From Suzanne Russo Adams at Ancestry.com, comes a detailed report on March 19's episode on Lisa Kudrow and her search for information in Belarus and Poland:Kudrow's episode was one of the most riveting of the series, says Suzanne. In it, Lisa visits the small shtetl of Ilya, Belarus, where her great-grandmother was murdered during the Holocaust.
Lisa’s father, Dr. Lee Kudrow, always wondered what happened to Yuri, a cousin who had escaped to Poland and who told about Lisa’s great-grandmother’s death. Yuri was never heard from again.
On a visit to Gdynia, Poland, to discover Yuri’s true fate, Lisa is shocked to learn that Yuri was still alive! Despite the tragic history, there is a beautiful reunion between two families separated by the Holocaust.
If you missed the episode, watch it here. (CAVEAT: Unfortunately, the link only works in the US, and not in Hong Kong or Australia, where I most recently attempted to watch it via online links.)
Suzanne provides tips (additional comments by Tracing the Tribe are included) for those curious about how the team of genealogists for this episode found out more about Lisa's Jewish family.
Here are resources to help newcomers better understand Jewish family history research.
Go-to resources: U.S. passenger lists, Yad Vashem, Ancestry.com, JewishGen.org
How they helped: Lisa Kudrow’s US family heard about her great-grandmother's death from a cousin named Yuri who visited Lisa’s dad and grandmother in the late 1940s. Lisa's research goal is to discover where her great-grandmother was buried and learn more about Yuri. Her visit to Belarus and online resources help her achieve that goal.
Resource #1: List of Jews murdered in Ilya massacre
Lisa’s family knew her great-grandmother was killed, but through a list of victims in Ilya, she sees the proof. Written next to her name are the words “killed and burned.”
Resource #2: Yizkor book: "A Tale of Struggling, Toil, and Tears," by David Rubin
While visiting Ilya, Lisa reviews a translated Yizkor (memorial) book about the massacre of 900 Jews in March 1942. The town’s Jewish population came to an end that day. Lisa walks the same path her great-grandmother was forced to walk 68 years ago. At the gravesite is a memorial to the murdered Jews.
Resource #3: Passenger list
Looking for some positive news on her trip, Lisa turns her search toward the one relative she knows survived – Yuri - who visited her father in the late 1940s. An Ancestry passenger list shows a man with the same surname but the given name Boleslaw. Are Yuri and Boleslaw the same person?
Resource #4: Registry card
In Gdynia , Poland, Lisa sees Boleslaw’s city registry card. Yuri changed his name to a Polish name for assimilation. His wife and son are registered.
Resource #5: Phone directory
The phone director lists Boleslaw, who is still alive.
Weren’t Eastern European records all destroyed?
The records from Eastern Europe that Lisa’s family found aren’t uncommon. Although millions of Jews were murdered in the Holocaust, records did survive.
Are you following US Jewish lines? Follow step -by-step through the US, including census records, passenger lists, citizenship records, vital records and more at various sites such as Ancestry and Footnote.com. Once you've found all the US records, then jump to European records.
Learn about your family's towns and villages, immigration data and clues to other relatives.
Check out sites such as JewishGen for a town's Yizkor book or its Special Interest Groups (SIGs), Yad Vashem for other Holocaust-related documents, Ancestry's holdings, Footnote.com's Holocaust collection (and other records), the Ancestry.com Jewish Family History Collection, and, of course, Tracing the Tribe: The Jewish Genealogy Blog.
Never give up, and keep searching.
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My father was there at the slaughter that day. He was the author of the "During that Day" in the Ilya Yiskor Book. Most of the people were not shot. They were put into the ice house and burned to death. My fathers first wife and his three young daughters died there in there. He was one of the men picked out not be killed because the Germans needed their skills. My father was a shoemaker.
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