Series 1 - Bergthal colony/Chortitzer Church registers

This series consists of 5 sets of registers with 2 volumes in each. The oldest group of ledgers is from the Bergthal colony Russia and were brought along with the Mennonites when they first began to settle in Canada in 1874. These ledgers were begun in 1843. The second group of ledgers were produced by the same church in Canada., where the church was named Die Mennonitische Gemeinde zu Chortitz, and hence known as the Chortitzer Church Registers. There are a total of 10 volumes – five pairs of two ledgers begun in 1843, 1874, 1878, 1887 and 1907. Each ledger was identified as a Litter (book or volume) A or B. ( Only in the Russian era was there a Litter "C" which was begun on the bottom half of the pages of Litter "B" and then continued in a separate ledger. This third ledger is not extant.) The books are patterned after those used in older Mennonite churches in Prussia and Russia. One page is devoted to each family. Opposite each parents' name is the page number of his or her parents' family. As each child married a page number was assigned to them and entered opposite their name. This method of cross referencing makes tracing parents and children relatively easy. The information recorded included birth, baptism, marriage and death dates.