From Our Contributing Editors

(Australia) First National Jewish Genealogy Conference, The Great Synagogue: A History of Sydney’s Big Shule, Insurance policy registers, German Jewish Cemetery Database project; (Canada) Jewish farming colonies, earliest Jews of Montreal, genealogical research and financial identity, Frankfort Memorbuch; (England) London Jewish Military Museum, “Who Do You Think You Are” television program, small Jewish communities in the British Isles, Freemasonry records; (France) Guggenheim family history, obtaining vital records from Poland, dissemination of personal data, given name Gentille; (Israel) Algerian Jews who served in the French army, Red Army soldiers killed in World War II, Haganah archives, women in the 1839 Montifiore census, Old Bailey Court documents, Jewish immigration into Germany, Sephardic surnames in the Russian Empire, Tel Aviv-Jaffo chevra kadisha Internet site; (The Netherlands) history of Scheveningen, Jewish soccer clubs.

AUSTRALIA (Caplan)

The Kosher Koala, publication of the Australian Jewish Genealogical Society, Inc., Vol. 15, No. 1, March 2008.

President Rieke Nash reminds readers that the first National Jewish Genealogical Conference will be held October 26–28, 2008, in Canberra, co-sponsored by the Sydney and Melbourne societies. Details are posted at <www.ajgs.org. au/conf08/index.htm>.

Peter Arnold, coauthor of the book Worlds Apart, the experiences of Jewish South Africans who migrated to Australia, indulges his genealogical imagination in an article entitled “Who Do I Think I Am?” He has found others with his original paternal name, Amolsky, but DNA testing does not match him to them—though it does link the others to one.

Rabbi Raymond Apple, rabbi emeritus of the Great Synagogue, Sydney, wonders if his great-grandfather, Abraham Joachim, was related to the famous Jewish violinist Joseph Joachim (1831–1907). Joachim, as the violinist was called, was born in Slovakia, near Bratislava. Abraham also came from Central Europe, and he named his Australian-born son Joseph. Rabbi Apple wonders if that fact points to a family tie. This issue also includes a review of Rabbi Apple’s book, The Great Synagogue: A History of Sydney’s Big Shule as well as a summary of his recent talk on “Biography As a Key to Jewish History.”

Glenda Goldberg knew that her 19th-century English ancestors originated in Holland. Goldberg found an Israeli organization, Akevoth, <www.dutchjewry.org>,that specializes in the family origins and heritage of Dutch Jewry. On this website, she found a database entitled “Ashkenazi Amsterdam in the 18th Century” that pools marriage, circumcision, cemetery and other records to arrive at detailed information on complete families. After a 20-minute search, Goldberg was able to discover a lineage stretching back one hundred years in Amsterdam.

The (Orthodox) United Synagogue (US) was formed in Great Britain in 1870. Since then, no person can be married in an Orthodox synagogue that belongs to the US without receiving a marriage authorization from it. The Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain (JGSGB) has been collaborating with the US to index these records. The first 3,277 marriage authorizations, indexed for the years 1880–85 inclusive, will be posted on a joint US/JGSGB website in Spring 2008.

United Kingdom researcher Kathryn Michael, traveling in Australia, described her collection of Levy and Michaels families dating from the 1780s. Michael is able to connect many of these English families and has helped other researchers with common roots.

George Rigal, also visiting Australia from England, spoke to the society about insurance policy registers held at the Guildhall Library in London. The registers span the 1690s to the 1860s, a time period when the Jewish population of England grew from a few hundred families to more than 40,000. Rigal estimates that about 10 percent of Jewish businesses had insurance policies and when found are especially helpful in identifying families by name. The years covered are also the period when Hebrew patronymic names, using combinations of only about one dozen biblical names, were being supplanted by fixed, inherited surnames for civic use. England, unlike most of continental Europe, never enacted legislation forcing fixed surnames. As a result, no lists exist of new surnames taken in a specific year. Because insurance policies include the holder’s trade and address, individuals often can be cross-referenced with details from later addresses and details in synagogue registers, directories, and censuses. The records are being indexed by Rigal; when complete, the index will be posted on the JGSGB website. A description of the registers may be seen now at <www.a2a.org.uk>.

