Martin Kotwila

I am looking for more information about my old ancestor Martin Kotwila who emmigrated to the United States around 1914. He settled in Greenfield, MA. Obviously he changed his name which in original was written as Marcin Kotwiła. He was born in 1890s. I found that there was a Polish parish in Greenfield and a Polish cemetery. So I pressume there a some sort of Polish community there.

Marcin Kotwila originated from a village (Otfinów but could be wrong) near Tarnów (Austria-Hungary in those days) He left his wife and two children there. However he got married for a second time while in the US. I have no idea about his new family. Any facts are totally unknown to me. I was looking on the internet there are quite a few people in Chicago with this surname. And generally in the area of Illinois too. Who knows, maybe it's just a coincidence.

Last letters from him can be dated as far as late 1950s. He also supported his wife and children for some time with moderate amounts of money. But as I said. Pressumably he died or got ill or didn't wanted to keep a contact any longer. He never went to Poland again. I can remember one of my family members saying that he didn't wanted to visit Poland because of communism. Maybe it was just an excuse

Any help or tips will be deeply appreciated

Otfinów – village in Poland put in the Małopolskie Province, in the Tarnów district, in the commune Żabno.

KOTWILA: probably derived from the Old Polish word kotew (anchor).

I'm coming back with some fruitful results of internet-based research ;)

I have done some research over the time and I found some interesting information about this ancestor. I have searched through 1940 US Federal Census.

It turned out that my great grandfather lived back in 1940 in the same place as stated on a envelope from 1946 which I have. In the actual census he was written down as ''Martin Katifila''. Who knowns in how many variations this surname was written in various official documents... Also the place of residence was the same in 1935.

And now it gets interesting. He is written down as a lodger in a household lead by a widow with seven children with ages spanning from 3 to 26. The widow was also of Polish origin as him. Despite living in the US since early 1910s, he had an Austrian citizenship (his family village was in Austria-Hungary when he left).Considering that he lived there for at least 5 years or so before 1940 Census, maybe it can be assumed that (at least) some of these children were his. I don't want to jump to much further going conclusions...

Too bad that I can't ''decode'' widow's surname from (therefore children's as well)... It would allow me to make some further research on the web. It would be much easier to find out at least some information how their life went on... if they ever got married etc.

Also he left his own family by going to the United States and never visiting his homeland ever again... although he never managed to persuade his wife to sell a farm and join him... Twisted history. Well, at least now I know a bit more about my ancestry. I hope that some of you might find this interesting.

KOTWI£A: posible source the now archaic verb kotwić (to seek revenge, do harm) or the reflexive version kotwić się (to be bored, unahppy, yearning). A small group of Polish surnames derived from the past tense of verbs, e.g. Biegała, Mrugała, etc. The femine form is the most common although at times one also seens masc. and neuter versions as in Przybył, Przybyła, Przybyło -- all bona fide surnames. Another source could have been the Old Polish kotew/kotwi (anchor), in modern Polish kotwica.

There is only a handful of Kotwiłas in Poland at present, and all live in the Radom area south of Warsaw.