Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain Blog

Jewish Historical Society of England Zoom event Tuesday 28th July 2020 at 8pm Richard Cohen on Churchill, the Jews and Zionism Richard was called to the bar at Middle Temple in 1977, was admitted as a solicitor in 1984, and after working in various firms, including as partner, he is now a consultant solicitor in Ilford. He was also a District Councillor in Epping and is former chairman and senior warden of Loughton Synagogue. A long-time Rotarian, he is a member of the Board of Deputies, the Council of Christians and Jews, and Faith Matters. Most recently he became chair of the Jewish Historical Society of England Essex Branch. Besides these pursuits, Richard is a devoted part-time historian and archival researcher. Over the years he has lectured on Churchill, Disraeli, the history of Israel, the story of Sir Jack Cohen and TESCO, and numerous other subjects, he has just finished researching and proofreading a new biography of Winston Churchill by Professor Andrew Roberts. Regis...

Our next meeting in the JGSGB Virtual Meeting Programme is an extra meeting from the JGSGB Eastern European Special Interest Group (EE SIG) by Zoom. •       Date July 26th 2020 •       Time 14:00 London •       Title: “Udla, Udla, Udla! – the Szatkowskis of Lask, Piotrkow, Poland” •       Speaker: Leigh Dworkin •       Description: One man’s quest to break through 3 seemingly impenetrable brick walls to research the Szatkowski family from Lask, near Lodz in central Poland. The research involved using the jri-poland website, the Polish State archives website, FamilySearch microfilms, visiting Polish archives and cemeteries as well as taking advantage of extensive learning from the IAJGS (International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies) conference in Warsaw. “Udla” is the name of the presenter’s great-great grandmother. We hope this talk will inspire others to go...

Hidden Treasures is a celebration of Jewish archives in Britain. The JGSGB have been involved with this project. Please have a look at the new website: https://celebratingjewisharchives.org/ "Archives featured on the website are part of a national network of state, local and communal archives that will enable you to discover more about the history of Jews and the Jewish community in Britain. It might even help you uncover some of your own family’s history. We are always looking for new archives to feature so if you are an institution, organisation or community group with an archive that relates to the history of Jews in Britain, then please get in touch ." To celebrate the launch of Hidden Treasures, the Jewish Chronicle have a special reduced-price offer of £1 (instead of £2.50) for a day pass to access their online archive . Jewish Chronicle subscribers can access the archive for free. Please enter HIDDENTREASURE as the checkout code. https://celebratingjewisharchives...

27 Jul 2020, 4–5pm BST, online event: Debra Barnes talks about her debut novel, The Young Survivors  What if everyone you loved was suddenly taken away? Five siblings struggle to stay together as the tides of war threaten to tear them apart. When Germany invades and occupies France in the Second World War, the five Laskowski children lose everything: their home, their Jewish community and most devastatingly their parents who are abducted in the night. There is no safe place left for them to evade the Nazis, but they cling together, never certain when the authorities will come for what is left of them. Inspired by the childhood of the author’s mother, this moving historical novel conveys the hardship, the uncertainty and the impossible choices the Laskowski children were forced to make to survive the horrors of the Holocaust. ​Debra joined The Association of Jewish Refugees (AJR) in 2017 to work on the My Story project. This initiative produces individual life-story book...

Monday 3 August 2020 8pm to 9.30 pm On Zoom The men named on a British Empire war memorial at Willesden Jewish Cemetery are all but lost to history. How can we interpret the significance of their service in a military campaign which today is seen as controversial? Molly Maslen investigates.    A special talk by Molly Maslen volunteer researcher with the “House of Life” and History MA graduate   In partnership with and supported by a grant from the Jewish Historical Society of England (JHSE)   Two memorial boards remembering Jewish fatalities of a war in South Africa 1899 – 1902 have been sitting quietly at Willesden Jewish Cemetery for 60 years.   The 116 Jews they name are all but lost to history. But who were they? And what did Jewish leaders want to say by putting their ultimate sacrifice into the public eye on a Roll of Honour while anti-immigrant feeling raged against the community at home?   At a time when historic memorials are subject...

