Journal Of the American Historical Society of from Russia

Volume 6 No. 2, Summer 1983

TABLE OF CONTENTS

REDACTIONS: THE EDITOR'S PAGE ...... ……………………………………………………...... i

REFLECTIONS ON THE DEDICATION OF OUR HERITAGE CENTER Adam Giesmger ...... ……………………………………………………...... 1

THE INTERRELATIONSHIPS AMONG THE VARIOUS GROUPS OF GERMANS IN RUSSIA Nikolaus Arndt ...... ……………………………………………………...... 3

VILLAGES IN WHICH OUR FOREFATHERS LIVED Adam Giesmger ...... ……………………………………………………...... 1

A BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF SETTLEMENTS IN ILAVIN COUNTY, KAMYSHIN DISTRICT Alexander Dupper ...... …………………………………………………...... 11

SHIPS BRINGING THE LARGEST NUMBER OF RUSSIAN GERMANS TO NORTH AMERICA Emma Schwabenland Haynes ...... …………………………………………...... 15

IMMIGRATION OF REFUGEES FROM RUSSIA TO CANADA IN THE 1920's Adam Giesmger .....……………………………………………………...... 19

MY RETURN TO RUSSIA Jacob Hieb, Sr. ...…...... ……………………………………………………...... 27

GERMAN CONGREGATIONALISM William G. Chrystal ...... …...... ………………………………………………………...... 31

BOOKS AND ARTICLES RECENTLY ADDED TO THE AHSGR ARCHIVES Emma S. Haynes ...... ……………………………………………………...... 40

On the Cover: More than 1,500 members and friends gathered in and around a tent on Wednesday afternoon, June 15, 1983 for the ceremonies dedicating the AHSGR Heritage Center.

Published by American Historical Society of Germans From Russia 631 D Street • Lincoln, Nebraska 68502-1199 Editor: Adam Giesinger © Copyright 1983 by the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia. All rights reserved. REDACTIONS: THE EDITOR'S PAGE This issue of the Journal was delayed somewhat because we wanted to include an article on the dedication of the new AHSGR Heritage Center, which took place during the society's Fourteenth International Convention held in Lincoln on June 14-19. The completion of this beautiful building is a historic event of great significance in the life of descendants of Germans from Russia on this continent. My reflections on it will be of interest to our readers.

One group of Germans in Russia, those living in the province of Volhynia, have received relatively little attention from the historians. Some of the reasons for this are obvious. The vast majority of these people were late comers to Russia. They migrated to Volhynia from neighboring regions in Poland, Galicia and Prussia, mainly during the period 1860-1880, and many of them stayed only a generation or two, not long enough to "make history." They produced no major historians of their own, as did the Volga and the . Some research on the Volhynian Germans is now being done through Historischer Verein Wolhynien, whose secretary, Nikolaus Arndt, was a visiting speaker at the recent AHSGR convention in Lincoln. If any of our Volhynian German members wish to contact him, they can obtain his address from AHSGR headquarters. He speaks English.

Some months ago an AHSGR member in Saskatchewan phoned me to suggest that I write something in my villages series on Kronau, her ancestral village in Russia, if information is available. She will receive a pleasant surprise in this issue.

Another article on German villages in Russia, which will find interested readers among our members, is one that deals with a group of Volga daughter settlements located northwest of Kamyshin, which have had very little written about them. A few weeks ago Edward Gerk of Kelowna, B.C., sent me a Russian-language article of the year 1890 on these villages, which he had obtained from the Lenin Library in Moscow. Alexander Dupper has translated it for us.

Material is still coming in from our members regarding the German refugees from Russia in the 1920's. In this issue we have an article on the migration of such refugees to Canada during that period.

The current installment of Jacob Hieb's story describes his difficulties with Soviet red tape when he was trying to leave Russia after his visit in 1928.

We have long sought articles for the Journal on the history of religious movements among our people. We are therefore pleased to be able to present in this issue an item on German Congregationalism. Although the majority of the Protestant Germans in Russia belonged to either the Lutheran or Reformed tradition, many of them, when they came to America, were attracted to the Congregational church structure. The history of this development was described in fine scholarly fashion by Rev. William G. Chrystal at a recent gathering of churchmen in Lincoln. We are grateful to Mr. Chrystal for permitting us to publish this address of interest to many of our members.

As most readers of AHSGR publications are aware, Emma Schwabenland Haynes has done a vast volume of research in the passenger lists of ships that brought our forefathers to America. At the recent AHSGR convention in Lincoln she gave us some interesting sidelights on this research. We are publishing her address in this issue.

Mrs. Haynes has also contributed her usual mini-reviews of the books and articles recently added to the AHSGR Archives. The length of this list shows how rapidly our Archives collection is growing, mainly through donations from our members, not least from Mrs. Haynes herself.

