Lida District (Uezd)

We fall under Jewishgen nonprofit status umbrella through Belarus SIG.  Contributions to any of our Lida projects are tax-deductible in the US via the JewishGen Web page.  You either can contribute online by credit card through the secure server or print the form and mail in your donation. Either way, every penny collected is earmarked for Lida uezd projects.

To our ancestors,  the Hebrew alphabet was  the natural way to write their names.  On civil documents, other alphabets were used. Names were transliterated in  arbitrary, varying ways.  (Click on your browser's "back" button to return here).
 

Records Translation Projects updated 9/09 - funds still needed before data can be put online

Additional Revision Lists!

Judy Baston is coordinating a project to translate additional Revision Lists after 1858.  More Details!  Names in Belitsa  Names in Eisiskes  Names in Lida Names in Nowy Dwor Names in Orlya Names in Ostryna  Names in Radun Names in Rozhanka Names in Sczczuczyn Names in Vasilishki Names in Voronovo   Names in Zhaludok    

LDS (Mormon) microfilm translation projects:

Judy Baston is coordinating a project to translate records from Novy Dvor, Orlya, Shchuchin, and Radun on LDS microfilm.  The results will be entered into the All-Lithuania Database.   
There  is an effort to translate the records filmed in Grodno and on LDS microfilm 2329356, Ostryna and Belitsa 1897-1900.  The translations will become part of the All-Belarus Database.  Contact me if you can help. 

These records were kept on a double page, with Russian on the left & Hebrew on the  right.  There were columns for the required data, so the linguistic demands are not high.  A few of these records have already been indexed and are available on this site.  You can see from the numbers involved here that the towns were small, so there aren't very many entries to work on;  once started, this should not be a huge project if enough people volunteer.

History of Lida District (Uezd)

• A brief history of Lida District
• A brief history of the Jewish Population of Lida District
• Another history of Lida
• Sefer Lida - the Yizkor Book for Lida
• More on Eastern European Boundary Changes (Click on your browser's "back" button to return here)
• The Imperial Edict shifting Lida Uezd in 1842 (Search for "creation of Kovno" or "Imperial Edict")
• More about administrative divisions
• Russian and Polish Geographical definitions
• Many families have stories about leaving Russia to avoid the draft.  Read an historic account about what was so bad about it.
• What is a starosta? and other comments on Community organization.
• The Tsarist decrees relating to Jews

Maps

• For those of you with up-to-the-minute technology, this site even pronounces the letters.
• This site doesn't even require enabling international fonts - it comes up on almost anything.
• Conventions for transliteration

Need to convert old Russian units?

Polish translation sites also change.  Do a web search to find a current one.

List of towns in Lida District

If you know which area page you want:

Eisiskes/Radun  |  Iwje/Lipniszki  | Lida  |  Ostryna |  Szczuczyn  |  Voronovo  |  Wasiliszki  |  Zaludok

Searchable Databases

• The 1858 Revision List (Census) for Eisiskes, Lida, Radun, Voronovo, Vasilishki, Zhaludok, Rozhanka, Belitsy, Nowy Dwor, Ostrynia,  Orlya  & Shchuchin  is now part of the All-Lithuania Database.  These records were purchased in part by participants in the LitvakSIG's Lida District 1858 Revision List Project.
• Kaunas Residents 1874 registered in Lida District Towns is in  the All-Lithuania Database.  To generate this list, you have to do a global text search,  for the string  Lida uyezd because the notation "Lida uyezd" is in the comments field.
• The 1929 Polish Business Directory for Nowogrodek Wojwod.  Lida Uezd was part of this administration district between the two world wars.  The sections for each town listed in Lida Uezd can be browsed from each of our area pages, too. (Not all the towns in our towns list have listings in the business directory).
• Belarus SIG has entered the business directory Vsia Rossiya (1903) for Minsk Guberniya into an on-line database.  See the All Belarus Database below. The Lida area was never part of Minsk Guberniya, but was close; relatives may have moved there from Lida in search of better opportunities.
• The All Belarus Database.
• Search the Ellis Island Database for Jewish passengers in one step
• Search a database of Jewish casualties in the Russo-Japanese War  for men from Lida, search for "Lidskij", other towns that occur are Voronovo, Ostrin & Shchuchin [use that spelling].
• The Jewish Encyclopedia is now online.  Typing "Lida" into the search box results in 25 hits.  Don't forget to try the names of  the other towns.  Use "Novy Dvor".
  
• Miriam Weiner's Routes to Roots Foundation web site has a searchable catalog of records held in Eastern European archives..
• 1923 Polish business directory at the Library of Congress [page images]
• Warsaw phone book from just before World War II [page images]
• The Jewish Colonial Trust Bank sold shares worldwide.  They have a searchable database containing the names of the owners of unredeemed shares.  There are literally 100s of names from Lida.  Vasilishki is spelled Wassilischki.
• Lida Area victims of Stalin's purges.
  

