JOURNAL Of The American Historical Society of Germans From Russia

Vol. 17, No. 4 Winter 1994 Editor CHRISTINE CLAYTON

Editorial Board IRMGARD HEIN ELLINGSON PETER J. KLASSEN Bukovina Society, EUis, KS California State University, Fresno ARTHUR E. FLEGEL TIMOTHY KLOBERDANZ Certified Genealogist, Menio Park, CA North Dakota State University, Fargo ADAM GIESINGER GEORGE KUFELDT University of Manitoba, emeritus Anderson University, Indiana, emeritus NANCY BERNHARDT HOLLAND LEONA PFEIFER Trinity College, Burlington, VT Fort Hays State University, Hays, KS WILLIAM KEEL HELMUT SCHMELLER University of Kansas, Lawrence Fort Hays State University, Hays, KS

On the cover: The Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia is published quarterly by AHSGR. The photograph shows members of Members of the Society receive the Journal, a quarterly Newsletter, and an annual genealogical publication, Clues. Members qualify for discounts on material available for purchase from AHSGR. Membership Abram Berg's family in the Ukraine. It is categories are: Individual, $40; Family, $40; Contributing, $50; Sustaining, $100; Life, $500 (may be paid in one of the few records left after the five annual installments). Memberships are based on a calendar year, due each January 1. Dues in excess family's repeated disbursement. John B. of $40 may be tax-deductible as allowed by law. Applications for membership should be sent to AHSGR, 631 Toews' translated and edited version of D Street, Lincoln, NE 68502-1199. The Journal welcomes the submission of articles, essays, family histories, anecdotes, folklore, book "Abram's List" tells the stories of the reviews, and items regarding all aspects of the lives of Germans in/from Russia, Manuscripts should be Berg family members and other Germans typed double spaced with endnotes. Computer fan-fold paper should be separated before mailing. If written in the Ukraine. on computer, please include a diskette containing a copy of the computer file. We can accept IBM- compatible ASCII or WordPerfect™ files. Our style guide is The Chicago Manual of Style, 14th ed. revised (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993). Please indicate in your cover letter whether you have photos or illustrations to accompany your article. If you wish your submission returned to you, please include a stamped, self-addressed envelope with adequate postage. Unless you instruct us otherwise, submissions not published in the Journal will be added to the AHSGR archives. The International Foundation of AHSGR is a non-profit organization which seeks funds beyond the annual dues of members of AHSGR to support the needs of the many operations of the Society. The Foundation accepts monetary gifts, bequests, securities, memorial gifts, trusts, and other donations. Gifts to the Foundation may be designated for specific purposes such as promoting the work of the Aussiedler Project gathering information from German-Russian emigrants recently arrived in Germany, the AHSGR/CIS Project of research in Russia, or supporting the Society's library or genealogical work; gifts may also be designated for use where most needed. All contributions help further the goals of AHSGR; to gather, preserve, and make available for research material pertaining to the history of Germans from Russia. For information and to make contributions, contact the International Foundation of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 631 D Street, Lincoln. NE 68502-1199. Telephone: (402) 474- 3363. Fax: (402) 474-7229. Donations to the International Foundation are tax deductible as allowed by law.

Opinions and statements of fact expressed by contributors are their own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Society, the Foundation, the Editor, or members of the Editorial Board, who assume no responsibility for statements made by contributors.

Published by the American Historical Society of Germans From Russia 631 D Street - Lincoln, NE 68502-1199 • Phone 402-474-3363 • Fax 402-474-7229 © Copyright 1 W4 by the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. ISSN 0162-8283 CONTENTS

CHRISTMAS EVE IN THE FATHERLAND...... ………...... ii Timothy J. Kloberdanz

IMPRESSIONS FROM OUR TRIP TO RUSSIA (SARATOV VILLAGES) AND KAZAKHSTAN (KUSTANAI AREA) IN 1993 ...... 1 William M Wiest

THE LANDAU BAPTISTS ...... …………...... 16 Adam Giesinger

"THE TERRIBLE GHOST OF 1941": A HAUNTING REMINDER OF THE VOLGA GERMAN DEPORTATION ...... 22 Rosalinda Kloberdanz, and Timothy J. Kloberdanz

ABRAM'SLIST...... ,...... ,...... ,...... ,...... 26 Edited and Translated by John B. Toews Compiled by Abram Berg

AHSGR LIBRARY POLICIES...... 40

NEW ADDITIONS TO AHSGR LIBRARY...... 41 Michael Ronn, AHSGR Librarian

GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH OUR NEIGHBORS: MULTI-ETHNIC RESEARCH...... ……………...... 49 Edward Reimer Brandt

BEGINNING GENEALOGY ...... 53 Donnette M. Sonnenfeld

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 CHRISTMAS EVE IN THE FATHERLAND

Timothy J. Kloberdanz

In what language do you cry out As swastika-bedecked youths Set fire to your shelter On this, the holiest of nights?

Surely you hear the attackers Running and shouting in the street As hatred's hungry flames Lap at the children's feet.

"Keine Auslander!" (No more foreigners!) "Schweinhunde!" (Filthy dogs!) "Kommunisten!" (Communists!) "Russen raus!" (Russians out!)

Could this be the same fatherland your old ones immortalized in song? —The home of Heine's Lorelei And deutsche Gemutlichkeit?

Or does it suddenly seem you are back in Omsk or Volchansk Where the frozen Siberian stillness Was pierced by other taunts?

"Rossiya dlya Russkich!" (Russia for the Russians!) "Frits! Frits! Frits!" (Fritz!) "Fashisty!" (Fascists!) "Nemtsy proch!" (Germans out!)

Yes, you can fight the encircling flames —Even whitewash the blackened walls. But how do you disguise the telltale smoke when it clings to the clothes of children?

Is this why you escaped the gulag And signed your hands upon barbed wire? Did you survive the Russian holocaust to warm your scars in German fire?

(Written after hearing a news report about the fire-bombing of a Germans from Russia refugee center in Werbig, Germany. The attack occurred on 24 December 1993.)

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 IMPRESSIONS FROM OUR TRIP TO RUSSIA (SARATOV VILLAGES) AND KAZAKHSTAN (KUSTANAI AREA) IN 1993

William M. Wiest After years of planning and hoping, my wife, Thelma, and Germans from Russia 12 (Spring 1989): 1-12]. Two years our oldest daughter, Suzanne, as well as a wonderful group later we had the privilege of leading a group of American of fellow travelers joined me in the summer of 2993 in and Canadian visitors to Friedrichsfeld in the North visiting the Volga villages of my mother's people. I had Caucasus, not far from Gorbachev's home village near long dreamed of seeing Brunnental (Krivoyar) and Stavropol [see article by Irene Kary in Journal of the Wiesenseite (Lugovskoye) on the Wiesenseite (or meadow American Historical Society of Germans from Russia 16 side) of the Volga River, southeast of Saratov; my maternal (Summer 1993): 36-40]. Such satisfying discoveries about grandmother, Maria (Weber) Buxman (daughter of the history of my father's family strongly influenced my Heinrich Peter Weber and Elizabeth Mohn) was born and determination to visit the Volga villages where my mater- grew up in Brunnental and she married my grandfather, nal grandparents were born and lived prior to their 1901 Karl A. Buxman (son of Peter Buxman and Katerina immigration to America. Helfenbein) from nearby Wiesenmueller, before they came When the formerly closed Saratov area was finally to America in 1901 (first to Isabella, Oklahoma, and a year officially open to foreign visitors we began to plan in ear- later to Windsor, Colorado), I remember my mother telling nest for our three week tour, "Russia: Old and New." Hav- me when I was a child that her mother, Maria, and her aunt, ing adequate time to spend in the Saratov area and espe- Elizabeth "Lizzie" (Weber) Uhrich often spoke longingly cially in the Volga villages was our primary objective. But of the beautiful wild flowers and wonderfully tasty we also wanted to be able to see some of the wonderful old strawberries that grew in the meadows near their homes in historically interesting places in Russia, and to experience a Brunnental. variety of types of transportation—train, cruise ship, bus, My own dreams about visiting Brunnental and and airplane. As a final objective, we wanted our tour to Wiesenmueller were further nourished in 1988 when make contact with the large group of ethnic German people Thelma and I, along with my parents, William W. and still living in Central Asia—so we also included a visit to {Catherine E. (Buxman) Wiest had the opportunity to visit Kustanai, Kazakhstan, a city of approximately 200,000 the village of Rohrbach not far from Odessa, Ukraine, where many of our people were re-settled during and after where my paternal grandparents were born [see article by their deportation in 1941. author in Journal of the American Historical Society of First, a number of highlights of our experience in other parts of Russia, including Saratov, are described. Following Dr. William M. Wiest, a professor of psychology at Reed College that, we move directly to what we saw and heard in and in Portland, Oregon, is related to three different groups of around the villages in the Saratov area. Finally, I relate Germans from Russia: His paternal grandparents were Black some very moving experiences we had among our people Sea Germans and Volga Germans, while his wife's ancestors in Kustanai, Kazakhstan, where many Volga Germans were Mennonites from the Molochna villages and the Kuban currently live. The following description draws from both Region of the North Caucasus. Dr. Wiest's current research tours of "Russia: Old and New" (6 July to 27 July, and 16 interests include identifying social psychological and personal history predictors of the decision to immigrate to Germany by August to 7 September) which I accompanied in 1993. members of the ethnic German population in the former Soviet Union. * * * A different version of the first part (Saratov Villages) of this ar- ticle appeared in The Village Frank/Brunnental Newsletter (Winter 1993/94; Spring 1994).

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Saratov Villages Red Square, made us more than ready for our bus tour into the peaceful countryside, about a half day's drive northeast Our sojourn began in St. Petersburg where we shared the of Moscow. We admired attractive farmland and beautiful delight of most visitors in the architectural beauty of the old old cities in the heart of ancient Russia—Vladimir and city. We were deeply touched by the Piskarevskoye Suzdal—and stayed overnight in nicely outfitted log cabins Memorial Cemetery, where the suffering and death of within the walls of the strikingly beautiful Pokrovsky many citizens of that city during World War II is so starkly Monastery in Suzdal. memorialized. We also saw some very encouraging signs During our excursion out of Moscow by bus we saw an of the new order in St. Petersburg. The large old Peter-Paul example at a roadside stop of the increasing use of private Lutheran Church on Nevsky Prospect, which had been delivery service between Russia, Kazakhstan, and converted to a swimming pool during the Soviet era, has Germany, The new private carriers have sprung up because now been given back to the church; efforts are underway to of the breakdown in reliable postal service in the former renovate the impressive structure so that it may again serve Soviet Union, as well as because many Aussiedler in its original purpose. Especially relevant to our roots-tracing Germany frequently send packages to relatives and friends interest was a visit to Oranienbaum, not far from St. in Russia and Kazakhstan. Petersburg, where our ancestors, arriving from Germany by After visiting Vladimir and Suzdal we flew via way of the offshore island, Kronstadt, first set foot on the Aeroflot to Volgograd, ate freshly made jam-filled blinys, Russian mainland in 1766; there they took the oath of drank mead and danced with contemporary Cossacks in allegiance to the Russian government before proceeding on their village between the Volga and the Don Rivers. We to the Saratov area. marveled at the size and felt the emotional impact of the After leaving the St. Petersburg rail station at midnight, "Mother Russia" sculpture at the Mamaev Memorial along we drank hot tea, slept somewhat fitfully, and eventually the Volgograd riverbank. We were also touched by the awakened to the picturesque dachas (small country homes stark evidence of the fierce fighting at "the battle of and gardens) spotted here and there in sunny forest Stalingrad," as evidenced by the ruins of the old Hergert clearings and meadows as our train approached Moscow. flour mill left as a reminder on the banks of the Volga Several days of fast-paced city life in Moscow, including a River in Volgograd. visit to the Armory gallery in the Kremlin, riding the Metro (impressive underground train system), walking around

One of the tsar's palaces in Oranienbaum under renovation.

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 By this time we were ready for a relaxing twenty-hour cruise up the Volga River to Saratov; many of us wistfully watched the sun setting from the comfort of our Volga cruise ship, knowing that as we awakened the next morning we would be seeing those places where our ancestors themselves once stood as they looked out over the mighty Volga, The city of Saratov was mostly a very pleasant sur- prise. It features many elegant old buildings still standing proudly and displaying the good effects of respectful main- tenance, an attractive riverfront promenade extending for several miles, impressive views from our hotel (Slovakia) of the river and its bustling shipping activity, an attractive and busy pedestrian mall (still named Ulitsa Nemetskaya or "German Street"), and a large number of old private wooden houses with intricate decorative carving around the windows; many of the latter were in need of repair. The city is valiantly trying to provide housing for all in the functional but mostly drab apartments that have become the trademark of most Russian cities in the Soviet era.

Pedestrians strolling on the very pleasant mall called "German Street" in Saratov. While in Saratov, my wife, Thelma, and I, along with others who had earlier contracted with Dr. Igor Pleve to do family history research had private appointments with him. Information from these conversations (later supported by written documents) was of great value in identifying the first Buxmann (Buxman) family to come to the Saratov area (to the village of Muller) from Rheinheim, Germany, in 1767. The directors and members of the German Cultural Center in Saratov welcomed us with open arms—they in- vited us to their meeting hall and entertained us with sing- ing, dancing, classical music, and skits by adult and children's groups; they also shared with us the history of their organization, and their current projects and aspira- tions. Groups of two or three of us were invited into member's homes for dinners (English speaking translators were provided for most groups), and we were over- whelmed by their generosity and hospitality. Because Thelma's maiden name was Bartel we were surprised and delighted to discover that our hosts were Vladimir and Margareta Bartel. We found out that Vladimir's grandfather had come from the same area of the Kuban River (North Caucasus) as Thelma's great-grandfather, so we are An old Volga German bank building now occupied by the History continuing to pursue the possibility that the Bartels in Department of the Saratov State University. Saratov may be her distant relatives.

AHSGR Journal/Winter J994 Many of the Saratov Germans are in positions of lead- ership in the community and live relatively comfortably by Russian standards; people we met were city government workers, elementary, high school and university teachers, nurses, doctors, musicians, architects, clothing designers, factory workers, military instructors, agricultural advisors, etc. Among the Saratov Germans we talked to I detected little or no evidence of a general interest in immigrating to Germany. Some expressed impatience with the government's slowness in implementing the long-discussed plans to privatize land, and people are clearly distressed about the painful effects of inflation. In this latter respect, Saratov Germans gave us the same message we heard all over Russia, But the picture is clearly different among our people who live in the Volga villages—we repeatedly encountered families in the process of selling their belongings in preparation for their move to Germany. We were told that many German people who used to live in the villages had already gone to Germany, and that of those remaining at least eighty percent were waiting for permission from the German government to immigrate. The nearly universal wish to go to Germany seemed to be accelerating in re- The former Lutheran Church at Neu-Walter. sponse to feelings that life would never get any better if they stayed in Russia, As one man put it, "the government has been pulling our leg—-all we hear is talk, but no ac- tion" (with respect to reestablishing more opportunity to purchase private land, and to have self-government along locked and we did not take the time to find a caretaker to the lines of the former Autonomous German Republic). open it because we wanted to get on to our destination— That is the larger political and social context of what we Frank. We later learned that this fine old former Lutheran saw. We now look at some details we experienced as we Church was in Neu-Walter. traveled to various villages, first on the Bergseite and then After another hour or so of driving, passing through on the Wiesenseite. fields of pumping oil wells and oil storage tanks, we found We departed Saratov for Frank via minivan early one ourselves entering Frank just after crossing a low, rickety- morning, raced through the outlying industrial areas south- looking wooden bridge over the Medveditsa River. We west of the city, and eventually were out on the rolling stopped to talk to both Russian and German local people plain. We admired fine-looking grazing land as well as before driving up the hill where most of the houses in Frank wheat and sunflower crops (occasionally, a field seemed to can be found. One German man in his thirties who came to be a mixture of both crops—surely not a good idea in terms talk to us had clearly been imbibing too much; he of harvesting efficiency), and noted that many of the apologized for his slurred speech, and said his only ambi- roadsides were lined with small trees, probably planted as tion in life was to go to Germany. (This first encounter with windbreakers. An abundance of many kinds of wild- a German villager was, fortunately, quite atypical; flowers, sometimes turning whole fields pink or yellow, Never again in seven more days of visiting villages did we also caught my eye. We stopped along the way to sample see evidence of drinking to excess among the German resi- local wild currants at the suggestion of our local guides, and dents; in addition to Frank, I visited Brunnental, in general found the scenery attractive and similar to mixed Marienburg, Wiesenmueller, Gnadenthau, Kolb, Moor, pasture and cultivated land in the Midwest United States. Grimm, Kraft, and Orlovskoye, and other members of our Several hours out of Saratov, a very attractive old church group visited many other villages as well.) building demanded our attention. The church was

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Impressions 5 asked about the name Weber, since that was my grandmother's family name. In Grimm we met a Mr. Karl Weber, born 1933, taken as an eight-year-old in 1941 to Krasnoyarsk, and returned to Grimm in 1958. Karl's son, Andrei (Heinrich), gave a wooden has relief of Christ, which he had carved, to a member of our group who had made an admiring comment about it. We all soon discovered that expressing admiration for any decorative item was almost always followed by receiving it as a gift! So, we learned to moderate too much overt expression of admiration, We were all amazed at the generosity and hospitality of people we met in the villages.

Typical old log house on Karl Marx Street in Frank.

After looking around Frank and seeing both new and old houses, we eventually spent most of our time visiting with Paulina Grosskopf and her daughter, Olga, both of whom lived together in a large old German-built house on Pushkina Street. Paulina related some of their very difficult experiences during the famines of the 20s and 30s, as well as during the deportation of 1941 and the time in exile. Her stories were repeatedly echoed by others whom we talked to in other villages. We were invited into the house and were pleased to see that inside everything looked quite comfortable and tastefully decorated, complete with the typical Oriental rugs mounted on walls. Outside in the garden we saw apples, cherries (which were ripe and which we were invited to The school building in Grimm. sample), tomatoes, squash, potatoes, cucumbers, and an abundance of dill. Reluctantly, we moved on because we Given my Buxman heritage in Wiesenmueller on the wanted also to visit nearby Kolb before returning to Saratov. Wiesenseite (eastern or meadow side of the Volga), I was In Kolb we talked to George Walter, Rheinhold Kuntsler, especially pleased to meet Anna and Wilhelm Sommer by Jakob Seibert, and a Mrs. (Schreiner) Schmidt. Each of these their house which they described as having been built by a people also had poignant stories to tell; most ended their Buxman family prior to the deportation in 1941 .We also saw stories with a sad comment, something like, "Das war eine the Yeruslan River, often mentioned by my Grandfather sehr schlechte Zeit!" [That was really a terrible time!]. Mr. Buxman. In the cemetery at Wiesenmueller there were many Kuntsler showed us a Kuntsler/Kantsler family history and unmarked graves, but on one of them we were able to read photo album sent to him recently by a relative in Ritzville, the inscription, "Hier ruht in Frieden Jakob Hefmann, Washington. Geboren 9 December, 1874, Gestorben den 5 Juli, 1913(?)." Wherever we went members of our group inquired about various family names of special interest. I often

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 square in Katharinenstadt, but years of neglect have taken their toll. Supported by funds from Germany, a new Roman Catholic Church is under construction on the outskirts of town. Unlike many cemeteries in the villages, the main cemetery at Katharinenstadt still has many German gravestones that are clearly readable. We visited Orlovskoye, not far from Katharinenstadt, to see this un- usual and interesting village that had earlier been described by a member of our group, Irma E. Eichhorn, who with her father had written on the early history and atypical layout of this village [see Jacob Eichhorn and Irma E. Eichhorn, "Orlovskaia on the Volga,' 'Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia 3 (Spring 1980); 36-40]. Orlovskoye, it turns out, is one of a small number of villages whose streets had originally been laid out in the form of concentric circles, a Rundell.

The Yeruslan River on the south side of Wiesenmueller.

Mr. Sommer showed us the former location of the Lutheran Church in Wiesenmueller. Where the church once stood is now a small building housing a very sparsely equipped hospital (Balnitza) or medical clinic. The small hospital or clinic had several in-patients who were attended by a young physician, One member of our group, Sue Kottwitz, was particu- larly interested in visiting the nearby village of Gnadenthau (Verkhniy Yeruslan) where it was reported that the church steeple built by her great-grandfather George Peter Schreiner was still standing. When we stopped to ask for directions from local people we were always told, "You'll see it from afar—there is a tall church steeple." The main structure of the old Lutheran Church is still solid and ar- chitecturally impressive, though it is obvious that the foun- dation and entrance steps have been badly neglected. The inside of the church also exhibited signs of earlier skillful construction, and we were all sad to see this beautiful building now used to house cattle! The account of our visit to the Saratov villages would The Lutheran Church at Gnadenthau. be incomplete without mention of a day trip via hydrofoil to Marx (Katharinenstadt) and from there by bus to Orlovskoye. The large Lutheran Church, currently used as a community cultural center, still stands in the main

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Impressions 7 Brunnental on our left while driving east, the road made a sharp turn to the north, so that we actually entered the village from its East Side. There on the northeast side of the village was a large pond with many ducks and geese, and cattle grazing around the edges. We turned into the village and stopped at the first clump of houses. Out bounded a group of children and several women. Mrs. Elviera (Foos) Rush brought us a liter of fresh milk, and Mr. Alexander Borgens volunteered to be our Brunnental guide. We went to his home, were invited into the main house (he had obviously been spending most of his time this warm day in the summer kitchen), and were served wonderfully tasty grebbel, home-baked bread with home-churned butter, canned fruit preserves, watermelon, tea, and of course, vodka. Mr. Borgens' wife had died and he lived alone. By then, the local chief of police, a friendly man with roots in the southern Republic of Azerbaijan, had joined us. He was with us, he explained, to join Mr. Borgens as one of our guides and to give us an official welcome to Krivoyar. Mr. Borgens seemed to know him well and to accept him The circular pattern of streets in Orlovskoye reflects the heartily. After lunch we admired Mr. Borgens' healthy original village plan. looking dill crop as well as the ingenious hand-washing apparatus at the edge of his garden. In all of the villages we visited most of the Russian and Our next stop was the well-preserved and still used German villagers live in old wooden houses, work on a Brunnental School. The former teacher's house was built in local kolkhoz or sovkhoz (collective farm or state farm, 1895 according to very clear signs on the south side. It is respectively) and have large and productive garden plots now being used as a preschool, and we got to tiptoe inside behind or beside their houses, sometimes even with a well to see children having their after lunch nap; we also for irrigation. Some also have "summer kitchens" and observed lots of colorful children's artwork posted on the buildings housing several pigs, and a cow or two. The lives walls. The school itself is an imposing and attractive two of the people in the villages appear to be hard by our story structure still used as an elementary and high school, standards—no telephones, few automobiles (though some Broken glass and piles of debris inside some parts of the families have a three-wheeled motorcycle, and some have a school attest to the fact that not all of the building is being horse and wagon), and no nearby store conveniently used effectively. stocked with groceries and other goods. In fact, the vil- lagers appear to be almost totally self sufficient—they raise and preserve most of their own food, Since Brunnental was one of my ancestral villages I will describe it in some detail. We left Saratov early in the morning again, this time heading east on the bridge over the Volga River to the city of Engels, then south along the eastern shore of the Volga, through Laub and Dinkel and eventually to near Rovnoe where we turned east. After another hour or so of driving on surprisingly good, paved road, occasionally having to dodge self-propelled combines moving from one field to another, we arrived at Brunnental. The grain fields here on the Wiesenseite were flatter than most of the area on the west or Bergseite that we had visited earlier; the wheat, barley, oats, and sunflower crops Teacher's quarters (built in 1895) next to the Brunnental appeared to be bountiful. This had been a good year with school. plenty of rain. As we approached

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Neff, walked the length and breadth of the old cemetery and estimated there were about 3000 graves. With Mr. Borgens' help, we found what he said were the two re- maining gravestones in the cemetery. One was lying on its side and obviously had decorative carving as well as words, but years of weathering had made the words unde- cipherable. Perhaps someone expert in stone rubbing will someday be able to read this gravestone. At the western edge of the old cemetery is a new one, fenced and con- taining a large number of grave markers, each with its own small iron fence in typical Russian fashion. Two of these newer graves and markers had German names. One was written both in German as well as in the Russian Cyrillic alphabet. The other was written only in Russian. Photos on headstones appear to be typical Russian features. Before we left Brunnental, Mr. Borgens guided us to Marienburg, a few kilometers south, where there is a mag- nificent old red brick Catholic Church still standing, though its steeple had been destroyed. Mr. Borgens told us "the story of the church that wouldn't be broken." Soviet mili- tary tanks had repeatedly rammed the church in an attempt to destroy it, but the main thing destroyed by this effort were the tanks. The church had been converted into a grain storage facility, with several rooms at the front used to cure piles of salted sheepskins. The inside front ceiling had a clearly discernible colored mural depicting the Christmas theme of Joseph walking beside a donkey carrying Mary and the Christ child. Main entrance of Brunnental school as seen from the south.

