Genealogy Chat

Looking for Catholic records for the Kreis Eylau area of East Prussia late 1800's to early 1900's.Hit a brick wall.Any ideas would be much appreciated. Hal

Seems the district has had a shakey past - you could do no worse than look at http://www.kreis-preussisch-eylau.de/ which tells you all about it - in German - and maybe contact the author who may be able to help you, especially as you may have a surname in mind. Maybe you know the actual town of that Kreis and they are all listed on the page Kirchenspiele. The author does explain that the number of Catholics now in the area is very low - in 1939 only 4.9% of the population compared with 92.7% evangelist. In 1945 the Kreis was taken over by the Red Army and became part of the Soviet Union giving inhabitants 24 hours to leave. You may now find that this area is now known as Landkreis-preuss................ You could also try http://list.genealogy.net/mailman/listinfo/ow-preussen-l - there is a facility to get the page in English

Thanks Joe. I already get the lists from OW Preussen. Have looked at the Eylau site but this will take time as my German is non too good. Any further advice would be appreciated.

Next years holiday ?? My German not so good either and most of the sites on this subject are in German - not really surprising ! Have you tried to use one of the Translation sites ? they are free - http://babelfish.altavista*com/tr (replace the asterisk with a stop) the translations are often a little hazy but give you an idea of what they are about. You can copy and paste from the Eylau site to the translation site and Hey Presto one more click and you get ... something !! Other than this I can only suggest that you e-mail the general Archives in Leipig, Berlin ... or even Konigsberg but I doubt you will find a Catholic archive as it appears to have been a very Evangelical area. Even though the archive you e-mail may not be the one for your enquiry maybe they will be able to direct you to the right one, so try - plead (lol) 'Can you please help me ......' Geheimes Staatsarchive Preussischer Kulturbesitz in Berlin - email addy - gsta.pk'at'gsta.spk-berlin.de Sorry but you may know that GR does not allow email addresses to be written or sites that include com or co You may have the name of the town in that area - there were about 32 towns/villages etc., and each may have had a church I guess. Anyhow better to make an enquiry - dont cost anything and may produce a result for you. Good luck.

Thanks again Joe.Need to digest your latest advice.Did't quite understand the bit about GR e mail adresses.Could you expand a little on that?Will certainly try Babelfish translation site.

Not very easy to explain what is allowed on GR - or why it isn't ! I gave you the following address : gsta.pk'at'gsta.spk-berlin.de now if I type that as it should be you will see the result [email protected] .......... Similar if I give the site for old maps which I will write in a form you understand then as it should be http://www.old-maps*co*uk/ (replace * with stop) correctly http://www.old-maps.co.uk/ ................ Now you see that everything after the 'at' symbol will not show and nor will anything after c o and same applies to c o m Crazy ?? well it is their rule !

Hello Joe Thanks for the clarification.Understand what you are saying now. Thanks again.