Marriage Records in Bieżuń, POLAND for 1860-1885

The parish of Bieżuń, powiat Żuromin, Poland was in the Russian partition of Poland so its birth, marriage and death records were recorded in paragraph form (rather than an easy to read table form). I indexed the marriage records for Bieżuń parish for the years 1860-1885. Until about the middle of 1868, the records were recorded in Polish. Thereafter, the records were recorded in Russian using the Cyrillic alphabet. In the 1800s, there was one volume devoted to each year. Names of witnesses, parents as well as the brides and grooms and can be confused when their relationships were not readily apparent during a cursory reading. So in this parish, the index was prepared by using the volume index and entering the transliterated (Cyrillic to Latin) versions of the grooms and brides. Then I went back to the 'paragraph' records and found the names in the paragraph and corrected my spellings as needed. Whoever prepared the volume index would have known the grooms and brides which would have differentiated them from any other names. Not all of the pages are numbered but marriages are numbered sequentially which serves as a substitute page number when the page number is not given. Using the link and image number from this site's index is the fastest way of finding the record.

The parish consisted of the villages of Adamowo, Dąbrówki, Elżbiecin, Felcyn, Karniszyn, Karolewo, Lutocin, Mak, Mojnowo, Obręb, Parlin, Pozga, Strzeszewo, Sembórz, Sadłowo, Siedliska, Stanisławowo, Seroki (in the 1800s some alternate spellings were used) according to Slownik Geograficzny. The village of Jonne was not listed though it was frequently cited in the records. Of course some brides and grooms were from outside the parish. Each marriage record started with the place they were from. When there was just one locale, presumably both were from that village. When two locales were given, we don't know to whom each locale refers. This is why locale information was put in the 'Notes' field for this parish. Records of this parish after 1872 gave two dates where one was on the Julian calendar and the other on the Gregorian calendar. Earlier records showed only one date which is presumed to be on the Julian calendar used in the Russian empire. I converted those dates to the Gregorian calendar for this index by adding 12 days. The Julian calendar lags the Gregorian calendar by 12 days during the 1800s. There could be other useful information in the record that was not indexed like marital status, name of a previous spouse and parents. Any additional information in the index beyond the brides and grooms depended on how easily the paragraph could be read-- language and handwriting make a big difference.

When searching for names, be savvy about alternate spellings. A common variation seen in names is 'i' versus 'ie' as in Lubinski versus Lubienski, Kaminski versus Kamienski, etc.