Ochmann: Curious about my Family History....

First Of All I Just wanted to know if my surname ochmann is popular in Poland?
All I Really know about my dad's side of my family is that my grandad Antoni Ochmann Left Poland and his family behind in the WW2 as the Germans Were in Search For the features ( Blonde Hair and blue eyes)

So He Left Poland at 16 Picking up languages (English, Russain, Spanish, French, German, Italian) Came to England, Had a Heart Attack, But I Never Met Him So I was wondering if anyone knew anything about my Ancestry?

Hi Katie,

Looking at the distribution of names, looks like Ochmanns are concentrated around Opole and Silesia. Sounds like you're Silesian :)

There are also quite a few Ochmanns in the Ruhr area of Germany. Maybe settled after the war, or during the earlier waves of immigration from the East.

Last one before bed, it's apparently came from "Achmann".

Much appreciated, Thank you :D

So That would be why alot of people think Im part German.... aha thank you :) Hopefully I Will be able to visit some day as apparantley I have a fair amount of relatives In Poland!

302 Ochmann's in Germany.
"Ochmann" is a german surname and means "the man from the water".

yasni.de/ochmann/name+verzeichnis

You are most probably of german/silesian heritage...be proud, me too! :)

Lol yeah I should be sleeping now, Truely thanks :)

:O 302 wow :D Thank you :')
Am certainly proud :)

Oh And My Dad's name is Marek is this Mark in Polish?

Yes indeed. Now, not to rain on our resident Silesians party, remember that it takes two to tango. So there could have been a Silesian Ochmann a long time ago, and the name might have just stayed alive. There was a lot of intermarrying going on through the ages, especially in that area. Crazy history down that way. Do you know what language he spoke at home? BB or someone a bit more competent in all things Silesian can probably tell you if a Silesian family would name a son Marek or Markus...

Silesians were quite a mixed bunch....Marek Ochmann would be rather typical! :)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marek


Czech/polish/slovak name + german surname = Silesian! :)


So...your dad was a warlike man from the water! :)

Ahh Ok So There would have been a mix?
So was the area founded by the Germans or something?
Crazy history you got that right I dont know what to say to people when they ask me what is my heritage on both sides!

Hmm Im not sure I will have to get back to you on that one as my dad doesnt really speak of him for some reason, Well My dads mother was irish so makes me wonder why he does have that name, My Uncle (Dads brother)'s middle name is voycheck is it?

There's another option of course, he might have been either Polonized or Germanized. It depends on whether his first or last name was changed at some point of his or his ancestors life.

Ahh Ok As It was mentioned earlier that Ochmann was changed from Achmann? So The Last name was probably changed but definately not the first name... Unless there is something I dont know

Family names are better indicators...first names are changing in every generation, after the fashion of the time often...but the family name stays and lives on in our regions because of the customs (female takes male name after the marriage) with the males.


It's the other way around...it's the last name that stands. First names are changed quite easily.

Yeah, Its mainly the family surname you have to look at right.....?

Well if you put it that way (which is most likely right) your origin is rather German than Polish.

Polonized Germans?

It happened in the past, just talk to softsong, she'll tell you.

But My Grandad was Polish So maybe further back than my grandad(great grandad or something) was a polonised german?

OCHMAN: possibly Polish adpataion of Hofmann (courtier); similar analogy is ochmistrz (steward) from German Hofmeister.

Funny, I was once told the highest rate of recruitment into the Polish navy is/was from Silesia.

Perhaps a loaded article, but it'll give you some idea of the complexity (remembering there are two sides to a story, at least). en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polonisation

Ochman has been a Polish surname for over 500 years, there are famous Poles such as Wieslaw Ochman!!! It has archaic german origins, but it is no longer a german surname, any people with the surname living in Germany, are always of Polish origin. There is even a village near Krakow called "Ochmanow".. POLISH!! and be proud, you are Polish and don't believe their german propaganda!!

You can also come from Czech Silesia. My name is Jindřich (Henry) Ochmann. I live in Ostrava, Czech republic, but my ancestors are from near village Dolní Lutyně (German: Deutsch Leuten or Nieder Leuten, Polish: Lutynia Dolna) is a village in Karviná District, Moravian-Silesian Region, Czech Republic, near the border with Poland. My great-grand-father was Anton Ochmann. My father was born 1944 in nazi Germany, Berlin to Jindřich/Heinrich Ochmann and his mother was from France. Poland had annexed Deutsch Leuten just before the Nazis. :-D After WW2 we were Ochmans with just one "N" for a while. :-D So Ochmans with just one "N" are more likely to feel like the Slavs, with two "N" more likely like the Germans or whatever. :-D

Katie Another aspect to watch out for is that a lot of Germans, Mennonites or Amish were asked to emigrate into the Ukraine and Russia around 1750-1800 time frame in order to become farmers. Along the way some may have decided to say to hell with the rest of the trip and stayed at certain points along the way because of the job opportunities that were offered. Such as textiles and whatever else. That is what got me into that side of the genealogy and I got connected to distant cousins that are living in Germany. They are related to an aunt and uncle of my great grandfather, and this aunt and uncle moved into the Ukraine about 1870.

Ochman is Polish surname since medieval times. There is a Polish village called Ochmanów near Kraków. Any population distribution maps show the highest concentration of the name is in Poland too. It's quite a common Polish surname and there have been famous people with the name such as Polish singer Wiesław Ochman.

He was born in Bytom in 1937....and in medieval times it was not only polish:

"....It is one of the oldest cities in the Upper Silesia, and the former seat of the Piast dukes of the Duchy of Bytom. Until 1532, it was in the hands of the Silesian Piasts, then it belonged to the Hohenzollern dynasty. After 1623 it was a state country in the hands of the Donnersmarck family. From 1742-1945 the town was within the borders of Prussia and Germany,and played an important role as an economic and administrative centre of the local industrial region...."

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bytom

So his nationality after 1945 was polish for sure, the name and the region point to german heritage though...why is that so hard to accept...it's Silesia after all! A mixed region if there ever was one...

I've seen numerous "German"-sounding Polish surnames, belonging to non-Jewish Poles by the way, dating back many centuries.
Often the etymology is said to be sketchy, but undoubtedly the cross-confluence of German speakers within historically "Polish" lands has all but merged the Germanic origins of these names (both place and family names) so that they technically belong to both countries equally.

Just keep in mind the history of the region. There were people with German sounding names or even of German/Austrian origin who identified themselves as Poles (like general Fieldorf aka Nil, Wilhelm Brasse, von Hochbergs during WW2) and people with Polish sounding names like von dem Bach Zelewski who identified themselves as Germans.

In many cases these were people with mixed Polish origin.

I would say so.

*mixed Polish /German /Prussian origin.

This is the most plausible expalnation, Definitely. the surname Ochman is not of Slavic origin.


How do you know this? The OP did not indicate the place of his birth. The fact that he came from the Opole region was only a speculation based on the highest frequency of that name in Poland. In fact, the name is concentrated in southern Poland (altogether 1,800: Bytom 829; Bielsko-Biała 291; Katowice 191) but is scattered across the whole country (for example, Warsaw 385).

Anyway, I strongly doubt if Marek was a first name given to children in the Polish-speaking Silesian families in either part of the Upper Silesia before 1945.

Not the OP but the mentioned example....



Why? What's wrong with it?