If you have ancestors from the slice of Europe which is currently Zakarpattia Oblast (Ukraine), was Podkarpatská Rus (Czechoslovakia) between WWI and WWII, and which was part of Hungary before that, then prepare to get excited. After this area became part of the newly-formed country of Czechoslovakia after WWI, the new government conducted a census in 1921 to get a handle on their population. A fellow Subcarpathian researcher let me know that this is now online, and OMG, is this incredible.
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| Part of Lajzer Ruttner's Family, 1921 Czechoslovakian Census, Dulfalva/Dulovo |
The amount of information contained in these lists is enormous. I'll talk about what each of these columns means, but first, here are some directions to find your own family.
- Go to https://library.hungaricana.hu/hu/collection/KarpataljaiNepszamlalas1921/
- Scroll down below the introductory language, and you'll see the different districts (járás). If you don't know what járás your town was in, there's a great page that breaks them down here.
- Once you've clicked on your járás, find your town--with its Hungarian name. Click and then browse through the documents!
For the towns I've looked through, it looks like the first pages are just lists of heads of household, followed by the more comprehensive census sheets. For my towns, there didn't seem to be any correlation between names in the list and the order of the following census sheets, but at least it'll let you know if your family will be found and it's worth the time.
As far as language, some are written in Slovak (like the image above, so English-speakers will be able to easily read the names), but other towns are enumerated in Ukrainian, so you'll need to know (Google Translate or Facebook groups can be helpful) what your surname of interest looks like in Ukrainian.
The entries go across two pages. Here are what the columns are (these may different by town, but they seem accurate for the few towns I've browsed through):
- Number of person
- Surname
- Given name
- Relationship (to head of house)
- Sex
- Marital Status
- Date of Birth
- Place of Birth
- Date of first registration
- Place of registration
- Nationality
- Religion
- Profession
- Province
- County
- Village Council
- Village
- Street/House number
- Name of House Owner
Some disclaimers:
- Birth dates/places may be wrong. For some people, I have their birth records, and they are on different dates and sometimes different villages than are listed. Like any other census, the data is only as good as what was provided and what was recorded
- For some towns, the writing is very faded and difficult to read.
- But this is still huge!
Here's part of my favorite find--my great-great grandparents. It also shows you how many columns with information are included!
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| Mosko and Ruchel Ruttner, 1921 Czechoslovakian Census. My great-great grandparents |
Happy hunting! Please comment below if you find your family.
hi lara
ReplyDeletethanks for sharing
i found many diferences with the years of borth shown in the census compared whith my knowlenge and borth records.
did you found the same diferences ?
Yes. I mention that near the bottom of the post.
DeleteTY for sharing your experience with this resource! My "Hungarian" ancestors came to USA early in 1900s, but they did leave some relatives behind in towns and cities covered by the records you mentioned. Will have to check them out.
ReplyDeleteHi Lara, I looked for the census records for Velete/Veljatyn but couldn't find them. Is this another case of the records for this town being missing or am I missing something? John
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately it seems like it's missing, at least from this webpage. :(
DeleteI found my father's maternal side in Horlyo, in Szerednye district, but I cannot find any listings for Beregrakos/Rakocin/Rakoshyno, in Munkacs district, which is my father's paternal side.
ReplyDeleteBut this is great - thank you for posting!!
I'm glad you found some, at least!
DeleteWhat is with all of the red? I assume pre-computer census calculations, but that is just a guess. the DOBs are indeed really off as mentioned in the post.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I believe it's some kind of metric calculation. But it's a pain sometimes!
DeleteDo you expect this data to be added to JewishGen any time soon? If so, how detailed will the information be?
ReplyDeleteThanks
Would you like to help organize a transcription project?
DeleteI would like to donate some money if there was a project, but my transcription skills are not good enough for something like this project.
DeleteAt this point all my cycles are coordinating vital records transcriptions. I'd need someone else to coordinate this, with my guidance.
DeleteOne thing I see in Ganya but not other towns I searched is that the wives are listed with their maiden names!!!!!! This is very helpful.
ReplyDeleteI found the town (Korosmeso in Hungarian and Jasynja in Ukraine), the district (Tiszavolgyi) and the county (Marmaros). However, when I went to the library (https://library.hungaricana.hu ...), I could not find either the county or district. Did I miss something? Thanks.
ReplyDeleteI looked where that town is geographically, and it's near Rahó. And in fact, the town is (don't ask me why!) listed under Rahó here.
DeleteThank you Lara.
DeleteJohn, who was looking for Veléte - look under Nagyszőlős járás on the census page. I found the two towns I'm interested in (Bilke and Misztice) under Ilosva rather than Felvidék.
ReplyDelete(I found my great-grandfather on the first page of the Misztice head of household pages - still searching for the census sheet.)
Thank you Lara! My grandfather and 4 siblings left Munkacs well before the First World War - but 3 of the siblings and their widowed mother remained. I found all three siblings and their families as well as my great-grandmother and her 2nd husband in this census. One caveat - once you get to Munkacs, which was one of the largest towns in the area, the records are sub-divided by the names of the streets on which they lived. Using birth registrations where street names were given, I could find them - even though one of the major streets changed names. It was awesome to find them in this census! Thank you for your post about this site and your good directions on using it. Continued success!
ReplyDeleteMy family only lived in small villages, so thankfully I didn't even realize that would be the case!
DeleteI've found my husband's great grandparents, Itzak and Chebe Herskovics in Vajnag, Tocsoi. Ages of the 3 adult children are way off.
ReplyDeleteGlad you found them! And yes, ages are very odd in some cases here!
DeleteI've used this source and have been able to find several relatives in the 1921 CZ census. I'd like to get in touch with Ron Donath but need his e-mail. Thanks, Roberta
DeleteRoberta, his email is nocia01 at bigpond.com
DeleteThank you Shana Tova and Chatima Tova.
ReplyDeleteAccidentally googled into your website; I've been searching for my great-grandparents for many years and found both sets on my maternal side! Thank you so much for posting this, it is a treasure trove of records and information for my family.
ReplyDeleteYay, that makes me so happy! I have lots of other resources throughout my blog for this part of the world, since it's where my mother's maternal ancestors lived.
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