"Welwel told his grandchildren that he came >from Panevezys... [but]
my mother used to tell me they came >from Vilna."

Absolutely true that emigres >from little towns often name a bigger town
when saying where they are from.On this topic, the special aura of what
it meant to be ">from Vilna" is described by Esther Hautzig, born in Vilna
in 1930, in her introduction to Remember Who You Are (1990). "My daughter,
a true-born New Yorker, has said for years that, 'We're just different...
We're >from Vilna.'

My son claims that I'm covered with some mysterious substance that
attracts all manner of things only >from Vilna. In occasional exasperation
he wishes that 'You guys [meaning only me] all came >from Montana.' But
when I asked David, at age nine, whether he'd like new curtains in his
room he told me, 'Neh, I'll stick with the old ones.' I said they were
so plain and old-fashioned...and he replied, 'That's OK, Ma, I like them.
It's like having a little bit of Vilna in my room.' When I first met my
husband, many years ago, he said that being >from Vilna must be a state of
mind, not just a fact."

Judith Singer's suggestions re: the two Uyezds are very much on target as
stated, but a note on the terminology of the Russian Empire's 19th century
administrative hierarchy may also be helpful.PROVINCE (GUBERNIA) - a high
level, major governing unit. DISTRICT (UYEZD) - a lower level administrative
division within a gubernia. Lithuania had three PROVINCES -- Kovno, Vilna,
Suwalki -- each of which was divided into seven DISTRICTS. Panevezys Uyezd
was a district in Kovno Guberniya. Vilna Uyezd was a district within Vilna
Guberniya.

See:http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/lithuania/LithuaniaRegions.htm

Sonia Kovitz