Our first meeting of the year featured speaker Tom Sadauskas, who introduced members and guests to Genealogy Research in Lithuania. Tom began with a concise historical overview, explaining that although Lithuania was founded in the 13th century, its history has been closely intertwined with that of Poland for centuries. He discussed the formation of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569—one of the largest and most populous countries in Europe during the 16th through 18th centuries—and its eventual partition among the Russian, Prussian, and Austrian Empires at the end of the 18th century. While Poland was divided among all three empires, Lithuania fell almost entirely under Russian control throughout the 19th century. Following World War I, both Poland and Lithuania re-emerged as independent nations, though Poland’s borders included territory that is now part of Lithuania. As with Poland, Lithuania’s present-day borders were established after World War II.

Building on this historical framework, Tom explained how shifting political boundaries influenced the languages used in Lithuanian genealogical records and how an ancestor’s religion could further affect the language in which records were created. He outlined a practical approach for tracing immigrant ancestors back to the Old Country and discussed the use of gazetteers and historical maps to identify ancestral towns and villages. Tom introduced several key websites for researching Lithuanian burials, deportations to Siberia, the 1942 German census of Lithuania, and indexed Lithuanian vital records. He also offered guidance on writing to Lithuanian archives and highlighted the types of records held by each repository.

In addition, Tom demonstrated how personal names and place names may appear differently in Polish and Lithuanian records, explored the impact of post–World War II ethnic cleansing on the migrations of Poles and Lithuanians, and discussed the holdings of the Arolsen Archives, including records for displaced persons, victims of Nazi persecution, and forced laborers.

Attendees shared enthusiastic feedback, including:

“Slideshow was very useful and well summarized.”

“Tom’s presentation was wonderful. It followed a logical order and was not too overwhelming.”

“Tom was a very engaging presenter. Great sense of humor and personal stories.”

“Although I do not have ancestors from this region, I thought the discussion of the changing borders, timeframes of records, the changing languages of records, relevant across whichever region one may be researching in Poland.”

“Tom was an engaging speaker. His enthusiasm really came through in his presentation.”

The recording is now available on our Meeting Recordings page for members to access.