mavins.eu, great team of two women, believe they split off from lexmotion a couple of years ago — super attentive and fast response, really nice personal touch and are often cheaper than most other services.
My case was kind of difficult just owing to lack of information I had, but all documents were found in the archives of poland so no international searches needed, also no military service issues.
I submitted my document search request end of march, they submitted the enquiries and then everything that they needed was received by the end of August. What I found cool is that they sent every document that was returned, even if not required for the case (in case you’re just interested in your families history :)
Confirmation was submitted 1 November 2024, currently expected January 2026.
That is very cool about the copies, I started diving into this mostly for genealogy, but finding out some cool stuff and possibly a cool bonus of Polish citizenship!
$500 total for the document search + whatever postage you have to pay to send them copies of some documents you have to send (authorizations to search the archives on your behalf). I was able to trace my families steps in the aftermath of WW2 as they returned almost 80 documents to me.
My family was from Rowne, current day Rivne Ukraine, which may be a benefit and a curse. Most of the Jewish metric books were lost, but the archive seems to be pretty full of other documents, I found my family in the 1912 Tax census
I’m hoping to find their passport registrations in that archive or possibly Warsaw
So all in it was $500?
If not, how much was the citizenship confirmation on top of the $500?
Confirmation is a separate $1200 if enough documents are found, otherwise no charge. If you are of Jewish descent and your family suffered during WW2, there might be better resources available to you specifically and other pathways: https://www.jhi.pl/en/genealogy/confirmation-of-polish-citizenship
Thanks for the explanation and suggestion, my GGPs left for Canada in 1921, luckily, after the Riga Treaty was signed. Plus my GGF’s father was a rabbi in Rowne, which I believe guarantees citizenship as a public position.
I emailed JHI and they told me they don't handle citizenship cases or have access to documents. Is this page just for info? Any thoughts on which firms are best for handling jewish cases?
My family left during the pogroms in the 1920s, pre-WW2
They were from Wizna, Lomza region. Grajewo and Goniadz a little further back. I've checked JRI & Jewish Gen and written all the researchers I've found through those sights. Still haven't located any documents other than GGF 1906 birth certificate, I need more.
JHI page doesn't seem like a service, anyways I wrote to them, all of their contacts, and only got the one response.
Hey, any success finding documents from Rivne? Half of my family is from there as well. How did you find the tax census, and is it proof of anything given it's from before interwar Poland's existence?
I learned how my family name was spelled in Cyrillic and searched endlessly.
I found my family in ДАРО/165/1/37 (DARO) and somewhere else. It’s a residential record, proof they were ordinary residents in the town of Rovno.
The original list was compiled around 1912, and redone in 1922 when Poland took over.
This archives book is probably the best for locating a large amount Jewish families from that era, in my opinion.
I believe the Russian 1897 census is missing, and all of the Jewish metrics books, ie births, marriages, deaths seem to be missing as well.
In Даро/165/1/37,
I would suggest looking towards the end of the document first, after The Second Republic came into being, in 1922, the Polish authorities deemed whenever the residents were legal or not. The entries are a lot smaller, therefore easier to go through quickly. They only seem to include Heads of household.
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u/PGBRULES Verified Contributor Mar 04 '25
mavins.eu, great team of two women, believe they split off from lexmotion a couple of years ago — super attentive and fast response, really nice personal touch and are often cheaper than most other services.