Modern Belarus

• Belarus SIG
• Jews in Belarus
• There is now a Jewish Community in Lida
  
• Description of modern Lida City from the Virtual Guide to Belarus :  click on "cities" & select Lida- other cities in the district are also included.  Then click your browser's "back" button to return here
• A Lida website by a resident of Lida - mostly in Belarussian
• An overview of Belarus that loads quickly because there aren't any glitzy graphics. Then click your browser's "back" button to return here
• Dudutki, a museum of old Belarus [for Americans:  think Colonial Williamsburg],  though not in Lida
• There's a Klezmer group in Lida!
• Belarus Chamber of Commerce Addresses
• Storks figured large in the popular imagination in Europe; they were the most spectacular bird people were likely to see.  Since there's no corresponding bird in the US- European storks adapted to human presence to the point of frequently nesting on roofs, which was considered to be lucky for the residents of the house in question - the only remnant left in US popular culture is that babies are brought by storks.  Thanks to Tony Gabis & Ellen Sadove Renck for this link.
  

History

• Marjory Seltzer's family kept their ancestor's draft exemption document, dated 1889

Holocaust

Research

Landsmanshaftn

• The  United Lieder Relief Society is still active in New York City. There's an annual meeting in May to remember the victims of the mass murders in Lida May  8, 1942. new 11/08

IAJGS Cemetery Project entries for Belarus.

Join the Lida District Researchers, a free birds-of a feather group

Archival

Archives Addresses,  including Lida Municipal Archive, the types of material they hold, and a comprehensive review of sources,

Success Stories

• Stephen A. Cohen
• Irene Newhouse

Links

• Shtetlinks links to other Belarusian communities. Of particular interest, because they're close to Lida Uezd, are Mir (not an official ShtetLink), Mstibovo, Nesvizh, Skidel, Slonim (also not an official ShtetLink), & Svisloch
• ShtetLink for Vilnius Vilna was the big city our Lida ancestors looked to for culture & the latest
• Grodno was another nearby big city to which family might move
• Belarus SIG web site
• A Belarus Miscellany Then click your browser's "back" button to return here
• Kastus Mardzvincau's Belarussian Web Pages A lot of material here!
• A link library for Belarus (multilingual)
• Jews of Belarus site
• The Bereza Area Research Group has interesting material, particularly a detailed map of Grodno Guberniya
• Photographs from the Lida Area  Bagnowka (scroll down to the bottom of the home page and click on "cemeteries".  Then click on the puzzle piece labeled "Jewish". In the alphabetical list, there's Lida and Zoludok. Szczuczyn is not "ours", but the other one. 
• Radzima  has photographs from many towns in Belarus. The home page comes up in Belarussian. Click on "en" in the upper right, just below the silhouetted skyline to change to English.Choose "our" region on the left - Grodna. Towns in "our" area appear in these districts: Lida, Iŭie, Ščučyn, and Voranava. Clicking on any of these districts brings up a page with a list of town names. When you click on the town name, only the choices with a little camera to the right contain images.   
• http://www.globus.tut.by has many, many pages of pictures of Belarus. For pictures from Jewish cemeteries all over Belarus, paste the URL http://www.globus.tut.by/type_tn_graves_evr.htm into http://translate.google.com/  -- there's a box for a URL near the bottom of the first screen on the translation site. You can even click around the globus site within the translator! Be prepared for some funk: the town Mir, for instance, is rendered Peace, because that's what Mir happens to mean....  For pictures of towns in Belarus [heavily weighted toward Christian churches] paste http://www.globus.tut.by/area_pl_grodn.htm into the translation site. This page lists all the towns in the Grodno region for which it has pictures & you can click on the town of choice, all the while getting an instantaneous translation. Thanks to Ellen Sadove Renck for finding these sites!

Jewishgen Home Page | ShtetLinks Directory

Compiled by Ellen Sadove Renck & Irene Newhouse HTML by Irene Newhouse This data, along with all copyright and other rights therein, is and shall remain the original donor's, Lida District Researchers and Ellen Sadove Renck. No right is granted for the resale of this material or its uploading to any electronic or computerized service for which a fee is charged other than a flat fee for access. However, a limited license is hereby granted to anyone accepting the terms of the license to make no more than 2 printed copies and no more than 4 electronic/cd copies of the work for genealogical purposes only, specifically excluding commercial or religious proselyting purposes, and specifically excluding the right to make derivative works without the prior written consent of Ellen Sadove Renck and further excluding all other rights not specified herein. In consideration for the limited license herein granted the copier, by making a copy of the listing, hereby agrees to be bound by and accepts the above conditions. Updated by EIN 11/08 Copyright © 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002,2003, 2007, 2008 Ellen Sadove Renck, Irene Newhouse