The inside of the school was being repainted and gen- erally cleaned up in preparation for the beginning of classes in September. On our second tour m late August, the teachers were scurrying around very busily and had cheerful troops of ten to twelve year old girls volunteering to help get everything ready for the first day of school. At the request of one member of our second tour, Mrs. Gerda (Stroh) Walker, AHSGR village coordinator for both Frank and Brunnental, we were able to examine a bound booklet entitled, "History of the Krivoyar School." The book was written in Russian and contained many old photographs; it made reference to the fact that "the school had been built by German settlers who used to live here" but no mention was made of when or why they left! Mr. Borgens showed us the location in an open square just south of the school where the Brunnental Church used to stand. The area was fenced off and we were told that there were no remains of the Church, However, next time I get back to Brunnental, I will want to examine this area more closely to see if any relics of building materials can be found. Next we visited the old cemetery east of town, south of the large pond. It appeared to be simply a large open grass- covered field until one looked more closely—then the large number of mounds arranged in rows could easily be seen. One member of our second tour, Mr. Harley The former Catholic Church at Marienburg. On our second visit to Brunnental Mr. Borgens was out Kazakhstan to live and work on the experimental farm. of town doing business in Rovnoe so we were not able to Their quarters were quite cramped, but they seemed pleased use his good services to help find the well-known weir— to be part of this new enterprise. the dam with openable gates. However, among the team of volunteer schoolgirls were several, including Oxana and Nadya, who agreed to climb aboard our bus to show us the way to the dam. As we neared the fairly large body of water held behind the dam on the northwest side of Brunnental, we got out to walk the remaining distance along the reed-filled lake. There appear to be fourteen large metal valve gears mounted on a steel superstructure, all held in place by concrete and sod embankments. Turning the gears independently raises or lowers the gates, which hold the water back.

One of a set of temporary aluminum housing units from Germany, located just outside Brunnental.

Before we left Brunnental we visited with Waldemar Alexanderovitch Brott and his neighbors. Mr. Brott's wife, now deceased, had been Irma Weber, daughter of Jakob Weber of Brunnental. Mr. Brott invited us into his house, filled with boxes packed in preparation for his departure in two weeks for Germany where he would be joining other members of his family. He had still not sold all of the things View of the mechanism/or controlling the water level at the he could not take along. It seems that with so many Brunnental dam. Germans leaving the villages, it is a buyer's market. Mr. On our way back to the village, we encountered new Brott was very happy to be leaving, hoping for a better life, aluminum housing units that have recently been put in if not for himself, then at least for his children. His German place with help from the German government. These were neighbors were also hoping their own departure permission described as part of a project involving numerous locations papers would arrive soon. Weren't they encouraged by the in Russia and Kazakhstan where many ethnic Germans efforts to establish an experimental farm in the Brunnental live. The German government is hoping to make life more area? No, they'd "had it up to here" (with gestures toward attractive for the German people in Russia and Kazakhstan, their necks) with government's promises that were never so they are less likely to want to immigrate to Germany. fulfilled. "Words, it's just words, and no action!" many of This particular set of twenty or so houses was said to be them said. And on that note they are waiting quietly for part of an experimental farm jointly sponsored by the their turn to leave their ancestral villages for what they German and Russian governments. We visited with one hope will be a better "promised land." family, which had recently come from

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Kustanai Area various construction projects, street repair, new apartment buildings, new private single family houses, water and So far the story of our visit to Russia and Kazakhstan in sewer lines, etc. summer 1993 has taken us to St. Petersburg, Moscow, Suzdal, Volgograd, Saratov, and many of the former German villages on both sides of the Volga in the Saratov area. The account next takes us into one of the areas of Kazakhstan (Kustanai) where a very large number of ethnic Germans still live. In order to round out our trip of exploration, we wanted to visit one place in Central Asia where our exiled people now live. In Oranienbaum (near St. Petersburg) we saw where the first of our ancestors had arrived in Russia, then in the Saratov villages along the Volga we walked on the ground our ancestors had worked for many years. Now we complete the circle by visiting Kustanai, Kazakhstan—to see what kind of life they were living in the place where they had ended up after the long years of nearly unbearable hardship that began in 1941.

The city of Kustanai is located in the northern part of Kazakhstan not far from the Russian border, about midway between the eastern and western boundaries of Kazakhstan. Getting there from Saratov required returning to Moscow and then flying from Moscow over the Ural mountains to Kustanai, The population of Kustanai is about 200,000, the Vast fields of wheat being harvested near Kustanai. majority being Russians and Ukrainians with Kazakhs, Germans, Koreans, and other ethnic groups being We were met at the airport by our hosts, Alexander significant minorities. The city is situated on a flat fertile Winterholler, and Alexander Dederer of Deutsche plain alongside the Tobol River, whose waters eventually Wiedergeburt ("German Rebirth") of Kazakhstan. They flow into the Arctic Ocean. Surrounding the city are vast made every effort to make us as comfortable as possible in expanses of wheat, corn, milo-maize, and a small but our not very comfortable hotel. We were probably the first significant crop of potatoes. Along the Tobol River one group of Americans to visit Kustanai, and it was clear that sees intensive cultivation of cucumbers, watermelons, the hotels did not usually cater to foreign tourists. I had cantaloupes, and other vegetables, as well as some apple been to Kustanai in 1990 with my aunt Martha (Wiest) orchards. We were told that the vegetable crops were raised Buxman to visit some of our many newly-discovered mostly by Korean farmers—apparently Koreans in the Rus- Wiest relatives, and it was on that visit that I learned about sian far east were forcibly moved westward by Stalin at the large population of Germans now in Kustanai, who had about the same time that ethnic Germans were moved been displaced from their homes along the Volga River eastward. and from the North Caucasus in 1941. As we arrived in Kustanai the quite good wheat harvest In summer 1993 we had only three days to get a gen- was fully underway. The city center has an attractive set of eral impression of the life of our ethnic German people in public buildings and on one of our visits a colorful local this place so far removed from where their and our ances- contest of making decorative displays out of flowers was tors had chosen to live in Russia more than two centuries underway. After two weeks of exposure to every con- earlier. Our hosts, Deutsche Wiedergeburt, did a very fine ceivable sort of inefficiency and disorganization in Russia, job of helping us learn as much as possible in a short time. many members of our group commented on the fact that Deutsche Wiedergeburt is an organization that ties together Kustanai seemed somehow different—perhaps it was the many German people throughout the former Soviet Union, fact that we saw many people (even men!) working on

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 and it appears to be quite active in the Kustanai area where was on the order of two hours one way. Families arrived at more than 40,000 ethnic Germans now live. In Kustanai our hotel at the appointed hour, and members of our group Deutsche Wiedergeburt sponsors a weekly TV program, were assigned to these families. Without exception our "Phoenix" (deliberately capturing the image of "Phoenix experiences with our host families were outstanding and rising from the ashes"), broadcast in German and widely memorable. We were shown very warm hospitality, tables received in the city and surrounding rural areas. It is clear were heavily laden with beautifully arranged and tasty that German people in Kustanai, just as in the city of home cooked food, and we were given the best of the Saratov, are deeply involved in the life of their commu- family's quarters for sleeping. My wife, Thelma, and I nity—they are TV reporters and cameramen, city manag- together with Irma E. Eichhorn were assigned to the ers, physicians, orphanage administrators, teachers, medical Dornhof family, Alexander and his wife met us at the hotel laboratory technicians, eyewear distributors, foreign in one of the Korporation Kreis's company cars. Alexander automobile importers, community cultural affairs directors, spoke reasonably good German and began to explain much electricians, bakery and cheese factory managers and of his vision for the future as we whizzed along (too fast for workers, university professors, chauffeurs, building engi- any of the visitors' tastes!) on a heavily trafficked four lane neers, and a few are collective farm managers. divided highway out of Kustanai toward Rudny. The An ever-increasing number is actively engaged in problem with the high speed was that the highway was also newly established business enterprises. As an example, occupied by weaving three-wheeled motorcycles, bicycles, meet Alexander Dornhof of nearby Rudny, a small town trucks, tractors, an occasional stray chicken or dog, and about twenty-five miles from Kustanai. Alexander is gen- other drivers who were intent on going even faster than we eral director of Korporation Kreis, a company established did! We were relieved when we arrived at Rudny where we by a small circle of ethnic Germans seeking funds to build were joined by other German friends of the Dornhofs for a a modern potato chip factory using the latest technology spirited discussion of life in Kazakhstan over a beautifully from Germany. Dornhof noted that every year tons of po- prepared delicious dinner. Mrs. Dornhofs kitchen was the tatoes raised in the region spoil while waiting to be trans- model of modernity and efficiency. After dinner we ported, Because of the large supply of potatoes at a rea- watched ourselves and other members of our group on the sonable price, he and his associates believe there would be Phoenix TV program, and generally received the an excellent market for potato chips, both locally and impression that the visit of the group from America was throughout Russia and Kazakhstan. Thus, he and others are being given extensive and in-depth television coverage. seeking venture capital from contacts in Germany. Mr. Another memorable aspect of our experience in Dornhof exemplifies the substantial number of ethnic Kustanai was the unusually good food served to us in a Germans we met in the Kustanai area who are closely iden- German restaurant named "Apogey." Most all of our meals tified with the German Cultural Rebirth movement, and (except those with German families) were taken in this who believe there is a good future for them and their fami- private restaurant; members of our group often remarked lies in Kazakhstan. that the quality of the food, the variety, and the service was There is clearly a difference of opinion on this matter much closer to American or western European standards among Kustanai Germans associated with Deutsche than most of what we had experienced in Russia. Every Wiedergeburt; many, even those with prominent positions morning we were allowed to choose from at least a half in the community, feel that emigration to Germany is still dozen different kinds of fruit juice imported from Ger- their best option for the future. Some are concerned about a many. Lunch and evening meals offered imported wines recent Kazakhstan government ruling requiring that in the and beer at no extra cost. Waiters and waitresses who future all public business and education must be conducted smiled while they worked were also a noticeable plus! in the Kazakh language; there is also concern that the Perhaps the highlight of our stay in Kustanai was the Islamic Fundamentalist movement, already having effects program put on for us at the German Cultural Center. in the southern part of Kazakhstan, may eventually move as Deutsche Wiedergeburt owns and operates a large building far north as Kustanai. with many meeting rooms, ample office space, and several Our hosts, Deutsche Wiedergeburt, had arranged for larger meeting rooms including an auditorium. An hour and members of our group to stay overnight with German fami- a half program by children and adults, consisting of skits, lies in the area. "In the area" was sometimes defined so folk music and dances (Russian, Kazakh and broadly that driving time from Kustanai to outlying villages

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Saratov area. But even our excellent English translator, Professor Harry Klein of the Kustanai State University, was discouraged at the prospects for himself and his family in Kazakhstan. It is no wonder, since he and his teaching colleagues at the university had not received their salary for the last three months. Klein, and other professional people survive by doing odd jobs here and there and by their own hard labor in their dachas. Klein is also fluent in German and Russian, and helps many people fill out their application papers for Germany, as well as translates their letters from friends and relatives in America and Germany, Description of life in Kazakhstan would be incomplete without mentioning the important role played by the dachas or small garden plots that most city families have in the countryside around the city. Surrounding the city are a number of forty to sixty acre spaces divided into approximately 200 smaller plots, so that each smaller fam- ily plot contained about two-tenths of an acre. Many of the German singing group performing at the Deutsche small plots have a little house (an A-frame or building with Wiedergeburt program in Kustanai. Dutch style roof) in which members of families may stay on weekends or on summer evenings. Often the whole family takes the car or bus to their plot after work each day, German) and classical music was followed, after a break for and the family works in the garden until sundown. Such lunch, by a serious discussion period. plots are surprisingly productive; most have pressurized Given the content of his comments, it was ironic (or water piped in for irrigation, but we noted that some perhaps symptomatic of the "loss of traditional culture" felt families had to rely on a shallow well and portable pump. by so many), that Mr., Dederer spoke in Russian rather than The plots are not actually owned by families (this may German, with translation into English. He outlined the main change with the beginning of private ownership of land) but lines of thinking within Deutsche Wiedergeburt, especially a family may keep a given plot as long as they pay a token with respect to questions such as: "Shall we stay here in fee to the city each year. The small family plots often have Kazakhstan and try to maintain (or, more realistically, apple trees, raspberries, strawberries, gooseberries, reconstruct) our German language and culture?", "Shall we potatoes, squash, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, carrots, stay here and continue the process, already far along in the cucumbers, dill and other herbs including sweet basil. In younger generation, of assimilating with the surrounding, fact, enough food is produced on these plots to meet most mostly Russian, culture?", or "Shall we make every effort of a family's needs. Since the growing season is short— to immigrate to Germany, and if so, should the function of June through September—most of this extensive produce is Deutsche Wiedergeburt mainly be to help people negotiate canned. We saw that most families had closets stashed full the many and increasing number of bureaucratic hurdles in of one half liter containers of tomatoes, apples, etc. In some applying for permission to emigrate to Germany?" We, the cases city apartment dwellers store their canned produce visitors from America, were asked for our input and it was from the dacha in underground cellars within their locked clear that we also had different points of view, although we private car garages—the tatter also crowded together in a all agreed that most Germans from Russia in North "car garage section" of the city! America had pretty much taken the route of assimilation As noted above, surrounding Kustanai are several areas into American culture. No single answer to these questions in which new private houses are being built, mostly of brick was agreed upon by Kustanai Germans. It appears, as a with various combinations of red bricks and white ones. I rough approximation, that about one-third of the Germans visited one of these new houses, having been invited by my gives an affirmative answer to each of the three questions. father's cousins, Heinrich and Valentina Kling. I was If there is a preference for one of the three options over the pleasantly surprised at the size of the new house; it others, perhaps it is that more believe their best option is to reminded me of new "ranch style" homes built in the United go to Germany. Yet, the stated intention to immigrate to States twenty to thirty years ago with all rooms on Germany seemed not as strong here as in the villages in the

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 me out to a separate building near the house. Clearly, preparations had already been made; a coal burning heater provided plenteous quantities of very hot water, and there were exceedingly hot stones on which more water was occasionally poured, resulting in a very hot steamy room. Volodya speaks very little German, but undertook to reas- sure me when I displayed hesitancy at seeing billowing clouds of steam emanating from the sauna as we cracked the door ever-so-slightly from the safety of the dressing room. He motioned me to follow him and do as he did. The heat of the sauna was almost too much for me; never- theless, I did as instructed, laid face down on a bench and immediately after felt a bucket of cool water poured over me. "What wonderful relief," I thought. The next bucket was warmer, and the next still warmer. Meanwhile the very hot hissing stones continued to have water sprinkled on them, producing great clouds of steam that again made the room almost unbearably hot. Another welcome bucket of Typical scene of gardens and small houses at dachas cool water was splashed over me. Out of the comer of my outside Kustanai. eye I watched Volodya as he swished a freshly cut birch branch in and out of a bucket of obviously very hot water. one level (except for the ubiquitous cellar under the en- Eventually this steaming mass of birch leaves and twigs trance room, and except for the fact that there did not seem was being applied to my shoulders and lower back. The to be both a front and a back entrance). Rooms were nu- action was gentle and soothing—a far cry from being merous and spacious, some were carpeted, many had a "beaten with birch branches" which I had encountered in textured plaster surface, art pieces were hung on the walls, written descriptions. The whole process as described was there was a bathroom with all the fixtures of a new Ameri- repeated several more times, and I was finally offered a can house, and the kitchen was spacious and equipped with warm bucket of water to rinse off following a thorough a surprising assortment of electrical appliances. shampoo with liquid soap. We cooled down slowly in the While awaiting final preparations for dinner, I was dressing room, and later in the adjoining workshop where invited to experience a Russki Banya (a Russian style the other men had gathered. Everyone seemed anxious to sauna) by Volodya Kling, a married son of Heinrich and know whether I liked their Russki Banya, and I assured Valentina, who had come for the occasion. Volodya them I had thoroughly enjoyed it. This very pleasant (even showed luxurious) experience in the home sauna of our ethnic German relatives in Kazakhstan provided yet another per- spective, Clearly, some of the Germans are living far more comfortably than average, and these are the people who seem inclined to stay in Kazakhstan. I later learned that Heinrich Kling had recently retired from a quite responsible position in the city. He had been chief engineer for construction of public buildings (schools, hospitals, apart- ment complexes) in Kustanai, His and Valentina's son, Volodya, is responsible for the distribution of eyeglass frames for much of northern Kazakhstan. As a going away present, Volodya gave me two pairs of very good quality and stylish eye glass frames—one of Italian origin and the other Japanese. The most surprising and rewarding experience for me, personally, on the entire trip happened in Kustanai,

New private houses under construction outside of Kustanai.

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 following the Wiedergeburt cultural program. My wife, Thelma, and I were among the last to get on our bus taking us to lunch. We had all been surrounded by many people anxious to meet Americans who were descendants of Germans from Russia. People asked many questions, and many were interested in locating relatives in the United States. Just as we were about to board our bus, I was aware of someone who had just run up to me through the crowd and was gently tugging on my sleeve to get my attention. The woman somewhat breathlessly said, "Ich suche meine Verwandten von Amerika" (I am looking for my relatives from America). I asked "What is your family name?" and she replied, "Buxman, my mother's maiden name was Buxman, Eva Buxman, and I had two uncles, Karl and Heinrich, who went to America." Both she and I couldn't have been more astounded as I told her my grandfather was Karl Buxman, that his brother, Heinrich (Henry) also came to America, and that my mother often spoke of her Aunt Eva who was the only one of her family who had stayed in Russia, and then she volunteered that her mother had been born in Wiesenmueller, the village our group had visited several days earlier. It did not take long for us both to realize that I had just been found by my mother's first cousin, Paulina (Maier) Lender—sometimes spelled Under Paulina (Maier) Lender, newly discovered first cousin of the in German. Paulina, aged seventy-eight Joined us for lunch author's mother, relating her family's history. and very quickly and with many tears reviewed her whole life for us—her experience of seeing her two brothers, is located on a lot larger than the typical dachas that most Heinrich and Jacob, shot by Bolsheviks, the terrible families must drive or take a bus to. And the garden was famines in the 20s and 30s, the unspeakable hardships they full of all the kinds of fruits and vegetables already noted, experienced during their forced relocation in 1941, and as well as a host of colorful flowers—zinnias, cosmos, finally her husband's being forcibly separated from her and roses, marigolds, red cannas, snapdragons, gladiolas, and their two children during this time and his subsequent dahlias. The flowers, everyone in the family agreed, rep- remarriage when he could not find her after the war. He resented Paulina's work. In the back of the yard were three later learned she was still alive and wrote a letter of barns—one storing grain for the animals, another housing apology from Germany, but she still experiences great fifty or so young chickens, and the third providing quarters sadness about this loss. for a half dozen hogs. There were also about a dozen geese Paulina invited us to her home for dinner for the fol- and ducks that wandered around the barns and into some lowing evening. She lives with her daughter and son-in-law parts of the vegetable garden. The house is decorated with who provide a very comfortable home for her. Their house carved wood trimming done by Paulina's son-in-law, is one of the newer private homes in a suburb of Kustanai, Alexander Demchenko, He also has a tool shed in which he named Zaretchna, across the Tobol River from Kustanai, has many mechanical tools for working with wood and The inside of Paulina's house looked like my grandmother metal such as one sees in the garages of many Americans Buxman's home as I remember it from my childhood. The who enjoy metal- and woodworking. floor of the entranceway was freshly painted, and there When we arrived for dinner at Paulina's house we were were embroidered decorations all around. A picture on the greeted by ail of Paulina's family in the area, including her wall showing a guardian angel protecting two small daughter and son-in-law and their children and grand- children crossing a rickety old bridge at night was exactly children, as well as her son and his family, who had driven like a painting my Buxman grandparents had. There were to Zaretchna from Rudny, Her son, Albert Lender, strongly also Bible verses posted. The house resembles my Buxman uncles both in appearance and mannerisms. Then followed lively visiting and taking of photos (including use of a Polaroid camera by Paulina's grandson, Sasha—apparently purchased in Germany on one of his many trips there as an importer of foreign cars). Dinner began with delicious chicken noodle soup followed by pork and potatoes, sliced sausages, bread, pickled to- matoes, fresh tomatoes and cucumbers in sour cream, and,

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 finally, freshly picked cherries for dessert. After more than ready walked eight to ten miles from her home and was enough food and toasts (with vodka, cognac, and cham- on her way to Rudny, at least another twenty miles away. pagne) everyone sat around the table to sing, first Russian Her plan was to walk the entire distance, but she climbed and Ukrainian folk songs, then Paulina sang some old aboard our bus, glad to accept the offer of a seven-to-eight- German songs by herself, and finally we sang old German mile ride toward her destination. When we stopped at the hymns that even Thelma and I knew, such as "Gott ist die bakery, she got off and cheerfully continued on her way, Liebe." That we could join in on the old German hymns Mr. Klein said it was likely she would walk the entire dis- was especially touching to Paulina who is a very devout tance without further offers of assistance. This experience woman. She liberally laces her conversation with was another in a whole series which reminded us of how quotations from the Bible, and also often adds, "As it is we too easily take our privileged lives for granted. said. . ." and then launches into a set of rhyming verses Other experiences we had illustrated effective efforts delivered dramatically and with obvious feeling. She sent by people in Kustanai to help others outside their own her Lutheran Prayer Book, recently printed in Germany, families. One day, for example, we visited an impressive with me as a special gift for my mother. Later that evening orphanage that was run with a combination of government Paulina showed me a letter written in the early 1930s to his and local philanthropic funds. The institution cared for sister, Eva Buxman, by my grandfather. Eva kept this letter approximately one hundred children ranging from age one throughout the times when it was dangerous to have any through about five. Members of our group were impressed items from foreign countries and eventually passed it on to by the cleanliness of the facility and the friendly spirit of her daughter, Paulina. the staff. Recognizing the need for additional toys and play Impressions from our trip to Kustanai, Kazakhstan, areas for the children, many members of our group offered would be incomplete without mentioning our visit to a a substantial contribution to the medical director as a vote bakery and cheese factory very near Kustanai. On our sec- of confidence in how well the institution appeared to be ond trip we had two unanticipated extra days for touring managed. This institution was called an orphanage, around Kustanai since our scheduled flight to Moscow had although for some of the children—those whose unwed been delayed twice because of "insufficient fuel for the mothers worked, or were in school—the facility functioned airplanes." Both the bakery and cheese factory had been essentially as a day care program. constructed of German-made machinery, including the air- Clearly, our trip to Russia and Kazakhstan was full of conditioned aluminum buildings, and both installations many discoveries and would have been very rewarding represented the highest standards of cleanliness and even if we had not met my mother's first cousin, Paulina. efficiency. The manager and most employees of both en- The experience of her finding us, and the ensuing discovery terprises are ethnic Germans, and the products, though of much new information about what had happened to this somewhat different from the usual Russian bread and branch of my mother's family was a special, unexpected cheese, are rapidly gaining acceptance by the local popu- bonus. [In August 1994 we received the sad news that lation. As guests we had ample opportunity to sample both Paulina (Maier) Lender had died in May while working in products: the bread consists of small hard-crusted loaves her garden. We are full of sadness but also of gratitude that resembling French bread, and I found the cheese similar to we were fortunate enough to learn to know her and to mild cheddar. As we left the bakery the manager was obtain much family history from her in summer 1993. We insistent that each of us be given a half dozen freshly baked continue to be in contact with her children and loaves of bread and approximately two pounds of cheese! grandchildren.] But after some reasonable pleading by our guide, Professor In 1988 I had discovered many of my father's first Harry Klein, our gifts were pared down to an amount we cousins in Kustanai and the surrounding area. They had could comfortably carry. lived in the North Caucasus, near Stavropol at the time of An incident on the way to the two new establishments deportation. Five years later, discovering that my mother's illustrates another fact of life in Kazakhstan. We were ap- first cousin from the Volga village of Wiesenmueller also proximately ten to fifteen miles out in the country on a now lives in Kustanai very near my Wiest relatives was a little-traveled but paved road. Suddenly Harry Klein asked wonderful surprise. Now my father's and mother's cousins our bus driver to quickly stop the bus. Mr. Klein stepped in Kustanai share information about "their American out to invite aboard an old woman who was walking with a relatives" and also have been spending some holidays noticeable limp and carrying several bags. She had al together. THE LANDAU BAPTISTS