Many thanks to all the helpful people who keep sending me useful materials! (signed:) Adam Giesinger i AHSGR’S HERITAGE CENTER IS DEDICATED

Ed Schwartzkopf, International Foundation President, David J. Miller, first AHSGR President, and Ruth M. presided at the ceremonies. Amen, second AHSGR President, unveiled the plaque which has now been placed inside the main entrance.

Arthur E. Flegel, present AHSGR President, received and held high the keys to the new building.

Adam Giesinger, third AHSGR President, and Jake Sinner, who supervised every step in the construction, unveiled the plaque which marks the Heritage Center After ceremonies in the tent, the crowds moved to the as a historical site. front of the building for the ribbon cutting.

ii REFLECTIONS ON THE DEDICATION OF OUR HERITAGE CENTER Adam Giesinger The completion of our beautiful new building, the first stage of our Heritage Center, is a high point in the history of our people on the North American continent. We have reached a pinnacle of respectability as an ethnic group! To appreciate this fully, we have to look back to our beginnings and the rough road that we have come to arrive at our present social status.

Our German forebears were for the most part humble folk. They were peasants, day-laborers, and tradesmen, of little education, who left their ancestral homeland in the latter part of the eighteenth and early part of the nineteenth century to migrate eastward into an unknown and mysterious Russia. They left a divided of many small independent states, wracked by wars, poverty and oppression, to go to a new land which promised them a better life for themselves and a more secure future for their children. After an arduous journey, they were settled on lands along the lower Volga, along the Dnieper, in the Crimean peninsula, along the coasts of the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, and some even beyond the mountains of the Caucasus. Their settlements were closed areas, within which they had local self-government and were able to preserve the eighteenth century German peasant culture that they had brought with them. Far from their old homes, with only the most primitive means of communication available to them, forced to devote their energies to the struggle for a livelihood under difficult conditions, they soon lost touch with their ancestral homeland, the source of their culture, and no longer received inspiration from there. On the other hand, they strenuously resisted all influences coming from the foreign society that surrounded them. They became a conservative, introverted people, islands of eighteenth century German dialects, folklore, music, educational methods, religious pietism, prejudices and superstitions. For them this old-country heritage became a sacred trust, which had to be preserved at all costs.

A century after the first German peasant colonists had settled in Russia, a new migration began, this time from Russia to the new world overseas. Russia was no longer as attractive to the Germans as it once had been: a new military service law in the 1870's subjected colonist sons for the first time to conscription into the Russian army; soon the Russian government also began attempts to russianize the Germans through their schools; at the same time, as a result of population growth, land shortages were developing in all German areas, a disastrous development for an agricultural people. Overseas, in the Americas, on the other hand, there were attractive promises of free land and freedom. From the 1870's to 1914, and as refugees after the two world wars, there was a steady stream of Germans from Russia to the , Canada, and South America. Many, many thousands of them came: our parents, grandparents, great-grandparents. Their descendants in the Americas today, conservatively estimated, number well over a million.

All of us know through our personal experience, or through the stories of our elders, what has happened to our people here. Economically they did very well, much better than they could have hoped for in Russia, but the old culture, which they treasured so much, was difficult to preserve under the new condition. The immigrants could not isolate themselves in closed communities as they had in Russia. Their foreign folkways were ridiculed by their American neighbors. Their children had to attend American public schools, which soon made them English- speaking Americans, somewhat ashamed of the old ways. When the anti-German feeling engendered by the first world war brought active discrimination against them, many of the younger people tended to hide their origin, change their names and attempt to forget their family's past. As a result, as the older people died, the dialects, the folklore, the music and all other aspects of the culture of our forefathers, and even the knowledge of their sojourn in Russia, appeared doomed to extinction on this continent.

Such was the situation up to 1968. The founding and development of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia has arrested this trend for the time being. The growth and the accomplishments of this society have been phenomenal. In the course of just a few years, it acquired an extensive library of books and periodicals on the history and folklore of the Germans in Russia; it collected a set of genealogical records on its people unequalled anywhere; it published historical and genealogical journals and books which aroused wide interest; and it held annual conventions attended by increasing numbers of interested people from all parts of the continent. There was no doubt that the work of the society was finally making many descendants of Germans from Russia proud of their heritage.

1 By 1978, however, when the society celebrated its tenth anniversary, it was becoming obvious that its rapid success had created some serious problems. The head office staff was working in cramped quarters that made efficient operation difficult. Most of the society's valuable books and records were stored in borrowed space, in various locations, even in different cities. We urgently needed a building of our own [the original page 1 ended here] to provide suitable accommodation for our materials and our staff. When I became president of the society in June 1978, I made the solution of this problem my highest priority.

