Digging up Russian Roots

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Allyn Brosz of Washington, DC has been researching his Russian roots for 25 years. That may seem odd since his heritage is ethnically German. His ancestors were part of the movement of Germans to Russia in the early nineteenth century. Brosz’s family came from Wuerttemberg on his father’s side and the Alsace on his mother’s side. Resettled in the Crimea, his family belonged to the ethnically closed community where German language, culture, Lutheran religion, tax advantages, military exemptions, and free land prevailed. Brosz has been able to trace his family’s heritage with the help of microfilmed records by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), available through its Utah-based Family History Library. He’s also made use of documents and records collected during the Nazi regime of ethnic Germans living outside Germany.