Professions of our ancestors
Specific occupations leave specific paper trails. Here is what survives — and what we can find — for selected Polish professions.
Peasants (chłopi)
The majority of Polish ancestors were peasants. Estate inventories, serfdom registers, post-emancipation indemnification files, cadastral records, and village court books document their lives in remarkable detail.
Read more →Soldiers and officers (wojskowi)
From Napoleonic-era Polish Legions through Austro-Hungarian and Russian-army officers, the interwar Wojsko Polskie, and the Polish forces of WWII — career military ancestors leave a uniquely detailed paper trail.
Read more →Railway workers (kolejarze)
Personnel files, pension records, and railway-line staff lists held by the Polish State Railways and predecessor administrations (k.k. priv. Galizische Carl-Ludwig-Bahn, Prussian and Russian state railways).
Read more →Postal workers (pocztowcy)
Personnel files of post-office clerks, telegraph operators, and rural letter carriers — held by the Polish Post and predecessor administrations.
Read more →Civil servants (urzędnicy)
Service files of officials of the Austrian, Prussian, Russian, and Polish administrations — clerks, judges, county heads, treasury employees. A profession of strict record-keeping.
Read more →Teachers (nauczyciele)
Personnel files of primary, secondary, and seminary teachers — held by school boards (kuratoria), state archives, and the schools themselves. Often well preserved thanks to the strict bureaucracy of the Galician and interwar education system.
Read more →Foresters (leśnicy)
Personnel files of foresters and forest guards employed by the State Forests, private estates, and earlier the Austrian and Russian forestry administrations.
Read more →Doctors (lekarze)
Medical chambers, university diploma rolls, hospital staff lists, and military medical service files document the careers of Polish physicians from the 19th century onward.
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