Hi Chris, Not quite a direct answer to your question, but if looking for earlier (1800s) records for Evangelicals in Poland it is always a good idea to also look at records kept for the Roman Catholics, esp for births and deaths. Marriages nearly always show up in the Evangelical register, but it is not uncommon for births and deaths to be registered with a more convenient RC Church. There are times when the Polish Evangelicals seem a little more RC to me than I am used to from my Australian Lutheran upbringing, for example calling a Pastor a Priest. This may be just a language blip, however there are some customs that have been adopted by some families such as sharing wafer at Christmas (alas I forget the correct term here - oplatek?), fasting on Good Fri etc which were not familiar to me. Am I correct in thinking you already know the location of your ancestors in Poland. If not it is most important to gather as much information as possible about villages of birth etc from records where these people settled after leaving Poland. Kind regards, Bronwyn. On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 10:09 AM, <Csgen50@aol.com> wrote: > Hello All, > > I have a general question about the Protestant Church in Poland. What form > did this take? Was it for example a High Church with ceremonies more akin > to > the Catholic Church than the Protestant as we know it in UK or America? > > In UK there is a small branch of the Church of England that is known as > High > Church. If you went to a service there you would find incense, statues, > crusifixes and genuflecting as a normal part of the service, despite the > fact > that it is very definately Anglican and not Catholic. If visiting the area > you > would be forgiven for thinking that you had walked into the local Catholic > church by mistake. Might this be the case in Poland? > > My reason for asking is that if statues and crucifixes are a normal part of > the Protestant Church in Poland (or were in the early 20th century) the > family > might have made an error in believing that Marie was Catholic simply > because > she had these in her possesion. > > As I said before, all her children were baptised in the Church of England. > She was never known to attend church of any demonination during her > lifetime, > except for the baptism of her children and their subsequent weddings. I was > however mistaken when I thought that she married in the Church of England. > In > fact she had a civil ceremony at a Register Office. > > Many thanks for helping me to understand a little more about life in > Poland. > Regards, > Chris