The first step in the process that led to the construction of our new Heritage Center was taken at a board of directors meeting in Phoenix, Arizona, in February 1979. At that meeting I initiated a discussion on "our most urgent needs”, in which I stressed that our most basic immediate need was a suitable headquarters building. After lengthy discussion of the suggested project, there was a motion, which was approved unanimously, that the president appoint a building committee charged with the following tasks: 1) to prepare plans for a new headquarters building or find an existing building suitable for the purpose; 2) to prepare a prospective budget to build or purchase a building and provide for its future maintenance; 3) to carry out a fund-raising drive to finance this building project. Subsequently, Edward Schwartzkopf, Ralph Giebelhaus, Gordon Schmidt and Jake Sinner were appointed as the building committee, with the first-named as chairman. They were asked to survey the situation and bring a preliminary report to the next board meeting.

On 20 April 1979 the chairman of the building committee reported to a board meeting in Lincoln that the committee had not been able to find a suitable existing building. They thought construction of a new building would have to be undertaken and that the most suitable site in Lincoln was on the land bounded by C and D and 6th and 7th Streets. The board members took time to examine this site and then approved a motion asking the building committee to take the necessary steps to acquire a building site on the land they recommended. It took some months to get certain zoning restrictions waived, but this problem was eventually solved. Publicity given to our building plans at the 1979 convention and through the Newsletter began to bring donations to the building fund. On 2 February 1980, at the board meeting in San Antonio, Texas, the building committee was authorized to proceed with the purchase of the land needed for the headquarters building and on 6 April the deal was consummated. AHSGR had become a landowner — the traditional ambition of our forefathers!

With the land purchase the society had committed itself to the construction of a new headquarters building, but everyone realized that there were still many problems ahead. In fact, as it turned out, the enthusiasm for this venture was so great that the problems were solved unbelievably rapidly. On 8 July 1980 the building committee was authorized to engage an architect and over the next few months detailed plans for the new building were prepared. During the winter of 1980/81 an organization was set up to undertake a major capital funds campaign, which was carried out through the summer of 1981 and proved highly successful. On 11 September 1981 a groundbreaking ceremony heralded the beginning of construction. A steady stream of donations from members in all parts of the continent and a competent group of volunteer workers from the Lincoln Chapter made construction possible on a pay-as-you-go basis. By January 1983 our office staff could move into beautiful and spacious quarters in our new Heritage Center. The dedication ceremony at the recent convention was the climax of a highly successful project, of which we can all be immensely proud.

The Heritage Center was built to accommodate our present needs, but it is even more important for the future. Coming generations of our descendants, much intermarried with other ethnic groups and living scattered all over the continent, will no longer have enough in common to be interested in belonging to an AHSGR chapter nor in attending an AHSGR convention. The chapters and conventions will pass into history, but our Heritage Center, if we leave it sufficiently endowed, will continue to exist. It will preserve our books and records in perpetuity and will be visited by many Americans and Canadians seeking information about that mysterious great-grandfather who spoke German but was born in Russia. What a thrill it will be for them to see that forefather's name on a plaque on the wall and to read about him in the memorial book! Will they not be ever grateful to us who had the foresight to build this Heritage Center?

2 THE INTERRELATIONSHIPS AMONG THE VARIOUS GROUPS OF GERMANS IN RUSSIA* Nikolaus Arndt** In talking about this subject, you have to start with the premise that there was little or no contact between the various groups of Germans in Russia during the 180 years that the settlements existed. This was true under the czarist regime, as well as in the between the two world wars.

To clarify the situation, we shall define the groups that existed by their geographic location. Arranged roughly in the order of their numbers, there were Germans on the Volga, the Black Sea, the Caucasus, Volhynia and the Baltic provinces. Although the last group is not usually included when we discuss the Germans in Russia, we shall include them in this instance, because they played an important role, in a positive as well as in a negative manner, in the interrelationships and unification efforts of the Germans in czarist Russia.

The contacts between the groups that we are going to examine did not begin till very late and were not felt very much till the colonies ceased to exist. There were a number of reasons for this: 1) the immigrants came to their Russian settlements at different periods of time, by different routes, and from different areas in Germany; 2) their colonies were separated by considerable geographic distances; and 3) from the very beginning the new colonies were tightly organized, especially through the churches, and were so concerned about their own economic and cultural interests that they didn't feel the need for contacts with others.

To sum it up, one can say that the first generation of the immigrants were too preoccupied with their own adjustment, their work, and their own troubles, to have time for the pursuit of outside contacts. They did not even maintain contact with people who had come to Russia with them but stayed behind en route, such as the Petersburg settlers, who came with the in the 1760's, and some of the Volhynian Mennonites, who came with the Black Sea Mennonites in the early 1800's.

Because the Germans still in Russia and the emigrants now living in the Federal Republic of Germany and overseas are today generally considered to be one people, we shall take a closer look at the connections that did exist among them in earlier days.

