Metadata: Chancellery of the Civilian Governor of Vilnius
Collection
- Country:
- Lithuania
- Holding institution:
- Lithuanian State Historical Archives
- Holding institution (official language):
- Lietuvos valstybės istorijos archyvas
- Postal address:
- Gerosios Vilties g. 10, 03134 Vilnius
- Phone number:
- (8 5) 213 74 82
- Web address:
- http://www.archyvai.lt/lt/lvia_naujienos.html
- Email:
- istorijos.archyvas@lvia.lt
- Reference number:
- f. 380
- Title:
- Chancellery of the Civilian Governor of Vilnius
- Title (official language):
- Vilniaus civilinio gubernatoriaus kanceliarija
- Creator/accumulator:
- Chancellery of the Civilian Governor of Vilnius
- Date(s):
- 1795/1916
- Language:
- Russian
- Extent:
- 98,708 files
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
The Civil Governor was the highest administrative position at the governorate (guberniya) level in Vilnius. The chancellery’s collection includes records on government activities in the governorate as well as data on economic, social and religious issues which were brought before the Russian officials in Vilnius. The materials cover the period between 1795 and 1916 in Vilnius and throughout the governorate.
The collection includes a broad array of Jewish-related materials. The official correspondence and memoranda contain data on various issues: Jewish communal affairs in Vilnius and other localities (including elections of the members of the Kahal and their activities, taxation and selection of military recruits); appointment of Jewish officials ("learned Jews" and members of the rabbinical commission); Jewish communal institutions, including the Jewish hospital in Vilnius; printing and censorship of Jewish books (including data on Jewish printing houses and bookshops); Jewish merchants, contractors and distillers (some documents refer to Jewish and Karaite contractors and suppliers of the Russian army during the war of 1812); travel and resident permits (including a list of temporary resident permits granted to Jewish contractors of the French army, who remained in Vilnius after the Napoleonic invasion); Jewish farmers and agricultural settlements in the 1840s and 1850s (including lists of Jewish farmers, data on Jewish families settling land in the governorate of Kherson and pleas by Jewish farmers wishing to retain their status as town dwellers in the 1850s); criminal activities such as smuggling, counterfeiting, prostitution and espionage (including a record on the 1839-43 investigation of a riot during confiscation of smuggled goods in Novoalexandrovsk); disasters including plagues (notably a cholera epidemic in the early 1830s), fires and famines (notably in 1840-41); the recruitment of Jewish soldiers, including complaints about cases of injustice, fraud and desertion; and apostasy (including a report from 1838 on Jews joining the Old Believers). Several documents mention fundraising for the Jewish community in Palestine. A number of documents from the early 1830s mention damage and casualties incurred during the 1830-31 Polish insurrection.
Other records mention the government's policy on Jewish affairs: files from the 1850s include correspondence concerning surveillance of Hasidic communities and their leaders. Correspondence from 1833 refers to the expulsion of R. Yitzhak of Volozhin from the town in 1833. The collection also contains the governors' memos concerning Jewish policy and legislation from the 1840s and 1850s. Some documents include information on the Jewish reaction to the government's plans and measures regarding education, including the establishment of state-run schools. A number of files contain reports and data regarding Jewish attendees at institutions of higher learning, mostly in the 1840s.
- Archival history:
- Prior to the 1917 revolution the records of the Russian administration in Vilnius, including the materials of the governorate, were kept in a separate government depository. In the early 1920s they were transferred to the newly established Vilnius State Archive, which became a part of the Central State Archive of the Lithuanian SSR in 1940. In 1957, together with other pre-revolutionary documentation, these materials were included in the Central State Historical Archive of the Lithuanian SSR, predecessor of the current State Historical Archive.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The collection contains the records of the Chancellery of the Civil Governor, the highest administrative position at the governorate (guberniya) level in Vilnius. The governorate of Vilnius was formed after the Third Partition of Poland in 1795. For a short period it was incorporated into the governorate of Lithuania, but between 1801 and 1917 it existed as a separate administrative unit. In 1801-43 the governorate included the major part of modern Lithuania. As part of an administrative reform in 1843 its western areas were included in the newly established governorate of Kaunas. From 1801 to 1912 the Vilnius governorate was part of the Vilnius Governorate General.
- Access points: locations:
- Kherson
- Novoalexandrovsk
- Vilnius
- Access points: persons/families:
- Volozhiner, Isaac ben Ḥayyim
- System of arrangement:
- A large part of the files are arranged chronologically, with inventories for each calendar year. Some other files and inventories include materials from various dates.
- Access, restrictions:
- The collection is open for reference at LVIA.
- Finding aids:
- A basic inventory is available online in Lithuanian. More detailed inventories in Russian are available at the Lithuanian State Historical Archives. Records and descriptions of the Jewish-related materials of the collection are also available at the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People.
- Links to finding aids:
- https://eais-pub.archyvai.lt/eais/faces/pages/forms/search/F3001.jspx
- Yerusha Network member:
- Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People
- Author of the description:
- Alex Valdman; Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People; 2013.
