Belogorodka Descendant Research Group

About the Belogorodka Descendant Research Group: 

In the midst of the COVID confinement, a message went out searching for descendants of the Jewish families from Belogorodka. A group of lateral thinkers who have found creative ways around the lack of traditional documentation for the town and concerning its diaspora assembled and began to meet monthly. 

We have shared our stories and our approaches to genealogy—learning from each other and becoming a tight-knit and growing group, each arriving with a different set of pieces of the puzzle. As vast amounts of documentation have been digitized in other regions of Ukraine, Belogorodka has yet to benefit from such a windfall, making our group’s efforts indispensable. We have learned about immigration patterns, family dynamics, professions and matchmaking both in Belogorodka and in the diaspora. 

We learned that somehow, as a community, despite generations and geography, descendants of Belogorodka continue to discover and forge familial and communal ties. That while we are diverse, there is an undeniable common thread and sensibility. We started a GedMatch Ancestor Group for Volhynia and found the interconnectedness extends outward in the region of Volhynia to a constellation of nearby towns such as Zaslav, Lechowitz, Teofpil, Shepitivka, Shumsk, Rivne, Slavuta, Dubno, Gritsev, and others. 

Once we went beyond researching our individual family lines and started to view the entire town and region as an extended family our research took off. Real tangible connections have been made. Lost branches have been reunited. Stories that could have remained buried have been unearthed and told. 

We meet one Sunday a month, please get in touch to join our list and find out about the next meeting: belogorodkafamilies@gmail.com

Family surnames we have researched (incomplete): 

Rich, Rudman/Rodman/Routman/Rothman, Sosna, Rotenberg, Cytron/Tsitrin, Lederman, Metchnik, Katz, Kasfir, Finer, Filer, Jacobs, Springer/Singer, Geeser, Steinberg, Gelin/Giller, Akerman, Handelman, Shore/Szczur/Schorr/Shereshevsky, Herman/German, Perlmutter, Hearst/Arscht, Dubov(oy), Schwartzman, Blitz, Brin/Breen, Oxenhandler, Balaban, Horwitz, Ellman/Gelman, Elboim, Lerner, Schneider, Greenspun, Rotenberg, Kasfir/Cashpir, Shanker, Waldman, Gartzmann, Metchnik, Rich/Raich/Raij, Tuller, Czernenko/Chernenky, Goldstein, Shor, Weitzbuch, Silberman, Richman, Kippel, Goltzman/Holtzman, Auret/Awret, Rubenstein, Reib, Weintraub, Fryer, Taxman, Silverman, Gould, Fishgall, Brady, Goldman, Rimmerman, Roth, Glazer

Our research is a work in progress and much more will be added very soon. Please see our surname list page for an idea of which other Belogorodka families we have discovered and have documentation about and contact us if you would like to join our monthly zoom meeting: belogorodkaresearch@gmail.com.

Use the research tools below to search the JewishGen archives for other researchers and documents.

NOTE: It's important to disambiguate any results from other towns in Ukraine named "Belogorodka" or similar, such as the town near Kiev. Look for the presence of "Volhynia" or "Zaslav." We go into greater detail about strategies on our "Which Belogorodka? Town Name Variations" page.