Adam Giesinger Landau was a German Catholic village in the Beresan preachers. The earliest of these was Ignaz Lindl, who came region of southern Russia (now Ukraine), founded in 1809- to southern Russia in 1820 and had a considerable impact 1810 by 108 families (470 persons), who had come from in the Odessa region and Bessarabia until 1824. The second Alsace and the Palatinate. This village was the first parish was Johannes Bonekemper, who served in Rohrbach- center for the Catholics of the Beresan region, with a Worms from 1824 to 1848 and preached widely in other resident parish priest, who also served the neighboring German villages. The third was Eduard Otto Wuest, pastor villages of Speier, Karlsruhe, Sulz, and Katharinental for in the Separatist village of Neuhoffnung near Berdyansk many years. Until the 1860s, by which time the population from 1845 to 1859, who spread his views very successfully had reached 2000, all the inhabitants of Landau were in the neighboring Mennonite villages. These three were all Catholics. Then, in just a few years, 1869 to 1872, a strongly influenced by the Pietism then prevalent in significant number of families became Baptists, That this Germany and spread it among the Germans in Russia. happened is mentioned by Conrad Keller, the historian of Ignaz Lindl was born in Bavaria in 1774 and ordained the Catholic colonies in the Odessa region.' How it came to the Catholic priesthood in 1799.4 Early in his priestly about is an interesting story, which I have gathered from career he became acquainted with a number of Pietistic various sources, mentioned in my notes. An article in a preachers then active in that part of Germany and in 1812 recent issue of the AHSGR Journal2 has suggested to me was converted to their views. He began to preach their that this topic would be a good subject for a follow-up ar- "heresies" in his parish and attracted and converted many ticle, people in his region of Bavaria. This brought him into There were no Baptists in Germany at the time of the conflict with his bishop and led to his being banished from immigration movement to Russia in the early 1800s. The the diocese. Through a friendly recruiter of immigrants to first German convert to the Baptist faith was Johann Russia he received an invitation in 1819 to come to St. Gerhard Oncken of Hamburg, who was baptized in 1834 Petersburg, There he ingratiated himself with the authori- by an American Baptist then studying in Germany.3 ties, who assumed that he was a priest in good standing, Oncken became a zealous preacher of his new faith and and received from them in 1820 the appointment to the made many converts. From his congregation in Hamburg position of Superior of the Catholic Church in the Odessa he sent missionaries to other parts of Germany and by me region. Soon after his arrival in Odessa, he began to pro- 1860s as far east as the German colonies in Russia. Oncken mote a grandiose plan for his religious career in that region. himself visited Russia in 1869 and spoke to some of the He asked for a tract of land on which he could set up a early Baptist converts there, as we shall describe later in seminary to educate clergy and also establish a colony of our story. his former parishioner converts from Germany. In the Lindl To understand the appeal that the Baptist faith had for seminary priests were to be trained not only for the the Germans in Russia at this time, it is helpful to study the Catholic villages of the Odessa region, but also for those on earlier religious history of the German immigrants to the the Volga. Although Lindl had some support for his plan in Black Sea region. There were among these immigrants four high government circles, the scheme eventually collapsed. main religious groups: Mennonites, Catholics, Lutherans, In the meantime he preached his Pietistic doctrines in the and Reformed, each of which generally founded villages of Odessa region. In August 1821 he came to Rastadt, where its own in Russia. In each group there were also dissidents, his preaching in the church was found objectionable and people who disagreed with the religious views of the caused him to be forbidden to preach there any more. He majority. Some of these dissidents set up Separatist then went to Muenchen and preached in a private house, villages. There were as well also a number of influential where he made a number of converts. He also preached dissident preachers in the early years. Three of these, with some success in Rohrbach and Worms. He attempted especially, became the forerunners of the later Baptist to preach in the church at Landau, but the leaders there prevented him from doing so. Back in Odessa

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 he eventually was given a land grant in Bessarabia on year did it dawn on him that he was leading a sinful life, which he founded, in 1822, with some of his followers not serving the Lord. He then renounced his sinful behavior from Germany, the village Sarata. There too he soon had and began to lead his people in Bible study at prayer problems. In 1824 he was banished from Russia by the meetings, in the manner of the Pietists. The pastor superior government. An eloquent preacher, with an attractive per- to him did not like the direction in which he was leading sonality, but rather confused in his religious views, he was the people and forbade him to continue to preach. In 1845 not able to establish his teachings in any of the places in he accepted a call to southern Russia to become pastor of a which he served. He is of special interest to us here be- Separatist congregation at Neuhoffnung near Berdyansk. cause some of his converts later became prominent in the There he served for the rest of his life, 1845-1859.8 Baptist movement.5 Because his Neuhoffnung congregation consisted of When Lindl was making his plans for the seminary in people who had been separatists from the Lutheran state the Odessa region, he wrote to a friend in Germany asking church in Wuerttemberg, as he himself was. Pastor Wuest him to send him young men of strong Christian faith whom readily gained acceptance among them and found them he could train for work in southern Russia. One of the receptive to the Pietistic prayer meetings he organized. His young men recommended was Johannes Bonekemper, eloquent preaching during these meetings also attracted who became keenly interested when he was told about this many people from outside his own congregation, especially invitation. Before going to Russia, however, he decided to from the nearby Molochna Mennonite settlement and from improve his qualifications by attending a three-year course the Lutheran villages of the Mariupol settlement. The at a Basel seminary for missionaries. He was ordained in Mennonites who agreed with his religious views later March 1824 and immediately undertook the trip to Russia. formed the Mennonite Brethren and looked up to him as a Arrived in Odessa, he was appointed to the parish of second Menno, who brought them back to the truth Rohrbach-Worms, where he preached his first sermon on preached by the first Menno. A group of Mennonite Breth- 20 June. Both Rohrbach and Worms had mixed ren, mainly from Gnadenfeld, formally established them- populations of Lutherans and Reformed, each of which selves as a separate church in January I860.9 They faced wanted religious services according to its own customs. many obstacles, put in their way by the other Mennonites Bonekemper, who was a Pietist, not too strongly attached and the Russian authorities, before they were legally ac- to either denomination, was able to bridge the gap and give cepted as a permitted religion.10 Among the new tenets that them a service acceptable to each group. Religion was at a they adopted, in the year 1861, as essential for membership, low ebb when he arrived, but gradually improved under his was baptism by immersion." This brought their views close ministry. In addition to Sunday services, he gradually to those of the Baptists, with whom they later had contacts. found it possible to attract many people to his Pietistic Independently of the Brethren movement among the weekday evening prayer meetings. He was a very able Molochna Mennonites, there grew up a similar movement preacher, who was often asked to preach in parishes other in the Chortitza settlement. The leader in this case was than his own. Many of the people whose lives were Abraham Unger of Einlage. He had been in contact by touched by Bonekemper's Pietism, during his years in correspondence with the Baptist leader Johann Gerhard Rohrbach, joined the Baptists in the 1860s and 1870s.6 A Oncken in Germany since 1858 and had become a convert good example of the power of his preaching is the effect it to Oncken's religious views. On 4 March 1862 he was produced in Alt-Danzig, an isolated, religiously neglected himself baptized by immersion by Gerhard Wieler at village, which he visited in 1840.7 His preaching there Liebenau in the Molochna region. On 11 March 1862 there brought about a religious awakening among the people, were eighteen baptisms at Einlage and the baptized were which eventually, twenty years later, led to its becoming a then organized as the Einlage Mennonite Brethren Church. Baptist stronghold, as we shall see. On 18 March there were seventeen more baptisms at More directly responsible for preparing the way for the Einlage and many others followed in rapid succession.12 spread of the Baptist faith in southern Russia was Eduard In the meantime interesting developments had occurred Otto Wuest. Born in Wuerttemberg in 1817, he studied in Alt-Danzig, the isolated German village, mentioned theology at the University of Tuebingen to prepare for a earlier, in which Pastor Bonekemper had preached in 1840. career in the established Lutheran State Church. After A traveling missionary named Kuss, a friend of graduation he served for three years, 1841-1844, as an assistant vicar in a Lutheran parish. Not until his third

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Pastor Wuest's, in 1847, on his way to visit his friend, Alt- and Neu-Danzig had the honor of receiving in their stopped for a time at Alt-Danzig and preached there. His midst the German Baptist leader, Johann Gerhard Oncken, preaching brought about a remarkable religious awakening, who came from Germany to visit the new Baptists in south- the first of several awakenings that stirred up that neglected ern Russia, as well as the friendly Mennonite leaders in village in the years that followed. The greatest of these Einlage who had been in contact with him.19 awakenings took place in 1859,13 This converted almost all August Liebig, the Baptist missionary mentioned the people of the village to Pietism and prepared the way above as visiting Russia in 1866, was called back in 1871 for them to accept the Baptist faith in the next few years. by the Mennonite Brethren to help them solve their orga- The later historian of this movement, Johann Pritzkau, then nizational problems. He arrived back in June 1871 and aged seventeen, was appointed in 1859 as teacher and stayed a year, during which he gave the Brethren many sexton for the village. He was later to become an helpful suggestions. After his year in Russia he returned to outstanding leader of the Baptist movement throughout the his work in Dobrudsha and remained there till 1875, when Black Sea region. he came back to take up permanent residence in Russia.20 At Pentecost 1864, two Brethren from Einlage came to We shall meet him again later visiting Landau and then as Neu-Danzig, a daughter colony of Alt-Danzig, and baptized the founder of the Baptist village of Friedrichsfeld in the a number of converted people there by immersion in the Caucasus, which is of special interest to us. He was a Ingul River, This caused a great sensation in the whole respected figure among both the Baptists and the region. On 15 September of the same year, a Mennonite Mennonite Brethren, who often consulted him. These two brother named Kowalsky came to Alt-Danzig and there groups, who thought alike on many matters, did not unite, baptized by immersion twenty persons, men and women, mainly because the Mennonite Brethren were afraid of who were convinced that this form of baptism was bibli- losing their exemption from military service, highly cally the right one. Before the end of that year, many others treasured by all the Mennonites in Russia.21 of the Alt-Danzig congregation had followed the example Among the many visitors to Alt-Danzig at the time of of that first group,'4 the great baptismal feast of 1869, mentioned above, there The Baptist congregations so established in southern was a native of the Catholic village of Landau, Christian Russia were not well received. The one at Neu-Danzig in Fischer, who was baptized at this gathering and became the particular had to endure much persecution in its early years. first Baptist convert from Catholicism in southern Russia. Its most prominent members were banished from Russia. He had lived for some years on rented land at some They went to the province of Dobrudsha in Romania and distance from Landau and there came into contact with a founded a Baptist congregation in Kataloi. A Baptist mis- group of Pietistic Brethren. Attendance at their prayer sionary from Germany, August Liebig, helped them to or- meetings and Bible readings convinced him that they had ganize their religious life in that village.15 discovered the truth and in 1868 he decided to become one Liebig had visited southern Russia as early as the of them. He became a very zealous apostle of his new faith spring of 1866. He had come as a result of an 1865 request and decided that it was his duty to bring the truth to his from Abraham Unger and his Brethren in Einlage who parents, relatives, and friends in Landau. His reception wanted help to organize their church. He came and spoke to there was far from friendly. When he told his father the the Einlage group, but was not permitted to stay. The good news about his conversion, the old man was very Mennonite local government in Chortitza, hostile to the disturbed at first, then grew fanatically angry and struck Brethren movement, had him arrested and banished from blows at his son, threatening to kill him if he did not give Russia,'6 As mentioned above, he went to Kataloi in up his heresy. After a lengthy beating and cursing, in which Dobrudsha. In spite of the persecutions, both the Neu- the father was helped by others, Christian was taken to the Danzig congregation and its daughter congregation in the parish priest. When he refused the priest's pleas to return to province of Dobrudsha flourished.'7 his ancestral faith and even dared to argue against the priest In Alt-Danzig also there was rapid progress. The great- by quoting the word of God, the Catholics present grew est baptismal feast in this village occurred at Pentecost very angry and began beating him again. They dragged him 1869. Brother Abraham Unger and some other Mennonite along the street back to his father's house, beating him more brothers came from Einlage to carry out the baptismal along the way. This was the reception he received on his ceremony. Large numbers of new converts were baptized in visit home in 1868.22 After his baptism in 1869, he was the Ingul River on that day.18 In the fall of 1869, even less welcome at his home- but he did

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 gradually win supporters in Landau. He had to visit them Much mention in Pritzkau. stealthily to bring them the word of God and to encourage Adam Amann, born 1839, son of Michael, wife them to persevere in their new faith. Occasionally his en- Katarina, two sons, Johann and Nikodemus, appear on the emies caught him during one of these visits and inflicted 1933 map. List of family, Stumpp, page 731, number 135. severe physical punishment on him." Franz Boehm, born 1837, son of Michael, wife The small group in Landau that Christian Fischer had Elisabeth, son Karl appears on 1933 map. List of family, converted to the Baptist faith in the early 1870s, met at the Stumpp, page 759, number 719. home of his cousin Michael Fischer. They suffered much Daniel Decker, born 1840, son of Christian, wife persecution in those years at the hands of Landau Annamarie. Mention in Pritzkau: funeral dispute over son Catholics. One early problem was the use of the commu- Jakob deceased 1874. List of family, Stumpp, page 779, nity cemetery. In 1874 one of Michael Fischer's children number 1151. died. When he sent men to the cemetery to dig a grave, Michael Fischer, born 1842, son of Michael, wife they were told that the child could not be buried in this Franziska, List of family, Stumpp, page 752, number 604. cemetery because it had not been baptized. Appeals to the Christian Heidt, born 1839, son of Johann, wife local government and to the parish priest failed to solve the Alexandra. List of family, Stumpp, page 744, number 410, problem. It took appeals to the Russian authorities to find a Mention in Pritzkau. burial place for the child. Three months later there was a Philipp Kary, born 1837, son of Andreas Heinrich, similar incident regarding a deceased child in the Decker wife Margarete. List of family, Stumpp, page 778, number family.24 1138. The greatest problem that the Baptists in Landau faced Josef Kary, born 1839, son of Andreas Heinrich, wife was a secure meeting place. As mentioned above, most Elisabeth, four sons, Peter, Johann, Mathias, and Emanuel, often they met at the home of Michael Fischer, who suf- appear on the 1933 map. List of family, Stumpp, page 778, fered many losses on this account. Whenever it became number 1139. known that the Baptists were meeting, particularly in the Jakob Kunz, born 1837, son of Franz, wife Franziska. evening, this home was subjected to much vandalism. List of family, Stumpp, page 737, number 264. Eventually permission was obtained from the authorities to Josef Wolf, born 1838, son of Jakob, wife Katharina, build a prayer-hall on space donated by Michael Fischer on son Daniel appears on the 1933 map. List of family, his lot. This building was completed in 1882 and blessed Stumpp, page 737, number 280. by August Liebig, who came especially for this occasion. It George Zimmermann, born 1836, son of Jakob, wife was used for Baptist services thereafter. Although hostility Elisabeth, son Peter appears on 1933 map. List of family, to the Baptists in Landau never disappeared, since they Stumpp, page 743, number 402. were always a small minority in this Catholic village, it Martin Zimmermann, born 1834, son of Johann, wife eased off somewhat in the 1880s.25 In southern Russia, in Katharina, sons George and Josef appear on 1933 map. List general, the Baptists then had more freedom, as a result of of family, Stumpp, page 743. number 391. receiving legal recognition as a Protestant church in 1879.26 The fact that the family heads listed above were all No complete list of the Landau families that became born in the period 1834-1842 suggests that we look at the Baptists in the 1870s is available, but putting together in- religious situation in Landau during their childhood and formation from a variety of sources,27 we can produce a youth. It was a period during which religious fervor in the reasonably accurate list of some of the families. Since parish was at a low ebb. The parish priests were Poles, who Christian Fischer and his cousin Michael Fischer seem to did not know the customs and traditions of their pa- have been the leaders, they are listed first and then the rest rishioners, spoke German poorly, and took little interest in in alphabetical order. the school and in activities of teenagers. At least two of Christian Fischer, born 1841, son of Gottlieb, wife them, mentioned by the historian Keller, were not models Elisabeth, two sons, Jakob and Samuel, appear on the 1933 of morality in their personal life.28 Raised in this atmo- map of Friedrichsfeld. List of family, Stumpp, page 752, sphere some of the young people became indifferent to number 607. Much mention in Pritzkau. Catholicism. When Christian Fischer, after becoming a Michael Fischer, born 1838, son of Johannes, wife newly converted Baptist in 1869, visited the friends of his Elisabeth. List of family, Stumpp, page 752, number 598. youth in Landau, some of them, impressed by his fervor in his new faith, decided to become Baptists also. Here

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 again the parish priest, at this point a German, failed to deal 1900s.34 The 1933 map of the village shows that both the with the situation wisely. Keller describes the situation as it Baptists and the Adventists had prayer-halls at that time. was in 1873 as follows:29

The Baptist proselytizing at this time had reached its Notes peak and Bishop Zottmann believed he had the right man in Father Burgardt to quell this evil. But that was a 1. Conrad Keller, The German Colonies in South Russia, 1804 to 1904, trans. Anton Becker, rev. ed., 2 vols. (Lincoln, mistake. Father Burgardt was not wise enough, nor did Nebraska: AHSGR, 1980). Volume 2 deals with the Catholic he have enough love in his heart to bring back the colonies in the Beresan region. The Baptists in Landau are misguided people to the faith of their fathers. One does mentioned on pages 10, 56-57. not convert people by thundering and scolding. He was 2. Irene Kary, "A Visit to Friedrichsfeld,' 'Journal of the American powerless in preventing the spread of the Baptist sect. Historical Society of Germans from Russia 16 (Summer 1993); 36-40. Friedrichsfeld, until its German inhabitants Recognizing this, he asked for a transfer. were deported from it during World War It, was a Baptist village in the Caucasus, among whose founding families there Some details of the later career of Christian Fischer are were Landau Baptists. of interest to us.30 After his baptism at Alt-Danzig in 1869, 3. An article on "Baptists" in the Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913 he and a group of other new Landau Baptists settled down edition. Volume 2, 280, gives the following information about Oncken: on rented land nearby and for a time were part of the Alt- Danzig congregation. During the winter months Christian The founder of the Baptist churches in Germany was did much traveling to bring the good news to others. He Johann Gerhard Oncken, whose independent study of the brought Bibles and other pious literature to the people he Scriptures led him to adopt Baptist views several years before he had an opportunity of receiving "believers' visited, particularly to Catholics, who were his special baptism." Having incidentally heard that an American interest. His occasional visits to Landau, where there was Baptist, B. Sears, was pursuing his studies at Berlin, he much hostility and therefore much danger to him, added to communicated with him and was with six others baptized the number of his converts. Eventually he was called to by him at Hamburg in 1834. His activity as an evangelist drew new adherents to the movement. The number of the Johannestal, near Landau, to serve as preacher of the Baptists increased, in spite of the opposition of German Baptist congregation there. In this position he was able to state churches. In Prussia alone relative toleration was be more helpful to his fellow-converts in his home village. extended to them until the foundation of the Empire Then, after a short time in the new colony Michailovka, he brought to them almost everywhere freedom in the exercise moved to Friedrichsfeld in the Caucasus, where August of their religion. A Baptist theological school was founded in 1881 at Hamburg-Horn. From Germany the Baptists Liebig set up a new Baptist congregation in 1885 and 31 spread to the neighboring countries, Denmark, Sweden, appointed Christian Fischer as the first preacher. Switzerland, Austria, Russia. It was undoubtedly Christian Fischer who brought some of his Baptist brothers from Landau to Friedrichsfeld, They 4. There is much detail about the interesting life of Ignaz Lindl in the two volumes of Conrad Keller, The German Colonies in were unhappy in their home village, where, although no South Russia, 1804 to 1904, For information on Lindl see vol. longer persecuted under a more enlightened parish priest, 1,69-74, and vol. 2,245-246. Lindl's career is described also they were generally looked upon as traitors to their Catholic in: (1) Joseph Aloysius KeBler, Geschichte der Dioezese faith. In addition to them there came to Friedrichsfeld also Tyraspol (Dickinson, North Dakota: Verlag von Rev. Georg Aberle, 1930), 23-24; (2) Erik Amburger, Geschichte des Baptist families from Rohrbach: Protestantismus in Russland (Stuttgart: Evangelisches Ackermann, Bachmann, Bolaender, Croissant, Fuhrmann, Verlagswerk, 1961), 72; and Georg Leibbrandt, Die deutschen Herzel, Schaefer, and Wiest. In addition to these there came Kolonien in Cherson und Bessarabien (Stuttgart: Ausland und Benkendorf and Buchholz families from Alt-Danzig, Grenz Heimatverlag.1926), 119-128. and Kalmbach families from Gueldendorf, Ernst and 5. Putting together information from various sources, we can trace some of Lindl's converts from Muenchen and Rohrbach to Rothmann families from Waterloo, a Balliet family from 32 Neu-Danzig, where they became Baptists, were then banished Peterstal, and a Nagel family from Bergdorf. All these from Russia and went to Romania, where they established a family names appear on the 1933 map of Friedrichsfeld, Baptist congregation in Kataloi in the colony of Dobrudsha, It is interesting to note that quite early in its existence from which some families later migrated to the United States. the Baptist colony Friedrichsfeld had some religious An example of such a family was the Georg Leitner fam- ily. The 1811 census lists them in Muenchen as follows: dissidents in its midst. They were Seventh Day Adventists, 33 Georg Leitner, 41, his wife Eva, 45, son Michael, 15, whom the Baptist leaders did not like. Some Adventist daughters Eva, 12, and Barbara, 4. Among the Lindl converts families from Friedrichsfeld came to America in the early of 1821 in

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Muenchen are listed the families of Georg Leitner and Michael 16. Friesen, 340. Leitner, They were in the group that went to Neu-Danzig in 1841, 17. Pritzkau, 37-18. became Baptists in 1864 and were banished from Russia. They were 18. Pritzkau, 13-14. in Kataloi in the colony of Dobrudsha till 1885, when they migrated to 19. Friesen, 461-463. America, where they settled near Cathay, North Dakota. We have a 20. Friesen, 466-467. list of the family members then living. 21. Pritzkau, 94-96. 22. Pritzkau, 97-101. This information is taken from the following sources: Keller, vol. 2, 23. Pritzkau, 22-23. 245, 264; M. Woltner, Die Gemeindeberichte von 1848 der deutschen 24. Pritzkau, 23-26. Siedlungen am Schwarzen Meer (Leipzig: Verlag von S. Hirzel), 200- 25. Pritzkau, 26-27. 26 Priesen,398. 202; Johann Pritzkau, Geschichle der Baptisten in Siid-Russland 27. (1) Pritzkau; (2) the 1891 census of Landau in Karl Stumpp, The (Odessa: Wenske und LUbeck), 3-4, Emigration from Germany to Russia (Lincoln, Nebraska: 15-18; Passenger list of SS Brooklyn, Liverpool to Halifax, April AHSGR, 1973), 730-780; (3) 1933 map of Friedrichsfeld, Journal of 16-29,1885. the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia 16 6. Information about the career of Johannes Bonekemper in Russia is (Summer 1993): 36; (4) correspondence with Irene Kary of Telkwa, given in Joseph Schnurr, Die Kirchen und das religioese Leben der British Columbia, Russlanddeutschen. Evangelischer Teil, 2d ed. (Stuttgart: AER 28. Keller, vol. 2, 55: Franz Woitkewicz, and Keller, vol. 1,181: Verlag Landsmannschaft der Deutschen aus Russland, 1978), 67-80, Christopher Pietkewicz. 127, 214. 29. Keller, vol. 2. 57. 7. Pritzkau, 3. 30. Pritzkau, 101-102,147. 8. For information about the career of Eduard Otto Wuest in Russia see 31. Pritzkau, 97. Peter M. Friesen, The Mennonite Brotherhood in Russia (1789-1910), 32. The home villages of these families were obtained from Translation and Editorial Committee: J. B.Toews, Abraham Friesen, village lists in Stumpp's Emigration from Germany to Russia. Peter J. Klassen, Harry Loewen (Winnipeg: 33. Pritzkau, the historian of the Baptists, calls them "die Christian Press), 205-227. Adventisten mit ihren verderblichen Lehren" (the Adventists with 9. Friesen, 230-232. their pernicious teachings), 146. 10. Friesen, 233-262. 34. Members of the family of Michael Fischer, born 1842, son of 11. Friesen, 284-285. Michael, who came to America in the early 1900s, were Seventh 12. Friesen, 290. Day Adventists. This information was given to the author by 13. Pritzkau, 4-9. Irene Kary of Telkwa, British Columbia. 14. Pritzkau, 12. 15. Pritzkau, 16-17.