Although the Germans in the Volga and Black Sea regions, from their earliest days, were administered by a special government commission set up to supervise the German colonies, this body did not establish contacts between them and was abolished in the 1870's, when the colonies were incorporated into the general Russian administrative structure. The first contacts between these two large groups and the Germans in the Caucasus came about when the descendants of the original settlers began to look for new farmland. Land shortages had developed in the old settlements and landless sons began to move to new areas to found daughter settlements. During this new colonization Germans from the Volga, the Black Sea, the South Caucasus met in the North Caucasus and eventually, towards the end of the nineteenth century, in and Central Asia. In the new villages people from the various old settlements often settled together.

There were indirect contacts between all German groups in Russia also through the churches, which were organized on a nation-wide-basis. Pastors, teachers, merchants, physicians, and other professionals and tradesmen, some of whom came from Germany, Poland or the Baltic states, also often moved from one area to another.

Some contacts gradually developed also through educational institutions. The school system in the colonies was relatively simple, lagging far behind developments in Germany but superior to anything existing among their Russian neighbors. In the later part of the nineteenth century, some demand for higher education developed, German middle schools were founded, and eventually colonist sons went on to university. The only Russian university that offered classes held in German was in Dorpat (Yuryev, Tartu) in the Baltic region. Contact with the at this institution was generally a bitter experience for students from the colonies. The aristocratic, lordly sons of the Baltic barons, then the intellectual elite of Russia, looked down upon the folksy peasant ways of the colonist sons. This sobering experience and the mutual getting to know each other brought ______*An address delivered on 16 June 1983 at the 14th International Convention of AHSGR in Lincoln, Nebraska. **Mr. Arndt, whose home is in Wiesentheid, Germany, is secretary of Historischer Verein Wolhynien. 3 the students from all colonist areas together and gave them an ethnic awareness of their common German ancestry. It led them to the founding at Dorpat University of a fraternity that included students from all German colonist areas — but no Baltic Germans! This fraternity had the nationalistically signficant name, Teutonia.

[the orginial page 2 began here] To a certain extent, the different groups of colonists were linked by the German-language newspapers of the czarist empire. The St. Petersburger Zeitung, founded in 1727, did not publish much news about the colonists, but the Odessaer Zeitung, founded in 1863, devoted considerable space to them. It was the most widely read newspaper in the colonies. The Volga region and the Germans in the Caucasus did not have newspapers of their own till 1906 (Saratowsche Deutsche Zeitung and Kaukasische Post), and Volhynia never did. The Odessaer Zeitung had correspondents in the Volga region and had some readers there. Other German papers read to some extent in the colonies were the Moskauer Deutsche Zeitung, the Rigasche Rundschau, and various religious and agricultural periodicals. During the years preceding the first world war, the various groups of colonies were brought closer together by important political events that occurred in Europe and in Russia itself, even though only parts of these groups and only their leaders were affected. It started with a nationalistic political wave that poured over Russia, coming from Italy, France, Poland and Germany, where it was reinforced by the founding of the German Empire in 1871. The Germans in Russia came under pressure from the czarist government to become better assimilated into Russian life and became a pawn in a struggle for power among the nations of Europe. During the same period the Prussian government tried to increase the ethnic German population in parts of its Polish provinces, as did the German Baltic barons in Latvia and Estonia. Between 1900 and 1905 these recruited some of the poorer German colonists willing to emigrate from their settlements in Russia. The Black Sea colonies were not affected to any degree, but thousands of Germans from the Volga region and from Volhynia were recruited and moved to the Baltic provinces and to the area around Posen (Poznan) in .

The Russian revolution of 1905 had important consequences for all groups of Germans in Russia, for it gave them opportunities for development and challenges in the cultural and political sphere. The czar's government now decreased its pressure for assimilation and the Germans in all areas seized the opportunity to found newspapers and cultural organizations and to prepare themselves for the election of the first Russian parliament, the Duma. In the forefront of this movement were the Germans in the Baltic and the Black Sea regions.

It was soon realized that the organizational structures of the past, based on church-oriented and deeply rooted traditions, could not cope with the upcoming challenges. The older generations, naturally, tended to cling to the old ways, but the new generation was more inclined to be concerned about the interests of the Germans in Russia as a whole and to bring about reforms in the intellectual sphere and to do it on a national scale. Most probably the patriotic currents in Russia and in the German Empire were contributing factors. Representatives of the various groups of Germans now established contacts with each other and started discussions regarding united action. Difficulties arose when certain Baltic Germans tried to take the lead over the entire body of Germans in Russia, but this had a good result, because it brought about more active cooperation between the representatives of the Volga and the Black Sea Germans.

