This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/RdC.2ACI/498.1 Message Board Post: The only other records I can find for the parish of Miastkowo are birth records from 1890 to 1892. Go to this site, and click on "More" at the end of the line where they are listed: http://baza.archiwa.gov.pl/sezam/pradziad.eng.php?miejscowosc=Miastkowo&gmina=&wojewodztwo_id=&wyznanie_id=&rodzaj+aktu_id=&search=search That will give you the address of the archives. I would write to them and ask them if they have any more records for this community. If you want them to do your research for you, ask them what the fees are for researching and the cost of the documents. Costs vary from one archive to another. You will have to deal with 3 languages to do your research. There are some sites, which will help you learn how to read the documents you have found. It will take time to get the hang of it, but they all have a specific format, which the goverment said they had to have. Documents from abotu 1868 to the end of WWI will be in Russian. The ones before 1868 and from 1918 on are in Polish. The ones before 1808 are in Latin. I speak and read some Polish. I'm learning more and more as I researh. Just this month one of my cousins tackled finding records. She has begun with Russian and is doing real well with. The Family History Center, where you do should have some literature with guidelines on reading these documents. I will email you, if you wish, some attachments of a couple of things I found on the Internet years ago, which I have been using. I copied them incase the website died. Sure enough, I can't find them on the Internet anymore. Now I pray my computer does not crash. :) I will have to put them on CDs so I will have them. As far as searching for records in other parishes or gminas, you need to establish a starting point. That would be the parish and/or gmina where your ancestor was born. You have mentioned Miastkowo. Are you sure this is where your ancestor(s) lilved or were born? Once you find that first record, you will know that you have it. My grandmother told me my grandfather was from Filipow. She was wrong. His ship manifest said he was born in Bakalarzewo. It was wrong. Once I found his birth record, I learned he was born in Garbas, parish of Bakalarzewo. His mother was born in Filipow. That is where she was living when he left Poland in 1911. Once you have a brith record, you will learn approximately when the parents were born because the record will tell you their age. From that birth record, you can go back in time a year at a time until you find their marriage record. This will tell you where they were living at the time of their marriage ... for both the bride and t! he groom. It will give you their ages and their parents names. To learn of other villages, which may have records, I think, at this time would be like playing hopscotch, just jumping from one place to another. You first need to find that one birth record on your ancestor in this parish. If it is definitely not there, than it is time to move onto another parish. Miastkowo is found in docuements to have existed in 1431. The parish came into existance in 1451. The villages within this the gmina (administrative district) in 1890 were Chmielewo, Czastorya, Drogoszewo, Dzierzki, Jankowo, Korytki-Lesne, Kuleszka, Luby-Kiertany, L.-Kurki, Miastkow, Rybaki, Rydzewo, Sosnowiec, Sulimy, Tarnowo and Zaruzie-Gozdy Stare. I would at least state with the church: Parafia Rzymsko-Katolicka p.w. Matki Bozej Rozancowej Lomzynskiej 4 Miastkowo k. Lomzy 18-413 woj. podlaskie Polska - Poland Contact persons : Antoni Kapusta Hope this will help you. Tina Ellis