The Cirksis Family

Janis CIRKSIS was a displaced person (DP) after the Soviet union annexed Latvia and the Baltic states during WWII. This is a continuation in the series of letters that he received from his homeland, translated into English. To see the other letters in the series click  HERE . For more information on Latvian translations please see the  Latvian Translations  page. This is the 19th Letter in the series.  You might notice a little paranoia in this letter - not unfounded I might add. You will note a lack of full names. In this letter, Kate refers to "Uncle P". I believe this refers to Peteris PIRTNIEKS, Janis's uncle who was deported to Siberia - see the post  Postcards from Sibīrija .  Nica, 30.4 (1955) Sincere and loving greetings to you, dear brother, from - me, mum and dad!!! It’s a week now since mum greeted me on my arrival home from work with the words that today is again a very happy day, we have received a letter f...

Janis CIRKSIS was a displaced person (DP) after the Soviet union annexed Latvia and the Baltic states during WWII. This is a continuation in the series of letters that he received from his homeland, translated into English.  To see the other letters in the series click   HERE . For more information on Latvian translations please see the  Latvian Translations  page. This is the 17th Letter in the series.  PS Greetings from old Mr Meiers) Nica, 5.8.49 Very loving greetings from home! We received a letter from you again, dear Janis, about which we were again so very happy, for we had been waiting for a long time. But now we know that they won’t come so often and we don’t worry in vain about why you are not writing. Thank you so much for the letter and the greeting cards for Whitsun and Jāņi! You have such pretty, typically Latvian postcards there. I am glad that it is possible for such cards to be made there. – I haven’t written to you for ...

Relatives from the Pirtneiks side of my family, Siberia Finally, the digitising project is finished! I have had about 1500 family photos digitised over the last year or so - several technical problems plagued the project, which is why it took so long. Not all of them relate to this blog but there are several photos that are important to the Čirkšis family history. One of the benefits of digitising photographs - and publishing a blog about them - is that you take a closer look at things. Many of the photos I have, have Latvian writing on the back of them. A lot of the writing is illegible, at least for a non-Latvian-speaker (I know I should learn!) but occasionally I can decipher enough to work out what the photo is of. This particular photo had been sitting in an album and I had never taken it out to examine it though, I had some idea that it must be the Pirtneiks (my grandmother's) side of the family. Today, while I was checking off the scanned photos to ensure they were a...