Under the heading “Useful Websites” is the-work-in-progress German Jewish Cemetery Database Project <www.jcdp.de>. This database of Jewish cemeteries and their gravestones in Germany currently covers 34 cemeteries and has approximately 18,500 records. The site may be searched in English, French, German, or Hebrew.

CANADA ((Lederer)

    Montreal Forum, Quarterly Publication of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Montreal, Vol. 3, No. 2, December 2007, available online at <www.jgs-montreal.org>.

Janice Rosen, archives director, Canadian Jewish Congress and Charities Committee (CJCCC) national archives, reports on current interest in the CJCCC archive collection of records about Jewish farming colonies established in western Canada and in the Laurentians north of Montreal in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by the Jewish Colonization Association (JCA). Records of the colonies begun in 1891 contain folders filed by community name and year and include details of each family from their arrival and their subsequent progress. Details of loans are also recorded as well as many photographs. Most of the western settlements dissolved during the Great Depression. Information about the collection is accessible at: <www.cjccc.ca/nation alArchives/archives/arcguideJCA.htm>.

It fell to Stanley Diamond, president of JGS Montreal, to “Find the Family of David Myer Wald” upon receiving a request from Meir Rotenberg in Liege, Belgium. Apparently, a forgotten sefer torah was recently discovered in Maastricht, Holland, with the inscription, “For our son, David Myer Wald, who was killed in the War.” It was believed this soldier, either American or Canadian, was killed during World War II not far from Maastricht. Diamond’s task was to locate living relatives. The article describes his prodigious, detailed, and ultimately successful inquiries.

We are reminded of just how old the Jewish community of Montreal is in snippets by Anne Joseph (Montreal Forum editor), who discusses the illustrious Levy Solomons and his descendants. Levy Solomons is believed to have been born in England, either in 1729 or in 1730. He was in Albany, New York, in the mid-1750s in partnership with other Indian fur traders (Montreal Forum, September 2007). Levy arrived in Montreal in 1760 from Albany and traded extensively from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and down the Hudson River. Levy was married first to Louise Loubner (with whom he had two children) and, after her death, to Rebekah Franks, daughter of Abraham Franks (formerly Franco or France DuCosta, in Spain), one of the founders of Montreal’s Sephardic Congregation, Shearith Israel, in 1768. One of Levy and Rebekah’s daughters, Rachel, married Henry Joseph. William (Bill) K. Joseph, their great-great-grandson, is Anne Joseph’s husband. Levy Solomons died in Montreal in 1792, leaving 13 children.

Stanley Diamond reflects on his retirement years, which have been devoted to Jewish genealogy. He describes the experience as “gratifying, rewarding, satisfying, heart-warming, enjoyable, and fun.” He encourages other members of JGS Montreal to share their genealogical results by contributing articles to Montreal Forum. He provides apt examples of the six emotional rewards he has felt. Not only has he done his own family research, he’s helped other members of the family with theirs, as well as fielding requests from the larger Jewish genealogical family pertaining to their quest for information, be it in Montreal, Canada, generally, or in Poland.

From “Nuggets from Various Family Histories,” we are informed of the following events:

