Seeking help finding Alexander Gennadievich Kashenev near Ivanovo/Yurevetz city in Russia

Faithe42

I sent this via message to someone, but any and all recommendations are warmly welcomed.

I have been aimlessly looking online trying hard to find any documentation or record of the Kashenev/Kasheneva's near Ivanovo/possibly Amur (Blagoveshchensk) area. My best friend, who I'm with and consistently been with trying to research together her family history. She was adopted to the United States from "Orphanage 1" in Ivanovo, Russia when she was 12, which was in 2006. We have her birth certificate here and everything has been translated to English which is helpful. The longing is to find her father's side of the family, and the information we have on him is simply "Alexander Gennadievich Kashenev" -- but we have no date of birth for him, any record of them getting married?.. Pretty much anything besides his name. Any suggestions or guidance you might have for us would be so much help. If it helps, her mother's name was Marina Nikolaevna Kasheneva, born 01-11-1976, she was 18 years old when she gave birth to my friend, Valentina Alexandrovna Kasheneva at Maternity Hospital #4 on March 10, 1994 in Yurevetz City, Ivanovo region. Their previous residency was Yurevetz city Ivanovo region, Krasnaya alley, house #2, fl. 10. 

Again, thank you for any help or guidance at all!

Faithe

Kennneth Smith

Moderator has removed personally-identifying information. (email address and surname)

Ellie Vance

Answered this privately with a few more links which I have removed here for privacy, but thought I would post this here in the event it might help others in similar situations :)

Because of privacy reasons, it's going to be difficult to find any documentation online for events this recent. Documents regarding the birth, marriage, or death of Valentina's parents are going to be held in the civil registration office. But there are still things that we could try searching for online!

One thing that can be very useful in adoption cases like this is social media, Facebook, VK (вКонтакте - it's like Facebook), or OK (Одноклассники - also similar to Facebook). I like to search for individuals mentioned in the records you have, or simply just the surname that you are looking for in the city or area. Sometimes people won't respond, or they might not know any information, but sometimes they do and can provide just what you are looking for. I suggest writing messages in Russian (Google Translate usually works just fine), and explaining not only who you are looking for, but why. I'd suggest searching Facebook, VK, and OK for any other people with the surnames you are looking for.

Another thing is to post your story in every Facebook genealogy group that you can find. You never know who you might encounter that might have some information or be able to put you in touch with the right people. There are several for Russia, Eastern Europe, Adoption, etc. The most useful ones are going to be Russian language groups. I find this to be a very helpful one! https://www.facebook.com/groups/169714816510441 Along those lines, sometimes you can find groups for towns and communities. If you can find a group like that for Yurevetz, you might be able to connect with people that live there and could have information that could help.

I also suggest trying to contact the civil registration office in Yurevetz. Civil registration offices can be difficult to work with, but they might be able to locate a marriage record for you (or Marina's birth record, with an exact date, that should be easy to find). You'll probably need to establish proof of relationship and pay copy/research fees. If it is a closed adoption though, you might not be able to get any information. Here is contact information for the civil registration office in Yurevets: https://gogov.ru/zags/ivnv/z75979

DNA is super helpful in solving adoption cases in the United States, but is not quite as useful for Russia, because there are not that many people that have tested, thus resulting in a smaller pool of matches (or no matches at all). If your friend decides to do DNA testing, I would suggest My Heritage because that has more Eastern European individuals in the testing pool than other testing companies. There is a Russian testing company, but I'm not super familiar with them. I'm not sure if someone outside of Russia can take it and how big their testing pool is. But here is the link to their website: https://www.genotek.ru/genetics/genealogy/

As far as online genealogical records go, probably one of the best collections that is somewhat recent in time and covers most of Russia is Pamayat Naroda, a WWII military database. Occasionally, you can use the patronymic (middle name based on given name of father), and find a military record if the person's father served in the military. I wasn't able to find anything that matched Alexander's patronymic (there is likely another generation in between). But I did find this that is for a person with the same surname from the same town. Could possibly be a relative. https://pamyat-naroda.ru/heroes/person-hero109090604/?backurl=%2Fheroes%2F%3Fadv_search%3Dy%26last_name%3D%D0%9A%D0%B0%D1%88%D0%B5%D0%BD%D0%B5%D0%B2%26first_name%3D%26middle_name%3D%26date_birth_from%3D%26static_hash%3D75fae465f5f810178d8aa5071aeaea98v3%26data_vibitiya_period%3Don%26group%3Dall%26types%3Dpamyat_commander%3Anagrady_nagrad_doc%3Anagrady_uchet_kartoteka%3Anagrady_ubilein_kartoteka%3Apdv_kart_in%3Apdv_kart_in_inostranec%3Apamyat_voenkomat%3Apotery_vpp%3Apamyat_zsp_parts%3Akld_ran%3Akld_bolezn%3Akld_polit%3Akld_upk%3Akld_vmf%3Apotery_doneseniya_o_poteryah%3Apotery_gospitali%3Apotery_utochenie_poter%3Apotery_spiski_zahoroneniy%3Apotery_voennoplen%3Apotery_iskluchenie_iz_spiskov%3Apotery_kartoteki%3Apotery_rvk_extra%3Apotery_isp_extra%3Asame_doroga%26page%3D1%26grouppersons%3D1%26place_birth%3D%D0%98%D0%B2%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B2%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B0%D1%8F&search_view_id=memorialchelovek_dopolnitelnoe_donesenie68126289

Hopefully this gives you a few things to start with! Good luck!