[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] New Website is great ....

[William Remus]

I too found the new website better in lots of ways. Particularly nice 
is the way the website site links to on and off site resources.

One thing that I think needs to be discussed more on the website is 
that even Lutherans need to look in Catholic records - particularly 
before 1810. So here is the story...

Prior to 1772 Poland was an independent country and as of 1714 the 
Lutheran Church was officially banded. In 1772 Poland was partitioned 
(and later partitioned even more) and the areas acquired by Prussia 
finally began to get Lutheran churches again. But in many areas a 
pastor was not available until after 1800 (and sometimes not easily 
available until much later).

Consequently, Lutheran baptisms, marriages, and deaths between 1714 
and into the 1800's often appear in the Catholic Church books, often 
with the Latin notation acatholic (not catholic). 

Another reality is that there were Catholic and Lutheran marriages and 
those were often in the Catholic church books. In Kreis (county) 
Tuchel in West Prussia (part of Poland till 1772), there are lots of 
Remus family in the Catholic records - and often married to Polish 
girls. (And Polish guys married to German girls, too). 

Also, German Catholics arriving in Volynia found largely Lutheran 
churches and largely only potential marriage partners who were 
Lutheran. For example, my great grand mother Wilhelmina Hardwardt was 
born Catholic in Szczepanowo, Poland and married my great grand father 
August Wilhelm Remus a Lutheran from Kreis Tuchel, West Prussia. 
Consequently, when tracing your ancestors back out of Volhynia do not 
assume that they will be found only in  Lutheran records.

So dig out your old high school Latin text (or better yet the Mormons 
guide to church Latin), and take a look in the Catholic records when 
you cant find them in the Lutheran records. Oh, yes. Take a look at 
the website's list of equivalent German and Polish names (for example, 
Froelich (German) = happy person = Wesselowski (Polish)). You might 
find the records under the Polish version of your family name.

Regards Bill