26th International AHSGR Convention

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994

"THE TERRIBLE GHOST OF 1941": A HAUNTING REMINDER OF THE VOLGA GERMAN DEPORTATION

Rosalinda Kloberdanz and Timothy J. Kloberdanz Several years ago, an eighty-three-year-old woman by the there were houses of wood and sugar beets everywhere.) name of Barbara (nee Weinhardt) Weinhardt wrote to us. The sketchy information Frau Weinhardt provided us She introduced herself by stating that she was one of the was not much to go on (houses of wood and sugar beet many thousands of ethnic Germans who had made their fields once dotted areas all over the central and western way out of the U.S.S.R. and had reestablished themselves United States!) but Frau Weinhardt's knowledge of family in Germany. Frau Weinhardt, who was living in Baden- nicknames helped point us in the right directions. With the Wurttemberg, made a most unusual request of us. "Please," aid of church records, cemetery files, ship passenger lists, she pleaded in German, "is there any way to find out where and Volga German immigrant settlement maps, we were I was born in America?" able to determine where Frau Weinhardt's parents first Frau Weinhardt went on to explain that her parents, lived and where she had been born: it was in the city of "Wanka" Johann Weingardt and Barbara (nee "Christjans" Pueblo, Colorado. Many Volga German immigrants la- Appelhans) had left their native village of Rothammel, bored there in the steel mills during the early 1900s. Some- Russia, and immigrated to the United States in 1906. Ini- time later, the Weingardts moved north to work sugar beets tially, her father made the trip alone and later sent for his in Logan County, Colorado—where Frau Weinhardt's wife and two children, Franz and Benedicktus. It was also maternal aunt, "Christjans" Christina Lauer, was living in in the year 1906 that Frau Weinhardt was born "somewhere the town of Sterling. in America." Eventually, however, the family members Once we had amassed a fair amount of information became homesick for "the Old Country." They returned to (including photocopies of vital records), we sent a large Russia when Frau Weinhardt was only three years of age. packet of family history off to Frau Weinhardt as a Christ- During their brief sojourn in the United States, Frau mas gift in December 1989. Her response was immediate Weinhardt's older brother Benedicktus died. Another and enthusiastic. She was elated to discover, at the age of brother, Johann, was born in America in 1908. When eighty-three, where she had been born in America. And as a Johann returned to Russia, he continued to be known by the token of her appreciation, she promised to help us by American nickname of "Joni" (Johnny) throughout his life. providing examples of Volga German folklore and other Perhaps to conform to the Russian mode of spelling, the information. Over the next few years, we exchanged many family members changed their name from Weingardt to letters. No matter how numerous our questions, she care- "Weinhardt," fully answered each one. When she was uncertain of her- Frau Weinhardt did not know where, exactly, she and self, she sought out other Volga German Aussiedler her brother "Joni" were born in the United States. She (emigres) who might know more or be able to provide wrote: ". . . Vielleicht konnen Sie es irgendwie heraus additional details. bekommen, wo mein Geburtsort ist. Ich kann mich nur In December 1993, we sent Frau Weinhardt a copy of erinnern, dass es Holzhauser waren und uberall our book about Volga German folklife in Russia, Thunder Zuckerruben." (Perhaps you are able to somehow figure out on the Steppe. Although unable to read the English where my place of birth is. I can only remember that portions, she was able to understand the German-language proverbs, stories, folk songs, and poems. This gave rise to Rosalinda and Timothy 3. Kloberdanz both work at North Dakota even more recollections and she also showed the book to State University (Forgo) and are the authors of Thunder on the other Aussiedler in an effort to encourage them to share Steppe. Rosalinda presented a shortened version of "The Terrible Ghost of 194}" at the AHSGR Convention in Lincoln last June. folklore memories of their own. At the age of eighty-eight, she seemed as dedicated and energetic as ever.

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Frau Weinhardt's contacts and solicitations brought to German newspaper in Kazakhstan) during her lifetime. light a number of sparkling folklore gems. In January 1994, "Das Schreckgespenst von 1941" is an interesting poem for example, she spoke to a niece who had recently left for several reasons. First, it represents the rich body of oral Russia and settled in Baden-Wurttemberg. This niece, Frau tradition that is still known to many Aussiedler now living Rosa (nee "Lermeese" Appelhans) Klatt, was a folk singer in Germany. Second, it provides us with a personal, up- who remembered numerous old Volga German songs and close view of one of the most traumatic events in the poems. history of the Germans in Russia. And third, the poem At Frau Weinhardt's urging, Rosa Klatt sent us a very focuses on the ordeal of a Volga German woman who had informative letter. She thanked us for writing Thunder on to contend with the pain of childbirth at precisely the same the Steppe and for remembering the Volga German people time as experiencing the pain of being torn from the still in Russia. She also enclosed a handwritten copy of a familiar surroundings of her native village and Volga fifty-two-line German poem entitled "Das Schreckgespenst homeland, von 1941" (The Terrible Ghost of 1941). The poem dealt The full text of "Das Schreckgespenst von 1941" ap- with a young Volga German married couple, Friedrich and pears below—as it was remembered and written down by Olga. Tragically, the birth of their first child coincided with Frau Rosa Klatt. An English language interpretation (rather the forced uprootal of approximately 400,000 Volga than a literal translation) of the poem also is included for Germans. Frau Klatt knew little about the poem other than the benefit of readers who do not understand German. that it was kept alive in the hearts of many men and women The persistence of this remarkable poem into the 1990s who had survived the great deportation of September- is a tribute to those Volga German survivors who, like Frau October 1941. Frau Klatt did not know the name of the Barbara Weinhardt and Frau Rosa Klatt, do not want "the poem's author and remembered seeing only one printed terrible ghost of 1941" and the injustices of that time ever version of the poem (in a to be forgotten.

Scenes of the 1941 Volga German deportation. Note the faces of the stunned and grieving exiles, the armed guards, the string of boxcars in the background, and the hurriedly dug graves. These sketches are by the Russian- born artist Alexander Wormsbecher, who was in his mid-twenties at the time of the Volga German deportation. From the August 28, 1991 issue of Neues Leben. Used with permission.

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Das Schreckgespenst von 1941 "Ungerecht! Mein Schatz, was machen?" Fragte Fried sein Irenes Weib. Ihm war Stalins schlimme Schergen trieben Uns wirklich nicht zum Lachen. Hochgewolbt war aus unserer Heimat fort Mit Gewalt und schon ihr Leib. Knuppelhieben Bis zu dem Verbannungsort. "Fried, es setzen ein die Wehen, Schaffmich ins Entbindungsheim! Schlimmes kann mir Unser Zugfuhr weit nach Osten, Keiner nicht geschehen. Gott, ach waren wir daheim!" hatt sich's vorgestellt! Neue grobschnauzige Posten Hatten uns da Olga kam in einen Wagen, angebellt. Derfur Kdlber vorgesehn. Immer grosser ihre Plage, "Eingestiegen in den Wagen, Du Immer heftiger die Weh'n! verddchtiger Spiofi!" Fasste euren Fried beim Kragen Ein besoffener Kujon. Keme Amme war zu haben. "Friedchen, Liebster," klagte Olga, Eine alte Frau halfmit. Einen Schrei stiess aus der Knabe— "Kehren wir noch je zuriuck? Wollt' mich Die FamiUe war zu drift! freuen bei Mutter Wolga An dem eignen Muttergluck!" "Gott sei Dank, es ist voriiber, " Olga Idchelt, fragt mit Witz: "He, Faschisten, Schnauze halten, Wollt "Sag, mein Schatz, was hast du Ueber, Einen ihr nicht, dass ihr verreckt! Wisst noch Viktor oder Fritz?" nicht, ihr Jungen, Alton, Wie das Blei im Bauche schmeckt!" "Viktor soil der Junge heissen! Emmal siegt Gerechtigkeit! Gluck will ich dem Schrie im Schafspelz laut die Wache, Kind verheissen Fur das ausgestand'ne Liefdas Schienengleis entlang. Leid!" "Schweigen nur ist cure Sache!" Alien wurde Angst und Bang.

Olgafuhr zusammen: "Leute, Man behandelt uns so schlecht! Alles, was da vorgeht heute — Himmelschreiend, ungerecht!"

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 The Terrible Ghost of 1941 "Unjust? Indeed. But what can we do?" Friedrich asked—in a voice calm and mild. Yet the young Stalin's ruthless henchmen Drove us couple had little to be calm about, For Olga was from our homes. Enroute to our place of already big with child. exile, We were struck with heavy blows. "Friedrich, you must take me to a hospital, My As our train prepared to head east, No one pains have begun!" Olga moaned. "Please don't could imagine such a scene! All the while, let anything happen to me. Oh God, if only we foul-mouthed sentries Took every were back home!" opportunity to blaspheme. A boxcar that was meant for calves Was the One drunken, unkempt scoundrel only place Olga could find. The torment Grabbed Friedrich by the collar. "Into grew by the moment, Her pains were of the the train you worthless spy!" The guard worst kind, was heard to holler. There was no midwife to be found But an old "Dear Friedrich," lamented Olga, "How long will woman helped immediately. Soon a cry came we be from our homeland torn? You know we from the newborn child— The family now wanted to be near Mother Volga when our little numbered three! bundle of joy was born." "Thanks be to God, it's over at last!" Olga "You fascists," shouted the sentries, "Be still exclaimed, her eyes in a mist. "Friedrich, my or you'll wish you were dead. All of you, dearest, which do you prefer? A little Victor or a young as well as old, Have yet to taste hot Fritz?" lead!" "Victor shall be his name!" he answered, "For Walking along the railroad tracks, A fur'- justice one day shall prevail. I hereby promise my bedecked soldier said under his breath, "They son a better life and the chance to tell him this mean it... you must be very quiet." Were we sad tale." staring in the face of death?

Olga gathered some people around, saying "Why are we being treated this way? Dear God, it is all so terribly unjust, Especially what we have endured today!"

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 ABRAM'S LIST

Edited and Translated by John B, Toews I first met Abram Berg in June of 1990. My wife Lillian fully preserved photographs were spread across the table. and I were on a brief visit to Karaganda, Kazakhstan, when Here was the Abram Berg of bygone days. A seven year Victor Fast, the leading minister of one of the local old Blumenort lad who witnessed the killing and savagery Mennonite churches, informed me that a certain Mr. Berg of Nestor Makhno's roving bands, A sensitive teenager who wished to see me. Amid the back lane roads and potholes obtained his education amidst the intensifying which characterize suburban Karaganda we finally found totalitarianism of Stalin's rule. Finally, a young man of his residence. A dignified seventy-eight year old gentleman twenty-four arrested on false charges in 1936, sent to the greeted me at the door. Since other family members lived Kazakhstan gulag, and only freed in 1955. with them I was ushered into the quiet and seclusion of the At the age of seventy-eight there was still the struggle living room. Within minutes materials pertaining to his to find meaning and continuity in a life characterized by boyhood in Blumenort, Molochna, as well as his years of dislocation and humiliation. Abram's innermost exuded a exile in Kazakhstan were spread out on the table. Here, he diffuse blending of sorrow and pathos as well as anger and felt, was someone who had empathy for his life of disconti- indignation about what had happened to his world and his nuity. loved ones. He wanted to document their passing, to Our time together passed quickly, I found it difficult to somehow make their meaningless deaths hallowed and to absorb the many passing references to names, dates, proclaim their innocence to posterity. The villagers he experiences, and concentration camps. Abram Berg was knew in his youth needed a memorial. They were ordinary, amazingly well versed in the Russian Mennonite story. good people paying the ultimate penalty for crimes they Was it possible for me to send him additional maps and had not committed. In a broad sense they were victims of a materials? I promised to do so and we exchanged ad- massive and nameless terror, locally they were often the dresses. A deeply moving scenario ensued. I was invited to object of some private grudge or the unlucky component of share supper with the Bergs. Karaganda was beset by great an arrest quota demanded by the NKVD. food shortages and so we shared a salad of onion greens Abram Berg decided to compile a list of victims. They and radishes grown by Abram, a few sausages and small belonged to the world he had known as a child and a sugar cake baked by his wife Olga. youth—close friends, extended family, and village acquain- There were frequent apologies because there was noth- tances. By September 1941, every vestige of that world ing else to offer this guest from abroad. Something brood- vanished. Some were executed by firing squad or found a ing and complex overshadowed the pleasantness of food slow, agonizing death in the gulag or Work Army. Survi- and conversation. The anxious manner and bearing of my vors were deliberately dispersed throughout the vast Soviet host conveyed the sense of issues still unresolved and ur- Empire. Abram knew only one small segment of the gent. Abram's place of one-time exile, Kazakhstan, had Stalinist terror, though he witnessed bits and pieces of the obviously become his home. The course of our conversa- larger tragedy during his years in the camps. He resolved to tion nevertheless evoked memories of a distant rootedness, do what he could. Through friends and relatives he es- of another world brutally destroyed and eradicated. Care- tablished a network of inquiry and painstakingly recon- structed their stories. When he showed me the death cer- John B, Toews was a long-time professor of medieval and reforma- tificate of his brother Jakob (obtained from the Melitopol tion history at the University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Since NKVD records) he remarked: "At least now I know what 1989 he is professor of church history at Regent College, happened to him." He felt it important that innocent people Vancouver, British Columbia, an international graduate school in have an identity in death. The people he had known would theology. For more than two decades his books and articles have not be nameless victims. focused on the Russian Mennonite story during the soviet era. Abram fortunately completed his task before his sud-

AHSGR Journal/Winter S994 den death in Cologne, Germany, on 11 April 1993, just two the Molochna, culminated in Blumenort in November weeks after moving into his permanent apartment, He had 1919. hoped migration might bring ease and tranquillity to his last Eyewitnesses differed as to what actually happened. days. It was not to be. Perhaps the shock of relocation, the Some argued a White Army patrol chanced upon the ban- stress of the processing camps and the long wait for an dits during the night of 11 November. Others claimed that apartment proved too much. The rest he could not find in former Selbstschutz adherents attacked the Makhno con- life he finally found in death, but not before leaving the tingent in an effort to destabilize Makhnovzi power in the larger Mennonite world with a memorial list of what region. Berg's research has added some other perspectives. happened to some of their co-religionists. He reconstructed Years later he visited the village of Bogdanovka and con- his world as best he could and in doing so left a sample versed with several former bandits, now old men. These record of the unimaginable catastrophe which encompassed believe a rival band had attacked the Makhnovzi. Berg's the Russian Mennonite world under Stalinism. investigations also confirm that Makhno personally came Abram Berg's birthplace, Blumenort, was founded in to Blumenort during the terror, but do not establish the 1805. It was under the jurisdiction of the Halbstadt volost, precise time of his visit. one of the two districts comprising the Molochna Menno- The massacre, which Berg witnessed as a seven-year- nite settlement. The colonization of the region began in old, occurred on 10 November and 12 November 1919, 1804-05 when some 350 West Prussian families migrated When it was over, some twenty Blumenort men lay dead. to the region. At the dawn of the twentieth century it was There were eight casualties in nearby Ohrloff and eleven in the wealthiest and most progressive of all the Mennonite Altonau, Abram never forgot the armed raiders traversing colonies in Russia. Socially and culturally it developed a the village; dead bodies laid out on a farm yard; the murder broad range of institutions including schools, hospitals, old of his father in front of their house; villagers fleeing for age homes, a school for the speech and hearing impaired as their lives; the personal appearance of Nestor Makhno. well as an orphanage. A century of relative stability Little did he realize that this was the first of several major brought with it a strong sense of identity, deeply rooted in tragedies, which eventually destroyed his world, and most religion, language, and folk customs. When Abram Berg of the people he would learn to know, was born in 1912 there was no indication that his world The second wave of suffering for the people of Abram would come to a violent if protracted end. Berg's world began in 1927-28. In response of the famine The residents of Blumenort heard about two revolu- of 1921-22 the Bolsheviks inaugurated the so-called New tions in 1917. The first, which involved the abdication of Economic Policy which once more allowed private enter- the tsar and the advent of a provisional government in prise on a small scale. Peasant farmers, however, refused to February, had little impact upon the village. By contrast, sell their grain at the low prices offered by the government the Bolshevik Revolution in late October brought Red and so by 1928 it began to seize the grain directly, With Army units into the region by early 1918, Some heavily Stalin's consolidation of power and the inauguration of the armed soldiers were seizing livestock, food, personal valu- First Five Year Plan (1928) came the forced transformation ables as well as farming inventory. The reign of terror only of the agricultural economy. Collectivization, in theory at ended in April 1918, when under the terms of the Treaty least, meant control of the grain supply. In order to ensure Brest-Litovsk, German occupational troops entered the the implementation of this radical scheme, the party Ukraine. By November 1918 Germany's military collapse decided to generate class wars within the village. The poor in the west meant a withdrawal of troops from the Ukraine. were promised the goods of the rich, who were now In short order Blumenort and other villages became subject branded as the kulaks (the "tight-fisted ones"). By May to the attacks of marauding bands. Encouraged by German 1929 the kulak had been defined in law and procedures for officers, Mennonites formed a militia for self-protection his elimination put in place. These involved dispossession (Selbstschutz) which collapsed when confronted by the and confiscation, disenfranchisement, expulsion from the advancing Red Army in March 1919. For a time a partisan village and even exile to northern labor camps. In Abram army headed by the anarchist Nestor Makhno allied itself Berg's world relatively few kulaks are identified. His list with the Red conquerors, and utilized the uneasy alliance nevertheless reveals that the to terrorize the Molochna villages. His atrocities, at least in

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 definition of kulak was expanded to not only include the been sent. Like thousands of others who languished in the wealthy farmers but the religious leaders of the region. hundreds of camps around Karaganda, Abram Berg sought Peasants resisted collectivization by burning crops and to rebuild his life in his former place of exile. destroying livestock. This, combined with the seizure of grain by the state, generated a massive famine in the early Causes of Death According to Berg's List 1930s, which may have killed as many as ten million people. Collectivization was a brutal, relentless process and Natural causes 14 (including deaths in by 1936 ninety percent of all the farms were collectivized. prison or as a result of prison) Executed The third major crisis in Abram Berg's world begins in 21 Died in camps or Work Army 37 Shot or died 1936. The era of the "Great Terror" (1936-38) constituted in camps 4 Died in exile (early 30s) the final phase of Stalin's consolidation of power. 4 Died in 1941 exile 7 Deaths related to Commencing with an inner purge of the Communist Party, exile but unspecified 3 No information it became a nationwide search for the real and imagined 2 enemies of the state. In a sense the show trial (1937) of seventeen party members, accused of liaisons with Japan Total 92 and Germany, signaled the advent of mass arrests, ex- ecutions, and exiles. As Berg's personal experience illus- trates, the purge was particularly directed against every level of the intelligentsia, from the village teacher upwards. His list also suggests that German minority status may A Glossary of Terms Used by Abram Berg have contributed to the widespread arrest of men and women from every station in life. The "Great Terror" de- Article 58 stroyed the last vestiges of Russian Mennonite community This article refers to the Soviet Criminal Code of 1926. It by its dispersion or liquidation of leadership, civil and consisted of 140 articles. Article 58, with its fourteen religious, and ensured the elimination of all individual subsections, was the most extensively used article in the initiative in the organization and structure of the collective entire Criminal Code. Abram Berg specifically mentions; farm. 58.2—This section dealt with armed insurrection, es- The final crisis, which destroyed the world, which pecially with the purpose of secession from the USSR. It Abram Berg once knew, erupted shortly after he was re- came to be applied to any republic in the Union. Any sus- leased from the prison camp in 1940 and began life as an pected nationalist, the Ukrainian Berg not excluded, could exile in Kazakhstan. In response to the German invasion be sentenced to ten or even twenty-five years under this of Russia in 1941 the Supreme Soviet decreed the mass section. deportation of all Germans in the western USSR. Though 58.10—The section was concerned with "propaganda or some Mennonite villages in Chortitza and the Molochna agitation ... for the destruction, subverting or lessening of were overrun by the Nazis before deportation could begin, Soviet power... and the spreading, preparation or possession a large number of Mennonites nevertheless found of printed materials of such content." The notion of themselves in freight cars bound for areas like Kazakhstan, agitation was expanded to include conversations between the Altai territory or the regions around Novosibirsk and friends and even between husband and wife. Omsk. The disbursement destroyed the last vestiges of 58.11—Section 10 of Article 58 already implied that Mennonite community. The Germans, and the Mennonites any ideological non-conformity was the equivalent of sub- among them, were only released from their "special settle- version, While Section 11 dealt with conspiratorial orga- ments" late in 1955, on the condition they not return to the nizations, it was often interpreted in such a way that an regions from which they were deported. They had to reconstruct their lives in the regions to which they had

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 exchange of ideas or words between two individuals meant KGB (after 1953). the inauguration or even existence of an organization. Hence Abram Berg or some of his friends are sentenced Rehabilitation under sections 58,10 or 58.11, which might simply imply This term has both a general and a specific sense. In a that they carried on a dissenting conversation with each broader context it implies two decrees (17 September 1955; other, 13 December 1955) issued by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. The first granted amnesty to ASSR those charged with conspiring with the German occupation Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics. In the former forces. The second allowed freedom of movement to USSR there were some sixteen autonomous republics and Germans exiled to "special settlements." Berg usually uses five autonomous regions. the term in a specific sense: the individual, whether living or dead, is cleared of all Belomor Canal charges by a special court. The Baltic-White Sea canal which ends in the Karelian ASSR town of Belomorsk. It was largely built with slave Troika labor. In general this term refers to a team of three horses harnessed together. They were used to draw a large phaeton Dvoyka or a Russian sled in winter. The term was applied to three- A committee of two with extra-ordinary legal powers used man boards of the NKVD who were granted special powers by the NKVD in order to accelerate the court proceedings. to sentence suspected persons without trial. These boards were abolished in 1953. Gulag Generally designates the Soviet penal system under Stalin. Verband More specifically a Russian acronym for the Chief A reference to the Verband der Burger Hollandischer Administration of Corrective Labor Camps, Herkunft (Union of the Citizens of Dutch Lineage) organized by Mennonites in the Ukraine in 1922 to fa- Kombedy cilitate both reconstruction and emigration. Committees of the Poor {Komitety Bednoty) organized in the villages to force wealthy peasants to turn over their White Army grain. The term applied to the counter-revolutionary forces, which tried to overthrow Bolshevik power by forming several Melitopol Memorial Committee fronts. The resulting civil war lasted until 1921. The An organization emerging after glasnost in the city of Bolshevik forces, fighting under the red flag of the hammer Melitopol for the purpose of documenting the victims of and sickle, were simply referred to as the "Red Army." the Stalinist terror. With access to the NKVD files the committee managed to establish individual identities as Work Army well as the charges against them and the sentences A special organization separate from the gulag system imposed. Abram Berg received substantial information inaugurated shortly after the German invasion in 1941. The from this committee. relatively few Germans or Mennonites in the Red Army were discharged and placed in the Work Army. Many of NEP the men still remaining in the villages were also drafted, as A reference to the New Economic Policy launched by the were many single females. Later all women between fifteen Soviets in 1921, which released a portion of the socialist and forty-five were inducted and their children given to economy to private initiative. strangers. Meager rations, severe discipline, and difficult NKVD work contributed to a high mortality rate. Those who The common designation of the Soviet secret police survived remained under police supervision until 1954. between.1934-1943. It was subsequently known as the NKGB (1943-1946), the MGB (1946-1953) and the