One of the most important matters under discussion in the early meetings was whether a German political party should be established for the elections to the Duma, similar to the parties of the other ethnic minorities, the Poles, the , and the peoples of the Caucasus, or whether one should just join one of the newly emerging Russian political parties. At this point the differences in the social structures of the rural and urban German population surfaced. No agreement could be reached to form a party representing and working for all the factions of the Germans in Russia. Actually, the idea of a parliamentary system based on political parties was foreign to the majority of the Germans in Russia, who were very loyal to the Czar and accustomed to a powerful central government. The choice of a political party was therefore left up to the individual German voter. The majority opted for the moderate monarchistic "Party of the 17th October" (generally called the Octobrists). After the elections it turned out that some Volga Germans had voted for a more democratic party, the Cadets, and some even for the Social Democrats, a party of the left. These more radical views existed in the Volga colonies because some of them had by this time a proletarian working class, as well as some teachers with social revolutionary tendencies. In the Black Sea region, on the other hand, where there had been isolated contacts with the German Empire, there was some support for the extreme right.

During the first world war there was little or no communication between the Germans in different regions of Russia, for such communication was frowned upon officially. But events did bring different groups together. During the summer of 1915, when German troops were advancing into Russia, the czar's government ordered the deportation eastward of all Germans in Volhynia. Many of these found refuge among their compatriots in the Volga and Black Sea regions and learned to know these for the first time. 4 In the spring of 1917, after the February revolution which toppled the Czar, delegates from all German areas in Russia gathered in Moscow for a three-day meeting, at which they decided on the formation of [the orginial page 4 ended here] a permanent central organization and agreed on a common course of action. Throughout that summer local meetings were held in all areas and there was enthusiastic activity in the setting up of local organizations, the re-opening of German schools, and the founding of German newspapers. But all came to naught when the October revolution brought the Bolsheviks to power.

In the summer of 1918 the B!ack Sea region and Volhynia were occupied by German and Austrian troops, whose withdrawal late in the year was followed by a cruel civil war which lasted till 1921. During this period the Volga Germans were cut off from the other German groups and were the first to be subjected to Communist rule.

The new Soviet state no longer included the Germans in the Baltic provinces, which now became independent, nor the Germans in western Volhynia, which became part of Poland, nor the Germans in Bessarabia, which was annexed by Roumania. The Germans remaining in the Soviet Union developed somewhat differently depending on the area in which they lived. Common action by all German groups was not encouraged, was not even possible under the conditions that existed. Many of the German farmers in the Black Sea region had fought on the side of the nationalistic White armies against the Reds and were treated extremely harshly when the Soviet regime finally established itself. They were in general also a rather individualistic group, who found it difficult to adjust to the collective farming methods introduced by the new regime. The Volga Germans, on the other hand, who had farmed over a long period under the old Russian mir system, found the change-over to the communist collective system somewhat easier. Their geographic location and the compactness of their settlement area also permitted the formation of an autonomous Volga German Republic, while the Germans in Volhynia and the Black Sea region had to be content with temporary German administrative districts. The proximity of the latter groups to the western border with Poland and Roumania, where the governments were inclined to fascism as in Germany, was another reason why these were treated more harshly than the Volga Germans during the expropriations and Stalinist persecutions of the thirties. In general, collectivization proceeded more smoothly in the Volga region than in these other areas and the Volga German collectives often received praise as being exemplary.

Starting with the deportations of the 1930's and especially after the second world war, many colonists from different areas met in the labor camps of northern Russia and Siberia. Since they were not allowed to return to their former homes and consequently settled mostly in Central Asia, the formerly separate groups of colonists are losing their distinctiveness and now form a new body of Soviet Germans, in which many of the younger generation are hardly aware of their former separate homes in European Russia. These are gradually losing their language, but are still aware of their German origin. The desire to emigrate to Germany is still widespread among the Soviet Germans. Recently statistics indicate that it is more prevalent among the Black Sea Germans than the Volga Germans, which suggests that the latter have become more reconciled to the Soviet system.

Nikolaus Arndt of Wiesentheid, Germany.

5

The Location of Kronau in the .

This map shows the Kronau Colonies east of the Inguletz river and their Sagradovka Mennonite neighbors west of the river.

6

VILLAGES IN WHICH OUR FOREFATHERS LIVED The Kronau Colonies on the Inguletz Adam Giesinger By the 1860's there were large numbers of landless people in most of the German colonies in southern Russia. In many settlement areas reserve land for future population increase had been set aside at the founding of the colonies. This land was generally used in the early years to pasture sheep, then relatively lucrative, and thus acquired the name sheepland. Later the sheepland was divided up into small parcels for farming and rented out by the district government to individuals, Germans and Russians. The revenue derived from this was used to build up a fund with which land could be bought for landless sons of the colonists. This was the way in which the Kronau colonies originated around 1870.

