Genealogy Chat

karries G Grandads naturalisation papers were amazing nell, the info and little personal comments about him were fantastic, well worth going to kew for if you fing yours were naturalised

This is the source info I found about Jewish immigrants: 'Before the arrival of Dutch Ashkenazi immigrants in significant numbers in the mid 19th C there was already a well established Ashkenazi community in London. These families were...living Spitalfields in Houndsditch and the Eastern fringe of the City of London close to Dukes Place where the Great Synagogue was... Their surnames... very largely based of patronymics , Abrahams, Benjamin ,Emanuel, Isaacs, Jacobs,Joel , Lazarus, Moses, Myers ,Phillips ,Sim(m)ons ... European Jews by and large did not use surnames until it became compulsory under Napoleonic Law after 1811. ..It is as a rule extraordinarily difficult to ascertain from whence these comparatively early immigrants individually originated since these common Jewish given names are shared by all European Jews . The one notable exception to the rule being the many early English families names Hart , which it is reasonable to suppose is an Anglicised form of the common Dutch given name Hartog . The first British census which included details of the place of birth was in 1851 by which time the almost all the 18 Th. C Jewish immigrants had died.' From http://www.zen28027.zen.co.uk/dutch.htm Aubrey Jacobus December 1998 [email protected]

my fathers side came from Kutno in Poland. It is unlikely that they had a surname there. Any jews that came from kutno have the surname Kutner, Kuttner or Cutner I'll have a look at the website tomorrow thanks

I have read this thread with great interest as my original reason for starting to research my family tree was that there is a hereditary genetic condition in my family said to be prominent in Jews of Eastern European desent (the gene is said to have originated in Lithuania 350 years ago, believed to be a result of interbreeding in the Ashkenazi Jewish communities). and I wondered if I had Jewish ancestory on my Mother's Father's side of the family. My Father seemed to think that because her Father's family came from the East End there MUST be! Turns out my Mum's Father's ancestors were Weaver's in Coventry! For anyone who is interested, I'm talking about a condition called 'Dystonia'. This causes involuntary muscle spasms and abnormal postures. In the 'olden days' it was considered to be a mental problem and sufferers were locked away in asylums. Just a tip for those who had Jewish ancestors described as 'lunatics' or such like on census records.