Rachel (Ray) Bellman Krupp, 1890-1953
For Rachel (Ray) Bellmman we have her photo and in addition something unique in terms of documentation. She's the only Beilman/Bellman offspring of Tuvaish and Raytzel Beilman to have an existing birth record from Lithuania.
Jewish records from Mariampol have been microfilmed and are catalogued at Familysearch.org as "Metrical books, 1823-1924, Jewish Congregation. Marijampolė (Lithuania)." But they're incomplete with many years unavailable. Fortunately there was at least one record relevant to the Bellman family, which revealed some fascinating new clues about the surname and parents' names. Click the image to enlarge.
Rachel was born in January 1890 in the town of Sakiai (Szaki), with the birth reported in February of that year. The translation of the Russian language record, courtesy of Marya Golik of the Facebook group "Genealogical Translations" (to whom we're very grateful) follows.
"Took place in the town of Mariampol (Marijampole) on 8/20 February 1890 at ten o’clock in the morning. Appeared the resident of the village of Szaki of Władysławów County, Dawid Girsz, son of Tobijasz, Bejlman, a merchant, 28 years old, and in the presence of the witnesses Icek Lejb Freziński, a shammes, age 35, and Gilel Fridman, a shoemaker, age 61, both residing in Mariampol, he presented to Us a child of female sex stating that it was born in the town of Mariampol on 1/13 February of the current year to his lawful wife Rejcel,née Markson, 28 years old. At the religious rite performed on this day this child was given the name Rachel. This act was read aloud [to the people present] and signed. Signatures of the keeper of civil registry and witnesses."
Rachel was the second child and first daughter born to the couple, whose names we can document as David Girsh [Hersh] Beilman and Rejcel [Raytzel] Markson. For the first time we also have the documented name of David's father, Tobijasz (Tobias or Tuviash in some translations), and the original spelling of the surname, which was Beilman, spelled Bellman after the family emigrated to the United States.
David was identified in this record as a merchant. The document also gives the ages of both parents, twenty-eight years old. On her naturalization papers Raytzel declares that her birth year was 1864 and not 1862, so one or the other is likely the accurate age.
Two witness are also named, Icek [Isaac] Leib Frezinski and Gilel Fridman, and helpfully their ages are also given. Icek's profession is listed as a "shammes," akin to a sexton in a church, a helper or assistant to the rabbi (you can read an interesting article on te origin of the term here.) Icek was probably not a relative of the family, but Gilel may have been.
Interestingly the child's grandfather, Tobias Beilman, is not mentioned as a witness. He's also not identified as deceased. He may not have been included due to illness, inability to travel, or may have already served as a witness to the birth of David's and Raytzel's first child, a son born in 1888.
A note about the place-names: why is the town called Skazi when we know it as Sakiai? Here's a brief history of the changes to its spelling over time:
- Before 1900: Szaki, Władysławów, Suwałki, Russian Empire
- Circa 1930: Šakiai, Šakiai, Lithuania
- Circa 1950: Šakiai, Soviet Union
- Circa 2000: Šakiai, Lithuania
So this is in fact the correct name of the town for its time. Thanks to WikiTree for this information.
This is all we know of Rachel until her emigration to the U.S. in 1909, when she joined her older brother Samuel Isaac Bellman in El Paso. There she met Eli Paul Krupp, a fellow merchant, whom she married on October 2, 1910. The couple made their home in Safford, Arizona, later home to several other Bellman siblings who emigrated during the 1910s.
Eli and Rachel, known as Ray, had four children: Dorothy, Theodore, Leon, and Alvin. Sadly Ray and her sister Mary (Miriam) Bellman Long lost their lives in 1953 while on a flight from Miami to New Orleans when inclement weather caused a catastrophic failure of their aircraft. National Flight 470 was lost over the Gulf of Mexico. The two Bellman sisters were mourned by the entire community.