In the year 1869, their mother colonies in the Prischib district west of the Molotschna river1 had accumulated sufficient funds in their sheepland capital to buy 18,000 dess. of land on the east side of the Inguletz river, south of Krivoy Rog, from the Russian landowner Count Kotchubey. On this land 12 German villages were founded.2 The settlers were obligated to repay the purchase price to the mother colonies in instalments over the years.

Ten of the twelve villages still existed in 1941. They were: Kronau Fuerstenfeld Landau Ebenfeld Fuerstental Neu-Mannheim Eigenfeld Nikolaital Eisental Schoental

The first eight were Evang. Lutheran, with parish center at Kronau; the last two were Catholic, with parish center at Neu-Mannheim. Kronau was the local government center (volost capital) for the group.

Across the Inguletz river from these Lutheran and Catholic villages was a larger group of seventeen Mennonite villages, commonly called the Sagradovka group, daughter colonies of the Molotschna Mennonites, founded shortly after the Kronau group.3

Statistical information about the villages on the Inguletz was gathered by Dr. Karl Stumpp in 1942 and is available to us in his publications.4 The people of these villages were evacuated to German-occupied Poland in the fall of 1943 and at the end of the war suffered the same fate as all other such re-settlers.

We have below a German visitor's impressions and reflections just before the people of Kronau were evacuated from their village.

The Last Days of Kronau Wilhelm Staub5 It is 23 October 1943. A few hours ago SS-Brigade-Leader Hoffmeyer told me that tomorrow the evacuation of the German colonists from the region between the Dnieper and the Bug will begin. About 200,000 Germans of the Ukraine and of Volhynia will be leaving their homes in the next few days, men, women and children, the old, the sick and the crippled. Almost all of them will be departing, in covered wagons, from the land which has been their home and that of their forefathers for four or five generations. I think of the numerous villages which, through their efforts, had developed into prosperous oases in the midst of the inefficient Russian farm economy. I think of the civil war, of the Makhno bands, of the famine years, collectivization, banishment and deportation, murder and plunder, all the misery of the last quarter century and then — the liberation! “We were Germans and shall remain Germans," that is the basic attitude.

The little PKW labors heavily through the tough plastic black earth. It rained yesterday, one of those brief but violent downpours, which convert the whole country for days into a mushy, tough, almost impassable mass, German villages appear in the slightly rolling steppe ahead: Eigenfeld, Deutschendorf6, Schoental. The land has already been replowed to some extent, but the German farmers will not harvest next year's grain. Sunflower and corn fields, the crop taken off them, have the dried-up residues lying along the roadside; beyond them are vast stubble fields; then finally there is a well-paved road and before us lies Kronau. There is the church, with its cut- off bell-tower, dishonored and desecrated by the Soviets; to the right a small Rumanian soldiers’ cemetery, to the left the village council office, a low one-story building. Beyond it is the school. In the schoolyard there play blond and brown boys and girls, who cheerfully group themselves around their young teacher, while I take a few pictures. 7 The news regarding the impending removal of its people had not yet reached Kronau, but l am asked questions about it. Should these people be told the bitter truth now? I didn't do it, because I myself still had the silent hope that the re-settlement from this area would not be necessary. Diagonally across from the school there is a large two-story building, the German hospital. I walk down the broad village street. It presents the same picture as I had seen earlier in Bessarabia: a wide roadway, a sidewalk of flat stone plates, bordered by stunted acacia trees. And then the lone farm-houses, each by itself, separated from the street by a massive, low, whitewashed wall, which has an opening only for vehicle entry.

Behind this wall lie the long extended farm buildings; the house in front, then the stables, the granaries, the retired parents' home, the well and the summer kitchen. The houses look neglected, the coating of whitewash is largely peeled off, the greyish-yellow clay plaster beneath shows through obtrusively. The roof is damaged, has an emergency patch here and there, for there is no lumber available for repairs anywhere on the broad steppe. In spite of this, everything suggests to some degree the former prosperity of 25 to 30 years ago. In the living room there are a few old pieces of furniture, salvaged from the period of endless turmoil and worry: a chest of drawers, a trunk, a bed such as is a feature of every living room; sometimes there is also a showy piece produced by Soviet mass-production, a sofa snobbishly rebuilt and numerous mirrors. On the walls, in addition to a picture of the Fuehrer, there hang again the old family pictures, the confirmation verses and family blessings; on the trunk lies the old bible; and on the window sills there are vases and jugs with colorful paper flowers. In spite of all the poverty, everything is painfully clean. So I saw Kronau in October 1943. And what was it like in better days?

