GER-VOLGA-L Archives

From: "Vera Beljakova" <>
Subject: also "Church Family Registers"
Date: Sat, 8 Jan 2005 20:48:09 +0200

Don't forget, Russia was an extremely bureaucratic state,
And loved red tape.

To complicate the matter further,
Besides Church books, Census and Family Lists,
The church kept also Family Register Books,
Where all the combined information on one family/
one person/ would be kept, which would give an immediate
overview of a person's church-going history & important events.
Birth, baptism, confirmation, engagement, "marriage exam",
wedding, death.
This would immediate give a pastor/priest a completely overview
of the family's standing in the church.
Very important, when old priests died/moved, and
new ones took over the post.

So, there were 2 types of organizations that kept track of
The population in Imperial Russia:

The Church -
All sorts of registers and the
"Super"Register (per family unit)

The State -
Census, Family Lists,
Village Admin, District Admin (volost') -
The latter 2 kept all paperwork regarding the villages
Administration - eg.: even minutes of all commune meetings

Vera Beljakova-Miller





Vera Beljakova-Miller



Vera,
Thanks for the clarification, so the lists sent to the Volost were just
taken from the same civil or adminstrative records we have previously
discussed. And what was recorded in the civil or adminstrative records
varied tremendously over the years and from village to village. And in
the
case of Josefstal the records appear to be very detailed with complete
lists of births, deaths and marriages. The copies of these records sent
to
the Volost could be another source of information if the originals have
been lost.

What we don't know for certain is if the Josephstal list was pulled from

the civil or administrative records from a census type periodic survey
or
if they started to maintain a seperate list of life events (births,
deaths
and marriages) recording them as they occured. If they started to
maintain
these types of records in Russia, it came late.

For clarification, the term vital records in the US refers to the
individual recording of life events, birth, death and marriages. It may
go
by different names in different countries. A certificate of each event
can
be provided by the local government for each event. It has nothing to do

with a census or periodic record keeping.

Patrice


At 01:25 PM 1/7/2005, wrote:
>further:
>
>Ted and Patrice !
>
>I have samples of Family List records from 1874 and then 1885,
>with additional notes entered up to 1903 (in my case).
>
>These are called civic or administration records.
>Copies were also with the volost' or Village District Office.
>
>Vera
>
>
>
>
> >
> > This is quite an interesting find, particularly since you have seen
them
> > yourself. I have been told by Pleve that he has not seen any vital
records
> > for the Volga Germans and they were not kept. So perhaps he does not
know
> > because they were not kept by the archives or they were very rare
and he
> > has just not come across them.
> >
> > The question

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• also "Church Family Registers" by "Vera Beljakova" <>