Kolbuszowa II Cmolas~Zarebki~Mechowiec
Within Kolbuszowa, or any other County in Poland, there are a number of villages and hamlets. A traveler would be hard pressed to know the difference between them, where one ended and another began. Often one road passes a few houses a farm, perhaps a church and often a religious shrine on a tree. There might be a little shelter just big enough to house one statue. And that’s the end of that village/hamlet.
I learned my grandfather was from Cmolas, so Gosia and I set out to find the traces of his life there. You’d have to read my book for the full explanation of our confusion about all the churches in this little crossroad, but this is where we found that lovely old priest who brought us in from the cold and patiently searched the church records of births and deaths until at last we found Marcin Rzasa, his parents, marriage, wife, her parents, and birth of their son, Peter. I heard grandfather’s name in the middle of the priest’s Polish conversation with Gosia and I knew he had found my roots. The decades of questions and searching had come to an end as that frail man’s finger moved down the columns of yellowed paper. His quiet , peaceful countenance was unmoved by my joyous yelp and obvious glee. We were so excited to find these records and order official copies of documents, that we left without asking about the older church my family had worshipped in - assuming it had burned down or was destroyed long ago. It would be years and another trip to Poland before I passed through the doors of that special church and learned the full story of its move to Poreby Dymarskie (more on that in next installment).
The following slide show includes photos of the current church, priests’ home and outdoor altar. The church grounds are considered a “Sanctuary” where a miracle is said to have happened and now people make pilgrimages to the church annually. Some services are held at the outdoor altar. The web site gives a complete explanation of the churches of Cmolas, their history, current services and activities, and a virtual tour of the interior of the contemporary church. http://parafiacmolas.pl/ The neighborhood is quiet and consists of small neat houses and what appears to be working class residents. The “Hospital Church” is close by on the site of the old wooden church of my grandfather’s time in Cmolas … which was later moved to Poreby Dymarskie.
ZAREBKI
Once I connected with Wladek I learned more about Cmolas. Prior to one of my visits, Wladek and his father went to the address in Zarebki, found in church records. They hoped to find family members, but unfortunately, there were no Rzasa people left on the street. When I visited with Wladek he knocked on more doors for information while I joked that the pigeons here must be descendants of my grandfather’s pigeons.
We hit it lucky when we tried another house and an old woman came out of the barn with her babushka, apron and cane. She was Miss Kapusta with sparkling blue eyes and wrinkles for each of her many years. Wladek translated as she spoke of her memories of the last Rzasa families who lived on the street with her. We all chuckled about the cousin who offended grandfather in a letter which caused him to stop all contact with Poland after that. Miss Kapusta didn’t like her either. It seemed the dislike for Victoria crossed all languages and generations.
Over the years Wladek has recorded the names of all the families who lived on the street with the Rzasa family and sometimes the diagram he drew provides helpful information for people whose family were neighbors of grandfather. I include it here in case your family was from Cmolas or Zarebki. (Again, please excuse my lack of proper punctuation for the name Rzasa, which should have a mark under the first “a”.)
Zarebki 1850, Kolbuszowa
It can be hard to follow the Polish system of creating house lots. Note my opening photo showing the map of long, narrow, wavy lines which are the property lines for each house “lot”. When farms were subdivided again and again, new numbers were added following the previous number… so you have numbers that skip all over the landscape rather than proceed consecutively. House numbers then take the same number, so you could be confused when looking for a particular house and lot.
For our purposes, if you find your family’s name on this list or the hamlet “map”, you can conclude that your family was in very close proximity to my family.
MECHOWIEC
A few miles away was another community known as Mechowiec. This was the hamlet my grandmother was from. Maybe 4 or 5 houses on a small road with cemetery and sign post were all we found. Wladek spoke to a neighbor to ask questions about my grandmother’s family, but there was nothing to be learned. Wladek sometimes mentions his ongoing curiosity about this part of my family tree but we may never know much more than we have entered in the Ancestry.com family tree. My grandmother’s maiden name was Fieluba.
Today there is a train stop for Cmolas/Zarebki and it would be a short walk to explore the hamlet. Trains run out of Rzeszow. Line 71 Ocice - Rzeszów Główny (31,115 km)
I met a DNA cousin who walked the area from the train stop and found helpful, welcoming local people. Poland visitors are often pleasantly surprised by the warm and helpful, sweet nature of the Polish people.
