 1986 to 1990.

· Some of these books are out of print but many are still available from the Bessarabian Museum bookstore in Stuttgart, Germany. Many of these and similar books are held in the GRHS library.

· Tarutino zentrum der deutschen in Bessarabien 1918-1940 by Fandrich and Bisle

· The basics of family research apply when beginning your search. It is essential that new researchers have an understanding of those basics before getting too deeply into the Bessarabian part of their research.

· Cyndi’s List (a well-known genealogy site, although not specific to GR research) has a number of articles and tips for beginners.

· GRHS Tools and Tutorials contain some information on genealogy basics, although focuses mostly on GR-specific tips.

· This is not inclusive and is not meant to be a handbook for beginners, but a few key points are:

· Go backwards in time with your research, starting with what you know. Start with yourself, noting the basic life events, and then go to your two parents, then to your four grandparents, charting the lineage of your ancestors as you go.

· Gather copies of the documentation as you go. If you don’t do an adequate job of this, you’ll waste time by needing to go back later to review the original document and verify a detail you didn’t realize was important at the time.

· Focus on one ancestry line at a time. If you try to gather in too much at one time, you may scatter your efforts, resulting in confusion and frustration about which family line was where.

· As you gather data on relatives who are in your direct ancestral line, it is often valuable to take notes on others that look like they could potentially be in your family tree. An example – your ancestor’s birth may be recorded only as “Polen,” while his brother’s birth is shown as “Plock, Polen,” giving you a clue that you wouldn’t have gotten from your direct line. Find some way of keeping that extra data where you can find it when you want it.

I know the basics about genealogy; how do I get started looking for my Bessarabian German ancestors?

· Identifying the village your family came from is key to your research. If you know your village name, the GRHS Research Page will show you information available about your village. Note that some village names changed several times; the Research Page lists the name most commonly used. Other names for the village will be listed on the individual Village Data Sheets.

· The GRHS Clearing House shows Bessarabian (and other Black Sea GR) records made available through the efforts of volunteers.

· The GRHS Search page allows you to search for your family against the records available on the GRHS website. This is one way to pinpoint your village if you don’t know it.

· The Bessarabian RIG Research page shows the wealth of resources available for Bessarabian researchers, and includes a link to search throughout the GRHS website.

· The Head-of-Household (HoH) indexes allow you to locate the Bessarabian family record for your family. The family records show full families grouped together, making it very useful to identify family connections. You may want to read the HoH Introduction to understand how to use these records.

· The LDS Family History Library (FHL) has many of the original Bessarabian church records available on microfilm. The GRHS CH (Bessarabia section) includes a list of the Bessarabian villages and associated film numbers. (There are three lists of film numbers; shown as phases 2, 3, 4 at the above link.) Contact your local FHC for how to order and view these films.

· Numerous village censuses have been extracted by volunteers and published by GRHS. Although not available online (due to agreements with archives in Ukraine), they are available to be purchased at the GRHS Store.

· Two sets of records show the German families that left Bessarabia in 1940. These contain information about those specific individuals as well as their family history. Even if your own family left Bessarabia prior to 1940, these can provide valuable information for you if a branch of your family remained there. One set of records are the Koblenz records. The other are the EWZ/DAI records. Allen Konrad’s Korner includes a number of these records.

· Bessarabian Newsletter Issue 4-3 included a list of Bessarabian research resources that existed at that time (December 2000). Lots of new resources have become available since then, but it is still a useful summary.

· The Odessa Digital Library (ODL) also has a number of records useful to GR researchers. Go to the full text retrieval function and put your family name in the search field for the Bessarabian Collection to access extracts from some of the Bessarabian church records.

· The St. Petersburg records were reports made from the original Bessarabian church records and include almost all of the births/marriages/deaths in Bessarabia from 1833 to 1885.

· The "St. Pete" reports began in 1833. At that time, the Evangelical Lutheran churches of Russia were required to start sending annual parish reports to a central geographic archives. The Bessarabian St Pete reports are already indexed and ready for use.