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 The Victims-of Stalin's Reign of Terror During the 1930s and 1940s Compiled by Abram Berg 1. Berg (Barg), Helene J. (Mennonite) My sister was born against the Soviet government, he was shot in Melitopol on in Blumenort on 29 September 1903. She was arrested on 29 November 1937. On 11 November 1960 he was 25 June 1941, and taken to Melitopol, then transferred to rehabilitated by the Judicial Collegium for Criminal Affairs the city of Zaporozhye. Together with a large number of of the Ukraine Supreme Court. other German women under arrest she was forced to walk 4. Berg (Barg), Abram J. (Mennonite) I was born on 12 to Kharkov and then sent to prison in Ufa (Bashkir ASSR). April 1912 in Blumenort. I was arrested on 23 January 1936 On 1 December 1941, the supreme court of the Bashkir and brought to Dnepropetrovsk. Between 14-19 May 19361 ASSR sentenced her to ten years* imprisonment for was tried by a special section of the district court in criminal activity according to paragraphs 58-10 and 58-11. Dnepropetrovsk on charges of being a member of a She was then transported to the concentration camp Karlag Ukrainian-Bulgarian-German block of teachers at the in the Karaganda region, where she died of dysentery on 18 Pedagogical Institute in Melitopol. According to paragraphs August 1942. 58-2 and 58-11,1 was sentenced to four years' 2. Berg (Barg), Johann J. (Mennonite) My brother was imprisonment and a two-year loss of civil rights. I worked born in Blumenort on 18 September 1907. He was arrested as a clerk in the mechanical room of the prison basement, in 1936 together with the leader and workers of the butter Since I was a specialist in animal husbandry, I applied factory in Lichtenau (Svetlodolinsk). He was sentenced to to the prison administration for a transfer to an agricultural ten years' imprisonment by a special tribunal of the district camp. It was twice denied. Actually my sectional leader, a court in Melitopol according to paragraphs 58-2 and 58-10. party man, kept my applications because he did not want to In November 1936 he came to the concentration camp lose me. I finally petitioned the prison camp head in Karlag in the Karaganda region, Kazakhstan. I came to this Moscow and gave the letter to the driver of our prison camp in July 1936, and worked as a specialist in animal warden, who was having his service vehicle repaired in our husbandry at an experimental station, some twenty garage. He was good enough to mail my letter in the city. kilometers from "the capital" of the camp, the former Two weeks later I received special permission from the German village of Dolinka. Here, thanks to the help of a camp authorities and was sent to the agricultural camp learned biologist, I met my brother Hans. He was sent as a Karlag in Kazakhstan with the first group. As a soldier specialist to a butter factory in Dolinka (Schoenau) and accompanied me to the camp administration I chanced to worked there until July 1937. At this time the surveillance meet the head of the animal experimental station, Professor was very severe and a meeting was impossible. I Fortunatov, He knew me and the animal research I had nevertheless learned that in July 1937, brother Hans had done in the Rosovka region, then called Dnepropetrovsk, been sent to Pechora (Komi ASSR) in the north as a Thus, I was sent to the experimental animal station. "dangerous criminal." I very rarely received a letter from When my prison term expired on 23 January 1940,1 my brother who had to work as a logger. He soon became remained in the camp as an exile. On 13 July 19441, as a seriously ill (caries in his knee joint) and spent a long time German, was sent to Karaganda. Here I was to be handed in the hospital. Later he could work as a tailor. A cripple, he over to the Work Army of the Karaganda region for work in returned to his family living in exile in the Kustanai region, the coalmines. However, the agricultural department of the Kazakhstan. His wife Erna Berg (nee Neufeld) lay on her regional administrative committee arranged for me to work deathbed. He himself died on 22 April 1972. as the head of their animal husbandry section. I worked 3. Berg (Barg), Jakob J. (Mennonite) My brother was born there as an exile until the end of December 1955,1 was pen- in Blumenort on 29 October 1909. He was arrested in 1937 sioned on 12 April 1972.1 was rehabilitated by a plenum of and sent to Melitopol. On 10 November 1937 he was the Supreme Court of the USSR on 24 May 1965. sentenced to death in Melitopol by the dvoyka. Accused of 5. Berg, Peter J. (Mennonite) participating in a conspiracy My uncle was born in 1890 in Blumenort. He was arrested in 1937-38. His wife Susanne Berg, nee

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Teichrab (born in Blumenort on 7 November 1894), and 14. Berg, Kornelius J. (Mennonite) He was born in her son Gerhard Berg (born on 21 July 1920) were told that Blumenort in 1912, In September 1941 he was drafted into he had been sentenced with no right to receive mail. Both the Work Army and perished while serving in it. his wife and son died in the 1980s in Vancouver, Canada. 15. Bekker, Jakob J. (Mennonite) He was the husband of It is probable that Peter J. Berg was already shot in 1938. my cousin Tina. He was born in Schoensee on 21 6. Berg, Abram J. (Mennonite) He was born in Blumenort December 1910. He was arrested in 1937 and sentenced to in 1907 (?). During the early 1930s he served in the Red death for unsubstantiated counter-revolutionary activity by Army and lost his arm in an accident. He was nevertheless the NKVD troika of the Dnepropetrovsk region. On 23 drafted into the Work Army, where he died. November 1937, he was shot m Dnepropetrovsk, He was 7. Berg, Elisabeth (Lisbet) J. (Mennonite) My cousin was rehabilitated on 7 July 1960. born in Blumenort in 1905 (?). She was exiled to the 16. Boschmann, Jakob D. (Mennonite) Born in Rosenort, Kustanai region of Kazakhstan in 1941. During the first district of Melitopol, Ukraine. He was arrested by the winter (1941-42) she was found on the steppe, starved or NKVD on 5 August 1937. The troika of the regional frozen to death. NKVD (Ordzhonikidze or Vladikavkas) sentenced him to 8. Berg, Jakob J. (Mennonite) He and our father were death and he was shot on 22 August 1937. The charges read cousins. He was born in Blumenort in 1890 (?). He was that he was an active member of a counter-revolutionary arrested in 1934. He was accused of sabotage because he group in the Dolinovka estate. He was rehabilitated by a refused to join the collective and allow his blacksmith shop decree of the Stavropol district court on 14 October 1954. to be nationalized, He died in a. concentration camp of the 17. Braun, Maria J. and her twin sister gulag. 18. Braun, Margarethe J. (Mennonite) The twin sisters 9. Berg, Anna, nee Pauls (Mennonite) The wife of Jakob J. were the daughters of Johann Braun, a haulage contractor Berg. She died in 1941-42 during the first winter of exile. well known in our region. Before the revolution of 1917 he She and her child starved or froze to death. built the Fyodorovka Volnovacha railway embankment. I 10. Berg, Johann J. (Mennonite) Born in Blumenort and was unable to determine where this family came from, but the brother of Jakob J, Berg. He was arrested in 1937-38, since 1917 they lived in Blumenort. His wife was paralyzed He was either shot or perished in a concentration camp. for many years and was confined to a reclining chair. His 11. Berg, Isaak I. (Mennonite) In Blumenort, where he was oldest daughter Anna was the talented chef of an eating born, and in the neighboring villages he was known as the establishment in Blumenort. The twin sisters spoke flawless village philosopher. Because he was very poor he was German, French, and Russian. All the inhabitants of selected as head of the Kombedy. He had little influence Blumenort were deported to Kazakhstan in September upon the affairs of the village, even though it was said of 1941., and the twins died of starvation in the winter of him: "Here comes Mr. Isaak with the law book in his hands 1941-42. and all the farmers shout: 'He is taking our land.'" During 19. Beuel, Alexander J. (Mennonite) He was born in the expulsion in September 1941, he starved to death on Ohrloff. In Melitopol he was the assistant director of the the train and was buried in a ditch near the track, department for correspondence courses at the Pedagogical 12. The wife of Isaak Berg was ill and died at home in Institute. As one of the chief defendants in the trial of the Blumenort. teachers of the Melitopol Institute, he was sentenced to ten 13. Berg, Johann (Hans) J. (Mennonite) He was born in years' imprisonment by a special tribunal of the district Blumenort around 1907. In September 1941 he was drafted court in Dnepropetrovsk on 14-19 May 1936 (paragraphs into the Work Army and perished while serving in it. 58-2 and 58-11, armed insurrection). He came to the Karlag camp in the Karaganda region and died in the Spasski section of the camp in 1941, where he was also buried. He was rehabilitated in 1959.

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 20. Cornies, Philipp D. (Mennonite) He was born in the A resident of Rosenort whose name appears on the list village of Spat, Crimea, on 25 September 1885. He was the of the Melitopol Memorial Committee. great-grandson of the famous Johann J. Cornies, who 24. Dino, Johann E., Jr. played an important role in the history of the Mennonites in A resident of Rosenort whose name appears on the list South Russia. Philipp Cornies and his siblings were taken of the Melitopol Memorial Committee. in by relatives because of the extreme poverty of his 25. Enns, Nikolai I. (Mennonite) He was born in Kleefeld father's family. Philipp came to his aunt in Ohrloff where on 3 September 1912 and became a teacher in Tiegerweide. he attended the Ohrloff Central School. Then he graduated He was drafted into the Work Army on 5 September 1941 from the Teacher's College in Halbstadt and then worked as and sent to the concentration camp Solikamsk in the a village school teacher in the Orenburg region. Later he Molotov (Vyatka) region. He was arrested on 23 September moved to Rosenort near Ohrloff where he inspired a love 1943 and, according to paragraphs 58-10 and 58-11 of the for literature, music, and song in his students. criminal code, was sentenced to imprisonment by a special During the 1920s, Philipp Cornies belonged to the tribunal of the NKVD on 30 October 1943. He was sent to executive committee of a German agricultural union as well the death camp Ivdely where he died on 21 March 1944, as an association for animal husbandry. He was arrested in according to a death certificate issued in the city of Ivdely, 1934 and his former activity in the promotion of Sverdlovsk region, on 14 May 1977. The exact cause of agriculture, culture, education and so forth was portrayed as death was not specified, though it is likely that he was shot. counter-revolutionary work. He was sentenced to ten years 26. Epp, Johann G. (Mennonite) My father-in-law was born in prison, and sent to the Komi ASSR in the far north. in Petershagen on 21 August 1893. He was drafted into the There he was employed as the head of the animal Work Army on 3 September 1941, and died of dysentery husbandry section. When his term ended he was sentenced while in the Work Army on 7 November 1941, in the city to another ten years, ostensibly for counter-revolutionary of Ivdely, Sverdlovsk region. activities, when the only reason was the need of a good 27. Fast, Jakob P. (Mennonite) My uncle was born in agricultural specialist. Blumenort on 14 September 1868. He was declared a kulak After twenty years (1954) and following Stalin's death, in 1931, expelled and exiled to the city of Nizhni-Tagil Philipp Cornies moved to Aryk-Balyk in the Kokchetav (near Sverdlovsk) in the Urals, He died of typhus during region of Kazakhstan, to the home of his sister Gertrude the night of 31 December 1931. Warkentin (nee Cornies) and her son Johann and daughter 28. Fast, Sarah G. (nee Wiens) My aunt was born in Maria. His wife had died many years earlier. He died on 17 Blumenort on 23 September 1870. She was exiled with the February 1962, at the age of seventy-seven in the home of family of Jakob Past and died of pneumonia in Nizhni- his sister then living in the city of Shchuchinsk, in the Tagil on 27 July 1931. Kokchetav region in Kazakhstan. 29. Fast, Abram J. (Mennonite) My cousin was born in 21. Duck, David A, (Mennonite) He was born in Altonau on Blumenort on 11 February 1907, He was expelled together 28 July 1906. Arrested in Dshankoi, Crimea, on 5 with his family in July 1931, and exiled to Nizhni-Tagil in November 1937, on charges of anti-Soviet activity, he was the Urals. Accused of espionage and sabotage, he was sentenced to ten years' imprisonment on 26 November arrested in 1937 and sentenced to ten years in prison. He 1937, by the NKVD troika of the Crimea ASSR. The froze to death in a concentration camp in the Perm region Melitopol Memorial Committee reports that he died of (northwest of Sverdlovsk) on 13 December 1943. He was dysentery on 2 May 1938 in a concentration camp in the rehabilitated in Sverdlovsk during the 1960s. Karelian ASSR. 30. Fast, Helene J. (Mennonite) My cousin was born in 22. Dino, Eduard J., Sn. Blumenort on 29 November 1908, She and her parents A resident of Rosenort whose name appears on the list were exiled to Nizhni-Tagil in July 1931. On 29 October of the Melitopol Memorial Committee. 1938, she was tried in Sverdlovsk on charges of spying for Germany, sentenced to death and shot. 23. Dino, Heinrich E., Jr.

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Abram's List 33 too was arrested in connection with this group on 23 31. Fast, Jakob J. (Mennonite) My cousin was born in January 1936. The trial was conducted by a special section Blumenort on 7 January 1912. He and his family were of the Dnepropetrovsk district court. Paul Friesen was exiled to Nizhni-Tagil in July 1931. Like his sister Helene, found guilty under paragraphs 58-2 and 58-11, and he was tried in Sverdlovsk, sentenced to death and shot. sentenced to eight years in tabor camp. He was sent to the 32. Fast, Agatha J. (Mennonite) My cousin was born on 31 concentration camp Karlag in the Karaganda region and August 1914 in Blumenort. She and her family were exiled worked at an agricultural experiment station as artistic to Nizhni-Tagil in July 1931. Severe conditions soon specialist. Friesen was only released in early 1946. For a caused her to become ill and [local] doctors recommended time he remained in exile in the agricultural region of immediate release from exile and a return to her former Osakarovka. During this time we often visited with him and homeland with its milder climate. The NKVD refused and, his wife and daughter. at the age of nineteen, she died in exile of kidney infection Following Stalin's death they moved to the city of and pneumonia on 1 August 1934. Karaganda. There he was employed in the Palace of Cul- 33. Friesen, David J. (Mennonite) He was born in ture and headed the art and music instruction for people of Blumenort in 1886. The family owned a large farm. He all ages. This teaching took place during people's leisure studied in Stuttgart in 1914 and graduated from a school time (after work, on holidays, or during vacation). Paul for the construction of agricultural machinery. He was Friesen's teaching was deeply appreciated by the general active in Blumenort as a NEP man. He owned an American population. A large number of students, officials, and "Fordson" tractor and the so-called steam threshing friends celebrated his ninetieth birthday on 23 July 1978, machine, originally driven by a locomobile and later by the He suffered an unexpected hemorrhage on 9 August 1978 Fordson tractor. My brother Hans Berg was the only and a second one on 28 August. I helped look after him tractorist in Blumenort at that time. David Friesen was every morning and evening. He died in my arms on 31 already arrested in 1929, but soon returned. Somewhat later August 1978, in the presence of his wife, Vera, and his he worked with several organizations in Halbstadt, but then daughter Irene. His funeral, attended by a large number of vanished without a trace. Various rumors circulated. He his former pupils, was held on 3 September 1978,1 led the was probably shot in Melitopol, The rest of the family (son funeral service at the request of his wife and daughter and Jakob and his two unmarried sisters) died soon afterwards. gave the farewell address at the cemetery, Pavel Petrovich was beloved by a great variety of people in the city and 34. Friesen, Paul P. countryside. His generosity was well known, Born on 23 June 1888 in Ohrloff, he was my teacher in the Ohrloff Central School. He was the son of the well-known 35. Gossen, Johann J. Mennonite historian Peter M. Friesen. Paul studied Born in Blumstein around 1887. Around 1935 he was the privately with the renowned artist K. F. Iuon, and at the nonpartisan vice chairperson of the Halbstadt (Molochansk) Charkov and Moscow art academies. During 1914-18 he Administrative Committee. Around 20 May 1936,1 and was at the Caucasian front and headed the activities of the Paul Janzen (the son of the teacher at the Hearing and regional Red Cross in the army commanded by Grand Speech Impaired School in Tiege, Heinrich Janzen), were Duke Nikolai, whom he knew personally. After 1918 he sitting on our bunks in a very large cell in the lived in Ohrloff and gave private painting and violin Dnepropetrovsk prison discussing our future. The cell door lessons. Between 1926-29 he taught Russian language and opened with a loud clang and a guard stepped in and said: literature as well as drawing in the Ohrloff Central School "In a few minutes I'm bringing you a prisoner from death and also led the music group in the drama program. row who has just had his sentence commuted to ten years in Subsequently (1929-35) he taught music and art in the prison. He is very weak and psychologically disturbed. Melitopol Pedagogical Institute. He, together with a Please prepare a bunk for him so he can lie down. Calm number of the other teachers at the institute (Russians, him and see if you can get him under control." Ukrainians, Bulgarians, and Germans), were arrested at the A large, broad-shouldered, pale, white-haired man en- end of 1935.1 tered. It was Johann Gossen from Blumstein. I knew him well and he recognized me. We helped him lie down on the bunk. He closed his eyes, smiled and said quietly: "Many thanks to our state chief Kalinin who pardoned

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 me." Then he fell asleep. ten year middle school. We were close friends since the Many years later I learned that he was sent to the 1920s and carried on a regular correspondence. At the end Karlag camp (Karaganda region). He was posted as a of 1935 Paul, his brother Dima and his uncle Paul Friesen watchman at the warehouse but died of a heart attack a year were arrested and brought to Dnepropetrovsk. I was or a year and a half later. arrested on 23 January 1936, A trial began on 14 May 1936, and involved a Russian-Bulgarian-German nationalistic 36. Granz, Anna (Lutheran) block of teachers from the Melitopol Institute. A special She was born in Blumenort in 1909. In September 1941 she tribunal of the regional court in Dnepropetrovsk sentenced was deported from Blumenort and exiled to the region of Paul Janzen to ten years' imprisonment and a five-year loss Kustanai, Kazakhstan. She died of starvation during the of civil rights according to paragraphs 58-2 and 58-11. Paul first winter of 1941-42. Janzen was sent to a northern horror camp, where he died 37. Granz, Peter (Lutheran) defending his bread ration against regular gangsters. He was born in Blumenort in 1914, He was drafted into 43. Janzen, Dima (Dmitri) H. (Mennonite) Born in Tiege he the Work Army in 1941 and died there. was the older brother of Paul Janzen, and a minister in Tiege. He was arrested in the affair of the Melitopol 38. Harder, David J. (Mennonite) Born in Friedensruh, Pedagogical Institute in 1935 and brought to Zaporozhye region, on 30 November 1911. He was arrested Dnepropetrovsk, where he received a six-year sentence. in Friedensruh by the NKVD on 30 October 1937. On 17 After his release he came to Michalovka in Karaganda as a November 1937 he was sentenced to death by the Peoples minister. Here he experienced considerable difficulty with Commissar of the USSR NKVD on unsubstantiated his hearing aid. One day he misjudged the loud horn of an charges of circulating counter-revolutionary, fascist oncoming truck and jumped in the wrong direction into the propaganda among German youth. He was shot in the city path of the vehicle, and was crushed. of Melitopol on 30 November 1937, and later rehabilitated. 44. Janzen, Johann J. (Mennonite) The son of a teacher, 39. Horn, Jakob M. (Lutheran) Born in Blumenort. He was Johann was born in Ohrloff in 1893. He received arrested at the beginning of the war in June of 1941. He pedagogical training, then turned to art. He studied was exiled and died in a concentration camp. He was the privately with the renowned artist K.F. Iuon, then at the first chairman of the collective "Bolshevik!." Moscow Art School (today the Art Academy). Together 40. Horn, Jakob J. (Lutheran) with his friend Paul Friesen he was a medic at the Born in Blumenort in 1920. He was drafted into the Caucasian front between 1914-18. After 1918 he was first a Work Army in September 1941 and died there. teacher then director of the Ohrloff Central School. He 41. Horn, Peter J. (Lutheran) taught chemistry, physics, and mechanics. At the same Born in Blumenort in 1922. He was drafted into the time, he was a teacher of gymnastics. In the early 1930s he Work Army in September 1941 and died there. taught in Prischib near Halbstadt. Around 1934 he was arrested for political activity and sentenced to five years, 42. Janzen, Paul H. (Mennonite) Paul was born in which he spent at the infamous Belomor Canal construction Tiege/Ohrloff in 1911, His father, Heinrich Janzen, was a site. After his release he was arrested and sentenced a sec- teacher at the Tiege School for the Hearing and Speech ond time. Eventually he came to the Caucasus and joined Impaired. Paul learned French from his mother. He was a his family in the city of Prochladny in the Kabardin-Balkar good friend of his uncle, the musician and artist Paul ASSR. For a time he worked in the local museum, became Petrovich Friesen. Paul played the flute, his sister Irene the ill with cancer and died during the latter 1960s. piano and his uncle Paul the violin. We central school students often gathered at the Heinrich Janzen's to listen to 45, Janzen, Nikolai J. (Mennonite) these concerts. After central school Paul studied zoology at Born in Ohrloff in 1891, the brother of Johann J. the Pedagogical Institute in Melitopol. Following his Janzen, He was an outstanding specialist when it came to graduation around 1933 Paul got a position in the nature preserve Askania-Nova as well as a teaching position in a

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 automobiles and agricultural machinery. Later he taught nian NKVD for the Dnepropetrovsk region sentenced him physics and mechanics at the technical institute in Prischib. to death on unsubstantiated charges of participating in a Around 1937 he was arrested and exiled. There were German counter-revolutionary insurgency. He was shot in rumors that he had been shot, the city of Melitopol on 28 October 1938. 46. Nass, Gustav H. (Catholic) He was born in one of the 53. Neufeld, Wilhelm W. (Mennonite) My cousin was born Baltic republics. Together with his father and brother he in Liebenau on 16 December 1900. He was ostensibly purchased a multi-story windmill (Hollander) in arrested in 1938 and sentenced to five years' imprisonment. Blumenort, which was sold to a Ukrainian around 1930. He died in the region of Akmolinsk (Zelinograd), Gustav then became the business manager of the Ohrloff Kazakhstan, on 27 May 1944. hospital. He was arrested in 1937 and shot in Melitopol, 54. Neufeld, Johann W. (Mennonite) My cousin was born in Liebenau on 23 December 1902. He was arrested in 1937. 47. Nass, Viktor G. (Catholic) The troika of the Ukrainian NKVD for Dnepropetrovsk Born in Blumenort in 1914 as the son of the above- sentenced him to death on unsubstantiated charges of mentioned Gustav. He was arrested in 1937-38, exiled and participating in the distribution of counter-revolutionary died in a concentration camp. fascist propaganda on 27 October 1937. He was shot on 23 48. Neufeld, Johann W. (Mennonite) November 1937 in Dnepropetrovsk, and rehabilitated on 23 Born in Blumenort. He was drafted into the Work Army October 1965. in September 1941 and died there. 55. Neufeld, Gerhard W. (Mennonite) My cousin was born 49. Neufeld, Margaretha J. (Mennonite) Born in in Liebenau on 16 September 1904. He was probably Blumenort, arrested and died in a concentration camp. arrested in 1938 and died in a concentration camp in May 1943. 50. Neufeld, Wilhelm P. (Mennonite) My uncle who was born in Liebenau on 11 September 1873. He was arrested 56. Neufeld, Abram W. (Mennonite) My cousin was born in in 1937. On the basis of unsubstantiated charges that he Liebenau on 23 March 1907. He was arrested during 1937- actively spread propaganda for fascist Germany, he was 38 and sentenced to ten years' imprisonment. He died in tried by the troika of the Ukrainian NKVD for the exile at the Lenger concentration camp in Kazakhstan on 2 Dnepropetrovsk region on 3 September 1937, He was June 1948. sentenced to death and shot in Melitopol on 14 September 57. Neufeld, Maria P. (Mennonite) The wife of Abram 1937. Neufeld, Maria was born in Schoensee on 26 October 1911. She was arrested on 28 June 1941. On 17 October 1942 a 57. Neufeld, Peter W. special NKVD tribunal of the USSR sentenced her to ten My cousin who was born in Blumenort on 21 June 1897. years in concentration camp on unsubstantiated charges of He was arrested in Memrik, Ukraine, on 16 November participating in anti-Soviet agitation. She was in the NKVD 1934. He was sentenced to ten years' imprisonment in May concentration camp Ivdely (Sverdlovsk region). The 1935 by a special tribunal of the NKVD in Stalino presidium of the Zaporozhye regional court rehabilitated (Ukraine). He was successively sent to concentration her on 31 March 1962, She now lives in Neuwied, camps in Karelia, Murmansk, and Karlag (Karaganda). He Germany. remained under arrest until October 1946. Accompanied by 55, Neufeld, Helene W. (Mennonite) My cousin was born in a soldier he was brought to the city of Karaganda. Then he Liebenau on 8 February 1912. She was arrested on 25 June was exiled to the ore mine Kairakty. His family was 1941 and brought to a Melitopol prison. On 10 August allowed to join him only on 28 December 1948. His family 1941 she was transferred to a prison in Zaporozhye, then stayed with him in exile until 1956, when they moved to marched with others (on foot) to Kharkov where they lived the region of Kustanai where he died of cancer in 1975. outside until 30 August 1941. Between 6-27 September 52. Neufeld, Jakob W. (Mennonite) 1941, she was taken by train to Ufa, where she remained in My cousin was born in Blumenort on 16 May 1899. prison from 27 September 1941 to 18 July 1942. She He was arrested in Schoensee. The troika of the Ukrai-

