Ukraine Jewish Records

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Historical Background
The history of the Jews in Ukraine goes back over a thousand years. In the westernmost area of Ukraine, Jews were mentioned for the first time in 1030. Jews worked as artisans and merchants while a smaller number were farmers. By the 1760s, the Jewish population in Ukraine had reached about 300,000. Most were clustered in communities near the Dnieper River, and in Volhynia, Podolia, Braslav, Rus Czerwona, and Kiev guberni. Because of the economic success of the Jews, many Ukrainian peasants resented them. Tensions between Jews and the Ukrainian populations continued throughout the centuries. In 1881, Alexander II was assassinated and rumors circulated that Jews were behind it. A wave of large-scale anti-Jewish violence, called pogroms, swept through the southern Russian Empire, including Ukraine throughout the mid to late 1800s. During the 1917 Russian Revolution and the ensuing Russian Civil War, an estimated 31,071 Jews were killed during between 1918 and 1920. During the establishment of the Ukrainian People's Republic (1917-21), pogroms continued to be perpetrated on Ukrainian territory. In Ukraine, the number of civilian Jews killed during the period was between thirty-five and fifty thousands. Massive pogroms continued until 1921. In September 1939, the first Jews living in the western regions under Nazi control were forced into ghettos, and later sent to death camps, which continued throughout the remainder of the war. After WWII, many surviving Jews left Ukraine for the United States or Israel. After the fall of the Soviet Union, roughly three-quarters of the remaining Jewish population left Ukraine.


 * To learn more about Jewish history in Ukraine, read Ukraine, The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe.
 * To learn about the history of the shtetl your ancestor lived in, see the Ukrainian Jewish Heritage site.

Find the Town
In order to research your family in Ukraine, it is essential that you have identified the place where they came from. It is not enough to know only 'Ukraine;' you must know the town or shtetl that they came from. In addition to research in the records of the country the immigrated to, you may also want to examine the following sources to help you determine possible town locations.

JewishGen Family Finder

 * The Family Finder is a database of both ancestral hometowns and surnames that have been researched by their descendants world wide. The Family Finder allows you to connect with others who are researching similar ancestors and origins and collaborate your research. To add the surnames and locations you are researching, click on Modify (Edit your existing entries) or Enter (Add new entries). Type in the surnames and/or locations of interest and hit Submit. To search the database and see if you can connect to family members and other researchers, choose Search (Search the database) from the Town Finder home page. You can search for a surname and/or a town. Search results will appear in a chart format giving you the surname, town, country, and researcher information (often includes contact information) and the date they last logged into JewishGen.

Miriam Weiner's Surname Database
aUsing the Surname Database on Miriam Weiner's Routes to Roots Foundation website can help narrow down a more specific location for where individuals lived who shared your ancestor's surname.


 * Use the Standard Surname Database if you know your ancestor's given name, surname, or town name. This database is comprised of name lists from local historians and heads of Jewish communities, name lists from books, and name lists from various archives.
 * Use the OCR Surname Database (optical character recognition) to search for your ancestor's surname in either the Latin alphabet or in Cyrillic. This database is comprised of information from business directories, address calendars, telephone books, typed name lists, and name lists from books and from archives.

Database of the Ukrainian residents born between 1650 and 1920

 * Pra.in.ua's database contains over 3.7 million individuals. The database is not exclusively Jewish, but does contain Jewish individuals.

Maps and Gazetteers
Once you have determined the town your ancestor came from, the next step is locating the town in a map or a gazetteer. This will help you to identify political boundaries, place names, alternate spellings, etc. Gazetteers and historical maps are especially useful for understanding boundary changes or finding communities that no longer exist. In your research, in gazetteers, pay attention to the town's district and province as this will help you locate records such as the 1897 Census and Revision List records.

JewishGen Gazetteer

 * The JewishGen Gazetteer is a useful online gazetteer for locations in Eastern Europe. Note that wild card searches are not supported. To view an entry page, click on the Jewish star to the left of the town name. Entry pages provide jurisdictions for before WWI, the interwar period, after WWII and modern-day. Alternate names and Yiddish and Russian spellings are also included. In the center, you'll find a map and a list of additional Jewish communities located nearby. Finally, under Additional Information and in the green box at the top, you'll find links to references and additional resources that may help you in your research.