1. London, 1940. Jewish Polish immigrants to London gave birth to Harry Ehrengott (later Errington) in 1910, two years after their arrival. Harry joined the Auxiliary Fire Services at the outbreak of World War II, and he was in a shelter hit by a bomb that killed 20 people, including 6 other firemen. Harry lost consciousness. When he came to after the blast, he became aware that two of his colleagues were trapped under the rubble. Harry succeeded in dragging both men, one after the other, from the burning building to the street. For his bravery, he was awarded the George Cross, only one of three fireman so honored in World War II and the only one from London.
2. Spain and England, 1588. A Portuguese mariner, Hector Nunes, after graduating as a physician, emigrated to England, where he became acquainted with and doctored many aristocratic families, including Sir Francis Walsing­ham, principal secretary to Queen Elizabeth I. Nunes maintained contact with trading associates in Spain, and one of his informants sailed from Lisbon with the Spanish fleet on May 30, 1588, managing to send a message to Nunes about the imminent voyage. Nunes, in turn, informed Walsingham, so that the English were ready and waiting for the Armada.
3. Dunkirk, 1940. A third of a million people were successfully evacuated from the beaches in May 1940. Raphael de Sola, an English Jew who volunteered his yacht to help, was responsible for rescuing many troops, swimming back and forth from his yacht to the Dunkirk shore under heavy enemy fire. It is recorded that he was able to lay tefillin (phylacteries) while on the beach. Later, the de Sola family hired a small liner that sent 30 Jewish refugees to the United States. De Sola died in 1989.
4. Off the Coast of Crete, 1942. Thomas William Gould, whose father was killed in action in 1916 when Thomas was only 18 months old, joined the Royal Navy in 1933, becoming a submariner in 1937. While aboard HMS Thrasher off the north coast of Crete in February 1942, the submarine came under attack. When it surfaced after dark, two unexploded bombs were located in the casing of the submarine’s internal hull. It took 40 minutes for Gould, while holding the bomb in his arms, and Roberts, lying on his stomach pulling Gould with the bomb, inch by inch, to traverse the 20 foot cavity. Both men were awarded the Victoria Cross (with Gould being the only Jewish VC recipient in World War II). Gould died in 2001.

    Shem Tov, publication of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Canada (Toronto) Vol. 24, No. 1, March 2008. Includes a list of 2008 society officers. Features former editor Diane Kriger, an expert on the society’s Roselawn Cemetery Project. Her family names are Kriger, Movshovitz, Israel, Lapidus, and Wideman from Friedrichstadt, Latvia; Gorzt, Yochabova, and Kobilnik (Lithuania) and Manchester, England.

David Malamed reminds us that genealogy research may threaten financial identity. Canada’s protections include the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). Genealogists should use common sense and politely begin interviews by announcing how they will use any information and consider posting data online as PDF pages or even as encrypted PDFs.

The digitized Frankfort (Germany) Memorbuch, 1628–1907 is available at <http://jnul.huji.ac.il/dl/mss/heb1092> in English or Hebrew for readers with the free DjVu software. Free searchable Canadian databases include phone numbers <http://findaperson.canada411.ca>; Library and Archives Canada <http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/ archivianet>; records for decennial censuses through 1911, divorce 1841–1968, patents 1869–94, and naturalization, and selected Ontario deaths and burials </www.benjamins. ca/index.cfm?fa=home> AdvancedSearch and <www.ogs.on. ca/services/fh_ont_cemeteries.php>, plus various sites for immigration and military service.

Jane E. MacNamara uses the Archives of Ontario to explain the difference between a library and an archive and how each institution is organized.

ENGLAND (Joseph)

Shemot, publication of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain, March 2008.

This issue commences with an exciting announcement concerning the London Jewish Military Museum. Genealogists worldwide will be aware of the use that data held by such an institution can have for their craft. The news is that the records of this museum are being computerized, and details of tens of thousands of Jewish personnel who served in the British armed forces are becoming available. The quality of the data is variable but potentially may assist many researchers. It is an online resource at <www.ajex. org.uk/record.php>. Later in the issue, Martin Sugarman discusses this and other sources for Jewish military research.

The hugely popular BBC series, “Who Do You Think You Are?” often has featured Jewish cases, and a recent JGSGB conference was addressed by Jenny Thomas, a senior genealogical consultant to the series. She explained the background to the research, and a summary of her talk is printed in this issue. At the same conference, Dr. Ian Ellis spoke on human genetics and DNA technology, also summarized in this issue.

Dr. Beverley Bergman and Jacqueline Gill explore shipping tragedies (including the Titanic) and their Jewish dimension. Judge Kenneth Zucker follows with an account of the life of a remarkable relative of his, a left-wing politician named Morris Streimer, and Gina Marks adds some details of the Australian convict descended from the well-known Jewish pugilist, Daniel Mendoza (also an ancestor of Peter Sellers).

Mike Gordon interviews the Reverend Malcolm Weisman, OBE, who has been the Minister for Small (British) Jewish Communities for more than a generation. Weisman’s work entails travelling an average of a thousand miles-plus per week as he serves many Jewish communities scattered the length and breadth of the British Isles. Although a traditional Jew himself, Weisman takes an inclusive, non-judgmental approach and simply encourages any Jew, however isolated, to identify as best as possible with whatever community within reach that may be available. As if to emphasize the point, Gordon gives details of the histories of the small Jewish communities that have existed and still survive on the Channel Islands.

