- Specific Notes -

1. Villages. The list only attempts to describe localities having at least a substantial minority of German settlers. A village list which included every town in the Batschka would be much longer, unwieldy and not all that much more useful to Donauschwaben researchers. If you don't find it, Shtetl Seeker is an interactive, fuzzy-search gazetteer with maps of 24 countries east of Germany, Austria and Slovenia (inclusive).
2. Names. Do try your best to pinpoint your ancestor's town as closely as possible, but if at the end of the day you are unable to exactly match the spelling that is in the documentation you have, do not put too much stock in the discrepancy. Note that in the case of family documents such as bibles, often they are not compiled by the first settlers at the time of settlement, but by descendants many years later when memories have become foggy or to whom the name was never properly known in the first place. In the case of American government documents such as naturalization papers, consider that the village name may have been given in response to an interviewer who probably neither spoke the language of the name of the village, nor even knew what it was. And that ensuring the accuracy of the spelling of the name of the town he had abandoned was likely the lowest priority of the settler struggling with the details of his new life and rather yet another tedious matter of bureaucracy to be quickly dispensed with.
3. Population figures. Population data is typically presented in two numbers. The first is the total number of inhabitants and the second in parentheses, if any, is a count of the number of German speakers in the place. In some cases, where the number of German speakers appears to go down, it may be an artificial reflection of the Magyarization policy under Hungarian auspices.
4. The FHL Microfilm Nr. is a reference to one or more microfilms available at Family History Centers around the world. Typically this is presented as a range of numbers, e.g. 0639384 - 0639389, which indicates that there are actually 6 microfilms, i.e. 0639384, 0639385, 0639386, 0639387, 0639388 and 0639389 available on the topic. Although these films have Hungarian labels on the FHL computer, the actual film content is in Latin. If you would like to the FHL catalog yourself, visit the Place Search page of the FHL catalog.
5. Church Information. The religious denomination of churches found in the villages are from the Gazetteer of Hungary for 1877. These churches may or may not be present in the village after that date. If your ancestors lived in a village and were not of the denomination/church listed, check the adjacent villages for that denomination and records. Note also that newly-founded colonies often did not have a full-fledged church until decades later. While a small local chapel, a filial parish, served most of the settlers' needs, registration of their births, marriages and deaths would in these cases be recorded in the church of a nearby larger town. In cases where this town is known to us, this fact is noted in the list. We would like to record any others of which you may be aware. By the way, there is now a website for the Kalocsa Diocese Archives.
6. Census Information. Note that a corner of the Batschka, as shown by the orange line in the map at FEEFHS, was part of the Military Border Region. These settlements do not appear to have participated in the 1828 Census. Included among them appear to be Curug, Djurdjevo, Donji, Gardinovci, Gornji Gospodjinci, Iwan, Josefsdorf, Katsch, Kovilj, Kowil-St. Lok, Mosorin, Nadalj, Neudorf, Novi Sad, Titel and Vilovo.
7. Newspapers. Newspapers currently being published with which it is possible to place a personal advertisement for genealogical enquiry.
8. HOGs. A Heimatortsgemeinschaft (HOG) is a society devoted to a single village and is a possible source of information for the researcher. Quite a few exist for Batschka villages. To find out if there is one for yours, please consult this list of societies separately as they are not otherwise linked to in the list you're looking at right now.
9. Maps. Once you have found the Official Name of your village of interest, and its country, find it on this 1910 map. (779K)
10. Errors and Omissions. If you discover any, please inform us.

- Browsing the List -

[Index]

Sources:

1. Connor, Martha R., Germans and Hungarians: 1828 Land Census: Bacs Bodrog, Hungary (1991, Las Vegas: self-published, 7754 Pacemont Court, Las Vegas, NV 89117, USA)
2. Cseres, Tibor, Titoist Atrocities in Vojvodina 1944-1945/Serbian Vendetta in Bácska [Hungarian: Vérbosszú Bácskában] (1993, Buffalo, New York, USA and Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Hunyadi Publishing).
3. Dvorzsak, Janos, Magyarorszag Helysegnevtara (Gazetteer of Hungary), Comp. Budapest: Havi Fuzetek, 1877 [Available at Family History Library European Reference Collection 943.9 FSd. Fiche #6000840]
4. Ginal, Andreas, Familienbuch Kunbaja (Kumbaj) in der Batschka, 1819-1946 (1700-1994) (1994, Echter Verlag, Würzburg)
5. Markovíc, Milica, Geografsko-istorijski imenik naselj Vojvodine za period od 1853. godine do danas = La liste géographico-historique des lieux habites de Vojvodina dans la période depuis 1853 jusqu'a nos jours (1966, Novi Sad : Izdanje Vojvodanskog muzeja)
6. Regenyi, Isabella & Anton Scherer, Donauschwäbisches Ortsnamenbuch (1987, Schriesheim, Germany: Arbeitskreis donauschwäbischer Familienforscher, 2nd edition).
7. Rieth, Adolf, Die geographische verbreitung des Deutschtums in Rumpf-Ungarn in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, Hrsg. in Verbindung und mit Unterstutzung der Stiftung für deutsche Volks- und Kulturbodenforschung, Leipzig. Stuttgart, Ausland und Heimat Verlags-Aktiengesellschaft, 1927. (Schriften des deutschen Ausland-Instituts, Stuttgart. A, Kulturhistorische Reihe, band 28) [available at the Hoover Institute]
8. Rudiger, Hermann, Die Donauschwaben in der südslawischen Batschka (1931, Stuttgart: Ausland und heimat verlagsaktiengesellschaft; Series title: Schriften des deutschen Ausland-Instituts, Stuttgart. A, Kulturhistorische Reihe, band 28) [available at the Hoover Institute]
9. The Suffering of the Germans in Communist Yugoslavia, 1991-94, Muenchen/Sindelfingen, Donauschwäbische Kulturstiftung e.V., Volume IV., Human Losses - Names and Numbers to the Crimes on Germans Committed by the Tito Regime between 1944 and 1948 (Leidensweg der Deutschen im kommunistischen Jugoslawien, 1991-94, Muenchen/Sindelfingen, Donauschwäbische Kulturstiftung e.V., Band IV, Menschenverluste - Namen und Zahlen zu Verbrechen an den Deutschen durch das Tito-Regime in der Zeit von 1944-1948)
10. FHL microfilm lists
11. a previous village list from [email protected] with contributions from (in alphabetical order):
    • Norbert Bambach
    • Dennis Bauer
    • Sue Clarkson
    • Richard Heli
    • Gordon McDaniel
    • Michael Stamm

Credits

• Dennis Bauer - Church and District information
• Johann Bayer - information on Pivnice, Csatalja
• Sue Danielson - information on Obrovac, Tovarisova church records, the missing Gajdobra (incorrectly filed under Bars megye by the FHL)
• Helmut Flacker - information on camps
• Erich Gerber - info on Kleinker
• Rita Greenwell - information on Kernei
• Robert Goetz - military border/census information
• Ron Gretz - information on Tschonopel
• Cathy Horn - a great deal of FHL microfilm information
• John Niefer - information on Jarek
• Igor Prlja - information on Szeghegy
• Andras Szeitz - Hungarian proofreading

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