didjewknowwhen?

Genealogy has always been a passion of mine and is very important for Jews as a whole. I read a statistic the other day that half-Jews now out number full Jews. Dershowitz in his book "The Vanishing American Jew: In Search of Jewish Identity for the Next Century" from 1997 said by the year 2067 that there would be no secular Jews left in America. I have found at the largely Christian elementary school that my son goes to that several of the practicing Christian parents are of Jewish ancestry. I guess my point is that the Jewish history and culture is a rich one and that Jews were involved in almost every significant action that has taken place in the past 400 years. There were Jews that fought and financed the Revolutionary War in America. An English Jew that fought to the death at the Alamo. 5 Jewish Generals that served in the Civil War on the Confederate side. Half a million that served for America during WWII. Several that sailed with Columbus at one time or another and he may even have been a Jew.
So going forward I will be adding Jewish genealogical links to this site starting with this one for those who may have had family serving in the Soviet Red Army:http://www.bfcollection.net/fast/knigapamyati.html

Here is some more info on that link:

Database of Red Army Jewish Soldiers Killed in Battles or Missing in Action in World War II

World War II was one of the most cataclysmic event in recent Jewish history. We mourn the six million innocent victims who perished at the hands of the German Nazis and their eager collaborators throughout Europe. We are proud that Jews resisted the Nazis whenever they had a chance–whether in ghettos, in the forests as partisans, or as soldiers in the armies of the Allied Forces. It has always been common knowledge that the Jews of the Soviet Union fought bravely in the Red Army in World War II, known as The Great Patriotic War to the Soviet people. Likewise, it has been known that the Soviet government denied Jews their battle awards and blacked out information about the Jewish participation in the war against the Nazis. The information, suppressed and hidden, nevertheless survived and outlived the "Evil Empire".
When the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1991, its archives became much more accessible to researchers. One project that started in the early 1990's was to compile a list, from the former Soviet Army and Navy archives, of all Jewish soldiers listed as killed or missing in action. At least half a million Jewish men and women fought in the ranks of the Red Army and the Navy. Many thousands were killed or missing and presumed dead. The work of compiling their names was done by the staff of The Central Archives of The Ministry Of Defense and The Russian State Archives of the Navy, at the request of the Russian Union of Jewish War Invalids and Veterans. The results do not list all Jews known to have died in combat. For example, my father’s cousin Iosif Feldblyum, missing in action 1943, was not listed in the database, nor were a number of his friends and classmates such as Isaak Arbisman, David Datskovsky, Mark Gammer, Grigory Filler, Iosif Kilevsky, Zinovy Zinder. There could be many reasons that files for these and many other Jewish soldiers have not been found. Nonetheless, the database contains about 100,000 names - the most complete listing today. As more records are found and are collected from private individuals, it is possible that additional volumes will be published over and above the eight books available today.
FAST Genealogy Service is offering Jewish genealogists records from this enormous collection. The copyright considerations allow us to present only the English translation of the records (see examples below). The information, including the references to the actual archival files, will undoubtedly open new research venues for many a genealogist who looks for missing links with their families in the Soviet Union of 1920's-1940's.