TKF Ukrainian Shtetl Finder

 * TKF seeks to locate and share knowledge about Jewish communities in Eastern Europe. There are several resources available on their website including the Ukrainian Shtetl Finder.

Gesher Galicia
This site is useful for areas that are now part of modern-day Ukraine, but were historically Galicia. Use the town locator, which is organized alphabetically, to determine jurisdictions for your town

Maps of your Ancestor's Town

 * Miriam Weiner's website offers select historical maps of Ukraine, as well as a variety of historical images from towns in Ukraine that may prove useful in your family history.
 * Gesher Galicia's Map Room has online historical maps for both regions, and specific towns. The collection even has cadastral land maps.
 * To view present-day Ukraine at Google Maps, click here.
 * For a Jewish population density map of Europe in 1900, click here.
 * For a map showing the percentage of Jews in the Pale of Settlement and Congress Poland, c. 1905, click here.
 * To view an additional historical map showing the historical percentage of Jews in governments, click here.

1897 Census
The 1897 Russian Imperial Census was the first and only census carried out in the Russian Empire. The census enumerated the entire population of the Empire (excluding Finland), but after statistical data was gathered, many of the census returns were destroyed. There are, however; surviving census returns for many locations throughout Ukraine. Use the resources below to help you determine if census records survive for your ancestor's shtetl and how to access them. Use the Reading the 1897 Census "How to" Guide to learn how to read census records.

JewishGen (indexed records)
Census returns still exist for the city of Odessa. A JewishGen indexing project of these records is underway. Learn more about the status of the project here. The records that JewishGen is in the process of indexing are located on FamilySearch in the Ukraine, Odessa Census Records 1897 collection. See the FamilySearch heading below for more information.

Lipes Genealogy Database (indexed records)
Lipes Genealogy Database has indexed portions of census records from the City of Odessa and the Kiev Gubernia. In order to search a limited version of the database, you will need to create an account, which can be done for free. The full version of the database starts at 10 Euros per day. If you wish to order the original document through Lipes, you will be charged an additional fee.

FamilySearch (digital images)
Census returns still exist for the city of Odessa. Original images are not indexed, but are available to browse through the Ukraine, Odessa Census Records 1897 FamilySearch collection.

There may also be records available through the FamilySearch Catalog. Census records are catalogued at the uyezd level.


 * a. Click here to access catalog entries for Ukraine.
 * b. Click on Places within Ukraine and a list of gubernia will appear.
 * c. Click on the gubernia, then select Places within [Name of Gubernia].
 * d. From there, a list of uyezdi will appear.
 * e. Click on Places within [Name of Gubernia, Name of Uyezd].
 * f. Click on the Census topic. Click on the blue links to view specific record titles. Look for a title containing something like Переписные листы 1897.
 * e. Some combination of these icons will appear at the far right of the listing for the record. The magnifying glass indicates that the record is indexed. Clicking on the magnifying glass will take you to the index. Clicking on the camera will take you to an online digital copy of the records. A camera with a key on top means the record is viewable but with certain restrictions that may mean the record can only be viewed at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, a Family History Center, or FamilySearch Affiliate Library. Take a look at the Family History Center Finder to discover a location near you.

1897 Census Finding Aids
Census returns may also exist for other locations, but images or indexes may not be available online. Use sites such as Archive Fonds of the First 1897 All-Russia Census or the Catalog of Surviving Census Sheets in Archives of Russia, Ukraine, and Other Countries to help you determine if census records exist for your area. These sites are in Russian, but can be easily navigated using Google Translate. If you are using the Google Chrome browser, just right click anywhere on the page and click Translate to English. If you are using a different browser (Safari, Firefox, Edge, etc.) you can still use Google Translate, but it requires a few extra steps. Go to translate.google.com and change the language settings to translate from Russian to English. Paste the URL of the site you would like translated into the Russian box and then click on the link that shows up in the English box. This will take you a translated version of the site.

