Sugihara Visa Archive

命のビザ
The compilation and the archive

Where this archive differs from the Kitade–Bluman compilation

The numbered list of Chiune Sugihara's visas compiled by Akira Kitade and Professor George Bluman is the spine of this archive: it is cited on every register page, and most of what the archive has found was findable only because that work had been done first. A list of 2,140 lines read from damaged consular handwriting will contain errors, and this page states openly every place where a document or a family has led the archive to a different reading, rather than overwriting a cited source in silence. Each line carries its evidence and where it stands with the compilers.

A running ledger, kept as the divergences are found · status: open, sent, accepted or refused

1. Relationships

No.The compilation saysThe archive findsEvidenceStatus
1760brother of #1762, plus two family membersPerla was his WIFE. Dawid was his brother, and is not on the register at allJan M. Gronski, a relative, 4 Sep 2026; and a February 1947 list of liberated former persecutees entering "KERSZENCWAJG, Chaim / wife: Perla", with "KIRSZENCWAJG, Dawid M." separately and with no wifeOPEN
1762sister of #1760Wife of No. 1760. After Chaim died she married his brother Dawidas aboveOPEN

Why it matters beyond two lines: the compilation's sibling reading never explained why his birthplace is recorded as Warsaw and hers as Łódź. A marriage does. The archive had published the sibling relationship and repeated it in a letter to the family before the correction came back.

2. Duplicate pairs

No.FindingStatus
1951 / 176Not among his thirty-nine marked duplicate pairs, but the same man: both aged 37, both tailors, both born Radzymin, both on JEWCOM line 304. Put to him 31 Aug 2026ACCEPTED — he confirmed 1 Sep 2026 and will correct it in the next posting on his website. He asked that it be treated as his numbering, not the register's

3. Field-level divergences

No.FieldCompilationArchive / other sourceStatus
1303age35 (Kitade–Bluman, 11 Jun 2019 alphabetised list)34 in this archive's own recordOPEN — trivial, but one of them is a mistranscription and it is checkable
459next destinationCanada/USA (same 2019 list)USA in this archiveOPEN — the family passport's own amendment reads "to Canada, England", so Canada belongs in the record somewhere and this archive is the one that has dropped it

4. Readings, not corrections — two hands on one line of ink

These are not errors in the compilation. They are places where the archive reads the consular handwriting differently, and both readings are recorded on the page.

No.Compilation readsOther readingsNote
2093Hafftka OlacorrectThis archive and USHMM both read Haftka HelaThe compilation was right and the archive was wrong. Corrected 4 Sep 2026 at the daughter's word; two wartime Kobe documents also read Ola. Worth recording the other way round, so the ledger does not become one-sided
805issue date 2 August 1940The visa itself is stamped 1940 VIII. 5.Not a transcription error: the list was sent from Prague in February 1941, six months after the fact. The stamp is the contemporaneous record. Recorded on the page, unreconciled

5. Still open with him, not corrections

him 31 Aug 2026 as a question rather than a correction — the archive's reading is that both are true in sequence, Burma in 1941 and onward after Rangoon fell. No answer yet.

Dated amendments to the compiled fields

Changes the archive has made to the ages, names and family notes it took from the compilation, each with its date; the reasoning is on the record concerned and in the corrections log.

Professor Bluman's lists are at his own page. A divergence recorded here is a question put to the compilers, not a verdict on their work.