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 was then a prisoner in Dolinka (Karlag) from 18 July 1942 small apartment on the outskirts of the city. Gredel until March 1943. Until then Helene Berg had shared her managed to travel to Crimea but soon after succumbed to fate. She was again imprisoned in Ufa from March 1943 asthma. Her Polish friend finally wrote me that her until 3 August 1943. On 3 August 1943 she was sentenced condition steadily worsened and that she died during to death and kept in solitary confinement on death row until emergency surgery. 23 August 1943, when the death sentence was commuted. 62. Nickel, Viktor P. (Mennonite) The son of elder Peter She remained in the Ufa prison from 23 August until Nickel and brother of Margaretha, Viktor was born in September 1943. She was then sent to a work camp in Ufa Ohrloff in 1913. He worked as an interpreter in the Donetz from September 1943 to February 1949, From 27 February Basin for a considerable length of time. Arrested in Stalino 1949 until her release on 25 June 1951 she was exiled to (Ukraine) in 1935, he was sentenced by the NKVD troika, Inta-Abez in the Komi ASSR. After her release she was en- exiled and died in a concentration camp. Many attempts to route until 21 July 1951—three days from Abez to Inta; find a trace of Viktor proved fruitless. three days to Kirov; three days to Sverdlovsk; three days to 63. Nickel, Viktor (Mennonite) He was born in Tiege in Petropavlovsk; one week to Karaganda, where she arrived 1913. His father was usually known as "Verband Nickel." at Kairakte accompanied by two soldiers. She remained His cousin Viktor P. Nickel (the son of Elder Nickel) was under guard until 10 April 1956. usually called "Viktor the tall" because of his height, while Helene Neufeld then went to live with her brother and he, the son of "Verband Nickel", was small of stature, and his family in the district center Komsomlez in the Kustanai usually known as "Viktor the short," The four of us— region. After the death of her brother Peter on 14 myself, the two Viktors, and Paul Janzen—worked in the September 1977, Helene, her sister-in-law Justina Neufeld Donetz Basin as interpreters. When I was already in the and her daughter Helena moved to Germany. They live in concentration camp Karlag, I received a postcard from Neuwied, "Viktor the short" in which he informed me he had been 59. Neufeld, Heinrich J. (Mennonite) He was born in arrested and sentenced to ten years' imprisonment. It ended Liebenau on 21 December 1908. He was arrested in 1937 with the phrase "Good bye." The NKVD arrested him in and sentenced to death on 27 March 1938 by the Peoples Sverdlovsk in 1938. He died in the concentration camp. 1 Commissar of the NKVD and the state prosecutor on learned all this from his mother in Melitopol in January charges of belonging to a counter-revolutionary terrorist 1941. organization. He was shot in the city of Melitopol on 15 64. Penner, Jakob G. (Mennonite) He was born in April 1938, and rehabilitated on 16 January 1989. Kuruschan near Rosenort in 1912, the stepson of the deaf- 60. Nickel, Peter P. (Mennonite) Born in Ohrloff, he was mute beekeeper Samuel Dunyevski, who had attended the the elder of the Ohrloff Mennonite Church and a teacher at School for the Hearing and Speech Impaired in Tiege. the Ohrloff Central School. He was forced to leave Ohrloff Jakob Penner completed the Ohrloff Central School, then and together with his family, daughter Gredel and son spent some time studying in a German technical institute. Victor, settled in the city of Stalino (Ukraine). He was He was drafted into the Red Front District (Waldheim) arrested in 1934, exiled, and subsequently died in a Work Army on 5 August 1941. Thanks to his inventive- concentration camp. ness and diligence he survived his service in this terrible 61. Nickel, Margaretha (Gredel) P. (Mennonite) She as organization. He continued his exile after the war, working born in Ohrloff in 1910 as the daughter of Peter Nickel, the for a pulp and paper enterprise in Solikamsk (Urals) as an elder of the Ohrloff Mennonite Church. She was arrested in engineer. After his exile ended in 1956, he and his family the city of Stalino (Ukraine) in 1937. The NKVD troika moved to (he city of Prochladny in the Kabardin-Balkar sentenced her to ten years' imprisonment. She came to a ASSR. Our beloved high school teacher Johann J. Janzen concentration camp on the Pechora River in the far north, lived there as well. Jakob's wife died from a severe throat where she worked in the prison hospital. After Stalin's and lung ailment contracted during insecticide spraying death she came to Kiev with a Polish fellow prisoner operations in the large garden enterprise where named Janina. Here Maria Mirau, a former school friend, helped them find a

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Abram's List 37 she worked. They had two sons and a daughter. Jakob Kramatorski machine factory. While at school he already Penner died of a hemorrhage on 28 November 1989. demonstrated an extraordinary talent for design. His sister 65. Pankratz, Franz J- (Mennonite) He was born in the Lydia and brother Sieghard also came to Kramatorsk.. . . village of Prangenau, Halbstadt volost. During the 1920s he Hans Pankratz arrived at our house in Blumenort in the was a notable economist, businessman and farmer in the spring of 1934. He had to flee since agents were waiting for village of Tiege, Halbstadt volost. He owned a Fordson him when he came home from work. ... He had collected tractor. In the fall of 1929 he and his family (wife, one hundred rubles from a good Russian friend for tuning daughter, and two sons) left for Moscow with other his piano . . . and left for Blumenort. He hoped to borrow Mennonites in order to initiate emigration to Canada. He money from his uncle Johann Pankratz, who was a village returned to Tiege late in 1930 and in September 1933 went teacher. We met secretly near the river but, since his uncle to Kramatorsk. Here he was arrested, sentenced to five had many children, he could not lend him anything. We years and sent to Vorkuta, north of Petropavlovsk, This is decided he should go to the Caucasus and hide with friends information according to his son Sieghard. and acquaintances. My sister Lena and I both gave him He returned home after five years but was deprived of some money. At night we walked to the Lichtenau his civil rights for another five years. He lived in (Svetlodinsk) railway station and I bought him a ticket to Krasnodar-Paschkova, and subsequently moved to Novo- the Caucasus. And so my dear friend left—forever as it Pavlovka. There he was imprisoned for another five years. turned out. In the letter she wrote to me, his daughter Lydia did not Hans got off at a railway station near Kemero and went know the exact year Franz was sent to the peninsula Belo- to the residence of female acquaintances. Here he was Ica and after his release he walked the 1,000 kilometers somehow betrayed, arrested and after severe torture back to his home. He did not want to wait until the ships brought to Stalino (Ukraine) as a prisoner. He was given a sailed again and feared that he might be re-arrested. Since ten-year sentence and sent to a northern camp in Karelia. the railway stations were forty-five kilometers apart, he Before the war broke out in 1941, several women friends in walked that distance each day and slept in the station to Melitopol, whose husbands had returned from Karelia, avoid freezing to death. He arrived home very ill, with informed me of Hans' death. He had forgotten his design severe rheumatic pain in all his joints. He died in Novo- drawings in the barracks and as a result had been beaten to Pavlovka, Kirgizia, on 22 March 1961. death by the camp guards. His relatives were informed that I remember so well how, when I was a prisoner in the he had been shot seeking to escape. concentration camp Karlag in 1937,1 chanced to find pa- His sister Lydia indicated that she received a photo- pers in the warehouse which were written by my acquain- graph from him dated 17 November 1936. She writes: "His tance Franz Pankratz, the father of my friend Hans fiancée Olga Schulz went to him in order to get married. Pankratz. I asked about him and it turned out he was well Otherwise we know nothing of our dear Hans." known on the farm. Other than that they only knew he had 67. Rabbe, Johann F. (Lutheran) He was the oldest man in been sent north with a prison transport. Blumenort and a talented wheelwright and carriage builder. He was possibly murdered or died in other circumstances. 66. Pankratz, Johann (Hans) F. (Mennonite) Johann was born in Eugenfeld, district of Zaporozhye, during 68. Rabbe, Jakob J. (Lutheran) The son of Johann Rabbe, December 1911. Not long after he and his family moved to he was born in Blumenort. He was a good carpenter and Tiege. I befriended him at the home of my Blumenort construction worker. He was arrested as an enemy of the friend Rudi Klassen. We two entered the fourth grade of people in 1937, sentenced and shot to death. the Ohrloff Central School in 1925 and graduated in 1929. 69. Rabbe, Friedrich (Fritz) J. (Lutheran) The son of This was a particularly happy time for me and Hans Johann Rabbe, he was born in Blumenort, He was an Pankratz. His family was resettled to the village of excellent carpenter and coffin maker. Our grandmother, Neudorf. From there Hans occasionally came to Halbstadt Helene Fast, provided him with the boards for her own to work. When his family moved to Kramatorsk (Ukraine) coffin some seventeen years before her death (4 April he began to work full-time, When his family came to this 1933), He was arrested, sentenced, industrial city he managed to get a job as a design engineer in the large

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 and died in a concentration camp. death on 10 November 1937 by the NKVD on unsub- 70. Regier, Abram J. (Mennonite) My cousin was born in stantiated charges of participating in a German counter- Blumenort in 1890, He served in the White Army during revolutionary terrorist organization. He was shot in the Civil War. He returned home in 1920 and lived with his Melitopol together with my brother Jakob Berg on 29 mother, Tina (nee Fast), and sister Maria on his farm. He November 1937. He was rehabilitated on 11 November married, continued farming, and was granted sixteen 1960. hectares of land. In the early 1930s his family joined the 75. Sawatzky, Isaak J. (Mennonite) He was born in collective and he became a manager. Together with his Gnadenheim in 1913. He was the older brother of Jakob J. family and his wife, Susanna, he had to leave his farmstead Sawatzky. The family had moved to Blumenort where he (it was used as the site for the collective cow barn) and was arrested and taken to Dnepropetrovsk, He was moved into a small house. At the beginning of the war he sentenced to death by the NKVD troika of the region on 20 was drafted into the Work Army where he died, though it is September 1938, on unsubstantiated charges of also possible that he was shot. participating in a German counter-revolutionary terrorist 71. Regier, Johann (Hans) J. (Mennonite) My cousin was organization. He was shot in Melitopol on 25 September born in Blumenort in 1892. He was forcibly drafted into the 1938, and rehabilitated on 24 September 1960. Red Army. His brother, Abram, often advised him to join 76. Sawatzky, Nikolai J. (Mennonite) He was born in the White Army. Johann eventually returned home. I still Gnadenheim in 1918. In 1938, when he was in the ninth remember the day when Johann Regier and Helene (Lena) grade in the Alexanderkrone School, he was arrested and Teichgrab were married. Lena was the older sister of Anna taken to Dnepropetrovsk. He was sentenced to four years* J. Teichgrab, who later married the Blumenort village imprisonment and two years' loss of civil rights on 4 teacher Rempel. This Anna once wrote me: "After Johann's February 1938, by a special tribunal of the district court in death I once visited my sister Lena in Krasnovodsk. Dnepropetrovsk, He was charged with counter- Volodya Peer, the son of my sister Susanna, was in revolutionary agitation. He perished in 1939 at the age of Karaganda. At that time I learned that Hans Regier had twenty-one in one of the most horrible Stalinist spent ten years in a northern concentration camp. As he concentration camps, Magadan, in northern Siberia returned to the village where his wife and children lived, he (Tschutotka). He was rehabilitated on 9 December 1966. collapsed and died on the street," Hans Regier, like his 77. Sudermann, Jakob J. (Mennonite) He was born in brother Abram, was an exemplary family man. He worked Blumenort on 18 December 1905. His wife, born on 14 as a specialist in butter factories for a long time, including July 1905, was the daughter of Jakob Fast in Blumenort. the village of Lichtenau. When her parents and siblings were exiled to the Urals, 72. Rempel, Jakob (Mennonite) Maria remained at the Sudermann's as Jakob's wife. Life at the Sudermann's was very difficult. Jakob was arrested on 73. Rempel, Kornelius (Mennonite) 22 December 1937 and imprisoned in Melitopol (1937). 74. Sawatzky, Jakob J. (Mennonite) He was born in He, together with other inhabitants of Blumenort and other Gnadenheim in 1915. When I left Blumenort in 1934, Mennonite villages, was condemned to death by the dvoyka where I had worked in animal husbandry since 10 in Melitopol and summarily shot. He was accused of December 1932, and went to the cattle breeding station participating in a German counter-revolutionary Rosovka in the Dnepropetrovsk region, Jakob Sawatzky organization. came to Blumenort. His mother and two brothers 78. Sudermann, Peter J. (Mennonite) He was born in accompanied him. I often returned from Rosovka to visit Blumenort in 1907. In 1934 he was drafted into the Work my mother, sisters and brother Jakob in Blumenort, and Army, Because of these incredibly hard conditions he also visited with Jakob Sawatzky. When my brother Jakob, became physically and mentally ill. He died in hospital in who worked as a bookkeeper at the Ohrloff Hospital, was 1934. arrested in November 1937, they also took our friend Jakob Sawatzky into custody and brought him to Melitopol. He 79. Sudermann, Daniel J. (Mennonite) was sentenced to He was born in Blumenort in 1910. During the early

AHSGR Journal/Winter 3994 Abram's List 39 1930s he worked for a German firm in the Danubian Court on 26 July 1961, since there was absolutely no region. He then moved to the Stavropol district. At this evidence of a crime. time he was already married to a German woman who died 84. Teichgrab, Heinrich J. (Mennonite) The brother of in 1980. He had a son, Eduard J. Sudermann, who lived in Jakob Teichgrab, Heinrich was born in Blumenort in 1912. the city of Kislovodsk. Daniel was arrested in Stavropol in He was arrested in 1938 in Blumenort and died in a 1937, accused of counter-revolutionary agitation and concentration camp. sentenced to death. He was shot in the city of Pyatigorsk, 85. Teichgrab, Gerhard (Egor) J. (Mennonite) Born in but later rehabilitated. Blumenort in 1914, he was the brother of J.J. and H.J. 80. Sudermann, Johann J. (Mennonite) He was born in Teichgrab. He was arrested in 1938, sentenced and exiled. December of 1911 or 1912. He and I completed the fourth He died in a concentration camp. grade of the Ohrloff Central School. Later he went to 86. Teichgrab, Jakob (Mennonite) He was approximately Odessa to study in a German school for building and as old as his sister Susanne Berg (nee Teichgrab) who was design. He subsequently became ill and remained in born in Blumenort in 1892. She was the wife of my uncle Blumenort for a considerable period of time. He was Peter Berg. Jakob Teichgrab worked as a horse specialist in arrested in Alma-Ata in 1937, and accused of anti-Soviet the Blumenort collective. He was arrested during 1937-38, agitation and spreading malicious rumors. An NKVD tried and exiled. He died in a concentration camp. commission sentenced him to death by firing squad. An NKVD troika commuted this to ten years in concentration 87. Teichgrab, Nikolai N. (Mennonite) camp. On 9 April 1942 he died in the Sorokolage camp, He was the husband of my cousin Katherine (Katja) which was located on the Onega branch of the railway. He Berg. He was born in Blumenort prior to 1900. His large was buried in a mass grave near the city of Onega and later home was burnt to the ground by the Machnovzi in rehabilitated. 1919. He was tried, exiled, and died in a concentration 81. Sudermann, Kornelius (Mennonite) He was born in camp. Blumenort and arrested in 1937-38. He perished in a 88. Unruh, Peter P. (Mennonite) He was born in Blumenort concentration camp. He was arrested together with the in 1913. Drafted into the Work Army in September 1941, husband of my oldest cousin Katharina Berg, Nikolai he was eventually exiled and perished in the concentration Teichgrab, camp. 82. Teichgrab, Jakob J. (Mennonite) He was born in 89. Wiens, Franz (Mennonite) Blumenort on 5 February 1908. . . . For some years he was He was born in 1908 and lived in Blumenort. ... He was a a brigade leader in the Blumenort collective. He was person of sterling character and a good friend of the teacher arrested in 1938. On 22 September 1938, he was sentenced Sawatzky and my brother Jakob. All three were shot on 29 to death by an NKVD troika. He was charged with November 1937. belonging to a fascist terrorist organization, On 5 October 90. Wiebe, David (Mennonite) He was a resident of 1938 (at the age of thirty) he was shot in the city of Blumenort. In September 1941 he was drafted into the Zaporozhye, but later rehabilitated. Work Army and eventually exiled. He died in the 83. Teichgrab, Margarethe (Gredel) J. My cousin, nee concentration camp. Berg, was born in Blumenort in 1909. Her husband was 91. Wiebe, Jakob (Mennonite) He was born in Lichtfelde Jakob Teichgrab. On 8 August 1941 she was arrested in around 1890. He was arrested prior to 1937 and came to the Blumenort by the NKVD of the Zaporozhye region. She Karlag concentration camp in the Karaganda region. He was charged with anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda. came to the camp section called "Bur" and here he was She was shipped to the Bashkir ASSR via prison transport shot. Wiebe was a well-known chiropractor, whom I knew and incarcerated in Prison Number One in the capital city personally. of Ufa. The supreme court of the Bashkir ASSR sentenced her to death on 24 August 1942, according to paragraphs 92. Win, Peter (Lutheran) 58-10 and 58-11 of the criminal code of the USSR, She He was born in Blumenort. He was arrested, sentenced was shot in the city of Ufa on 1 October 1942. She was and died in a concentration camp. rehabilitated by a plenum of the Supreme

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AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 41

NEW ADDITIONS TO AHSGR LIBRARY

Michael Ronn, AHSGR Librarian

The titles below and other library materials are available for loan according to the AHSGR library policy as listed. Most of the titles listed here are not available for purchase from AHSGR. Please consult your current Order Form for books available for sale. Adolph, LeRoy. Armand Hammer Museum of Art and Cultural Center, Adolph Family Tree. CS 71.A363 1991 Los Angeles, and the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg. Alexander, John T. Treasures of Imperial Russia: Catherine the Great, from the Catherine the Great: Life and Legend. DK State Hermitage Museum. St. Petersburg. DK171.5.T73 170.A58 1989 1990

Alien, Clara. Austman, Fran. Descendents [sic] of Katherine and George Blanke 1865- The Dell History 1850-1993. CS 71.D44 1993 1981. CS71.B5775 1981 Barnett, Lucille Reiswig. American Historical Society of Germans from Johann Seibel and Sophia Schwarz Family Tree. Russia. CS71.S44 1994 Annotated Bibliography of Materials Available for Purchase: Periodicals, Books, Maps. Z1361.R86.A46 1993 Bartsch, Franz. Our Trek to Central Asia. BX 8119.R8.B3713 1993 American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, Denver Metro Chapter Genealogy Group. Germans from Russia in Colorado 1910 United States Bassler, Gerhard P. Census. F 781.R85.D46 1992 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. The German Canadian Mosaic Today and Yesterday: Identities, Roots, and Heritage. F 1035.G3.B3 1991

Naturalization Records of Immigrants from Russia in Becker, Mildred Gentry. Colorado. F 785.R85.D46 1993 DOES NOT The Peter Becker Family. CS 71.B424 1993 CIRCULATE. Becker, Ted J. and Alina Oleksik. Baptism Registers == Taufregister: 1814-1837, St. Joseph's Naturalization Records of Immigrants from Russia in Catholic Church, Krasna, Bessarabia, Russia. BX Colorado, Alphabetical by Village. F785.R85.D461 1993 4638.U38.B42 1992 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Beisel, Shirley M. Appelhanz, Isadore. Andrew Beisel and Wife Eva Beisel nee Longhofer and The Volga Germans in Topeka, Kansas, 1875-85. F Daughters, Anna, Eva, and Amelia. CS 71.B442 1992a 689.T6.A67 1992

Andrew Beisel and Wife Eva Who Later Married August Mueller (Miller, Muller). CS 71.B442 1992b

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Reinhard Beisel and Wife Katherina Elizabeth Engel. Chorzempa, Rosemary A. CS71.B442 1992c Konenie Polskie = Polish Roots. CS 49.C46 1993

Chronik und Familienbuch der Gemeinde Mannsburg, Kreis Bentley, Elizabeth Petty. Akkerman, Bessarabien, 1863-1964. DK651.M36.C46 1981 The Genealogist's Address Book. CS 44.B46 1992 Ciszek, Walter J., and Daniel L. Flaherty. Berend, Nina. With God in Russia. DK. 268.3.C58 1964 Deutsche Mundarten in der Sowjetunion: Geschichte der Forschung und Bibliographic. PF 5876.B47 1991 dark, Mildred. Ochs (Oks) Family: Descendents [sic] of Joseph Ochs (Oks) and Margarete Eisenmenger: Germans in Russia. Bier. Philip N. The Quest for Shar-i-sabs. CS71.0165 1989x PS3552.I4.QU41993 Crankshaw, Edward. Bouchard, Joan L. Khrushchev: A Career. DK275.K5.C7 1966 Rambur. CS 71.R326 1987 Cronin, Vincent. Braithwaite, Lenora Ruff. Catherine, Empress of All the Russias. DK We Are of Yesterday. CS71.R831989 170.C76 1978

Brautigam, Sol. David, Lois. Johan Georg Brautigam and His Wife, Katherina Margaret In the Beginning. CS 71.R49 1988 nee Brungardt; Emigration from Kolb, Russia to Ritzville, Dirk Family History, the Rhineland, South Russia- Washington. CS 71.B728 1993 Bessarabia, America 1800-1994. CS71.D57 1994

Broschat, Morris 0. DeBoer, Elaine Sauer. Friedrich Broschat a Short Narrative of His Life. Bending Branches: A Family History of Sauer-Madche and CT275.B76.B76 1991 Stuckle-Uhl. CS71.S28 1993

Genealogy of Jacob Hoffman, Sr. and Christina Laemmie Dmitriew, Helen. (1st Wife). CS 71.H635 1990a Surviving the Storms: Memory of Stalin's Tyranny. DK 268.D574 1992

Genealogy of Jacob Hoffman, Sr. and Katherina Goehring Dobler, Hugh H. (2nd Wife). CS 71.H635 l990b Dobler Family from 1500A.D. CS 71.D62 1993

Brott Family. Dollarhide, William. Brott Family Centennial Cookbook. Managing a Genealogical Project. CS 16.D64 1991 TX715.B76 1992 Doroshinskaya, Y. Brown, Dorothy J. Leningrad and Its Environs: A Guide. The Family of Michael Braun and Barbara Kiefel. DK549.D6813 1979 CS71.B727 1993 Dossigny, Janet Lee (Lange). Genealogy of the Wiederspan Family. The Family of Simon Huber and Rosina Gdtz. CS71.W534 1980 CS71.H8233 1993

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 New Additions To AHSGR Library 43 Dreith, Rita Jean. Fritzler, Myron Gene. Records of Friedens Evangelical Lutheran Church, Johann Christof Fritzler and Elizabeth Frank Fritzler Globeville-Denver, Colorado, 1915-1960. BX Bostrom. CS71.F747 1994x 8076.G56.F74 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Funk, Maxine Jennings. Information Relative to the Following "Volga German " Records of St. Paul's Evangelical Lutheran Church, Russian Families: Oblander, Schick, Weinbender. (Winter). Globeville-Denver, Colorado, 1905-1955. BX CS 71.024 1967 8076.G56.S24 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Garner, Esther. Ediger, David G. Gottfried Jaster Family from Daniel in 1760 to 1988. The Family History of David G. Ediger. CS71J37 1988 CS71.E33 1992 Genealogy of Johann Lippert and Katherina Morlock. CS71.L567 1992 Ensz, Edgar. Giebelhaus Family Chronicles 1994. The Claass Epp Genealogy 1700-1992. CS71.G532 1994 CS71.C52 1992 Glazier, Ira A. and William P. Filby. Epp, Elsie H. Friesen. Germans to America: Lists of Passengers Arriving at U.S. Episodes of the Prairie Pioneers: Five Branches from the Ports. Volumes 23 & 24. E184.G3.G38 1988 Family Tree of Heinrich Epp: Heinrich, Cornelius, Peter, Johann, Gerhard. CS 71.E66 1991 Goerz, Heinrich. The Molotschna Settlement. BX 8119.U45.G64 1993 Faust, Albert Bernhardt. The German Element in the United States With Special Goral, Verna. Reference to Its Political, Moral, Social, and Educational The Story and Genealogy of Henry and Mary Hoffman and Influence. E 184.G3.F3 1909 Their Family: From Frank, Russia, to Benhoud, Colorado. CS 71.H635 1992 Fettig, Andrew J. Our Family of Fettigs. CS 71.F47 1993 Gress, Frieda Weickum* Genealogy and History of the Weickum-Hofmann Families. Filbert, Henry. CS7LW443 1993 Maul Family History. CS7LM38 1994 Haberland, Jurgen. Floyd, David. Eingliederung von Aussiedlern und Zuwanderern: Russia in Revolt, 1905: The First Crack in Tsarist Power. Sammlung von Texten, die fur die Eingliederung von DK263.F56 1969 Aussiedlern aus den osteuropaischen Staaten und von Zuwanderern aus der DDR und aus Berlin (Ost) von Friend, Neita Oviatt. Bedeutung sind. KK 3506.A25 1988 The Christmas Keeping Germans. GT 4986.W6.F74 1981 Hardt, Donald G. The Hardt Family History 1800-1993. Friesen, Charles Toews. CS71.H37 1993 Johann "Hans" Ediger, 1775-1994. CS71.E34 1994 Harmon, Frieda B. Fritzler, Myron G. Janke. CS71.J361993 Johann's Family. CS 71.F747 1993

