Samuels Family Name
From Shmykis
to Samuels
Bernard always said that his grandfather’s name was something like David Shmykis, and that Morris and William and the other family members changed their names to Samuels when they came to the United States. Presumably, the original name was in Cyrillic or Hebrew or Yiddish, and it was transliterated in many different ways. Since passports would have been issued in Russian, it might have been the Cyrillic alphabet that caused some of the confusion.* And since many of the documents were written out in fancy handwriting, there were many errors in transcription. So, what to make of all of this? I’ve generally used the spelling of Shmykis, which is the one my father said was the family name, and is at least among the various spellings that were actually used in formal documents.
William’s ship manifest in 1913 (entering Canada at Nova Scotia) lists his name as “Wolf Schmuskis,” from Anopol, Wolinski G. [Gubernia], Russia. His closest relative was listed as his mother, identified as Challe Schmuskis from Anopol. His name was mistakenly listed as “Wolf Schmuskio” in the index of immigrants entering the United State from Canada, using the same ship manifest.
William’s naturalization papers use different spellings, even within in the same document. The declaration of intention, written out by hand, lists him, and he signed in different places, as Wolf Shmyskis, Wolf Shmykis, and Wolf Smyskis (or Smyskus), from Annopel, Russia. (The handwritten name sometimes uses the German double s, “ß”, at the end of the name.) The three children are listed as Bernice Shymskis, Bernard Shmyskis, and Selma Shmyskis. The Certificate of Naturalization lists his name as, and he signed as, William Samuels, but the children are listed as something like Bernice Smykis, Selma Shmukis, and Bernard Shmykis. Go figure.
Bernard’s birth certificate listed him as Bernard Samuels, and presumably the other kids were identified as Samuels. In the census records, the family is listed as Samuels, except for the 1930 census that mistakenly identified the family as Samual. William’s gravestone lists him as William Samuels, and in Hebrew identifies him as Zev Bar David.
Pearl’s ship manifest identifies her as Perla Garfunkel, and lists her last permanent address as Annopol, and her nearest relative as an Uncle, “Same Sruyakas” (or Sruyskas), which I presume is a misreading or misspelling of Smyskas. This is a person who presumably never came to the U.S., apparently a brother of David.
William Garfinkel’s social security application lists his father as Benjamin Garfinkel and his mother’s full maiden name as “Rebecca Shmuscus.”
*Another variation of the name that appears periodically is Shmishkiss or Shmushkis. For example, the Yad Vashem database lists several people by the name of Shmushkis (or Szmuszkis) who lived in or died during the Holocaust in Annopol, Ukraine, or nearby. I can’t prove that any of them were related, but it was a small town, and some of the names look hauntingly similar to some of our relatives (for example, Volf Shmushis from Annopol, Ukraine.) The Cyrillic for Shmishkis or Shmushkis looks like this - шмишкис. See, for example, this gravestone I found on the Internet, not necessarily related to anyone in our family.