David Conway and June Solntseff explore some details of their personal ancestries, and Rosemary Wenzerul looks at how Freemasonry records can assist some Jewish genealogical quests. Finally, a previous Shemot article (September 2007) has encouraged some correspondence on Jewish Friendly Societies.

FRANCE (Kallmann)

Revue de Genealogie Juive, publication of the Jewish Genealogical Society of France, No. 93.

After a series of papers by John Berkowitch about the genealogy of the Guggenheim family, we have published a chronicle, “From Lengnau to New York: The Guggenheim Family,” written by Jacques-Henri Gougenheim, a descendant of this family. The article focuses on the American Guggenheim branch whose fate and huge wealth equals that of the Rothschilds. The author locates the “founding couple” in the Swiss family before following it in the United States. There they beget a large number of offspring and demonstrate their sense of business, their imagination, and their talent; within decades they rise from small shopkeepers to industry tycoons. They drop businesses that yield too little profit in order to invest in new domains of international scale, like mines or metallurgy. The brothers, their sons, and grandsons remain united; their ability to recognize potential business opportunities carries them to the highest rungs of finance and society life. They climb to the climax of their wealth and power at the end of World War I. (to be continued)

George Graner writes “About the Changes of Given Names and Surnames in the Raynal Family from Bordeaux during the 19th Century.” On the specific example of the Raynal family from Bordeaux, Georges Graner proves that the change of given name and surname recorded in the 1808 registers was not immediately respected in either the official records or in daily usage.

Charles Benitah has collected the vital records of his namesakes from Marnia at the Centre des Archives d’Outre-Mer in Aix-en-Provence (France) and publishes their data in a table entitled “The Benitah Among the Jewish Population of Marnia (Algeria) in the 19th Century.”

In an article entitled “How to Obtain Vital Records from Poland,” Basile Ginger, author of the basic manual for Jewish genealogy in France, and José Klingbeil update the modus operandi for the most up-to-date strategy for research and acquisition of Polish vital records. The first step is to find the location of the archive and the record number(s) through JewishGen. The second step, ordering and paying for the records, differs from the procedure suggested by JewishGen and should minimize the cost and the time needed.

In an article entitled “The Atlantic Gap in Jewish Genealogy,” Ernest Kallmann observes that the survivors of the Holocaust and the dissemination of personal data are frequent topics in Jewish genealogy. He notes that they are considered and handled in quite different ways on either side of the Atlantic and concludes that such differing or opposed conceptions may result in major consequences. Duly informed readers can avoid the worst consequences.

Eliane Roos-Schuhl devotes an article to the given name Gentille, Gente, Yentl, and variants starting with its Latin etymology meaning people—thus, “other peoples” or “barbarians”—the equivalent of “goyim” to the Jews. Over time, the meaning changes to “nice, friendly.” The given name and its variants may be located on deeds and ketubot (marriage contracts) as early as the 11th century in France, along the Rhine, and in the British Isles, but it is most frequent in the Comtat Venaissin. Families with the derivative surnames Gentili (in Italy Gentil), Gentêt and Genton also have been found. Nowadays, the given name Gentille survives almost only in the Comtat Venaissin.

ISRAEL (Pickholtz)

    Sharsheret Hadorot, publication of the Israel Genealogical Society, Vol. 21, No. 4, November 2007.

Two successive issues mark two transitions in the Israel Genealogical Society (IGS). In her column in the November issue, Chana Furman bids farewell after seven years as Israel Genealogical Society (IGS) president. Her successor, Michael Goldstein, introduces himself to readers in the February issue. In that same issue, Yocheved Klausner steps down after eight years as editor of Sharsheret Hadorot. She will continue in the new position of associate editor (Hebrew), while Shalom Bronstein assumes the new position of associate editor (English). Israel Pickholtz will serve as editor. He introduces himself and some new editorial directions in the February issue. The editorial called “My Link” appears on the IGS website, <www.isragen.org.il>.

