GERMAN-JEWISH RESEARCH
© Mona Freedman Morris/Florence Kapoor 2015
The earliest record of a Jewish community in German lands is from 321 C.E. in Cologne. Documentation of
Jews in German lands increases in the early Middle Ages. The Jewish community was migratory, as
persecutions and expulsions, along with economic opportunities, caused them to move from city to city and
state to state.
During the 14th century most Jews were expelled from German lands after being blamed for the Black Plague.
However, the German Jews returned later.
After the French Revolution in 1789, Napoleon captured several German states and extended emancipation to
the Jews in those areas. When Napoleon was defeated, each German state independently determined the
status of the Jews residing there.
In 1871, the German states outside of Austria united under the Prussian king, adding Alsace-Lorraine, Baden,
Wurttemberg, Bavaria, and other states to the lands that had previously been held by Prussia, including Silesia
and Posen.
After WWI, Germany ceded Alsace-Lorraine to France, Upper Silesia, most of Posen, and West Prussia to
Poland, and other areas to Denmark and Belgium.
The subsequent history of the Third Reich, WWII, and the Holocaust is well known.
Primary Records in Germany
There is no central archive for German records. You must determine where and when your ancestors lived in
each town. You can then contact the relevant archives that hold records for that specific town.
There are several different types of archives in Germany:
Staatsarchiv (national)
Bezirkarchiv (district)
Landesarchiv (provincial)
Stadtarchiv (city)
Dorfarchiv (village)
Records such as address books, citizenship lists, emigration lists, and family registers are found in the
Stadtarchiv.
Additional research guides:
www.cjh.org/collections/genealogy/factsheets.php Germany: Jewish Family History Research Guide
A 60 page guide to research Germany
http://feefhs.org/guides/Germany.pdf
Genealogy Institute • Center for Jewish History • 15 West 16th Street, New York, NY 10011 • (212) 294-8318
• Leo Baeck Institute www.lbi.org
The place to go to for German Jewish History
Issues of Stammbaum (Journal of German-Jewish Genealogy); also in the JGSPBCI Library
German Minority Census 1939
http://www.lbi.org/collections/the-german-minority-census-of-1939-call-number-mf-466/
List of Archives in Germany:
http://home.bawue.de/~hanacek/info/earchive.htm
Minority Census of 1938/1939 lists given names and surnames, birth dates, birthplaces, education levels, and
which grandparents were Jewish. A good explanation and a list of localities covered are found in Avotaynu
Monograph Series, Teaneck, New Jersey : Avotaynu,1996. [FHL call # 943 X22e 1996 (in JGSPBCI Library)
https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/images/d/df/German_Census_films.pdf
Records in Germany
www.germanroots.com/germandata.html
Jewish Records online
In March 2009 the Landesarchiv Baden-Wuerttemberg made images of Jewish records available on the Internet.
Previously this collection could only be viewed on microfilm at the State Archive in Stuttgart. The collection includes birth,
marriage, and death registers, family books, and other lists, mostly from the 19th Century.
JEWISHGEN.ORG www.jewishgen.org/GerSIG
 German-Jewish SIG - Germany and German-speaking areas of Alsace, Lorraine, Switzerland, and
Poland.

Jewish Families of Northern Germany 3,000 families from Lower Saxony, North-Rhine-Westphalia,
Hamburg, Bremen, and Hessen.
 The Hessen Gatermann Index
Surname-and-town index of 19th- and 20th-century Jewish vital
records from Hessen, linking to images of the records. To date: 55,000 records from northern and
eastern Hessen.

Name Adoption List Index (NALDEX) From 1809 to 1812, lists of surname changes for Jews were
created in several German states. Included are person's residence, patronymic surname, new
surname, and birth date. Phase I contains 15,000 records from early 19th-century Prussia.

Jews in Würzburg, 1900-1945 - Biographical dictionary of more than 13,000 Jews living in Würzburg,
Lower Franconia, in the early 20th century.

The 1933 German Towns Project - Jewish inhabitants of German towns in 1933,
Kehilla Links - Berlin
http://kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/berlin/Home.html
Ancestry.com
German Phone Directories 1915-1981
German Casualities in the Franco-Prussian War 1870-1871
Index of Jews Whose German Nationality was Annulled by Nazi Regime, 1935-1944
Meyers Gazetteer of the German Empire
WW I Personnel Rosters
Meckilenburg-Schwerin Census 1819,1867, 1890, 1900
FamilySearch.org Indexed Historical Records for Germany
https://familysearch.org/search/collection/location/1927074
Includes:
German Births 1558-1898
German marriages 1558-1929
Find a grave
Death and Burials 1582-1958
Meckilenburg-Schwerin Census 1867, 1900
Bremen Passenger Departure Lists 1904-1914
Church Book Duplicates 1800-1870 (includes Jews)
German Word List:
https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/German_Word_List
German Letter Writing Guide:
https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Germany_Letter_Writing_Guide