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Weber. CS 71.W422 1992 Kissler, Clarence Donald. The Kissler Family of Frank, Russia. Herdt, Karl. CS71.K573 1994 Die Namengebung zweier Wolgadeutscher Dorfer: Alexanderdorf und Hoh (Alexander-Hoh), am Nachoistrom Kliewer, Leon R. gelegen sowie Episoden aus dem damaligen Bauernleben Johann Kliewer, Henderson, Nebraska, Family History and und Skizzen aus der Steppentierwelt. DK511.V66.H471983 Genealogy. CS 71.K56 1994

Hilkes, Peter. Kloberdanz, Timothy J. and Rosalinda. Germans from the Former Soviet Union. Thunder on the Steppe: Volga German Folklife in a DK34.G3.H54 1994 Changing Russia. DK 510.35.G3.K57 1993

Holzach, Michael. Koehler, Rayna. The Forgotten People: A Year Among the Hutterites. The Koehler's 1766-1993 Fact-Fiction and Family Fantasy. BX8129.H8.H6413 1993 CS 71.K633 1993

Jansen, Peter. Krannawitter, Michael J. Memoirs of Peter Jansen: The Record of a Busy Life. An Dreher Ancestors and Descendants. CS71.D73 1993 Autobiography. F 666.J36 1921

Jeli, Michael and Dianne. Krannawitter Ancestors and Descendants. Descendants of George & Caroline Jeli 1845-1991, CS71.K72 1993 CS71.J44 1991 Kuhn, Delia and Ferdinand. The Journal of Johannes Boger. Russia on Our Minds: Reflections on Another World. CT275.B63 1991 DK28.K83 1970

Kahle, Wilhelm. Langin, Bernd G. Symbiose und Spannung: Beitrage zur Geschichte des Die Russlanddeutschen unter Doppeladler und Sowjetstern: Protestantismus in den baltischen Landern, im Innern des Stadte, Landschaften und Menschen auf alien Fotos. DK Russischen Reiches und der Sowjetunion. BR937.B3.K34 34.G3.L36 1991 1991 Lainhart, Ann S. Karasek-Strzygowski, Hertha. State Census Records. Z 5313.U5.L37 1992 Es fuhret uns des Schicksals Hand: Bessarabisches Tagebuch. DK 509.35.G3.K37 1990 Levin, Deana. Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev: A Guide. Karvonen, Magdalena (Feigert). DK28.L48 1974 Feigert Germans from Russia. CS71.F444 1993 Lincoln, W. Bruce. King, Joyce. In War's Dark Shadow: The Russians Before the Great War. Church Records of First German Congregational Church, DK240.L561983 Arvada, Colorado, 1894-1954. BX7255.A78.F57 1991 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Litzenberger, Samuel. The Family Story of Wills Anderson West and Mary Elizabeth Sumner and Their Descendants and Ancestors. CS71.W47 1992

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Lock, Ethel. History and Church Records of St. John's Evangelical The Dietz Family Book 2. CS 71.D537 1992 Lutheran Church, Windsor, Colorado, 1909-1992. BX 8076.W56.S24 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Luebke, Frederick C. Immigrants and Politics; the Germans of Nebraska, 1880- History and Church Records of St. Paul's Congregational 1900. F675.G3.L8 1969 Church, Greeley, Colorado, 1905-1991. BX 7255.G73.S24 1992 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Luther, Martin. Der kleine Katechismus D. Martin Luthers. History and Church Records of Trinity Lutheran Church, BX8070.L7.A3 1898 Sterling, Colorado. 1912-1992. BX 8076.S73.T74 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Mai, Brent Alan. A Cumulative Index to the Original Volume and the 1976- 1988 Additions of the "The Dietz Family Past and Present." CS 71.D537 1990 Records of German Congregational Church, Milliken, Colorado, 1918-1976. BX 7255.M54.G47 1993 DOES NOT Danes Dynasty: Volume III. CS 71.D325 1991 CIRCULATE.

Mandel, William. Morrison, Elaine Becker. Russia Re-Examined: The Land, the People, and How They The Johann and Barbara Felchle Mauch Family. Live. DK 276.M3 1964 CS71.F446 1994

McHale, Joann K. Moser, Leland E. The Ancestors and Descendants of George Weideman and Hagen: A Family History. CS 71.H339 1992 Marie Elizabeth Web(b)er. CS 71.W4248 1993

Mushtukov, V.E. Mills, Mary Troudt. The Museums of Leningrad: A Guide. The Hill Family of Walter, Genealogies of Various Hill AM61.L4.M8713 1982 Families Who Settled in the Volga German Colony of Walter, Russia. CS 71.H54 1994 Nalchajian, Esther. The Wilhelm Pretzer Family 1865-1993. CS71.P73 1993 History and Church Records of Christ Lutheran Church, Eaton, Colorado, 1914-1965. BX8076.E17.C57 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Naumann, Ed H. and Charlotte Gust. Kramer Tales. F 644.K72.N38 1993 History and Church Records of Faith United Church of Christ, Windsor, Colorado. BX 9886.Z7.W56.F34 1993 Nelson, Marlin P. DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Genealogy Records of a Heinz Family from Bangert- Kukkus, Russia, Volga River on the Wiesenseite. CS 71.H4485 1993 History and Church Records of First German Congre- The Rabe-Schmidt Families: Black Sea Germans Who gational Church, Loveland, Colorado, 1902-1992. BX Came to South Dakota with Rathke, Fiedler, Krause and 7255.L68.F57 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Other Families. CS 71.R32 1994

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Neufeld, Jacob A. Remmick-Hubert, Judy A. Tiefenwege: Erfahrungen und Eriebnisse von Russland- Hoffer Family 1700-1988. CS 71.H63 1988 Mennoniten in zwei Jahrzehnten bis 1949. BX8119.R8.N48 1958 Jacob Schweikiert 1842-1923: A Blacksmith. Neuman, Ron. CS71.S3825 1993 A Lippert History. CS 71.L56 1992 Rempfer, Michael. The 1920 Federal Population Census: The Beresina, Bessarabia Rempfer Families and Asso- A Catalog of National Archives Microfilm. HA ciated Nitschke and Stehr Families. CS71.R458 1992 37.U54.F46x The Nonprofit Organization Handbook. Riggs, Angela Kaup. HV91.N58 1988 Voices of the Prairie. CS 71.K385 1992

Oberlander, Paul S. Ruhl, Beverly Preisendorf. Jacob Oberlander (1828) History. History and Church Record of Christ Congregational Church, CS71.023 1994 Ft. Morgan, Colorado, 1907-1992. BX7255.F67.C57 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE.

Oberlander Family History; Descendants of Phillip and Margaretha Oberlander. CS 71.0153 1992 History and Church Records of lmmanuel Evangelical Church, Ft. Morgan, Colorado, 1916-1992. BX Olsen, Helen Rosie Marcus. 8076.F67.I45 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. The Markus Family: A History of the Descendents [sic] of John Gottfried Markus (1822-?). CS71.M371992 History and Church Records of the Immanuel Congre- Ossowski, Herbert. gational Church, Brush, Colorado, 1908-1992. BX Die Bibel fur Kinder. BS 554.2.086 1984 7255.B78.I45 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE.

Pfannenstiel, Bruce L. The Family of Andreas Korbe and Eva Boxler. History and Church Records of Salem Congregational CS71.K66 1993 Church, Berthoud, Colorado. BX7255.B47.S24 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Pomper, Philip. The Russian Revolutionary Intelligentsia. Records of Evangelical Congregational Zion Church, Fruita, HN523.P674 1970 Colorado, 1907-1914. BX 7255.F78.E92 1993 DOES NOT CIRCULATE. Poppke, Herb. Felchle Weingaertner History. CS71.F447 1994 Rybakov, Anatoli. Children of the Arbat. W 3476.R87.D4813 1988

Sackmann, Gloria H. The Poppke Felchle Family 1994. CS 71.P66 1994 The Wahl Genealogy. CS 71.W33 1993

Pudwill, Myron. Pudwill Family History-the Danzig Connection. CS71.P82 1993

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 New Additions To AHSGR Library 47 St. Joseph's Parish, (Mandan, N.D.). Smith, Ruby F. Schulz. St. Joseph's Parish, Mandan, North Dakota, 1881-1956: A Ancestors and Family of George Herman Schulz. Booklet Compiled on the Occasion of the Seventy-Fifth CS71.S377 1993 Anniversary of the Parish and the City. BX 4603.M36.S24 1956 Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr I. The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-1956; an Experiment in Schaible, Artur. Literary Investigation. PG 3476.S697.A8 1974a Marienfeld: Kreis Bender, Bessarabien, 1910-1940. DK508.95.M37 1990 Steigerwald, Jacob. Banat-Topola's Schwaben, 1791-1945. Scherman, Katharine. DR2125.B37.S74 1992 Catherine the Great. DK 170.S33 1957 Strobel, Leann Heinrichs. Schleicher, John Samuel. Abraham Heinrichs Family 1818-1993. The Schleichers of Norka: A Study of One Volga German CS71.H4482 1993 Family. CS 71.S3465 1989 Suckut, Arthur. Schnegelberger, Leonard. Paris in Bessarabien: Chronik der Gemeinden Paris und Family History of Schnegelberger & Pabst: Germans from Neu-Paris in Bessarabien. DK 508.95.V47.S92 1990 Russia, Descendants and Allied Families—Kraft, Reisbig, Hegwald, Waltz, Strauch, Roth, Dreith, George, Spomer, Terrell, Bob. Miller, and others. CS71.S358 1992 Billy Graham in the Soviet Union. BV 3785.G69.T47 1985 Schroeder, William. The Berglhal Colony. BX 8119.R8.S37 1986 Teeuwen, RandaII C. Public Rural Education and the Americanization of the Schurr, Alvina. Germans from Russia in Colorado: 1900-1930. P Grenz von Guldendorf. CS 71.G73 1992 785.R85.T33 1993

Schwartz Families. Tepper, Michael. Schwartz Sammelbuch von geschichtlichen Schriften = American Passenger Arrival Records: A Guide to the Schwartz Scrapbook of Historical Writings. CS71.S3825 Records of Immigrants Arriving at American Ports by Sail 1992 and Steam. CS 49.T46 1993

Seltzer, Thomas. Thode, Ernest. Best Russian Short Stones. PG 3286.S44 1925 Address Book for Germanic Genealogy. 5th Edition. CS611.T48 1994 Shabad, Theodore. Geography of the USSR; a Regional Survey. DK28.S46 1958 German-English Genealogical Dictionary, CS 6.T48 1992

Shults, Melva J. United States. National Archives and Records Service. Prick Genealogy [sic]. CS 71.F74 1993 Immigrant and Passenger Arrivals: A Select Catalog of National Archives Microfilm Publications. Z5305.U5.U54 1983 Hoffman Genealogy [sic]. CS 71.H636 1993

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 United States. Office of Armed Forces Information and Wilhelm, Laurin Phillip. Education. The (Johann) Philip and Marie Elizabeth (Herdt) Wilhelm A Pocket Guide to Germany. DK 43.U54 1956 Family from 1845 to 1993. CS71.W54 1993

Wahl, Dale Lee. Williams, Vivian Noreen. Bessarabian Index of Heads of Households: Phase One. The Descendants of Anna Elisabeth Miller-Koch-Dell-Doll- DK 509.35.G3.W33 1993 Doell Families from the Village of Kolb, and Walter. CS71.M54 1993 Walters, George J. Wir Wollen Deutsche Bleiben=We Want to Remain Ger- Worman, James H. man: The Story of the Volga Germans. DK34.G3.W34 1993 Erstes deutsches Buch nach der naturlichen Melhode fur Schule und Haus. PF 3111.W67 1908 Wandler, Diane J. Handbook for Researching Family Roots. CS Wright, Stella. 16.W36 1992 Nazarenus Chronicles. CS 71.N32.W8 1992

Ward, Charles A. Wuschke, Ewald. Next Time You Go to Russia: A Guide to Historical Protestant Church Records on Microfilm for the Former Landmarks and An Museums. With Maps, Illustrations, and Congress Poland (1815-1915) and Volhynia: Microfilmed by Descriptive Commentary. DK 16.W37 1980 Family History Centre, Church of the Latter Day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah. BX 8025.5.W87 1992 Werth, Alvin V., Rev. Genealogy of Friedrich and Lucy Werth, Co-founders of Young, Lydia. Schoenchen, Kansas. CS 71.W4779 1992 "Misha", the Michael Schmitt Story 1873-1915. CS71.S3545 1994 Widmer, Elmer Andreas. Family History of Andreas and Magdalena (Mowes) Zion Lutheran Church, Kramer, North Dakota: Widmer. CS 71.W524 1994 1900-1990. BX 8076.K8.Z56 1990 D

Wiese, Luella Toevs. Franz. Toews from Heubuden, West Prussia to Moun-tain Lake, Minnesota 1812-1898 and His Descendants, Toevs, Toavs, Taves, Taevs. CS 71.T637 1993

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH OUR NEIGHBORS: MULTI-ETHNIC RESEARCH

Edward Reimer Brandt Two contradictory statements can be made about our As for Germans as "role models," consider their in- German-speaking ancestors in the Russian Empire: On the ternal affairs, e.g., the plight of the landless, who had be- one hand, they were recruited to increase agricultural and come a substantial majority everywhere by the 1860s. The economic productivity, mostly by serving as role models greed of the well to do is an object lesson. Is it any wonder for their neighbors. (This was quite explicit in the case of that there were enough Marxists among the landless that the Volga and Black Sea Germans, who received public aid the creation of a Volga German "Autonomous Soviet and special privileges to induce them to come. It was Socialist Republic" was not seen as, and was not, simply a implicit in the case of the Volhynian Germans, who "Russian" imposition? received no special treatment, but were invited by large If the Germans treated their own this way, it is easy to landowners suddenly bereft of free serf labor.) understand that their Russian and Ukrainian farmhands and On the other hand, our fore parents lived in large clus- housemaids were sometimes mistreated. ters of all-German villages, or colonies. This meant that In mentioning these shortcomings, I certainly do not their contact with their Slavic neighbors, and thus their intend them as a wholesale condemnation of "our people." ability to serve as role models, was limited. Today's Russian and Ukrainian governments have made it However, the Germans did not live in total isolation. quite clear that they value the Germans as much as the tsars Moreover, they were not always good role models. So let's did. On balance, their positive contributions far outweighed examine the positive and negative aspects of ethnic inter- their faults. action in "the old country." However, once we recognize that "our people," like all To begin with, the exchanges were reciprocal, not others, were both noble and ignoble, it becomes easier to unidirectional as the role model might imply. For example, strengthen the inter-ethnic cooperation celebrated in our how much Slavic cooking contributed to our justly vaunted "New World" ideals. Russian-German cuisine is illustrated by the large number This is especially true of inter-ethnic cooperation in of foods and dishes for which there is no equivalent genealogy, with its great potential for a positive effect on German word. national and international history. Agriculture was the essence of every national economy We have, in fact, already made tremendous progress in at that time. Unlike today, the Ukrainian steppes were the inter-ethnic cooperation. The "melting pot" concept might "bread basket" of Europe during the days of our fore be an exaggerated description of what happened in the parents. The same strain of wheat, which our ancestors nineteenth century, but it is a reality today. During and after brought across the Atlantic, has made Kansas wheat the the period of heavy immigration (which lasted until World best winter wheat in the continent. But where did it come War II for all the peoples from Eastern Europe, although it from? Not Germany. Its name, "Turkey Red," should be an ended for those from Germany in 1893), most of our important lesson in appreciating that our ancestors were ancestors deliberately buried their past in order to become receivers, as well as givers, for the land onto which they "real" Americans, moved had just been wrested from Turkey by Russia. Since World War II many German Russians—as well as other ethnic groups—have rediscovered their heritage or vastly expanded their knowledge. With the collapse of the Dr. Edward R. Brandt was a co-founder of FEEFHS and program chair for its first convention. He now serves as first vice-president. Iron Curtain, we now have an unprecedented opportunity Although primarily a Germanic specialist, he belongs to many ge- for cooperative research to learn more about our heritage, nealogical and historical societies devoted to other East European about the heritage of our neighbors, and about our groups. This is a revised version of his talk at the 1994 AHSGR ancestors' neighbors in greater depth. convention. Family history can be described as what social scien-

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 tists might call "micro-history," i.e., the study of the small- But to understand our own heritage fully, and to learn est units. Only in recent decades has the study of "ordinary" from it, we must also gain an insight into the perspectives people blossomed in some of our universities. But even of the peoples whose neighbors and guests they were. social history is concerned chiefly with people collectively, "Guests" is the right word for our ancestors, for their pri- not specific individuals or families. Genealogy still is not mary identity was always their cultural Germanness, Sec- considered a legitimate academic discipline by most ondarily, they were obedient subjects of the tsar. (In those scholars. days, only a few Europeans had the privileged status of a But history at all levels is inevitably intertwined; in- "citizen" and even they had no democratic rights.) This is dividuals, families, communities, ethnic and religious quite the opposite of German-speaking immigrants to the groups, nations and the world. History is concerned with New World who soon identified themselves primarily as the issues of war and peace, the relationship between the American (or Canadian, Brazilian, etc.) citizens. Indeed, in rulers and the ruled (which was not as one-sided as often most cases, the trans-oceanic emigrants deliberately gave depicted), the socioeconomic class structure, internal and up their mother tongue, in sharp contrast to the immigrants external trade, the development of knowledge and belief in the European East, who held onto it as one of their most systems, etc. But it is much more than that. prized possessions, The family is universally the basic unit. Thus family This difference between eastward and trans-oceanic history represents the foundation on which the history of immigrants is an excellent illustration of why it is impor- the development of any or all civilizations must necessar- tant to understand their relationship with their host peoples. ily be based. We must learn from our heritage by learning about that Both historians and genealogists have often been slow of others, because all cultures have both positive and to connect textbook history with personal heritage. But I negative qualities. Thus, we need to preserve and cherish believe that genealogists are more likely to perceive this what was good in our tradition, while simultaneously over- link than academicians for two reasons: coming what others perceived as wrongs done to them, • If you cannot find your ancestors, you need to study No group can gain more from the vast new opportuni- history to try to find the trail. This can be frustratingly ties for expanded inter-ethnic cooperation in research than difficult, but it is never hopeless for the perseverant. I ours, precisely because our immigrant ancestors spoke found a treasure of information about my father-in-law's German, but were generations removed from having lived ancestors and kin after more than two decades of utter in a Germanic environment, futility. Thus, German Russians should particularly benefit • On the other hand, if you can find your ancestors and you from the newly founded Federation of East European Fam- have a serious interest in your heritage, you will sooner ily History Societies (FEEFHS). FEEFHS hopes to do with or later want to find out more about the environment in respect to ethnicity what AHSGR has done with respect to which they lived. religion, i.e., render it irrelevant to our feeling of shared This means, for example, finding out why our fore identity while appreciating differences in our cultural heri- parents moved (two, three or more times) and from where tage. Our founding president, Charles Hall, who does not to where. Common factors accounting for most migrations have a drop of German or East European blood in his lin- throughout the world include: eage, coined the motto, DIVERSITY-UNITY-HAR- • Impoverishment or bleak economic prospects, caused by MONY. He himself is an embodiment of unity and har- an oppressive class structure, overpopulation and a shortage mony. Our members, convention speakers, and other con- of land, often compounded by crop failures and heavy tax tributors represent the diversity. burdens. PEEFHS was actually founded at the 1992 AHSGR • War in its many aspects (devastation and slaughter, in- convention in Seattle. It has published a quarterly news- voluntary military service, financial burdens upon villagers letter since December 1992, Its constitution was ratified in in war zones). December 1993. The first FEEFHS convention was held in • Religious discrimination against non-dominant groups of Salt Lake City in May 1994, Topics on Germans from believers. Eastern Europe were a prominent part of the highly diverse • The hope of betterment in any or all respects, if not for program, featuring about twenty-five expert speakers, who the migrants, then for their children and grandchildren. came from coast to coast, as well as from Canada and Russia.

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Let me give you a specific example of how helpful this East and Central Europe (Seattle: University of Wash- was: ington, 1993). While this is an expensive book, I cannot I am one of the co-authors of the popular Research praise or recommend it too highly. Guide to German-American Genealogy, the first book of There are numerous books, which are helpful for re- North American origin to cover German-speaking immi- searching your German-Russian ancestors. Diane J. grants from all European countries. We are now revising Wandler and the Prairie Heritage Chapter of the Germans this guide, and I have the primary responsibility for the from Russia Heritage Society, for example, have put to- sections on East European countries. The draft on the suc- gether an excellent Handbook/or Researching Family cessor states to the former Soviet Union already contains Roots (Garrison, North Dakota: BMG, Inc., 1992). It has ten times as much material as the 1991 edition. Information three components: introductory help for beginners, chap- gained at the EEEFHS convention accounts for a sub- ters specifically devoted to Russian Germans, and a guide stantial portion of this expansion. (I greatly appreciate the to resources in and around the Dakotas. Nevertheless, it excellent contributions of Gwen Pritzkau and Jo Ann contains relatively little material on genealogical resources Kuhr.) However, the most comprehensive accounts of ge- in Europe. nealogically valuable records produced in the former Rus- On the other hand, the Genealogical Guide to German sian Empire came from speakers who have never appeared Ancestors from East Germany and Eastern Europe at an AHSGR convention. Moreover, numerous speakers (Neustadt/Aisch, Germany: Verlag Degener & Co., 1984) dealt with areas from which our ancestors had migrated to contains much information about European sources, but the Russian Empire, specifically Germany, Poland, pre- virtually nothing about sources in Russia or Ukraine. This 1918 Hungary, and the non-Germanic areas under Austrian is the English translation, by Joachim 0. R. Nuthack and rule prior to World War I. Other information came from Adalbert Goertz, of the second of three editions of what is non-Germanic periodicals, most of them published by popularly known as the AGoFF-Wegweiser, the only Ger- PEEFHS members. man genealogical work which covers all of Eastern Europe. But the amount of information relating to genealogical The German-language third edition, published in 1991, records and resources in the ex-Soviet Union has increased likewise has very little about sources in what was then the tremendously since I co-authored what was then the most Soviet Union. (However, I just learned that new German comprehensive English-language article on the subject in and identical English editions are scheduled to be the spring of 1993. Therefore, it would be impossible for a published this year, so that may change the picture.) new edition of any genealogical guide to be completely up- We in AHSGR have already learned a great deal in the to-date. That is another reason why it is important to join past few years about the pertinent genealogical records and FEEFHS, which functions essentially, although not sources in Russia and Ukraine, thanks to dedicated exclusively, as an "information clearing-house" and keeps members and Russian scholars. But even if you are among you updated on a quarterly basis. the very few who have all the pertinent books, journals and It has the capacity to do so. However, whether this newsletters which focus on the genealogy of the Russian potential is realized depends upon the contributions of its Germans, and attend all the AHSGR and GRHS con- organizational and individual members, regardless of ventions, you will still miss some important items of in- whether they take the form of transmitting information to formation. the newsletter, speaking at conventions, helping to develop Most Germanic and Russian-German organizations other services, or assisting in disseminating information, and genealogical periodicals have already joined FEEFHS, which depends upon word of mouth communication, vol- thereby recognizing the usefulness of inter-ethnic research unteers, and funds. Thus, I hope that many of you will cooperation. choose to give as well as to receive. FEEFHS is a federation. Much of what it accomplishes Remember that Russians, Ukrainians, Moldovans, is done through and for its member societies, although Poles, Jews, Russians. Romanians, Slovaks, Hungarians individual members have likewise given and received a lot. and others are, to a greater or lesser extent, searching for As of now, FEEFHS has fifty-four organizational mem- the same kinds of information in the same places as we are. bers, but this figure will be out-of-date by the time this The extent to which this is true will surprise you if you appears in print, since it increases almost every week. Most look at the map of ethnic minority enclaves and mixed of them are from the United States and Canada, but there border regions in Paul Robert Magocsi's Historical Atlas are also organizational members from Germany, Russia,

