The Kresy — Poland’s eastern borderlands — were once home to millions of Poles, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Lithuanians, and Jews living alongside each other in a landscape that changed political ownership multiple times within living memory. Today, the Kresy lie in Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine. The families who came from there carry a heritage that crosses borders, languages, and archives in ways that make Kresy genealogy one of the most complex and most rewarding research challenges in Polish ancestry work.
If your Polish ancestors came from the areas around Lwów (now Lviv), Wilno (now Vilnius), Grodno (now Hrodna), Brest-Litovsk (now Brest), or the wide plains and forests between them — this guide is for you. It explains the history that shapes the records, the archives that hold them, and the research strategies that work best for this distinctive region.
Table of Contents
- What Is the Kresy?
- The History That Shapes the Records
- What Records Exist for Kresy Ancestors
- Records Now in Ukraine
- Records Now in Belarus
- Records Now in Lithuania
- Kresy Records Held in Poland
- Family Memory and Survivor Testimony
- Key Organisations for Kresy Research
- Final Thoughts
What Is the Kresy?
The term Kresy (borderlands) refers to the eastern territories of the interwar Polish Republic — the areas east of the so-called Curzon Line that were incorporated into Poland after the Polish-Soviet War of 1919–1921 and lost again to the Soviet Union in 1939 and definitively in 1945. The region includes: what is now eastern Poland (the Podlaskie region and areas around Białystok), Lithuania (including Vilnius/Wilno), Belarus (including Grodno/Hrodna and Brest/Brześć), and Ukraine (including Lviv/Lwów, Ternopil/Tarnopol, Ivano-Frankivsk/Stanisławów, and the broader Galicia region east of the San River).
The Kresy were ethnically, linguistically, and religiously diverse in ways that shaped their record-keeping: Polish Catholics, Ukrainian Greek Catholics, Orthodox Ukrainians and Belarusians, Lithuanians, Jews, Armenians, Tatars, and others all lived in this region, often in the same villages and towns. Records reflect this diversity — different denominations kept different registers, in different languages, now held in different archives.
The History That Shapes the Records
The Kresy changed administrative hands multiple times in the 20th century alone. Before 1795, it was part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. From 1795 to 1918, it was divided between Russia (most of the region) and Austria (eastern Galicia). From 1918 to 1939, it was part of reborn Poland. In September 1939, the Soviet Union occupied the region under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, annexing it to the Ukrainian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republics. After WWII, the borders were confirmed: Poland lost these territories permanently and the Polish population was expelled westward in a massive forced migration.
Each administrative change created a different record-keeping system — and often physically moved records or created competing administrative structures that generated parallel documentation. The result is that Kresy records are scattered across at least four countries, in multiple languages (Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Lithuanian, Latin, Yiddish), and subject to the access policies of governments with varying levels of openness to foreign genealogical researchers.
What Records Exist for Kresy Ancestors
The record types that exist for Kresy ancestors are similar to those for other Polish regions — vital records, church registers, land records, military records — but their survival and location varies significantly by sub-region and denomination.
- Roman Catholic parish registers — for Polish Catholics, the primary genealogical record. Many survive and are held at diocesan archives in the successor states, with significant holdings transferred to Polish archives.
- Greek Catholic (Uniate) registers — for Ukrainian Greek Catholics, an essential record type concentrated in eastern Galicia and parts of Volhynia. Now primarily in Ukrainian archives in Lviv.
- Russian Orthodox registers — for Orthodox communities in Belarus and parts of Ukraine, held in Belarusian and Ukrainian state archives.
- Jewish vital records — registered in the civil system or maintained by kehilot. JRI-Poland, JewishGen, and Yad Vashem are the primary resources.
- Civil registration records — Russian-era civil records from 1808 (Congress Kingdom areas) or equivalent dates in other zones.
- Land and property records — useful for locating families geographically and establishing property ownership across generations.
Records Now in Ukraine
Eastern Galicia — the area around Lviv, Ternopil, and Ivano-Frankivsk — is now in Ukraine, and its records are primarily held at the Central State Historical Archive of Ukraine in Lviv (TsDIAL). This archive holds Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic, and some Jewish vital records for thousands of parishes in eastern Galicia, as well as administrative records from the Austrian period.
Access to Ukrainian archives has historically required in-person visits, but digitisation has accelerated significantly. The Lviv archive has made portions of its holdings accessible through online portals, and FamilySearch has microfilmed significant collections from Ukrainian archives. The Genealogy Indexer project and some community-specific initiatives have indexed portions of TsDIAL’s holdings.
