Jewish Cemeteries of Glasgow, Scotland

The history of the Jewish people in Scotland may date back to  the late 1600's when there were records of Jews applying to take up residence in the country. However the first Jewish community in Scotland, located in Edinburgh, was officially established in 1816. There were Jews in Edinburgh before 1816,  but this was the date on which the community was established.
The time frame from the mid 1700's to the beginning of the following century was  a time of great growth within Scotland. This growth had a great impact upon the Jews of Scotland. In Glasgow,  the population went up over 400% during those fifty years, which led to the arrival of a large amount of Jews, who

Garnet Hill Synagogue

began to arrive in about 1820.
The Jewish community in Glasgow continue to grow and by 1870 included over 1000 people.  This growth led the community to decide in 1875 to build a  synagogue. This would be the first permanent synagogue built in Scotland. At a special meeting in 1875 it was decided that the new synagogue would be built at the corner of Garnet Street and Hill Street and was called the Garnet Hill Synagogue. The foundation stone was laid by Benjamin Simon two years later. The new synagogue was consecrated  on the 9th of September in 1879 by Rabbi Hermann Adler. The Garnet Hill Synagogue was opened just as the Jews from Eastern Europe fleeing from poverty and constant persecution began to arrive.
As a result of the growth of the community, it became necessary to establish cemeteries for the burial of those who passed. The majority of the Jews were buried in one of three cemeteries. These cemeteries, Glenduffhill Jewish Cemetery, Riddrie Cemetery and Sandymount Cemetery, are the final resting place for some 10,000 members of the community. Over time the cemeteries have fallen into a state that now requires restoration. Under the direction of the Glasgow Hebrew Burial Society, restoration work has now begun. A wonderful article on the project can be found on the Jewish Heritage Europe website.
The Burial Society in Glasgow has always been very helpful to those looking for their families. The records they hold are now included in Glasgow Hebrew Burial Society Database, which is available through the JCR-UK website. As helpful as they have been it is now time for others to help them. Please take a moment and read the article and see how you can be of service to the Burial Society. A few years ago I visited Glasgow and enjoyed the beauty of the city, now hopefully we can help return the cemeteries to that same beauty.
 

Romaniote Jews of Janina (Ioannina), Greece

In a past article in this blog, I have written about the Jewish community of  Kastoria in Greece. These people were famous for the work as furriers. In the last few months I have been researching some Jewish families of Greek heritage who settled in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York in the first part of the 20th century. 

As I began to research these families something became very apparent to me. This group had a very strong connection one to another. This was much more than the connection we would have today with our neighbors, to them it seemed as if everyone was family. These were the Romaniote Jews of Ioannina, Greece, which is located in the Northwest part of Greece.
 Romaniote Jews had lived in Greece and neighboring countries for over 2,000 years. Local tradition states that the first Jews into Ioannina arrived shortly after the destruction of the Second Temple in  70CE. These Jews were neither Ashkenazim or Sephardic but had their own traditions.
As I began the search, I quickly discovered that most of the families who left Ioannina, did so because they were looking for a new life in America. A large amount of the families had someone who left between 1904 and 1920 headed for New York City.
This people didn't just come one at a time, they came in groups, maybe to have the security of having friends and families around them. The passenger list below is just one example of that bond. This is page 1 of the manifest fro the S.S. Argentina which sailed out of Patras, Greece in November of 1912.

Of the families listed on this manifest, almost 2/3 identify themselves as being Greek Jews, and on the far right of the page most list the relative being left in the old country as being some on in Janina, Greece. Page 2 of this manifest continues to show how the community was staying together.

In the fourth column the passenger list the name and address of the person they will be living with upon arrival. As with many of the people on this page, thousands of the Jews form Greece and Turkey listed the final destination as the area around Allen Street, Manhattan. During the time frame of 1904-1920 there are thousands who list Allen Street, Broome Street, or Eldridge Street as their future home. One page from the 1920 United States Census for Allen Street reinforces this. On the page below, more than half of the families list themselves as either being from Greece or Turkey.

The page above is just the end of house number 94 and the first part of house number 96. There were many apartments in this area and because of that the residents of Allen Street alone fill hundreds of pages.
Upon arrival and after becoming established in their new neighborhood, many settled down and started families with those they know so well, people from Janina. The document below is the Naturalization Record of Esther Solomon.

www.kkjsm.org

Esther, who was born in Janina on 6 Mar 1908 arrived in New York on 30 Aug 1913 under the name of Esther Napthali. On 11 Dec 1929 she was married to Joseph Solomon who was born 10 May 1901, also in Janina. They then established a household at 278 Broome Street.

 By 1926, the community had grown enough that construction was begun on a new synagogue. Completed in 1927, Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue was built at 280 Broome Street just steps from the home of Joseph and Esther Solomon, who are shown in the document above. This is the only Romaniote Synagogue in the Western Hemisphere. 
The fact that they were separate from other Jews, with their own traditions probably had a lot to do with the strength of their commitment to each other. Another group of these Jews also existed in Seattle, Washington, where they also maintained a tight bond.

New marriage records at FamilySearch

Today there has been a very nice collection of marriage records added to the FamilySearch web site. The records are of six states of the United States as well as the records from Durham, England. Included are the records of a few states with large Jewish communities, New York,  Louisiana and Missouri. Not all of the states have records that are name search able as of today, however, almost 5.8 million records are search able. The chart below shows those locations and numbers of records. In addition, last week over 3.5 million marriage records were added from Indiana.

The range of years included is different for each collection and because of that some records give better information than others. For example the top record below is a record form the New York collection for a marriage from 1914. These records were gathered from the various counties who had started to require these records.

