Family Lists

Family Lists (Russian: Посемейный список) were compiled by Russian authorities periodically, starting in 1858 and until approximately 1914, for conscription and taxation purposes. They replaced an earlier form of population census called Revision Lists (Russian: Ревизские Сказки), although some updates to Revision Lists were produced for some years after 1858.

Database Fields

These records contains the following fields:

• Page # - The page number in the original document on which this record appears.


• Registration # - The family registration number for this family during this census count.


• Surname - Family name (hereditary surname) of this individual.


• Given Name - The first name(s) of this individual.


• Father - The given name(s) of the father of this individual.


• Relationship to Head of Household - Describes how each individual in the household is related to the head of the household.


• Sex- The sex of this individual. "M" for Male. "F" for Female.


• Age - Age of the individual, given in the present census enumeration.


• Age at Last Revision - Age of the individual, in the previous census enumeration.


• Reason Left - Explains what happened to individuals who were registered on the previous revision list, who are not in the present revision or are no longer registered as a member of this family.


• Year Left - The year in which the individual moved, died, etc.


• Comments - All other information which doesn't fit into any other column.


• Former Registration # - The family registration number for this individual during the previous census count.


• Day / Month / Year - The date that this census was taken. The exact date of the family lists is not always given in the original record


• Town - Town in which this census was taken.


• District - The district ("uyezd") in which the census was taken.


• Guberniya - The Russian province in which the census was taken.


• Type of Record - Denotes the type of record.


• Archive/Fond/Inventory/File - The archive where this record is now located and the particular Fond / Opis / Delo number in that archive.


• Microfilm #- If the record set was microfilmed this field will contain the microfilm number from the Family History Library. Very few family lists were filmed by the Family History Library

Sample records

Sample 1894 family list

Sample 1874 family list

Comments specific to the Pinsk family lists:

• These lists contain many notes that were added on various occasions for a number of years after the original records were compiled. The bulk of the notes related to tracing the conscription status of males. In some cases only parts of the notes are readable. In those cases you will see "[partially legible notes]" or "[difficult to read notes]" in the comments field. It might be possible to review specific records to see if more can be deciphered. Contact Debra Wolraich (djwolraich@hotmail.com) if you would like a specific record reviewed to see if additional information can be obtained.

• For some people, both their age and date of birth were given. In those cases, both are written separated by a slash ("/"). For some people their age will have an associated year (i.e. "17 in 1876"). This can occur when a person was added to the family list after the original lists were compiled or the age was in doubt and was confirmed by police or other authorities in a year different than when the original list was compiled.

• The Russian clerks used a confusing (and confused) diversity of terms like причислен, приписан, перечислен, переписан, etc. We believe they refer to two different phenomena/processes:

"перечислен" refers to the administrative reassignment of a family from a Jewish community of one town to another. This had almost nothing to do with where they actually resided. We translate those as "reassigned to....."  The same term was used when a person or the entire family was moved from one official social class (such as burghers, aka petty bourgeois) to another (such as guild-registered merchants).

"приписан" is a conscription-related reassigning a prospective draftee from the list of one geographic draft board to another. We translate these as "entered into draft list of..." Being assigned to a draft list of a particular town or uyezd may imply that the person actually lived in that locality even if formally registered in the Family List of Pinsk.

• Numerous notes in the 1894 family lists state that someone died (умер, умерла) or got married (Вышла замуж) without stating when. In most cases, this note is made in the same handwriting as the main body of the page's text. In other words, this note was made by the compilers of the 1894 list, and was intended to say that the person has been on the earlier versions of the family list but died before it was revised in 1894. In those cases we have added the clarification: умер до 1894 г (died prior to 1894).
  
  
• The note "did not show up for draft" (к призыву не явился) has genealogical significance in that draft dodging had be be closely correlated with emigration or at least a significant change of residence and possibly a change of name (to escape prosecution for draft dodging).
  

• There were numerous notes of the type "age according to physical appearance", related to conscription enforcement (dealing with widespread falsification of boys ages). They are voluminous, but offer little in the way of genealogical information and are generally not transcribed in these records.

• There were numerous notes on assignment to military service, or to militia, or deferrals, or release from duty, etc. These are generally not transcribed in these records except for the notes indicating that the person was taken into military service. Such notes have genealogical significance in that many soldiers settled in different towns (other then the one they were conscripted from) after completing their service.

• We have translated the Russian class "meshchane" (мещане) as "petty bourgeois" to be consistent with how it has been translated in other JewishGen record sets but there is some disagreement about this translation. The following are comments from one translator: "The plurality or even majority of Russian Jewish 'meshchane' were hired laborers. Even by a most rigid Marxist definition such people definitely were not petty bourgeois, they were proletariat. Furthermore, consider the dictionary (Merriam-Webster) definition: 'petty bourgeoisie: a social class that is between the middle class and the lower class : the lower middle class'. But in Pinsk and similar Jewish towns, Jewish 'meschane' definitely included also the lower and lowest classes! A better term is 'burghers'. This means 'town-dweller' and is exactly what the word 'meshchane' means linguistically -- inhabitants of a 'mesto', a small town. It is a more neutral term, and it does not mislead a typical JewishGen user into thinking that his ancestor necessarily owned a small business, a shop, etc." 

• Dates in these lists are based on the Julian calendar. The modern day calendar is the Gregorian calendar. You can convert a Julian date to a Gregorian date using Steve Morse's conversion tool

• The 1894 Pinsk family lists contain 1584 families but begin with family #794. The pages for families 1-793 have not been found. The 1874 Pinsk family lists contain 1256 families and all pages have survived. There are some additional pages with added people that have not yet been transcribed. 

Acknowledgements

The JewishGen Belarus Research Division would like to thank:

• Alexander Kott for his work on these records
• Century Vital Records for their transcription services
• The many people whose financial contributions have made it feasible to obtain these records.

Searching the Database

This database is searchable via the JewishGen Belarus Database.