A lost village

[Wolodymyr]

Can I make this more interesting by telling a story? I am not necessarily looking for answers here, but if any come my way, that would be a bonus.
I recently became driven to find out more about my father's family and history. In the past, he had told me that although he was Ukrainian, he had been born in Poland, because the border had been changed. Moreover his family had been moved out of their village, which no longer existed. Confusing!
In later years, he has told me many stories about his life at home up to the point where he was taken to Germany at the age of 17yrs.
All this aroused my curiosity, and I have since been finding out more.

My first thrust has not been geneological as such, but more historical / geographical as I was interested in where he lived, what it was like, and maybe if I was lucky, I might even find some photos on this great information highway, the internet!

At this point, let me say that I generally felt pity that as a youth, my father had been forcibly taken from his home, escaped, beaten, shot, then finally transported to labour in sometimes appalling conditions, before arriving in this UK haven. Having found his village ( I will come onto this later), and read of the circumstances surrounding those times, I now realise that he was one of the lucky ones.

Now the above comments are entirely apolitical and without malice, and I don't want to dwell on the negative here. When my father describes his childhood, it was clearly full and happy, that also made me want to understand better where he came from, and how it was in those days. In my next post, I would like to tell you how the internet did help me find out more.

Wolodymyr

[Wolodymyr]

My father had mentioned his village, which to me seemed unspellable and unpronouncable, it seemed to enter one ear and disappear out the other.
The village is Male Siedliszcze, although when I started to look for it, it could have been spelt a thousand different ways. Father said that it was about 15km from Kostopil, so I thought easy! I will find it on Google maps. However, there was no sign of it on this or any other current maps I found. I carried on searching with different spellings, along the way learning how the border had changed before and during WWII, and by chance came across a reference to pre war Polish maps to be found on
WIG Map Archive (English) - News
Looking here, the map I found was a 1:100000 scale A45 B43 KOSTOPOL from 1927 and if you want to look, Male Siedliszcze can be found approx 15km SE of Kostopol.
I then wondered whether there was any trace of it left on Google Maps, and set about tracing the river out from Kostopol and looking for any distinguishing features, I took screenshots of the 1927 map, and the satellite images from Google maps, and superimposed and scaled them to get a match. The local road junctions, and the curved nature of the village road in particular made it possible to pinpoint the village and if you look on Google Maps at 50.812N, 26.611E (Male Siedliszcze), you can see that all that is left is terrain, but with the curved path of the village road clearly visible.
The river seems to have been canalised, and the main road has been modified slightly, but superimposing the two maps matches very well, and 50.812N, 26.611E (Male Siedliszcze) is close to the church marker on the 1927 map.
It seems that the reason there is nothing left there is that the area was given over for military use, when my father went to visit in 2008, the family had to get permission from the army who escorted them to the site. He wanted to pay respects at his fathers grave, and although there is now no sign of the cemetary, at least we believe that he did so within 100m or so of his fathers last resting place.

Wolodymyr

[Hannia]

Welcome Wolodymir. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year !

Interwar Period (1919-1938) wies /village MAŁE SIEDLISZCZE> Kostopol was both the powiat (adm district-county) and the gmina (judicial-tax district) > Wolynskie wojiwodstwo > Reconstituted Poland / 2nd Republic of Poland. Village can be located SE of Kostopol. Nearby kolonias Rudenka, Cecylówka, Grudy, Kuty Zalesie, Sobówka, and Janiszówka,

File is to large to attach. Left click Kostopol area to bring up magnified area.
http://majmm.republika.pl/mapki/kresy.GIF

Google shows Male Sedlishche/Мале Седлище in Ukrainian as populated (odd), but w/o place name label. 9.2 miles / 14.8 kilometers ESE of Kostopil.
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What is it that you are trying to understand or accomplish?

[Wolodymyr]

Hannia,
thanks for the information. I haven't seen that map or website before, so will explore. As far as maps are concerned, I have yet to find one anywhere near the level of detail on the 1:100000 scale A45 B43 KOSTOPOL from 1927 (see previous post for link), but am always on the lookout for more.

What is it that you are trying to understand or accomplish?

I don't have any specific question at present, and I think that when I set out to ask one, I will end up with a thousand - just wait and see . I suppose that a broad answer to your question would be that I am trying to connect with my father, to understand his roots and document them for my family. The first step of that process was to find his village, that I have accomplished, but writing down his stories has been my other main preoccupation.
I have my living relatives in kostopol, who I will be asking for various information. The family name is Bilyk, and my paternal grandmothers family Usov. Her father came from Moscow where he was a glassblower, and her mother was Belarus from Grodno. As far as family trees go, I haven't formally started, but let's see what happens.

On another note, the only other references I have found to this and the surrounding villages, have been the lists of Polish and Jewish victims, and the story of Shmuel Liderman and his brother. My idea of finding some scenic village photographs has so far been shown to be somewhat naive, but there may be something out there somewhere.

Any comments and information are welcome, I am just happy to be here

Wolodymyr

[Hannia]

Set up Google (Advanced Search) for Ukrainian and Russian Languages. Perform search using Мале Седлище. There is some detail available re WW2 as per Russian perspective.

I have just recently finished reading "Bloodlands" by Timothy Snyder. As a Vohlynian, what Father endured and survived is in that book. It's all there.

[Wolodymyr]

Thanks Hannia,
good search suggestion, and I will go to Amazon for the book.

Wolodymyr

[Wolodymyr]

Hannia,
when you mentioned the book, I looked it up and saw that it has been reported as a thorough and important historical work, so I ordered, and my copy arrived yesterday.
I will start to read it with some trepidation, as I know that it will not be easy on the emotions.


Wolodymyr