Our next meeting in the JGSGB Virtual Meeting Programme is from the JGSGB Eastern European Special Interest Group (EE SIG) by Zoom. Date: July 19th 2020 Time: 14:00 London Title: Finding my great-great-grandmother’s missing sister Speaker: Daniel Morgan-Thomas Description: This talk is subtitled, “Why you should always look at records twice”: it is a cautionary tale about going back to your sources and describes finding a new branch of your family through a combination of old-fashioned detective work and DNA links. Featuring passenger lists, censuses and a trip from Manchester to Manhattan – and back again! After the talk, there will be an opportunity for Q&A on the talk. About Daniel Morgan-Thomas Daniel has been a member of the Society since 2008, when he joined at the age of 15! Since then he has served on the Programme Committee, as a library volunteer and helped run some of the Society’s workshops at the Jewish Museum. When not finding dead relatives and building his fam...

From Spitalfields Life blog:  "Several years ago, Adam Dant drew a Map of Huguenot Spitalfields and more than two hundred people got in touch to add their ancestors. Now Adam has created a plan of Sandys Row Synagogue, London’s oldest Ashkenhazi Synagogue, we are seeking readers whose ancestors who were part of the shul. The synagogue is launching Our Roots project to collect the stories of members of the congregation since it was founded in 1854, when fifty families formed the Society for Comfort of the Mourners, Kindness, & Truth . Email admin@sandysrowsynagogue.org if you have stories, photographs or any other information about your ancestors that would like to contribute. All are welcome to join the launch event on Zoom on Wednesday 22nd July at 7:45pm to learn more about the project and the history of Sandys Row Synagogue." Sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/our-roots-tickets-112983948030 You may also be interested in this post: https://spitalfiel...

 Follow Ilkley's Jewish Heritage Trail - a virtual walk through the town's past with Nigel Grizzard. This afternoon’s talk will visit the monuments and tell you some of the many stories about the people and personalities who were part of the town’s history. Nigel Grizzard came North after working as researcher for the Board of Deputies of British Jews. Working in West Yorkshire he became aware of the county’s wider Jewish past and has researched, written and guided many groups around a number of different towns and cities. Nigel is now the Jewish Heritage Guide for Yorkshire and is looking forward to the day when he can take groups around Yorkshire’s Jewish sites. WHEN: 12th July 2020 TIME: 16:30 WHERE: Online To book: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/3015894871797/WN_R7oJPnlrTOaYBCtktRB6sg

Sent in by Peter Heilbrunn: Appeal by the Documentation Centre of Austrian Resistance (DÖW) for the verification of the names for the Shoah Wall of Names Memorial The Shoah Wall of Names Memorial is currently under construction at Ostarrichi Park in the 9th District of Vienna. The names of the Jewish children, women and men from Austria who were murdered in the Shoah will be engraved on large stone tablets in memory of the over 64,000 who were robbed of their lives. Over the course of many years of work, the DÖW has created a database in which the names of the Austrian Holocaust victims are recorded. This will form the basis for the new memorial. The DÖW is now asking the families of the victims to help verify the names. We are happy to share the DÖW's appeal to view the Shoah victims' database online and to check that ancestors are (correctly) listed. Feedback should be sent directly to the DÖW ( office@doew.at ) and must be received by 10 August 2020 in order that it can be t...

Our next meeting in the JGSGB Virtual Meeting Programme is from the JGSGB Dutch & Sephardi Special Interest Group (D&S SIG) by Zoom. • Date July 12th 2020 • Time 14:00 London • Title: Cousins, three per crate • Speaker: Bernard Miller • Description: When Bernard Miller volunteered to be a guide at the Anne Frank exhibition last year, he knew that he was related to her in various ways. What he didn’t suspect was that researching facts and people would lead him to a whole series of family discoveries, some incredibly sad, some really heartwarming. They included one shared Dutch relative who was kept in hiding by a farming family and, like Anne, kept extensive diaries. Unlike Anne, he survived the war and even wrote a novel about his experiences. Discovering him led to a fascinating group of gay Dutch resistance fighters, many of whom were blood relatives. And when he was asked to give a talk about some of them, a chance comment led to a Swedish diplomat less well known than R...