Kronau lies on good black earth, with ground water level six to ten meters deep, in a flat valley, which protects it against icy winter storms, but has the disadvantage of collecting water in the spring and during rainy weather, which occasionally causes flooding that hinders traffic. The village was founded in 1862 as one of the forty-one daughter colonies of the twenty-seven colonies of the Prischib settlement area. Predominantly Halbstadt, Prischib, Blumental, Wasserau, Kostheim and Heidelberg sent the first settlers. These were the families Doehl, Bachmann, Ickert, Konradt, Hoffmann, Klein, Rausch and Schnell, who were the first to win their bread from the fertile soil and whose names one finds again and again in the old church registers. To join them came the families Braun, Kaul, Draeger, Dietz» Reimsch, Portje, Heise, Ridinger, Kessler, Bueche, Renner, Haas, Kraut and Scholl. The poverty of the first years is quickly overcome; the colony flourishes and thrives; there is sufficient land on hand for the children as they grow up. The colonists build their church, the spiritual center of German life, also their school, their hospital and just before the first world war their Gymnasium (classical secondary school). The population of the village, completely German, grows from 375 in the year 1911 to 543 in 1919. The first world war leaves scarcely any traces worth mentioning. But then comes the civil war and with it the great famine. Reds, Whites, and Ukrainian nationalists in turn quarter themselves here, requisition and rob. But the German farmer continues uninterruptedly to till his soil, until the crop failure of 1921 inflicts the first great wounds on the body of the people. During the winter of 1921/22, 55 persons die of hunger in Kronau, 13 men, 6 women and 36 young people under eighteen years. Whole families die out, as for instance the Konradts and the Haases with six persons each. Eduard Kraut dies of hunger, with his wife Emilie and children Gottlieb, Emilie and Eduard. The same happens to Eugen Renner and his sons Johann, Oskar and Eugen. Scarcely a family is left that does not have at least one member to mourn. Later, in the year 1933, four more persons die of hunger and in the winter of 1933/34 another eight persons. Since 1929 land is being expropriated, taken away from "kulaks''. Those people who do not join the collective are under suspicion. The hostility against Germans also increases. The wave of banishments and deportations begins with Reinhard Luebe in 1930 and Karl Michel in 1932. Up to the beginning of the war in 1941, 71 Kronau men are deported, among them old men like Johann Schumacher, aged 73, and Karl Michel and .Johann Doehl, aged 67. The teaching profession also has to supply its share of victims. The Gymnasium is converted into a 10-class middle school by the Soviets. Of the teachers working in this institution, Reinhold Hoffman and Karl Ranch are taken away in 1937. The years 1937 and 1938 in general, with 39 and 8 persons respectively, had the largest number of deportations. The places to which the people were banished were particularly the Far East (Khabarovsk in the Amur region), Siberia, and the high North (Arkhangelsk, Vologda, Murmansk),

The standard life, apart from an illusory period of prosperity in the middle twenties, becomes ever poorer. The wages for a day's work in 1940 are: 2 kg of grain, 800 g of potatoes, 500 g of sunflower seeds and 0.97 ruble. Comparing wages with prices at this time: a worker's suit at the cooperative store cost 80 rubles, from a free trader 300 rubles; a pair of shoes, 120 rubles at the one and 400 rubles at the other. The amount of food given out is not adequate for the usually large families, so that some additional food has to be bought through the private trade. The many-sided cultural life which had been characteristic of the Germans is prohibited by the Soviets. The Soviet middle school, organized on a departmental basis, with Rus-

8 sian and Ukrainian as languages of instruction, German being taught as a foreign language, had to be converted in 1941 into an eight-class German school, to satisfy the most pressing needs. About six percent of the people are illiterate. The village library was set up entirely from a propaganda point of view. It was destroyed by the Soviets themselves before they withdrew. Film presentations by Soviety propagandists took place occasionally, that's all. The German farmer has been degraded to a kolkhoz worker. In 1918 there were only 24 farm establishments, with a total of 1560 ha of land (the other houses in the village served as dwellings for teachers, tradesmen, etc.), but they were free farmers on their own land. In contrast with this, there are, in 1942, 160 farmyards with an area of 75 a each, while the land cultivated by the community collective comprises 1365 ha. In addition to that there are 5 ha of orchard and 3 ha of vineyard, also controlled by the collective. The predominant crops are wheat, barley, oats, rye, corn, millet and sunflowers. The average crop yield in 1941 was: wheat 18, barley 12, oats 14, rye 10, corn 22 and sunflower seeds 17 hundred kg per hectare.

There is little information about the development of livestock raising. In the year 1942 there are: in the collective in private possession horses 131 2 cattle 32 168 sheep 18 22 swine 57 281 When the Soviets withdrew, they took with them 45 horses, 32 head of cattle, 177 sheep and 65 swine. The number of domestic fowl lost, which are not given, are mostly easily replaced. There are now, in 1942, 2300 chickens, 30 geese and 20 ducks on hand.

