Posen 1835
Research Posen 1835
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1835 Posen City Directory (Adress-Kalendar)
The Adress-Kalender fuer die Provinzial Haupt-Stadt Posen auf das Jahr 1835 is the earliest known city directory published for the city of Poznan, Poland. It was compiled by the police commissioner and is purportedly very accurate. The directory generally lists only a surname, occupation, any military decorations, and a residential address. In some cases a first name or a business address appears.
Jews
Jews were usually listed by first and last name while Gentiles are usually listed only by last name. The reason is that the Jews were just newly eligible for naturalization in 1835, and many people had to become accustomed to dealing with Jews by last names for the first time. Last names were adopted in 1797, but it wasn't until the decree of 1833 allowing naturalization that last names came into common usage. The list purportedly includes all Jewish employed/retired heads of households living in the city of Posen. For further information on this topic, please consult Edward David Luft's excellent book on the subject, The Naturalized Jews of the Grand Duchy of Posen in 1834 and 1835.
Military Decorations
The profession column notes all medals/awards held by recipients. For more information on these items, please consult the separate Medals/Awards page. There should be files in some archive listing information on all holders of each such award unless the archive was later destroyed. In some cases, such as the French Legion of Honor, the lists are even published, such as in Les Fastes de la Légion d'Honneur. The awards offer a rich source of genealogical materials and include many Junkers, including those of Polish name and ancestry.
Source of Original Adress-Kalender
The following additional city directories appeared, but the present location of some of them is unknown. The rest are available in Berlin at the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Haus I; or at the University Library, Poznan; or both. Many years are available elsewhere in Poland and Germany. Two dates separated by a hyphen indicate that all years in between were also published: 1844, 1862, 1865, 1868, 1879, 1882, 1884, 1886-1907, 1910, 1912-1914, 1916-1917, 1923, 1925-1926, 1930, 1933. At various times, directories appeared for other parts of the province, including some rural areas.
Many thanks go to Angelika Ellmann-Krüger who located the volume in Berlin and who made most of the photocopy. To Edward David Luft who made the material available to PolishRoots for indexing and for proof reading the compiled index. Thanks also to Beverly Szumowski who compiled the index from the original work.