HERALDRY

Adam S. Eterovich

JURICH-JURIC

Jurich is found in all parts of Croatia with Dalmatia well represented with the name. The Coat of Arms was granted to Sylvester Jurich on Aug. 5, 1569 at Vienna by King Maximilian II.

Jurich was a leader of the Uskoks and was probably rewarded for attacking and plundering Venetian ships - in other words, a pirate. Croatians were the best pirates in all of Europe. Later, they followed more honest professions as captains, mariners and fishermen.

New Orleans, Louisiana is the home port of Jurich fishing boats, such as the "Radeski." John Jurich was a pioneer fisherman on Tomales Bay, Marin County, California. His children were born at Tomales in the 1890's and later married in the Croatian Church of Nativity in San Francisco. A Dalmatian, Jurich, was mining gold on the Butte in California in the 1870's and voted as an American citizen in 1874. John Jurich died during the Great Flu Outbreak of 1918 in San Francisco and was buried by the Slavonic Illyric Society at their Croatian Cemetery.

The Coat of Arms colors are simple to identify: dots are gold, horizontal lines are blue and white is silver.

Courtesy of the Croatian Genealogical and Heraldic Society, 2527 San Carlos Ave., San Carlos, California, 94070. Phone: 650-592-1190; E-Mail croatians@aol.com; Web www.croatians.com. Adam S. Eterovich.