End of May Update

Almost there! 

The splitting of Asiatic Russia into its former imperial provinces is near the end. All that is left in the Caucasus are the provinces of Stavropol and Terek. The pins in yellow and orange are left to do. Those in shades of red are complete. So far, 89 more locations have been added, covering the western part of the  North Caucasus (Russia) and the South Caucasus (Armenia, Türkiye, Georgia and Azerbaijan). 

Still on target for a mid-late June map update. This is what it looks like as of yesterday. 

Upcoming Conferences and Presentations

I will be presenting virtually and on-demand for GRHS and FEEFHS respectively. And in August, I will be attending AHSGR in Greeley, CO.  

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Germans from Russia Heritage Society Convention (Virtual), Saturday, July 22

Time Travel Using Historical Maps: Wander through time and explore your ancestral villages on geolocated maps. In the past decade, efforts have been made to scan and georeference historical maps that have been sitting in archives for hundreds of years. You will learn how to use information from the Germans from Russia Settlement Locations map to travel back in time and find your ancestral colonies on period maps using their GPS coordinates. You will learn where to find repositories of detailed maps online, how to overcome language issues with technology, and how to capture images and cite your findings. 

The geographical focus of the presentation will be on historical provinces of South Russia (the Black Sea region) of the Russian Empire.

As some of you know, when I do this presentation for chapters, I customize it by using colonies suggested by members. If you're going to be at this presentation either in person in Mandan, ND, or virtually, let me know what colonies you would like to see. 

Learn more and register here.  

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Foundation of East European Family Studies Conference (On-Demand), August 1–4

Germans from Russia Settlement Locations Project: It started with the same questions we’ve all had. Where was my ancestor’s village? Does it still exist? What is it called today? Was it far from other villages? Is it still in Russia? How do I find it on these old maps? Where is it on today’s map? This presentation introduces the Germans from Russia Settlement Locations project, a geographic genealogy tool built using Google MyMaps that plots the locations of German colonies across the Imperial Russian Empire. We’ll review the history of the project and the research methods, tour the map, and discuss what’s coming next.

Time Travel Using Historical Maps: Wander through time and explore your ancestral villages on geolocated maps. In the past decade, efforts have been made to scan and georeference historical maps that have been sitting in archives for hundreds of years. You will learn how to use information from the Germans from Russia Settlement Locations map to travel back in time and find your ancestral colonies on period maps using their GPS coordinates. You will learn where to find repositories of detailed maps online, how to overcome language issues with technology, and how to capture images and cite your findings. 

The geographical focus of the presentation will be on historical provinces of the European part of the Russian Empire.

Learn more and register here. 

And so, a busy May ends as a busy June begins. 

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Russian Turkestan

1900 Geological Map of the Caspian Region. Germans lived in the areas marked in blue, which followed the Transcaspian Railway and today border Iran and Afghanistan. To see the non-marked up map, click on the source link. Source: EtoMesto

The splitting of Asiatic Russia into its former imperial provinces continues. All of Russian Turkestan is done. This area includes the modern-day countries include Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan. 

Twenty-nine colonies were added, bringing the total for this area to 53. It was not a big German settlement area, and it was only open for a short time, roughly 1880 to 1910. During WWII, there were some deportations to this area and later resettlements. Those will be reflected under the Deportations section on the map in the future. 

The First Imperial Census of 1897 described a total of 3,722 native German speakers at the time living in the oblasts of Fergana (369), Samarkand (440), Syr-Darya (1,887), and Transcaspia (1,026). There were none reported in Semirechenskaya at that point. 

Map of the Syr-Darya Resettlement District from 1914. Most of the Germans in Russian Turkestan lived in these three oblasts, the districts of which I marked up and color coded: Syr-Darya (blue), Samarkand (red), Fergana (green). Source: EtoMesto

The census also did not include German populations in the protectorates of the Emirate of Bukhara and the Khanate of Khiva. But we know that Molotschna (Taurida) and Am-Trakt (Samara) Mennonites had settlements in those two Russian protected states, the result of the Great Mennonite Trek 1880–1884 for the End of Times. There is much about this topic out there. I recommend the very engaging book Pilgrims on the Silk Road: A Muslim-Christian Encounter in Khiva by Walter Ratliff. He is an Associated Press journalist, historian, and descendant of those original Mennonite pilgrims who were on the trek. He along with a group of other descendants recreated the trek in 2007. 

As for other German origins, there were few specifics. Along with the Molotschna (Taurida) and Am-Trakt (Samara) Mennonites, there were Germans from or somehow connected to the village of Frank (Saratov), Hussenbach (Saratov), Warenburg (Samara), Romanowka (Akmola), and Druzhba (Semirechenskaya), There were also reported Germans who came from the provinces of Ekaterinoslav, Kherson, Orenburg, Poltava, Samara, Saratov, Volhynia, Voronezh, and the Don Host. 

This is not a live map, but this is what the new research so far will look like when it gets posted. Click on it see a larger view. 

Next up is the Caucasus region, which will cover parts of modern-day Russia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Türkiye. I am looking forward to relaxing in the sun on the back patio this weekend as I start collecting maps and queuing up the data for the last leg of this research stint. I have a few other deadlines this month for upcoming convention presentations this summer. Given that I want to present new parts of the map in these presentations, I am highly motivated to meet my self-imposed deadline of posting the data before convention season starts. 

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