Revision and Family Lists
Revision lists are enumerations of the taxable population (most Jews in the Russian empire fell into a taxable social class). There were ten revisions taken sporadically from 1772-1858. These records are a foundational source in genealogical research as they provide names, ages, and relationships.

Supplemental Lists, also known as Family Lists, can be found ranging from about 1860 through the end of the nineteenth century. They are similar in format to revision lists and are often grouped with revision list records in an archive.

JewishGen (indexed records)
Many Ukrainian revision list records have been indexed and are available through the JewishGen Ukraine Database.

Lipes Genealogy Database (indexed records)
Lipes Genealogy Database has indexed portions of revision list records from select areas in the Kiev, Podolsk and Volhynia guberni. In order to search a limited version of the database, you will need to create an account, which can be done for free. The full version of the database starts at 10 Euros per day. If you wish to order the original document through Lipes, you will be charged an additional fee.

FamilySearch (digital images)
There may also be records available through the FamilySearch Catalog. Revision list records are catalogued at the uyezd level.


 * a. Click here to access catalog entries for Ukraine.
 * b. Click on Places within Ukraine and a list of gubernia will appear.
 * c. Click on the gubernia, then select Places within [Name of Gubernia].
 * d. From there, a list of uyezdi will appear.
 * e. Click on Places within [Name of Gubernia, Name of Uyezd].
 * f. Click on the Taxation or Census topics. Click on the blue links to view specific record titles.
 * e. Some combination of these icons will appear at the far right of the listing for the record. The magnifying glass indicates that the record is indexed. Clicking on the magnifying glass will take you to the index. Clicking on the camera will take you to an online digital copy of the records. A camera with a key on top means the record is viewable but with certain restrictions that may mean the record can only be viewed at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, a Family History Center, or FamilySearch Affiliate Library. Take a look at the Family History Center Finder to discover a location near you.

Krakovsky Documents (digital images)
Alex Krakovsky is one of the most influential figures in modern Jewish genealogy. He fights legal battles with Ukrainian archives to make records widely available and then publishes digital images of the records on various Wiki pages.

Revision lists are available for locations in Transcarpathia and Stanisław Voivodeships; Volhynia, Katerynoslav, Kiev, Podolsk, Poltava, and Kherson provinces.


 * The main Wiki portal is found here.


 * The Kiev Gubernia Revision List portal is found here

Database of the Ukrainian residents born between 1650 and 1920 (digital images)
There are several revision lists available for various cities, uyezdi, and guberni on the Pra.in.ua Library. The Library is organized by hashtags. Click on the #євреї on the webpage to see which Ukrainian Jewish records are available. Revision lists will be titled Ревізська сказка in Ukrainian. Clicking on the link will take you to a Google Drive folder with images of the records.

Revision List Finding Aids
If you are unable to locate records online, there are several resources to help you determine what records are available for your town and which archive they are currently stored in. Revision list records are referred to as "census" records, and may be translated as "Revision tales" or "Fairy tales." See the Additional Resources- Finding Aids and Records Inventories heading in this Wiki article for more information.

Vital Records
Throughout the Russian Empire, birth, marriage, divorce, and death records were required to be kept by the Jewish community beginning in 1835. Jewish records were generally kept in a tabular format with the left-side of the page in Russian and the right-side of the page in Hebrew. Vital records are available online in both indexed and digital image formats.

JewishGen (indexed records)
Many Ukrainian vital records have been indexed and are available through the JewishGen Ukraine Database.

Metryki Wołyń (indexed records)
Civil records of Volhynia are indexed on Metryki Wołyń. To search the database by name, look at the very bottom of the page for "In order to search the database press HERE."

Lipes Genealogy Database (indexed records)
Lipes Genealogy Database has indexed portions of metrical books from Kiev, Podolsk and Volhynia guberni. In order to search a limited version of the database, you will need to create an account, which can be done for free. The full version of the database starts at 10 Euros per day. If you wish to order the original document through Lipes, you will be charged an additional fee.

FamilySearch (digital images)
There may also be records available through the FamilySearch Catalog.