· The Beresan District RIG FAQ’s have a full discussion about these records, although written from the standpoint of a Beresan Lutheran researcher.

· Some do, many don’t. Those that do have home pages are listed in the Links page of the Bessarabian RIG website.

· However, each village has a Village Data Sheet that includes key information. You can also contact your Village Coordinator (VC) to find out more about what resources are available for your village.

How can I find out if there is someone who has family from my village in Bessarabia (or with my surname) to find out if we connect?

· The GRHS Der Stammbaum shows researchers working on the same/similar surnames.

· Use of the Bessarbian RIG listserve can also help you connect with others sharing your research interests.

Some of my ancestors came from places other than Bessarabia, like the Volga or Beresan. How do I find them?

· There were many German areas around the Black Sea. These include the Beresan colonies, Grossliebental colonies, Kutschurgan colonies, Glückstal colonies, the Dobrudscha area, and the Crimea. GRHS has other Regional Interest Groups (RIGs) that can help with your research around the Black Sea.

· The Volga area is in a different region of Russia, southeast of Moscow. Germans settled there in the 1700’s. GRHS has some information on the Volga area, but AHSGR specializes in this area and has much more information on it.

Some of the information that looks interesting on the GRHS website shows a lock and I can’t view it. Why is that?

· GRHS makes many resources available for free to all researchers. However, the majority of the most valuable data is reserved for GRHS members. There are costs to retrieve these valuable records from foreign archives and make them available for research, and GRHS must cover these costs to break even. GRHS is a non-profit organization, and does most of its work through volunteers in order to keep costs low.

· GRHS obtains research data from many sources. In some cases, the foreign archive or individual providing the data has specifically requested that the data not be made available to the public at-large, but only to the organization’s members.

· Online access to new records being made available for research. GRHS’ main focus is Black Sea GR family research, so this is the best place to find the most in-depth Bessarabian GR family information available.

· For those records that can’t be published online (usually due to restrictions by the foreign archive), members get a significant discount on all publications from the GRHS Store.

· Easy access to a network of fellow Bessarabian researchers via the Bessarbian RIG listserve

· Once you’re a member of GRHS, you can join multiple Regional Interest Groups at no additional cost. This can be valuable since the Bessarabian Germans came from many different locations.

· The Village Coordinator (VC) for your village is always willing to help! The VC’s of GRHS are extremely important to our organization.

I’ve got information about my Bessarabian family or village. How can I share this with others?

· Let others on the Bessarbian RIG listserve know the information you have available and that you’re willing to share!

· The GRHS Heritage Review and Bessarabian Newsletter publications would love to review your information for publication. Contact the Heritage Review Publications committee at

for the HR. For the Bessarabian Newsletter, contact the editor.

· Volunteer as a VC! Or Area Coordinator for your area of the U.S. or Canada. Or Ort Coordinator for the German village your family came from. Many villages do not yet have a VC. As a matter of fact, we could really use several VCs for each village, so don’t let that stop you from joining in on the fun!

· If you want to know more about the work of VC’s (and AC’s and OC’s), review the Mission and Goals information on the Bessarabian RIG webpages.

· If you think you might be interested and have more questions about becoming a VC, contact

or any other VC.

· GRHS focuses entirely on Black Sea (including Bessarabia) GR history and research, and is therefore the organization that is the most helpful for Bessarabian GR researchers.

· In Germany, the Heimatmuseum der Deutschen aus Bessarabien, has a collection of items from life in Bessarabia as well as a library of research materials. They are located in Stuttgart and can help with your research if you visit. Their museum is definitely worth visiting for a picture of life in Bessarabia.

· The websites of the Heimatmuseum, Landsmannschaft, and Hilfskomitee are all in German. For information in English about these organizations, see the Bessarabian Newsletter Issue 5-3 or NDSU.

· Other organizations exist related to the Germans from Russia, although they generally focus on specific areas outside of Bessarabia or have minimal genealogical research materials available.

What books do you recommend I read as a beginner? Which ones contain information on Bessarabia?

