Drucker Beginnings

Based on Sarah’s ship manifest, we learn that she came from Austria. [2]

Sarah Drucker ship manifest

Of course, parts of Austria over time were part of Poland, Ukraine, and the Russian empire.

Specifically, Sarah mentioned that she was from Otomin.

Otomin

Map showing Otomin

locaqtion of Otomin

From the JewishGen Gazetteer we learn that Otomin was 176.1 mile NW of Warsaw. We can see that another name for Otomin was Sulmin. [3]

From Wikipedia, we learn that Sulmin:

“was annexed by Prussia in 1772 in the First Partition of Poland, and from 1871 to 1920 it also was part of Germany, administratively in the Danziger Höhe district of the Province of West Prussia. Up to the turn from the 19th to the 20th century Sulmin had been an estate.” [4]

From the map we can see it was outside of Gdansk. [5] From it’s location, near the Vistual River and the Baltic Sea, Gdansk for good for trade and in the 15th and 16th centuries, wealthy Jewish merchants did settle there. Of course, the history of Jews in this area shows discrimination was always a way of life for them with extra laws and taxes being levied.

From 1772– 1776, there were 650 Jews in Gdansk. However, there were more than 1000 Jews in the villages surrounding Gdansk. By 1884, there were 5 separate Jewish communities including one called the “Polish ” one. [6]

The area had Germanic and Dutch influence [7] and so the meaning of the name “Drucker” makes sense that the family did come from this region.

Sources