Wednesday 12 October 2022

 

An introduction to Family History

Why trace our Family History?

Curiosity? Medical reasons? Religious reasons? It is a good way to keep the brain working – use it or lose it!

Getting started

We must work from the known to the unknown.

Speak with other relatives (especially the older ones). Are any of your relatives already researching the family? Who might have inherited the family papers? Request permission to copy photographs and documents.

Assemble your information. Check out those bundles of papers.

Use a Family History program to record the family details. Enter women under their maiden names!

Australian resources

Birth, marriage and death certificates

In the eastern Australian mainland states, a person’s birth place is recorded on the person’s death certificate and marriage certificate; and the birth certificate of the children. In other states there may be more or less information, especially in earlier years. See Graham Jaunay’s excellent website for a detailed table: http://www.jaunay.com/bdm.html

Wills and probates

Someone may leave items in a will to family “back home” in Germany (especially someone without close family in Australia). It is always worthwhile looking for wills, probates and intestacies from your ancestors and their relatives.

Immigration files

Detail varied according to place and time. Records for early free settlers in New South Wales often listed the names of the immigrant’s parents and religion. Records in Queensland in the 19th century usually just listed the name and age of the immigrant along with the details of the ship. Records will usually be in the relevant state archive.

After federation, immigration progressively became a commonwealth responsibility with post WWII records particularly being quite detailed. Immigration files can be found at one or more offices of the National Archives of Australia (NAA), and may be viewed for free at the relevant reading room or digitized for online access on payment of a fee. (The record may be accessed for free if it has already been digitized.)

Search the holdings of the NAA at the website www.naa.gov.au but be aware that there is much that is not indexed.

Naturalisation documents

As with immigration files, the content of naturalisation documents varies greatly according to place and time. Documents are mostly stored at the relevant state archive although those from South Australia and Victoria have been transferred to the National Archives of Australia (NAA).

Following federation, the commonwealth assumed the responsibility for naturalisation and documents are stored at the NAA. Once again, the documents can be viewed at one of the NAA reading rooms or be digitised to allow online access.

Other resources

·      Obituaries

·      Biographies

·      Newspapers

https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/, for Australian newspapers

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz, for New Zealand newspapers

·      Directories

·      Official gazettes

Accessing records

FamilySearch is a free site. They microfilmed and digitised records from around the world. Many of the records have been indexed.

Ancestry and MyHeritage have indexes to many overseas records and images of many of them. Both are subscription sites. There is some overlap with FamilySearch.

Findmypast and TheGenealogist have indexed records from the British Isles.

Some Family History computer programs

Family Tree Maker                            W M

Family Historian                                W

Reunion                                                  M

Legacy Family Tree                           W

Roots Magic                                      W M

TreeView                                           W M

Family Tree Builder (MyHeritage)   W M

Gramps                                              W M

Some useful websites and resources

FamilySearch (free): https://www.familysearch.org/en/

FreeBMD         www.freebmd.org.uk

FreeReg            www.freereg.org.uk

FreeCen           www.freecen.org.uk

General Register Office (England and Wales): www.gro.gov.uk

ScotlandsPeople: www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk

General Register Office (Republic of Ireland): www.gov.ie/gro

General Register Office (N. Ireland): www.nidirect.gov.uk/contacts/general-register-office-northern-ireland

Ancestry ($): https://www.ancestry.com.au/

MyHeritage ($): https://www.myheritage.com

Findmypast ($): www.findmypast.co.uk or www.findmypast.com.au

TheGenealogist ($): www.thegenealogist.co.uk

Genes Reunited ($): https://www.genesreunited.co.uk

Queensland BDM: https://www.familyhistory.bdm.qld.gov.au/

Graham Jaunay’s civil registration summary: http://www.jaunay.com/bdm.html

National Archives of Australia: www.naa.gov.au

Queensland State Archives: https://www.qld.gov.au/recreation/arts/heritage/archives

Queensland State Archives ArchivesSearch: https://www.archivessearch.qld.gov.au/

Wednesday 26 January 2022

 A Breakthrough in Pommern!

One thing leads to another

I was approached by the Pomeranian Special Interest Group (based in California) to do a presentation via Zoom on Pomeranians in Australia on Saturday afternoon January 22 their time or Sunday morning 23 January Brisbane time.

After a quick introduction to the history of European settlement in Australia and the arrival of significant groups of Germans from 1838 onwards, I spoke about a number of "sample families" from the former Kreis Lauenburg in Pomerania who had settled in Queensland: Kopittke and Rehbein who migrated to Maryborough but settled in Bundaberg and intermarried; Paradies who migrated to Bowen and moved to Charters Towers; and my own great-grandparents Daniel and Charlotte Kopittke, their son Gustav and daughter Auguste who migrated to Brisbane and settled at Geebung, now a Brisbane suburb.

To my utter surprise, Uwe Kerntopf from Germany posted a comment in the Chat section "Daniel KOPITTKE and Charlotte born JESCHKE married 1838 in Garzigar, County Lauenburg." Now these were indeed my great-grandparents! But why did I not already have the details of their marriage?

When Daniel died in 1880 in Brisbane, my grandfather Gustav was the informant for the death certificate and gave Daniel's age as 70, that he was born in “Poman, Prussia”, and that he had married Charlotte at Lauenburg. When Charlotte died in 1884, Gustav was again the informant and gave her age as 73, that she was born in “Gotzlow, Pommern, Prussia”, and that she had married Daniel at “Masson, Pommern, Prussia”. I thought that “Masson” might be a corruption of Klein Massow, but with Gotzlow being near Stettin, I thought that to be an error.

The information from the marriage record now told me that at the time of marriage (6 April 1838), Daniel was described as Knecht in Zelasen (servant in Zelasen) aged 27, Charlotte as Magd in Belgardt (maid in Belgard) aged 24, daughter of George Jeschke verstorbener Tagelöhner in Chotzlow (deceased day-labourer in Chotzlow). 

This would seem to solve the issue of Charlotte's birth place - apparently Chotzlow had been wrongly heard as Gotzlow - Chotzlow is now known by its Polish name Chocielewko and lies about 12 km by road to the south-west of Garzigar which is now known as Garczegorze. Belgard, now known as Bialogarda, lies about 9 km north-north-west of Garzigar; and Zelasen, now known as Żelazna, lies about 18 km to the north-east of Garzigar. I wonder how they met!

Uwe directed my attention to the database at Stolper Heimatkreise e.V. which contained the details of my great-grandparents marriage. 

https://www.stolp.de/globalindex.html?

With some 4½ million records in the database, this site is well worth a visit. With the use of wildcards, _ replacing any one character and % replacing any number of characters, the string "K_p%t%k_" entered in the surname field produced 1562 hits which could be variants of the surname "Kopittke".

So a big thank you to Uwe Kerntopf for reminding me of the Stolper Heimatkreise site, and for the record of the marriage of my great-grandparents. And another big thank you to the numbers of volunteers who have contributed to the Stolper Heimatkreise site!