 * a. Click here to access catalog entries for Ukraine.
 * b. Click on Places within Ukraine and a list of gubernia will appear.
 * c. Click on the gubernia, then select Places within [Name of Gubernia].
 * d. From there, a list of uyezdi will appear.
 * e. Click on Places within [Name of Gubernia, Name of Uyezd]
 * f. Click on the Jewish Record topic (it may be found at either the town or uyezd level). Click on the blue links to view specific record titles.
 * e. Some combination of these icons will appear at the far right of the listing for the record. The magnifying glass indicates that the record is indexed. Clicking on the magnifying glass will take you to the index. Clicking on the camera will take you to an online digital copy of the records. A camera with a key on top means the record is viewable but with certain restrictions that may mean the record can only be viewed at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, a Family History Center, or FamilySearch Affiliate Library. Take a look at the Family History Center Finder to discover a location near you.

Krakovsky Documents (digital images)
Alex Krakovsky is one of the most influential figures in modern Jewish genealogy. He fights legal battles with Ukrainian archives to make records widely available and then publishes digital images of the records on various Wiki pages. Metrical books are available for locations in Transcarpathia and Stanisław Voivodeships; Volhynia, Katerynoslav, Kiev, Podolsk, Poltava, Zhitomir, and Kherson provinces.


 * The main Wiki portal is found here.


 * Zhitomir Metrical Books are found here.

AGAD Jewish Records (digital images)
AGAD Archive, or the Archiwum Glowne Akt Dawnych (The Central Archives of Historical Records in Warsaw), is the repository of about 3,000 Jewish metrical books for the area of the former Lwow, Stanislawow, and Tarnopol Wojewodztwa (now Lviv, Ivano Frankivsk, and Ternopil oblasts in Ukraine). These registers are mainly for the period from 1877-1911 when these areas were a part of the Austrian province of Galicia.

State Archives of Volhynia
The Volhynia archives has recently digitized metrical books for the Jewish community of Male Sedlishche. The records range from 1924-1936 with some gaps in record coverage. To view a record, click on the blue hyperlinked number found in the third column (under the heading No. Справи/No. Cases).

Vital Records Finding Aids
If you are unable to locate records online, there are several great resources to help you determine what records are available for your town and which archive they are currently stored in. See the Additional Records - Finding Aids and Records Inventories heading in this Wiki article for more information.

Cemeteries

 * JewishGen Ukraine Database - includes entries from the JewishGen Online Worldwide Burial Registry.
 * Toldot, database of Jewish graves in Ukraine and Russia. The site can be searched in English.
 * Mitzvatemet, database of Jewish graves in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Lithuania.
 * Jewish Roots, database of tombstone inscriptions in former Russian Empire countries. The site should be searched in Russian.

Holocaust

 * European Holocaust Research Infrastructure Online Portal offers information on Holocaust archival material held in institutions in Europe and throughout the world.
 * Arolsen Archives, also known as the International Center on Nazi Persecution, is one of the largest archives on the victims of Nazi persecution. Many of their holdings are available to research online.
 * Yad Vashem Central Database of Shoah Victims' Names is a database of victims of the Holocaust.
 * Yahad in Unum: The Holocaust by Bullets is a French organization that works to conduct research on the Holocaust by bullets and identifies killing sites of Jewish victims murdered during WWII.

Yizkor Books
Yizkor books are memorial books commemorating a Jewish community that was destroyed during the Holocaust. Books are usually published by former residents and records the remembrance of homes, people and ways of life lost during World War II. Most books are written in Yiddish or Hebrew, but in recent years, many have been translated and made available online. You may wish to refer to the Glossary of Yizkor Book Terms list to help you.


 * Take a look at the JewishGen Yizkor Book Project to locate a translation or Yizkor book for your locality of interest.
 * Use Genealogy Indexer to find indexes to over 364 Yizkor books.
 * The New York Public Library has a large collection of Yizkor books, and many have been digitized.
 * The Family History Library has copies of many Yizkor books. Check the FamilySearch Catalog for availability for your town.

