25. Les Optants – They Opted Out!

 

If you are conducting research in the Alsace-Lorraine area of eastern France, there is an interesting set of records you may want to check out.  Alsace, currently a department of France could be either French or German, depending on who won the last war.  The area sits on the boundary of these two countries.  

 

At the end of the Franco-Prussian War (circa 1871), France (since they lost the war) ceded parts of Alsace and Moselle to the newly formed country we now call Germany.  Citizens of these areas were given the choice of staying in their villages and becoming German citizens or emigrating to somewhere in France.

 

If they chose to stay, their names would be Germanized.  The school curriculums would be Germanized.  The street names would be converted to German names.  The French aspects of their lives and culture were to be eliminated.

 

Alternatively, citizens were offered the opportunity to move to France and retain their French heritage.  France even offered some of the farmers in the region, farmlands in Algeria.  Algeria, at that time, was a French possession.  

 

Les Optants was the name given to those citizens who chose to emigrate to France.  Many moved to Paris.  Others took the opportunity to keep moving and emigrated to America.  

 

 

The German government issued somewhat fuzzy instructions and thousands of residents packed up and left, travelling west to France.  Some departed for Algeria and elsewhere.  It was chaos until the German government finally clarified the new rules.  Citizens who stayed were required to adjust their surnames to German versions.  Not only were towns and villages renamed, but street names were also changed to German versions.

 

Thankfully, genealogical groups have captured these naturalization records and made them available online.  Check out www.Optants.fr   Here, you can search using a surname.  Yes, it is in French, but you can probably figure out how to navigate the site and read the outputs with Google Translate as your new best friend. 

 

Ron Gilmore

Email:                rvg3@me.com

Website:           https://www.rgenealogy.ca