In November, we marked the passing of Distinguished Member of the IGS, Mazal Lininberg-Navon, who is eulogized by Shmuel Shamir. Mazal’s research featured her own well-known Sephardic families, residents of Jerusalem for the last several hundred years, the Ben-Attar, Asmzaleg and Navon families, including her brother, Yitzhak Navon, fifth president of the State of Israel.

Two family articles appear in November, one on the Montel and Esdra families of Marseilles, the other about the Kantorovitch family of Lakhva. In the first of a three-part article, James Montel presents portraits of his Montel family in what he calls “a menagerie of diverse characters” in pre-revolutionary France through the Shoah, with side trips to French colonies in Africa and Indochina. In February, Montel continues with portraits of his Esdra family, including the juncture of the two families, first as friends and neighbors and later with a marriage. The Kantorovitch family is described from the vantage points of Stephen Cohen in the United States amd Zohar Yereslav in Israel, each of whom began independent Kantorovitch research before they found one another and joined forces.

This issue also includes the last in a series of articles based on the second Annual One-Day IGS Seminar, held in November 2006. Mathilde Tagger writes about Algerian Jews who served in the French army, with background on the history of the Algerian Jewish community. The Jews of Algeria were local Sephardim, rather than transplanted French, but they were granted French citizenship, which eventually provided the opportunity to settle in France after Algeria’s independence.

Aharon Schneyer of Yad Vashem offers practical, step-by-step advice to trace Soviet Red Army soldiers killed in World War II. This article appears in full on the IGS website.

Ilan Shteyer, former deputy director of the Archives for the History of the Haganah, writes about using that archives for genealogical research. Most documentation dates from the pre-State period, since that is when the Haganah, the largest of Israel’s pre-State military organizations, operated, but the archives also includes considerable later material from the period of the founding of the State of Israel.

The November issue concludes with Yehuda Klausner’s rabbinic vignette, “The Admor’s Son Who Converted”; Sarina Roffe’s report on the International Conference on Syrian Jewry; Rose Feldman’s review of Margalit Shilo’s book, Princess or Prisoner? Jewish Women in Jerusalem; our usual report on new books in our library; and excerpts from foreign journals.

Vol. 22, No. 1, February 2008. In this issue, Rose Feldman surveys the status of the names of women in the 1839 Montefiore census recently computerized by IGS volunteers. This is no simple matter, because most of the women with living husbands are not recorded by name. In fact, the surnames of many families also are not recorded.

Yossi Yagur and Bondi Stenzler present a survey of the cemetery in Radautz in Bukovina (today Radauti, Romania). They discuss the condition of the cemetery, a project for conservation and documentation, maps, photographs and the database of names, dates and additional information. This article appears on the IGS website.

Two articles are reprinted from other sources. IGS member Joe Isaacs’ article (reprinted from Shemot) tells of using Old Bailey court documents to advance his family research. Stanley Diamond’s recent AVOTAYNU article is Shar­sheret Hadorot’s first significant article on DNA research.

Theme of the IGS Third Annual One-Day IGS Seminar in November 2007 was “The Wandering Jew: Migration between the 18th and 20th Centuries.” Keynote speaker was Professor Yaffa Berlovitz who spoke on “Zerach Barnett: Wandering Jew in a Zionistic Version.” Former IGS President Jean-Pierre Stroweis was awarded the title Dintinguished Member of the IGS. Martha Lev-Zion reports on the seminar in this issue; proceedings of the seminar are being prepared for publication in PDF format on the IGS website.

An article on migration not based on the seminar, comes from Michael Toben, who writes about Jewish immigration into Germany. Toben notes that the specter of anti-Semitism always played a role and was rarely far from the surface.

Mathilde Tagger documents an interesting aspect of her work on IGS databases—the fact that many Sephardic surnames appear in the Russian Empire. This is further evidence of Jewish migration over the years and the tendency to continue to identify with countries of family origin.

    In this issue, Sharsheret Hadorot inaugurates a new column entitled “Online Resources” that will feature a review of a resource for free online research. The first column reviews <ww.kadisha.biz>, the site of the Tel Aviv-Jafo chevra kadisha (burial society). This Hebrew-only website offers searches of burials in the Greater Tel Aviv area, as well as basic information on ordering tombstones, laws and customs of mourning and even a yahrzeit (anniversary of death) notification service.

