Local heritage book of Anhalt (Oberschlesien)

History of the village Anhalt

The village Anhalt O.S. (Hołdunów) was founded by a group of 64 families (303 people) on the 25th of May 1770, marking that day the arrival to their new home. Prior to that, those people lived in Seibersdorf (Kozy) about 45 km south-east of Anhalt. The river Weichsel flows between the two places. It used to mark the border between Schlesien, which was part of Prussia and therefore Protestant Christian, and the land of a Catholic Polish noble. That noble pursued and punished those who did not share his Catholic believe. That led to many Protestant Christians fleeing his land across the Weichsel, including the inhabitants of Seibersdorf. They asked Prussia for help. On the 24th of May 1770, the families of Seibersdorf were escorted to Prussia by a Prussian military unit, arriving there the next day. For the first few years, the village consisted just of the two parts Alt-Anhalt (Stary Hołdunów) and Neu-Anhalt (Nowy Hołdunów). An affiliated settlement, Alt Gatsch (Stara Gać), was founded in 1802 and another settlement, Neu Gatsch (Nowy Gać), was build 1820, both by the inhabitants of Alt-Anhalt and Neu-Anhalt.

The village is currently named Hołdunów and is part of the city Lendzin (Lędziny). The settlement Gatsch belongs to the city of Imielin nowadays.

Geography

Anhalt lies approximately 16 km south of Kattowitz (Katowice) and 7 km north of Berun (Bieruń).

Local heritage book Anhalt O.S.

The One-Place Study is mainly based on the Protestant church records of the parish Anhalt. During the time frame 1770 to 1795, the records can just be reconstructed by the book “Anhalter Familien nach dem Kirchenbuch des ev. PfA Anhalt Kr. Pleß”, as referenced in the sources. The book is basically a One-Place Study as a book with 262 pages written on a typewriter, spanning the years 1770 to 1874. The names are sorted in alphabetical order. The book also references entries about places that were not part of the parish of Anhalt O.S. as long as there was a connection to a person from the parish. These entries contain abbreviations for the places they reference. One frequently referenced place is Pleß (Pszczyna).

As long as I had the original entries or copies thereof, I used the register number of the entries. I referenced the aforementioned book just for the data that I could not get the original entries. I also used the church records of Seibersdorf (geneteka.genealodzy.pl) for the birth records of the first settlers in Anhalt. Using the data from Imielin’s registry office, which are available online, I was able to incorporate information beyond 1874 for the settlement Gatsch.

The One-Place Study already contains some entries from Catholic church records of Lendzin and Groß Chelm, for they were responsible for the Catholic inhabitants of Anhalt and Gatsch respectively. My long term plan is to incorporate these two church records into the One-Place study of Anhalt O.S.. Unfortunately, the records that can be viewed online only start 1820 for Lendzin and 1828 for Groß Chelm. Still, these are the main sources for that part of the One-Place Study. Other sources are referenced with their respective data. I sometimes used information from descendants which I referenced as those without registry numbers.

While working on the One-Place study, I stick to the mentioned book. I work on one name at a time but do not necessarily follow the alphabetical order. The One-Place Study is not yet finished; I only worked through a couple of the 262 pages as of now. Some names span 25 pages, some just part of one page. The author of the referenced book just included a name when it was used by the male descendants. There are a total of 586 different family names.

Processing status April 1, 2023

Sources

• Protestant church records Anhalt 1795 – 1874 (https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ix63jssfnhhjlex/AADI4zS0VmoyUNv4WwU2GiJIa?dl=0)
• Anhalter Familien nach dem Kirchenbuch des ev. PfA Anhalt Kr. Pleß, signature 82/129/0/5/121
• Registry office Imielin
• Protestant church records Pleß
• Catholic church records Lendzin
• Catholic church records Groß Chelm
• Register of the church records Kozy