School Records
The Volhynia Archive has digitized a collection of school records from the Lutsk Jewish Gymnasium. Records are organized in tables by year (1923-1938), and then by grade or annual marks. To view a record, click on the blue hyperlinked number found in the third column (under the heading No. Справи/No. Cases).

Historical Photos
The Image Database on Miriam Weiner's website contains photographs and postcard views of many towns and cities throughout Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Lithuania, Poland, and other select countries dating back to the early 1900s. These include pre-WWI and current town views, photos of synagogues, Jewish cemeteries, and Holocaust memorials. Even if you are unable to find a picture of your ancestor's town, it may still be interesting to see what other towns in the area looked like, which will allow you to a get a feel of what life may have been like for your ancestor.

Genealogy Indexer
Genealogy Indexer is a free database that provides access to thousands of records including city directories from the Russian Empire, Yizkor books, WWI casualty lists and other military records, as well as school records. Links to the original records are included.

Miriam Weiner Routes to Roots Foundation
Use the Archive Database to locate what records exist for your ancestor's town, and where to find them. Search for the name of your ancestor's locality, and the database will provide results for known surviving records from that location, and where the records are held. (Remember to adjust the search criteria for Soundex options or spelling variations).

This database contains documents such as army/recruit lists, family lists and census records, Jewish vital records (birth, marriage, death, divorce), immigration documents, voter and tax lists, property and notary records, Holocaust documents, police files, and pogrom documents (school records, occupation lists, local government and hospital records).


 * See Routes to Roots Foundation and hover over Ukraine for a Genealogical and Family History guide to Jewish and civil records in Eastern Europe.

Jewish Roots
The Еврейские Корни (Jewish Roots) site is an excellent resource to help you locate archival documents. The website is in Russian, but if you are using the Google Chrome browser, simply right click anywhere on the page and select Translate to English. Search using the name of the town (find the Cyrillic spelling of the town on JewishGen Town Finder) to see what archival records might be available for your location. In addition to the database, use the Forum to connect with other researchers and find other potential resources for your location.

Harkavy Collection of Pinkassim Vernadskiy Library in Kiev, Ukraine
See this document for an inventory of Jewish related resources found in the Pinkassim Vernadskiy Library in Kiev, Ukraine. Various society, memorial books, lists of merchants and other records are available.

Tsal Kaplun Foundation (TKF)
TKF seeks to locate and share knowledge about Jewish communities in Eastern Europe. There are several resources available on their website including an Inventory of Jewish Records in Archives.

Krakovsky Documents
In addition to revision lists and metrical records, there are additional records available in the Krakovsky documents collection. Check your area to see what is available.

The main Wiki portal is found here.

Reading Records
Ukrainian Jewish records are most commonly written in Russian or Hebrew, although you may see records written in Polish or Ukrainian. Use the resources in this list to help you learn how to read the records. You may also consider using a free translation service such as the FamilySearch Community (Be sure to post in the Russian Empire Genealogy Research group or tag @RussianEmpireGenealogyResearch in your question) or JewishGen View Mate.

Russian

 * The Russian Alphabet "How to" Guide
 * Deciphering the Handwriting and Understanding the Grammar "How to" Guide
 * Russian Genealogical Word List
 * FamilySearch Learning Center - Russian Handwriting Courses

Hebrew

 * Reading Hebrew Tombstones
 * National Jewish Outreach Program Hebrew Resources
 * Hebrew Naming and How to Read Hebrew Headstones (YouTube Video)

Ukrainian

 * Ukrainian Genealogical Word List

Polish

 * Polish Genealogical Word List

Additional Resources

 * JewishGen Ukraine SIG
 * Gesher Galicia SIG
 * Romanian SIG (including Moldova and southern Ukraine)
 * JewishGen KehilaLinks Ukraine
 * Interwar Jewish Press of Galicia, Volhynia, and Bukowina
 * Get ideas and help with Ukrainian Genealogy at Jewish Genealogy in Ukraine Facebook.


 * Montefiore Censuses of the Holy Land (XIX Century) citizens from Palestine who arrived from the Russian Empire.
 * FEEFHS Ukraine Resources
 * B&F Compendium of Jewish Genealogy - Ukraine