Moravia

You can find info about Sloup easily by googling. A few years ago, I took a bus from Olomouc to Brno. I see on a map that Sloup is not far from the route my bus must have taken. I rented a car in Brno. It's easy to drive in this area. So you could just do that to see Sloup and stay in Brno or Olomouc if the town is too small to lodge there.

I couldn't find any info about Cheddiwa. Maybe your spelling is off? Maybe try joining a few Facebook groups about history or culture for that area? My mom has some FB friends who are distant relatives from the old country in central Europe where her family is from and have provided her some info about the towns her relatives came from.

And FYI, "Czechoslovakia" has not been around for a few decades. If asking for info about Moravia, start by using the correct country name.

I've been in Moravia a couple of times, 2016 and 2017, both times in Brno and Slavkov (Austerlitz) as days trips from Vienna. There is some lovely countryside in Moravia. No doubt Moravia will still be on the trip agenda as I would like to see Brno in more detail (both times too superficial) and Olomouc (Olmütz) for its historical role it played in the 1805 campaign.

Hello from Wisconsin,

Yes to Moravia. Beautiful. Brno to Olomouc. rent a car and get into the coutryside. nice roads, easy driving.

Now for your Cheddiwa. Our first trip was in the 90s. We were looking for Nemecky. Some how we knew about where it should be because a document we had had Zdar on it. We went into a tourist information place and were told no such place existed. As we were leaving a kid came up to us and said we should talk to this old woman in the office. Her eyes lit up when we showed her the document. Nemecky is where she was from. Nemecky means German...and after WWII things German got renamed. It is now Snezne (falling snow).

You might have a misspelling. You might have a village that was renamed so Google maps would be of no use. It might be a village that was destroyed and died.

A complete guess on my part is that the two places are within walking distance of each other.

Moravia has a specialty, topinka. A heavy rye bread that is fried (in duck or goose fat) and then has garlic rubbed on it. A bare clove of fresh garlic is rubbed across that sandpapery top of the rye read until the clove is gone. Delicious. Oh, and potato pancakes, Bramborak. Both of these are country peasant food so restaurants shy away from it. If you find a restaurant that offers these two items, you have a real place.

Good luck in your search.

wayne iNWI

Hi from Wisconsin again,
I communicated with my Czech friend who lives in Moravia and went to college in Brno. He says there are two Sloups in Czechia, one in Bohemia and one in Moravia. I guess you knew that. But Cheddiwa is something he has never heard of. He thinks it is probably some misspelling, or an oral to written mistake. Ch has a strange sound in the local language, if I remember correctly. Here is what others say about Ch. "The difference between CH and H in Czech: CH is voiceless (velar fricative), H is voiced (glottal fricative). Does the sound change in different situations? Yes. CH can be pronounced H, and vice versa."

I also think I remember that the Czech language doesn't have double consonants. So 'dd' is odd to me. One of our family records had a god parent with the last name of Schaeffer. Locals, said that is not Czech.

My friend is about 60, so he doesn't have a pre-WWII memory of place names.

You don't say how long ago your mother's family came from Czechia. Pre-WWI this was part and parcel of the Autro-Hungarian Empire. I was doing some family research for my wife and I found her surname, Topinka (yes, exactly like the garlic rye toast) in records as having emigrated from Austria. It took me a while to remember Austria, oh, ya, the A-H Empire.

God help you if the town's name you are look for had a Hungarian name when your family left. Cheddawi doesn't seem to have enough Zs to be Hungarian. I jest.

Good luck,
wayne iNWI