The record below is from the collection for Louisiana from 1870. The original  records are in the possession of the Louisiana State Archives.

Most of the records from the United States are from the time frame that will also include the majority of census records, which makes these records vital to verifying family connections. The collections are not complete and will continue to be added to as more records are made available. 

Even with being incomplete, these are a wonderful resource for family historians and as with all other FamilySearch collections they are available for no charge at www.familysearch.org.

Holocaust Remembrance Day

Amsterdam

WE MUST NEVER FORGET

The Early Jews of Rhode Island

The Jewish history of Rhode Island is perhaps the earliest in all of North America. In Newport, the first members of the Jewish community started to arrive in the mid 1650's, over 100 years before the American Revolution. The first synagogue, known as Touro Synagogue was completed in 1763, and is still in use today, making it the oldest existing synagogue in North America.   The Hebrew Cemetery was open about a dozen years later in the mid 1670's. That makes it the oldest existing Jewish cemetery in America.

These early Jews were Sephardic, whose journey to Newport started in places such as Spain and Portugal, and like many of the early Jews in America, included stops in the Islands of the Caribbean. These earliest families in Newport, who had names such as Lopez, Rivera, Levy, Seixas and Touro, would one day be known as people who were very influential in the forming of early colonial history.
A few of these early leaders, included:

• Rev. Isaac Touro, was the spiritual leader of the community. His family, originally from Spain, came to Newport after stops in Amsterdam and the West Indies, The synagogue was called the Touro synagogue in honor of all he contributed to the community.

• Rev. Touro's brother in law, Moses Michael Hays, was a very successful  merchant. He introduced the order of the Scottish Rite Masonic Order to America. He was the first Grand Master of the Lodge in Massachusetts with Paul Revere and a good friend of Thomas Paine. He is also credited with being a founder of the Bank of Boston.

• In 1763, Jacob Rodriquez Rivera, met with a group of locals and made the first plans to establish a college in Rhode Island. The school would eventually become known as Brown University.

Today, the community has over 350 years of history behind it and continues to be a strong Jewish community. The Jewish population of Rhode Island today is almost 20,000 people. FamilySearch has quite a few databases that include the records of the Jews of Rhode Island.

As with all FamilySearch databases, these records can be viewed free of charge at anytime.

The Jews of Azerbaijan

The Jewish history of Azerbaijan is one that is old and very interesting. Located on the Caspian Sea, the country is surrounded by Armenia, Georgia, Iran and Russia.  The first Jews came to the area over 1500 years ago when the Mountain Jews arrived.
The Mountain Jews, who are also known as the Persian Jews first arrived sometime before the 5th century. The Mountain Jews have a history well over 2000 years old.
According to their own tradition, the Mountain Jews believe they are descended from the Lost Tribes who left what is now Israel after the destruction of the First Temple. After leaving Israel they made their way through Syria and Babylon before arriving in Persia. Finally their ancestors came to live in southern Azerbaijan, which is now the northern part of Iran. 

While living in southern Azerbaijan the Jews adopted Tat, which was the language of the native Muslim people. They adopted the language but remained Jewish. Their language over time has evolved into a very distinct dialect, Juhuri, which incorporates many parts of the ancient Hebrew language.
The first Ashkenazic Jews started arriving in Azerbaijan in the 1800's. It was at this time that the Czar of Russia first sent Ashkenazic Jews into the area. Another wave of Ashkenazim came during World War II in an attempt to escape the Nazis.
Today, most of the more than 15,000 Jews of Azerbaijan live in cities such as Baku, which is home to the majority of the community, and Quba and Grozny.
The overall population of the Jewish community has shrunk from where it was as recently as the 1990's. At that time there were more than 75,000 Jews. The decline in population can probably be blamed on economic conditions, and not anti-semitism which has for the most part not been a problem to the Jews. Yes, while the Soviet Union was in control they did seize many buildings and property, however the leaders today have returned many of those buildings, including the synagogues back to the people.
The fact that many of the Jews have no immigrated to Russia, Israel and the United States is because they are seeking employment or because the young people are looking for a place to get a better education.

IAJGS 2016 - Seattle, Registration is Now Open

It's official, registration for the 2016 International Conference on Jewish Genealogy is now open. Even though the conference is still seven months off, time will fly as the conference approaches. For more information on Early Registration discounts visit the www.iajgs2016.org website. I look forward to seeing everyone in Seattle.

Netherlands, Zuid-Holland Province, Civil Registration, 1679-1942

There is a long history of the Jews in the Netherlands, going well back into the 1400's. The communities were large and for the most part prosperous, made up of both Sephardic and Ashkenazic Jews.
FamilySearch has now added the Civil Registration records from 1679-1942 for the Province of Zuid-Holland to its Historical Records Collections. As of today only a small portion of the 5.4 million images have been name search able but as more records are indexed that number will increase as well.

The collection includes civil registration of births, marriages, and deaths. Indexes, marriage intentions, marriage proclamations, marriage supplements, and divorces are also included. For a list of records by localities and dates currently published in this collection, select the Browse link from the collection landing page.The records themselves give some good information, depending on the year of the record.
The record below is for the birth of Louiza Cohen, who was born on the 8th day of January in 1892 in Rotterdam, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands.

The record also tells us that her birth was registered on the next day, the 9th, also in Rotterdam. We now know that her parents were Jacob Cohen and his wife Eva. The record also tells us that her father was 33 when she was born, which would give us a year of birth as 1859. That same information for the mother was not provided. For those with ancestry in the Netherlands this collection could be of great help in finding your ancestors.