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Poland, and Australia. Many of their publications include research. (For example, I discovered that some of my wife's articles, which may be directly or indirectly relevant for ancestors, who lived briefly in the Odessa area between a research on Russian Germans. century in Galicia and a century in Canada, were descended So let's take a look at what some of the FEEPHS mem- from the very same Urban Rauschenberger as a Pennsyl- ber societies have to offer genealogists of Russian German vania Dutch family!) descent. Our first German organizational member, Zielke- First of all, we currently have six member societies Verlag, produced a genealogical publication, Ratgeber '92: devoted to Germanic genealogy in general. Moreover, we GUS/Baltikum, which listed the addresses of many English- have eleven German-oriented societies, which are multi- speaking researchers in the former Soviet Union who were purpose in nature or focus on a particular religious group or previously unknown in North America, A greatly expanded geographic area, besides the seven societies devoted chiefly edition, under the new title Ratgeber Ostforschung (for to Germans from Russia. We also have three others which I wrote an article on Russian-German genealogy in concerned with the former Russian Empire. North America) is scheduled to be published by Verlag We now have seven Polish-American genealogical Degener & Co., Germany's most prominent genealogical societies. (Rick Rye noted that nearly half the names in the publishing house, later this year. Polish Genealogical Society of America in Chicago, whose Among our multi-ethnic societies are: president is Stan Schmidt, are Germanic.) Many Germans • the East European Branch of the Manitoba Genealogical moved from Poland to Ukraine, and a few to other Society, which has a lot of German and Ukrainian members countries, which used to be part of the Russian Empire. whose ancestors came from Galicia, Volhynia, and Eastern Others came to the Russian Empire from areas which Ukraine, and publishes an excellent quarterly, the East belonged to the Austro-Hungarian Empire before World European Genealogist; War I. We have twelve Hungarian, Czech/Slovak, Balkan • the Minnesota Genealogical Society, which is comprised or other Slavic societies as members, plus five of a multi- chiefly of ethnic (including Germanic and Polish) branches ethnic nature (although some of them focus on a particular rather than local, county or regional chapters, and holds an area). annual "Branching Out" meeting in which all of these The yearbook editor for the Czechoslovak Genealogi- participate; cal Society International, Dr. Duncan B. Gardiner, is well • the European Interest Group of the Western Australian known for his authoritative historical/geographical book, Genealogical Society, which concentrates on continental, German Towns in Slovakia and Upper Hungary (Lake- as contrasted with British, ancestry, wood, Ohio: The Family Historian, 3rd ed., 1991). Some of None of this, of course, is any guarantee that you will these towns are now in Ukraine. Dr. Gardiner will chair the discover something about your specific ancestors through 1995 FEEFHS eastern regional convention in Cleveland. FEEFHS, which you would not have learned otherwise— Walter Rusel, founder and president of the Ukrainian although you might obtain pertinent clues or leads. Genealogical and Historical Society of Canada, will chair But if you are interested in your heritage, not just your the 1995 western regional convention, which will be held in pedigree chart, the idea of broadening the concept of Unser Calgary immediately after the AHSGR convention. (Both Volk ("Our People." the identical term used by other East are co-founders of FEEFHS.) European groups in their respective languages) to Unsere The president of the Hungarian/American Friendship Nachbarschaft (or more particularly the national or re- Society, Doug Holmes, has a strong interest in the ethnic gional neighborhood in which our ancestors lived), may be minorities in pre-1918 Hungary, especially Slovaks and just as exciting to you as it is to me. I have been richly Germans. This would, of course, include the significant rewarded for my strenuous efforts in helping FEEFHS get number of Germans from the Batschka region who mi- started, not monetarily, but in increased knowledge and grated to the Russian Empire. understanding. Many of you have kin with a lineage from some other You can request a two-page descriptive flyer (handed East European country. But even if you have no personal out at the AHSGR convention) and a membership appli- connections with any non-Germanic countries, bear in mind cation/subscription form from Edward Reimer Brandt, 13- that the heaviest concentrations of eastward and trans- 27thAve.S.E., Minneapolis, MN 55414-3101, or from our oceanic emigrants often came from the same general official address: P.O. Box 21346, Salt Lake City, UT German-speaking areas; this may be helpful in your

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 84121-0346. (An SASE is appreciated.) are raised. Members may also purchase the bound Volume John D. Movius, another founding vice-president of 1 of the FEEFHS Newsletter (1992-93) for $8 postpaid. FEEFHS recently compiled an expanding FEEFHS Write to: John D. Movius, P.O. Box 4327, Davis, CA ADDRESSBOOK of Officers & Directors, RESOURCE 95617-4327. Non-members may purchase the GUIDE to Member Societies, Organizations, Institutes, ADDRESSBOOK, RESOURCE GUIDE and DATABASE, Libraries & Ethnic Publications, and FEEFHS as well as the bound volume of the newsletter at a higher DATABASE of Professional Translators & Genealogists price. Specializing in East European Linguistics and Family The minimum annual dues are U.S. $ 15 (U.S./Canada) History. All 1994 FEEFHS members will receive an initial and U.S. $20 (elsewhere). You can subscribe to the news- copy of this publication in due time, with the option of letter, without receiving any other benefits or services, for buying future updates at a reduced price. Because of the $5 less. rapid expansion of FEEFHS, and consequently the Each AHSGR chapter is eligible to join FEEFHS as a directory, we cannot afford to offer this as a "freebie" in full-fledged member. I hope that all those with a genealogy the future, unless dues committee or library will do so.

BEGINNING GENEALOGY Donnette M. Sonnenfeld

If you look at the National Archives Building in Wash- really happen when you have been stricken with genealogy ington, D.C., you will find the following inscription: fever: "Heritage of the past is the seed that brings forth the harvest of the future." It seems a rather fitting description Danger? of genealogy. After all, isn't genealogy really a study of our Quarantined! rich heritage? I think the following poem from The Sunny Inhabitants of the place have been stricken Side of Genealogy paints an accurate portrait of genealogy: with genealogy fever, a deadly and infectious disease. Genealogy begins as an interest, Symptoms include: Becomes a hobby; Notepapers stuffed in pockets and boxes; Continues as an avocation, Takes Letters and books on the reading table; over as an obsession, And in its last Heart palpitations at the sight of gravestones stages, Is an incurable disease. and old trunks filled with letters; Bloodshot eyes from excessive microfilm exposure, I caught the "disease" and can't get rid of it. I found a Erratic speech patterns punctuated with pilgrims description that depicts the attraction of genealogy when I and princes; attended my first AHSGR convention in Milwaukee in Cold sweat upon the arrival of the daily mail. 1988.1 think my parents are ready to hang this description Incurable! on the door to my office at home. It shows what can Quarantined! Donnette M. Sonnenfeld is a life member of AHSGR and currently serves on its Board of Directors. She gave a different I like to take a more humorous approach to genealogy, version of this paper at AHSGR's 1994 convention in Lincoln, because I feel at times we become so frustrated we are Nebraska. ready to forsake our genealogical research. If you're looking for something to alleviate those frustrations and

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 to brighten your day, read the book Collecting Dead oral interviews, etc. The same computer program allows Relatives. Major bookstores carry it in their genealogy you to generate pedigree charts. (To be honest, the first sections, as do some libraries. It contains some fantastic time someone mentioned a pedigree to me I thought of my stories, I suggest to you that—when you've pretty well had friend's cocker spaniel, not myself.) When I began with my it with genealogy—you go home, relax, put your music on, pedigree chart I had myself, my parents, grandparents, and and get this book out. I have read it several times, and each two great-grandparents. I have since moved back many time I find something humorous I missed the first time, more generations. I'll tell you two short anecdotes and then we'll get into When filling out a family group chart, you'll notice the the nuts and bolts of genealogy. A family historian was husband is usually listed on top and the wife is listed writing his family history. He was dismayed to find one of underneath, with the children listed under the wife. There is his ancestors had been publicly hanged. In a moment of a mark that indicates the sex of the children. You should get inspiration he wrote: "He died during a public ceremony into the habit of indicating this on your forms, particularly when the platform upon which he was standing collapsed with names that can be used interchangeably. If there is a beneath him." Another family historian, who was dismayed child's name missing, but you know it was a male child, you to find out one of his relatives had been sent to the electric can indicate this and obtain the name later. chair, wrote this in the family book: One of the books that I have found invaluable is The "He occupied a chair of applied electricity at one of our Handbook for Researching Family Roots. If you are inter- more famous institutions." You can always find humor in ested in genealogy, this is a "must have book." With the anything if you look hard enough. George Bernard Shaw pink cover, you can't lose it in your research work. I have said: "If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may never lost it, and my genealogy area is not very orderly. as well make it dance." Well, these two family historians The book has just about everything you could want in it. It made their skeletons dance. You're going to find lots of pertains to the midwest, but I feel you can apply it to just things in your family history. Don't be alarmed, and don't about any area. The following tips come from that book. be ashamed. It is all part of the people who made up our The tips are the best I have come .across in explaining how past. Just accept it. to avoid pitfalls and hazards (or repeated research). • Record the surname in CAPITAL letters (e.g., John Jo- Where to Start sephADAMS), This will solve any questions about first If you read a book you should not start in the middle, or last names. Otherwise you might be left with the go to the end, and then read the beginning. The book might dilemma of whether "Adams" was a first or last name. not make sense. I realize that some of us like to read the last • Record the woman by her maiden surname (e.g., Margaret page of a "whodunit" and then go back to finish it. Jones), and underline the surname if it is the same as her However, usually you begin at the beginning. That is where married surname. This eliminates later speculations you need to start in genealogy. You begin with yourself and about her maiden name. work back. I spent eight years being very frustrated with • Record all dates in this order: day, month, year (e.g., 15 genealogy, and I was about to give it up because I began Jan 1889). Never get into the habit of recording dates with my great-grandfather. Finally Margaret Freeman— using numbers only. Always record the full year, not just bless her, I owe her my life in genealogy—explained that I '93. Was it 1893 or 1993? It will lead to less speculation hadn't started with myself. She asked how I had gotten to and confusion later. Great-Grandpa, and I explained I just chose him. I didn't • Record months using the following abbreviations; Jan, know who his siblings were when she asked. So the main Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug. Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec. thing is to start with yourself. (PAF will automatically do this for you.) • Use the following abbreviations: chr. for christening Using Family Group Charts and Pedigree Charts dates, b, for birth dates, bur. for burials, and m. for Headquarters has a genealogy form. I currently am married. using the PAF (Personal Ancestral File) form because I put • If a couple divorces, indicate this with div. after the all of my data into the computer. I have a stack of blank marriage date. PAF will allow you to do this. forms that I take with me when I am out in the field. When • If you are guessing a date, place the date in brackets (e.g., I say "field" I am referring to libraries, churches, [abt. 1889]). • The Handbook/or Researching Family Roots also sug-

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Beginning Genealogy 55 gests that if a child is stillborn you indicate so by placing freezer, wrapped in fragile brown paper. I asked Grandma "stillborn" in the column for baptism. It will help what they contained, and she said she didn't know and told eliminate the questions you have later whether the child me to open them up. Dad and I carefully opened them, I was stillborn or whether it lived for a short while. found my great-grandpa Voegele's Bible with his hand- • If someone marries more than once, you must fill out a writing in it, and when Grandma passes on, this will be my family group chart for each marriage. You must also possession, I also found my grandpa Voegele's Bible. In indicate the marriage number on the form, Grandpa's Bible was the wedding photo of his parents, I • Record the places with the town, county, state, and coun- made a xeroxed copy of the photo because Grandma won't try (e.g., Mobridge, Walworth, South Dakota, United let me have the photo or the Bible until she has passed on States), Record foreign countries by district, county, and (or moved). At least we know the photo exists. It has some state. If a town changes names indicate the former name scratches to it, but it exists. So now I know what great- in parentheses. grandma Voegele looked like. The Bible my grandma Sonnenfeld gave me also con- Information You'll Find Useful In Genealogical tained a State of South Dakota birth certificate for her Research daughter from her first marriage. The certificate shows her You should never skip the family Bible, I have my name as Alice Goehring, when in fact the name was Elsie. grandma Sonnenfeld's family Bible. The last page contains The gravestone is listed correctly. Had I been looking in the the names of her brothers and sisters written in German. courthouse, I probably would have missed this. I also found Prior to her passing away she read the names and birth a newspaper clipping indicating that the child passed away dates to me in English, There is a little line drawn between at the age of five weeks. We don't have a date at this time, one of the children born in 1887 and the one born in 1891. but we have a time frame. Grandma claimed she didn't know why this line was there. Another item you may have at home are old town his- She also told me her mother was from the colony of tory books. Grandma had a number of these in her posses- Neudorf. However, when talking to people from that sion, which she passed on to me. The 1937 Eureka book village, the names just didn't fit. But I knew the line had to had her parents, the Michael Hoff family, listed, Michael mean something. My father went to the LDS library in Salt Hoff's biographical entry indicates that he came from Lake City to research his family history. He discovered his Kassel in Russia, that he was fourteen when he left his grandfather had been married twice. That meant the line homeland, and whom he came over with. It also mentions drawn in the Bible separating the children showed which that he arrived in Yankton territory in June 1879 and was children were from Great-Grandpa's first marriage and greeted by an uncle. So now I know that a family member which were from his second marriage. had preceded the family over here. There is another clue to Once I found that out, things began to make sense. look for later. The town history goes on to list Michael However, not only what's written in the Bible is valuable Hoff's children and their spouses and where they were but also what you can find inside. I found Great-Grandma's residing. This allows me to look in the books from those obituary. We don't read much German, but we could make towns and gain further information. out Great-Grandma's name, when she was born, and the Another good source of information are funeral homes. fact that she was born in Hoffnungstal. Well, once I had It took some effort, but I was finally able to get some in- this town, I picked up the Hoffnungstal book and was able formation from the Straub Funeral Home in Eureka, South to trace the Schlichenmaier family back to Cottonweiler, Dakota. Once the owner understood what I wanted and that Germany. I had the exact dates to look for, he agreed to go to his safe I found the wedding photograph of my great-grand- and pull out the old original books. (This funeral home has parents Voegele in a town history book. I was told the only been in the family for three generations.) He pulled out my photo of my great-grandmother was of her throwing out the great-grandma Hoff's bill. It listed who her parents were, wash water. I knew there had to be an original of the photo which nobody knew. They were Roeslers. After I told this around if it appeared in this book in the early 1960s. One to my mom's cousin one evening, he said the Roeslers summer my parents moved a small freezer from Grandma always lived next to the Hoffs. Oftentimes, if families lived Voegele's basement into the room I was to use that close together in Russia, they did so in the United States summer. When I arrived at Grandma's for my visit, I did also. Grandma Voegele could not remember when her what I always do: I investigated her old books. I found two mother was born other than the year. The books that were previously hidden by the

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 funeral bill listed Great-Grandma's complete age in years, carcinominatosis." I work in the medical field and I had months, and days at the time of her death. I entered this into never heard of this. I called a friend of mine who is a PAF when I got home and found out her date of birth. I physician, and she laughed saying she had no clue. She said then called Grandma and asked her if that date meant it was probably just an obsolete medical term. You will anything to her. She exclaimed, "Ach, that was my mother's probably find you had relatives who died of some birthday." incredible diseases, and nobody has a clue as to the real When I went through my dad's trunk in the basement I cause of death. found a funeral card from my great-grandpa Sonnenfeld's As for naturalization records, some courthouses con- funeral. With the listing of pallbearers I get an idea of who tain them, and some have been sent on to the State Ar- his friends were. The families are still close to our family in chives. At the local level, if you don't find Grandpa listed in South Dakota. the county you thought you'd find him in, don't give up. Try Even with a wealth of information at your fingertips the next county. When all else fails try the county you least you still may have to go to a courthouse to do research. My suspect him to be in. Chances are that is where you will words of warning are: Be sure to call or write to find out find him. In one of the GCRA newsletters I discovered the when they are open. It would be a shame to drive four Campbell County listing of naturalization records. I saw hundred miles and not be able to get into a courthouse. Two my great-grandfather's name listed. He settled some sixty books which list locations of documents and courthouses miles away from the Campbell County courthouse and was are The Red Book and The Source. Telephone books from about eight miles from another court-house, The the area you are researching are an excellent addition to information in the naturalization record allowed me to your research collection. search the passenger lists in the LDS library to find out Be very careful when you go into a courthouse to re- when he came to the United States and the name of the search old records. You have no idea what some of these ship. It took my dad and me a day and a half, looking employees have gone through with genealogists and other through thirteen reels of microfilm, not to mention the individuals. A little sweetness goes a long way. I always strained bloodshot eyes, to find the information. It was indicate I am willing to get the books out and do the re- worth it. search myself, and that usually is just fine with them. You can obtain the legal descriptions of land for find- Although records contained in courthouses vary from ing out homestead information. You can check with the state to state and county to county, some items you may National Archives for this, find include; wills, marriage certificates, death certificates, Church records can yield a wealth of information. I and birth certificates. I have also been able to look at a rescued a book from my grandma Sonnenfeld's possessions divorce docket. I only had to give them a rough date. They following her death. It was from the Lutheran church in located it in their files, and brought it out. It was the first Eureka, South Dakota, celebrating its fiftieth anniversary. I time since the 1920s it had been filed. found a Johann Sonnenfeld listed, who was born in 1889. With wills you can find out the names of children and This was my grandfather's brother who was killed in a grandchildren not mentioned any place else. You can also cyclone at the age of five. Nobody knew when he was born. find out who was good and who wasn't according to whom The Eureka church records are indexed. I was able to get a Grandpa included in the will and whom he hadn't. A will copy of this index from a friend of mine. I found that may also list the property and land owned by the indi- Johann was born 21 September 1889, baptized 17 vidual. November 1889, and I also found the parents' names. My In some counties you can look at the marriage licenses grandfather was three when his brother was killed, and at and see who the witnesses, the church, and the officiating the time my grandfather was injured. pastor were, and see samples of their handwriting. Don't forget the cemeteries. I have an aunt who will Death records might be another good source of infor- probably never help me research again, because I dragged mation. Certified copies usually cost about five dollars. her through ten cemeteries. While you are researching cem- You can find out some fun information. I recently found eteries you will find some fun epitaphs, Ronald A. Bremer's out my great-grandmother died in Aberdeen, South Dakota, book The World's Funniest Epitaphs is a humorous which is in Brown County. I visited the Brown County collection of epitaphs, and, yes, they are real epitaphs. My courthouse and obtained a certified copy of her death favorite is: "I told you I was sick." This is the one area I certificate. Her cause of death is a "generalized will include some discussion on photography. I don't do

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 Beginning Genealogy 57 rubbings of gravestones, because I simply don't have room am doing an oral interview. You will need paper and pen. for them. I have done a lot of hiking in cemeteries in South You won't want to get too detailed or you will miss some- Dakota and I am thankful my parents help me out. When thing. Just take brief points down. Bring along extra cas- we find a name, I copy the information word for word, settes. Don't buy the cheapest ones. Purchase moderately even if names are spelled wrong. I then take a photograph. priced tapes. When you are done, break the tabs on top so I oftentimes use black and white film because I have my you don't record over a tape. Some people have ended up own darkroom and can develop my own photographs. I can recording over a loved one's conversation, and you can't also make enlargements at less cost. get it back. Bring along extra batteries. You don't want to Sometimes you can find military papers that include be in the middle of an interview and have to say, "Hey, branches of service, rank, and discharge information. You Jake? Hold it. I need to get more batteries." Chances are can contact the National Archives for further information. when you return Jake will have completely forgotten what Another good book for genealogical research, which you were talking about. actually mentions AHSGR, is Finding Your Roots: How You never know what an interview will yield. What Every American Can Trace His Ancestors, At Home and you anticipate, as a five-minute conversation could be a Abroad by Jeane Eddy Westin. It also gives information on four-hour interview that gives you everything you ever researching other ethnic groups. wanted to know. My first experience with interviewing I have purchased a genealogy dictionary, but it isn't a Grandma Voegele was interesting. She didn't want the tape must. You can always go to a library. recorder on. She was concerned about who would hear the Old newspapers and extracts of old newspapers give tape. I assured her it was only for me. She later got used to some great insight into your family. You can find out mar- that "stupid thing." When I was home and she was riages, deaths, births, and business news. remembering things she'd tell me to get it out. She told You may get information in the mail about getting a folklore stories about a bloody hand print on the wall that book specifically with your family name. I bought the one kept reappearing, as well as stories about one of her sisters, that has all the Sonnenfelds since the Civil War, but I who had been married twice. Her first husband actually haven't looked at it. It may have some addresses that are would come back into the house with the intent of killing useful to me. her. Grandma no longer remembers these things. Her I use old telephone books for tracking down families so memory isn't that good any more. that I can call or write to them. You can also get addresses When you talk to someone, let them wander off the for newspapers, courthouses, and churches. subject. Don't say, "I didn't ask you that." Chances are it When you try to research in a church beware. Many will be useful to you at some point. I was interviewing my pastors and priests won't let you in, or they tell you they grandpa Sonnenfeld one afternoon, and he was an inter- don't have old parish records. Sometimes they don't, but esting character. During the course of our conversation I sometimes they do and the records are written in German. asked him if he knew on which ship his father came to the The clergy can't read them. Some churches that are closed United States, He said he did. Grandpa's reply was "The may have transferred records to a neighboring church. You Mayflower," I said, "You were not one of the pilgrims." may also wish to contact the church's national archives to With his impish grin he said, "Well, it was a nice try." see if they have the records. The archives may also have If you can't do the interview in person, try the phone. If the records of the clergy who traveled the territories on that isn't an option, you can do the interview by mail with a horseback. questionnaire, I used to leave a list of questions for Some states will not allow you to request certain Grandma Voegele to answer. She might be dusting one day records unless you are an immediate family member. In when an answer comes to her and she writes it on the sheet. South Dakota it is fairly easy to obtain records. Oregon has Then, on my next trip home, I get the answers. Sometimes stricter requirements. when people try to think of an answer it will come to them later. Oral Interviews I won't spend a lot of time on this subject, since most Organizing Your Files libraries and bookstore carry books on interviewing tech- PAF has a section for generating logs to keep track of niques. You can use them as a basis and develop your own correspondence and what you have looked for and where questionnaire. I also take along my tape recorder when I on certain family members. You can just use a standard

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994 sheet of paper and write the same information down. When headache tablets, antacids, medication, and Kleenex in it. you write to someone for information, ALWAYS include a Many courthouses close during lunch. You can try the self-addressed stamped envelope, (There were times while I local library during that time. attended college, when I received twenty to thirty requests Use Clues from AHSGR as much as possible. It is a for information and I had to borrow stamps from Mom.) If wonderful source of finding potential relatives. I can't someone writes to you and you don't have the information, praise it enough. answer, and state you don't have the information. I keep the Use the genealogy person in your chapter. Ardella request in case I can find the information or someone who Bennett in my chapter is worth her weight in gold! If I have can help out. a question, she has the answer. If—and this is rare— she If you have questions, concerns, or information that doesn't have the information or answer I need, she'll point doesn't look right, write it down in a spiral notebook. When me to where I can find it. I can't thank her enough for her you find the answer, document where and when you found help over the years. it. My last word to you is to DOCUMENT, DOCUMENT, When I add information to my printed copy of my DOCUMENT. Even if you are not going to be publishing a group charts I don't reprint the sheet immediately. I use red family history book—and especially if you are—you need pen to show I need to add something, use a highlighter to to be able to prove where you found your information. If show when I have added it to the computer, and then once you got the information from an interview or a book, note it or twice a year print a new copy, in your information. This will show that your work is I can't praise village coordinators enough, especially legitimate. Margaret Freeman. She didn't let me quit when I was frus- trated. She helped me get back on track. Please, don't forget Headquarters. Whenever you find new information you Bibliography need to send a copy to Headquarters. That is one of the ways AHSGR will grow. If you are looking for information Baselt, Fonda D. The Sunny Side of Genealogy: A Humorous Collection of on your family and someone else has it, but they don't turn Anecdotes, Poems, Wills, Epitaphs, and Other Miscellany From Genealogy. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1988. it in, you'll never benefit. The same applies if you have Bremer, Ronald A. The World's Funniest Epitaphs. Salt Lake City, Utah: information someone else needs. Roots Digest, 1983. I try to use a research log to determine what I have Eakle, Arlene, and Johni Cemy (eds.). The Source: A Guidebook of researched and where. I keeps me from duplicating my American Genealogy. Salt Lake City, Utah: Ancestry Publishing efforts, Company, 1984. Eichholz, Alice (ed.). Ancestry's Red Book: American State, Country, & Town Sources. Salt Lake City, Utah: Ancestry Publ., 1992. A Few Last Words Galeener-Moore, Laveme. Collecting Dead Relatives, Baltimore; When you are researching on the road, don't drink Genealogical Publishing Co., 1987. vast amounts of coffee and expect to get a great deal done. Wandler, Diane J. (ed.). Handbook/or Researching Family Roots. Most courthouses are accessible via elevators. You Garrison, North Dakota: BMG Inc., 1992. should use a fanny pack instead of a purse. You Westin, Jeane Eddy, Finding Your Roots: How Every American Can Trace don't have to worry about forgetting it. Place your money, His Ancestors, at Home and Abroad. Los Angeles: J.P. Tarcher, 1977.

END OF VOLUME 17, NO. 4, WINTER 1994

AHSGR Journal/Winter 1994