1) There are two books that most researchers in GR genealogy recommend. The first one is From Catherine to Khrushchev - The Story of Russia's Germans by Dr. Adam Giesinger, 1974. This book has an excellent overview of the German immigrants in the various regions of Imperial Russia. It gives the reader an excellent understanding of the development of the colonies and their ultimate fates. This is the book that all GR researchers should consider adding to their personal collection early in their GR family research efforts. Available from GRHS Store.

2) The second recommended book is Emigration from Germany to Russia in the Years 1763-1862 by Dr. Karl Stumpp. This book gives detailed information by family name. In most cases, it shows where the family came from originally and has census and passport data for some of the early arrivals in the Black Sea area. Not easy reading, but an excellent reference source.

· However, it’s important to note that for Bessarabia the information in the Stumpp book ranges from very weak to excellent for the individual villages. The census data for Bessarabia was not available to Stumpp and so he relied on several other sources for his information. (Page 501 of the book gives a fuller explanation of the information he used.) Below is a list of the Bessarabian villages and the quality of data found in the Stumpp book.

Alt Elft	very good
Alt Posttal	very good
Arzis	good plus
Beresina	very good
Borodino	very good plus
Brienne	good
Dennewitz	weak
Friedenstal	good
Gnadental	excellent plus
Hoffnungstal	weak plus
Katzbach	good
Kloestitz	good
Krasna	very weak to nil
Kulm	very good
Leipzig	very good
Lichtental	excellent
Neu Arzis	very weak
Neu Elft	good
Paris	good
Plotzk	very good
Sarata	excellent plus
Schabo	good plus
Tarutino	very good plus
Teplitz	excellent
Wittenberg	very good plus

(This grading scale is a general assessment for each village. Individual family information may vary from this scale.)

· Much (though not all) of the Bessarabian data in the Stumpp book was also in the earlier 1938 version of the book.

· The Stumpp book is available at GRHS, at the LDS FHL on microfilm 6000829, and in electronic format from AHSGR.

3) Of specific interest to the GR Bessarabian researcher is the Homeland Book of the Bessarabian Germans by Albert Kern (English version available from GRHS). This book gives an overview of Bessarabian history, plus has photos and histories for each of the Bessarabian villages.

4) Another helpful book for tracing Bessarabian Germans who came to the U.S. is Richard Sallet’s book, Russian German Settlements in the United States. This book focuses on where GR’s were as of the 1920 U.S. Census. Available from GRHS.

6) The Heimatmuseum bookstore also has a number of books relevant to Bessarabian researchers. Although these are in German, those with detailed family information are fairly easy to understand even for a non-German speaker.

8) Book reviews of some of the GR-related books can help you decide if a specific book will help your research.

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What other information is available to read about Bessarabia?

· GRHS has published a journal called the Heritage Review since 1971. The index will help you locate articles of interest. Past issues of the Heritage Review are available for sale. A CD including all issues from 1971-1982 is also available at the GRHS Store.

· We have many records retrieval efforts underway to gain copies of more Bessarabian records held in the various archives scattered around old Russia. The best way to keep current with what’s happening is to read the Bessarabian Newsletter or subscribe to the Bessarabian RIG Listserv.

· In some cases, records are already available but require assistance from volunteers to make them accessible for research.

Can I help with some of these projects? My German isn’t that good (or I don’t speak/read it at all).

· Absolutely! There are numerous projects the GRHS Clearing House can use help with to benefit all Bessarabian researchers. For those who speak or read German, there are translation and extraction projects. For those who don’t and are willing to learn, projects are usually structured in steps so that novices have their work reviewed by more advanced German-speakers. And there are always projects to sort through existing data that don’t require any knowledge of German (or Cyrillic).

· The Bessarabian Projects page shows projects specific to Bessarabia, and the GRHS Clearing House page shows all existing GRHS projects and project coordinators. If you have an area of interest not currently listed that you’d like to initiate, we’d love to hear from you.

· Some projects that currently need volunteers are: 1) To compile emigration data on the origins of our Bessarabian Germans, especially from the Heimatkalendars; 2) To compile pre-1833 birth/marriage/death information to supplement the St. Pete records