The February issue concludes with a report on an Israeli Austria/Czech SIG meeting, by Paul King; a report on the Modiano Family Reunion, by Anne-Marie Rychner Faraggi (translated from French); a biography and genealogy of Rabbi Akiva Katz of Ofen, by Yehuda Klausner; our usual report on new books in our library; and excerpts from foreign journals. The foreign journals column henceforth will be coordinated by Meriam Haringman.

THE NETHERLANDS (Diamond)

This fourth issue of Misjpoge 2007 opens with an article by Harmen Snel, another in his series on school teachers of Jewish children in Amsterdam in the 1820s. The teacher in this article is Alexander (Sender) Abraham Stuttgard (1779–1851), who continued a school his mother had started. The article follows his life and genealogical details. In January 1818, his license was in jeopardy; government inspectors were unable to inspect his school, because it was filthy and the stench was unbearable. Alexander promised to address the problem, and no further action was taken. His pupils of December 1, 1823, are listed with dates of birth, parents’ names and some addresses.

The second article in this issue, by Bert van Gelder, describes an area of Scheveningen/The Hague that was rich in Jewish history from 1914 until the 1940s. Information is given about various families and establishments with many details about the end of this Jewish community during World War II. The author’s father had lived in the area, and his memories are part of the article.

Ze’ev Bar returned to Massbach, a small village in Bavaria, and found the farm of his ancestors (the Stoll family) and a diary of the village school. He had made contact with the Roman Catholic priest of the village, visited him on his pilgrimage, and was told, “When looking for your roots, remember this. Those who tell you things know nothing, and those who know will tell you nothing.” The 17th-century farmhouse in which his family had lived was still standing. Even the holes in the doorpost where the mezuzah had been fastened were still there a century after Ze’ev Bar’s great-grandfather died in 1900.

Daniel Metz writes about Jewish soccer clubs and Jews in non-Jewish soccer clubs in the interwar years, 1918–40.

Recent Acquisitions of the
Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People

Several recent acquisitions of the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People (CAHJP) in Jerusalem are useful for genealogical research. The CAHJP is located on the Givat Ram campus of Hebrew University in new quarters acquired in 2007. The table below gives examples of some 2006–07 acquisitions. Some are original documents, while others are photocopies.

Recent Acquisitions Useful for Genealogists

Locality	Resource
Pinsk-Karlin	Births and circumcisions, 1860–72
Bratislava (Pressburg) and environs	Circumcision registers, 1748–1833 (19 entries)
Miskolc	Marriage register, 1895–1924
Cicurel-Barcilon families	Tables, disks, letters, photographs, 15th–20th centuries
Płock (Poland)	Birth, marriage and death register, 1808–80
Bohemia	Index card collection, compiled by the late Ruth Kestenberg-Gladstein, of the 1724 census of non-metropolitan Jews in Bohemia
Piaski	Marriage register, 1858
Rohatyn	Voters for the Polish parliament, 1870
Białystok	Death register , 1938
Kraków	Taxpayers, 1906
Buenos- Aires, Argentina	Burials at three Jewish cemeteries, 20th century

Argentina: Jewish Colonization Association Files

CAHJP has been engaged for the past few years in cataloguing collections from South America. One such collection, numbering close to 10,000 files, is of the Argentinean branch of the Jewish Colonization Association (JCA). Founded in 1891 by Baron Maurice de Hirsch of Paris, JCA assisted Jews in depressed economic circumstances or in countries that persecuted them politically (chiefly in Eastern Europe). The most prominent of its activities was the resettling of Jews from Eastern Europe on lands purchased for them in South America, mainly Argentina and Brazil.

The collection holds about 7,000 files of colonists in Argentina who received plots of land from JCA. A list of these files has been posted on CAHJP’s website <http://sites.huji.ac.il/archives>. The remaining 3,000 files contain correspondence, financial ledgers, and censuses of the various colonies. When this part of the collection has been fully catalogued, its list will be posted on the website as well.

Hadassah Assouline, Director