For Volhynia and Podolia (areas now in central Ukraine), records are held at regional archives in Zhytomyr, Lutsk, Khmelnytskyi, and Vinnytsia. Access to these archives is more complex; some material has been microfilmed by FamilySearch.
Records Now in Belarus
Records for the Grodno, Brest, and Nowogródek (Navahrudak) areas — what is now western Belarus — are primarily held at the National Historical Archive of Belarus (NGAB) in Minsk and the Historical Archive of Belarus in Grodno. Belarusian archives have traditionally been less accessible to foreign researchers than Polish or even Ukrainian archives, but some remote research requests are possible.
FamilySearch has microfilmed portions of Belarusian archive holdings, and these are accessible through the FamilySearch catalog. The Brest (Brześć) area, a major destination for Kresy Polish emigrants to North America, is particularly well-represented in FamilySearch’s collections.
Records Now in Lithuania
The Vilnius (Wilno) region — historically the intellectual and cultural capital of the northeastern Kresy — is now Lithuania. Records for the Vilnius area and surrounding regions are held at the Lithuanian State Historical Archives (LVIA) in Vilnius. Lithuanian archives are relatively accessible and have a good track record of responding to foreign genealogical researchers.
FamilySearch has microfilmed extensive holdings from LVIA, covering Roman Catholic, Russian Orthodox, and Jewish vital records. The Epaveldas digital archive in Lithuania has made significant portions of LVIA’s holdings freely available online — including vital records from many parishes in the Vilnius and Kaunas regions.
Kresy Records Held in Poland
Not all Kresy records stayed in the successor states. When the Polish population was expelled westward after 1945, many brought documents with them; church and administrative records were also transferred in large quantities to Polish archives and institutions.
The most significant Polish repository for Kresy records is the State Archive in Przemyśl, which holds records for many parishes in the Przemyśl diocese that covered southeastern Galicia. The archives in Lublin, Rzeszów, and Białystok also hold records for Kresy areas within or adjacent to their historical catchment zones. AGAD in Warsaw holds some central administrative records from the Russian-era eastern gubernii.
The Ossolineum in Wrocław holds manuscript collections relating to the Kresy, including noble genealogies, estate records, and personal papers transferred from Lwów after 1945. It’s a specialist resource for noble families and landed gentry from the region.
Family Memory and Survivor Testimony
For Kresy families, oral history and family memory are particularly important research sources — because many of the people who lived there before WWII or were displaced after it are still alive, or their children are. The forced expulsion of 1945–1946 — when millions of Poles were removed from the Kresy and resettled in formerly German western Poland — created a generation with precise memories of the places they left behind: village names, family neighbours, the layout of the local church, the names of grandparents and their farms.
Interviewing family members who were born in or have knowledge of the Kresy is often the single most productive step a Kresy researcher can take. These memories can provide village-level specificity that would otherwise require weeks of archive research to establish.
Key Organisations for Kresy Research
- Kresy-Siberia Foundation (kresy-siberia.org) — documentation of Kresy families, particularly those deported to Siberia; includes a searchable database of family records
- Towarzystwo Miłośników Lwowa i Kresów Południowo-Wschodnich — Society of Friends of Lwów and the Southeastern Borderlands; holds community records and can connect researchers with others working on the same region
- Federation of Eastern European Family History Societies (FEEFHS) — connects researchers across Eastern European genealogy disciplines
- LitvakSIG on JewishGen — specialist resource for Jewish communities in the northeastern Kresy (Lithuania, Belarus, northeastern Poland)
- Genealodzy.pl — the Polish genealogical society’s forum has active discussions on Kresy research methodology
Final Thoughts
Kresy genealogy is genuinely complex — the records are split across multiple countries and languages, access varies enormously by archive and political context, and the historical disruptions of the 20th century mean that documentary chains are often broken in ways that require creative research to bridge. But the Kresy also produced remarkable record-keeping, vibrant communities with deep roots, and families who kept their stories alive through the most extreme displacements.
Start with family testimony and identify your specific community with as much precision as possible. Then match that community to its archive system — Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, or Poland-held — and work methodically through the available resources. The records are often there; finding them is a matter of knowing which border they ended up behind. For the broader research framework, see our Complete Beginner’s Guide to Polish ancestry research and our guide to Polish genealogy under the three partitions. Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly Polish heritage guides.
