Information on Potopchuk Wilno, Poland

Our family has been trying to research our family history for years. My grandfather Potopchuk was born in Camden, NJ in 1930. When he was 8 years old his father finally obtained his birth certificate. On the birth certificate is shows his father as Anthony Potopchuk Wilno, Russia and his mother as Millie Soklaoska Wilno, Russia. A second document was obtained from ancestry.com which showed Anthony Potopchuk military draft card form for older adults (he was born in 1884). On the form Anthony indiactes his country and city of origin as "Bakal, Russia". The other piece of information was obatined from the 1940 census where it indicated they were not legal immigrants in this country. My great grandmother died in 1975 and her death record indicates her name as Mealie Paplaska. She is not buried with Anthony and no one from the family speaks of him. We aretrying to locate information regarding Anthony and if he returned to his home country or died in New Jersey. My grandfather (Anthony/Mealies) son passed away in 1982 and was the only apperant son. He had an older half sister born in 1920 with the last name slezarchuck. Any informationand tips on our family history would be much appreciated!

A good start would be getting your ancestors names straight,because



are American invention.

No, those are Russian names which were spelled in a different alphabet.

Highly doubtful.I can bet on Soklaoska (would be hard to even pronounce it) being originally Sokólska and Paplaska (this one sounds funny) could be Popławska or something like that.

Sounds like the way the WASP Ellis Island officials wrote down what they heard when asking the incoming immigrant his/her name. These were probably Sokołowska and Popławska.

Thanks for the help!

I forgot to mention the etymology:

SOKO£OWSKI: Toponymic tag from any of several places in Poland called Sokołów (Falconville).

POP£AWSKI: Toponymic tag from any of several palaces in Poland known as Popławy (Floatville); form the verb popławiać (to float logs down the river).

For more information on where the bearers of these surnames live, how many of them are there and whether a coat of arms goes with them, please contact me.