From Jeff James, Chief Executive and Keeper, The National Archives: Since mid-March, our iconic and much-loved building in Kew has been silent. With our reading rooms closed, the vast majority of our staff working from home and many of our usual services suspended, we have focused on bringing you more digital content and online resources. I hope you’ve been able to enjoy our online talks, podcasts, free downloads of digital records available through our website and our ever-popular research guides and education resources. Following recent government announcements, I am delighted that our reading rooms in Kew will re-open on 21 July 2020 . It’s wonderful to know that visitors will again be able to use our reading rooms and have access to our collection of original documents. The re-opening will be a gradual process and The National Archives will look and feel very different to what you are used to. We’ll be providing limited access to parts of the building and our services will operate ...

"A synagogue, a tempel, a kloiz, a shtibl or bet ha-midrash - these words describe different places where Jewish communities used to pray. There were more than a hundred of them in pre-war Krakow, but were they all as grand as those at Szeroka Street? Were they as crowded? Were they all located within what we call “the Jewish Quarter”? We invite you for a walking tour to the places connected with Jewish religious life, during which you will hear the stories about the best known and the completely forgotten Jewish houses of prayer in Kraków." Online tour: Sunday, 19.07.2020, 10.00 Online walking tour live on Facebook. In order to participate you need to buy a ticket and have an active Facebook account. Tickets at 10 PLN are available on Museum’s website until 18.07.2020, 17.00: http://www.galiciajewishmuseum.org/pl/biletyonline More information: weronika.bilas@galiciajewishmuseum.org In Polish. Note to readers: If you're viewing this post via the daily summary email ...

Online Family History Show on Sat 26 September from 10-4.30pm JGSGB will be there! Tickets are £8 on the day but with our Exhibitor Discount link, you can get a ticket for just £5: https://thefamilyhistoryshow.c om/T2H43GNJ Further info - https://thefamilyhistoryshow.c om/online/

Please see https://templatelab.com/family-tree-templates/#How_to_Make_Family_Tree_Templates to download some free family tree templates in Word, Excel and PDF formats. Let us know if you have tried these, and if they work. See Dick Eastman's blog for his announcement: https://blog.eogn.com/2020/07/03/the-best-free-family-tree-templates-for-microsoft-word-and-excel/

If you are planning to attend the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies (IAJGS) 2020 Conference on Jewish Genealogy virtually in August, I'd be very grateful to receive your reflections afterwards. What did you like? What did you learn? Who did you talk to? Any thoughts, breakthroughs, or reviews of particular sessions would be welcome. Please send them to me at blog@jgsgb.org.uk, and I will compile them for the next Newsletter. Thank you! If you have not yet registered, or are still thinking about it, the Early Bird Discount Rate expires on Sunday, July 5, 2020 at midnight, Chicago Time. The virtual conference features Panel Discussions, Expert Interviews, Games Shows, a mini Film Festival, webinars with live Q&A and a Lecture Library of about 100 recorded sessions on a huge variety of compelling topics in the world of Jewish genealogy. Visit iajgs2020.org to view the preliminary program/schedule.

If you have uploaded your DNA test results to the free GEDmatch site (https://www.gedmatch.com), and included your direct ancestors as a GEDCOM file, you can take advantage of a new feature that is available if you pay $10 dollars to upgrade to Tier 1 membership. This utility searches the closest DNA matches with GEDCOM trees and compares their trees with yours. If it finds a MRCA (Most Recent Common Ancestor), it reports it in a table.  This is the description you will see when you enter your kit number: This program compares a family tree of the primary kit with the family trees of all of the closest DNA matches that also have family trees. It uses a pretty generous matching algorithm, so please don't take these findings as absolutely proven. It is very possible that this program will, in some cases, wrongly identify common ancestors. So PLEASE do a little bit of follow-up investigation to confirm the findings before accepting them as correct. Hopefully, in time, we will reduce...