Leopold Zuchowski and Anna Dmochowski: Their descendants and ancestors

By Stephen Szabados

My Polish roots are in the farm land northeast of Warsaw and in the farm fields a few miles south of Zambrow. The area was controlled by Russia when my grandparents were born and was included in the lands of the Second Polish Republic after World War I. I have used church records from the Catholic parishes in Andrzejewo and Czyzew to trace my ancestors back to about 1730. Before I began my research I believed my grandparents were from peasant stock but the records that I found indicated that their ancestors were landowners and minor nobles.The Zuchowski and Dmochowski family names are mentioned in early Polish history and were noble families who at one time owned large estates north of Czyzew. Over the centuries, the large estates were divided among the many generations of heirs until the farms were small and barely able to support one family. Inheritance laws were then changed to prevent the now small farms to be divided into smaller parcels. This change was one of the reasons for the large emigration of Polish workers to America that fueled the industrial development of America. Younger sons had to move off the farm after the oldest son inherited the land. With few jobs available in the farming communities, immigration was usually the best alternative. My grandparents were the youngest in their families and therefore had very low prospects in Poland if they stayed. America was the land of opportunities for them.My grandfather and grandmother each followed an older brother who had immigrated to America a few years earlier. My grandfather Steve Zuchowski joined his brother Boleslaw in Bloomington, Illinois in 1912 and my grandmother Anna Chmielewski joined her brother Hipolit in Camden, New Jersey in 1921. They met through my grandfather's cousin Alex Dmochowski and my grandmother's brother in Camden, married and settled in Bloomington where my grandfather worked for the C & A railroad until a heart attack forced him to retire in 1949. The story is also made more interesting because both Boleslaw and Hipolit returned to Poland shortly after world War I. The following pages will tell the story of my grandfather's family. It will start with the history of the Dmochy area and then begin the family history of the Zuchowski and Dmochowski families. I also try to describe life in rural Poland, information about the birthplaces of our Polish ancestors and information about Polish customs and history.I wrote this book for my children, grandchildren and their descendants. This is a living history and more details and stories can be added in the future.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1516991044
• ISBN13: 9781516991044
• Release Date: August 2015
• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Length: 253 Pages
• Weight: 1.63 lbs.
• Dimensions: 11.0" x 0.6" x 8.5"