With the outbreak of war on 21 June 1941, there begins a new period of suffering for the people of Kronau. Dragged away again are 58 persons, including 2 women and 8 young people under eighteen. Included among these are 7 teachers from the Middle School: Lina Zeiter, Abraham Buchert, Alexander Heinsmann, Reinhold Ickert, Bruno Heck, Adolf Kessler and Jakob Penner. It should be noted that among the 58 persons those are not counted who managed to escape and return home again.

The of the German troops increases the hatred for Germans immeasurably. The people of the village have to work at digging tank traps and rifle pits. Before the withdrawal of the , all the men between the ages of 16 and 60 are evacuated. The livestock too is driven away. Only gradually some of the men manage to escape through the front; some of the livestock is also recovered.

With the occupation of Kronau by the German Wehrmacht, a new zest for life returns. The people still present and those who manage to return, take to the plow again, and although no comparison figures for crop yields are available, one can count with certainty on the fact that they far exceed those of the Soviet period. The hitherto neglected houses are patched up again, the worst shortages of clothing are overcome through the MSV, a kindergarten is established, in the village school seven German teachers again instruct 210 German boys and girls. A singing group is organized, soon thereafter a theatrical group. In the evening there is music and singing again in front of the houses. New life has come to Kronau.

But the will to live could not be broken even by the Soviets. Very revealing in this connection is a look at the biological developments in these villages. While Kronau, as an entirely German settlement, had 375 people in 1911 and 543 in 1919, the population grew to 1120 Germans and 435 Ukrainians by 1937, as a result of the Soviet policy of denationalizing the German villages by placing other ethnic groups in their midst. In the year 1942 there are 959 Germans (265 families) and 367 Ukrainians (76 families) in the village. Through banishment and deportation, through deaths from famine and other causes, 141 German families lack a male head. In spite of this, it is gratifying to note, the number of mixed marriages, which total 14, is relatively low. The foreign blood in these 14 families consists of 5 men and 9 women. Marriages in which 10 or more children were born (in Kronau 17 marriages with 10-14 children) all date back to the years before the first world war. At the head of the list are Johann and Karolina Doehl and Christian and Olga Hein, each pair with 14 children. But even today the average number of children in a family exceeds that in the Reich. From 84 registered marriages contracted to 1919, there are 547 children, an average of 6 per family. During the years 1920-1930 there were exactly 100 marriages, from which 397 children were born (an average of 4 per family). Only five of these families had no children: in contrast to these, one family. Otto and Pauline Ickert, had 11 children, two families had 9, and five families had 7 each. The biological picture is quite otherwise for the 88 marriages contracted between the years 1931 and 1942, which had only 179 births, an average of 2 per family. What has to be considered here is that in a large number of these marriages the male partner has been deported or taken away (in 54 of them, 11 of them through draft into the Red army), and also that many of these marriages were contracted in the years 1938-1941 (16 in 1938,

9 14 in 1939, 7 in 1940 and 8 in 1941). This helps one to understand also why for the period 1931-1942 there are 11 childless marriages, for all of them were contracted in the years 1938-1941 (2 in 1938, 2 in 1940 and 7 in 1941).

So much for the history and development of the 80-year-old village of Kronau.

On the night of 21/22 October we were awakened by the jerky roar of a Soviet bomber. The blue-black sky with its countless stars arches peacefully over the broad steppe land. The silhouettes of the neighboring colonist houses stand out clearly. We stand and wait. The half-grown daughter of my hosts clings to me seeking protection. Somewhere the bombs fall, their echo comes over to us. The old lady, with her kind blue eyes in her wrinkled face, presses both of her hands against her breast; "Not that again." Not back under Soviet rule, with its hunger, poverty and death, with its arrests, persecutions and deportations: a few days later the people of Kronau, on hundreds of covered wagons, trek to their ancient homeland.

Notes

1. See the article on the Prischib colonies in AHSGR Work Paper No. 25, Winter 1977, pp. 28-35. 2. Emil Blank, "Die Prischiber Wolost" in Neuer Haus und Landwirtschafts-Kalender fuer deutsche Ansiedler im suedlichen Russland (Odessa-Kalender), 1913. p. 109. 3. The history of these villages is told in: Gerhard Lohrenz, Sagradowka, Rosthern, Sask., Canada: Echo Verlag 1947. 4. Karl Stumpp, Bericht ueber das Gebiet Kronau-Orloff, Sammhmg Georg Leibbrandt, Berlin 1943 (GR-99 in AHSGR Archives); and an article on the same topic in Heimatbuch der Deutschen aus Russland 1958, pp. 22-32. 5. There is a copy of this in the AHSGR Archives: GR-1024, "Kronau's Leidensweg und Befreiung" by Wilhelm Staub. The translation is by Adam Giesinger. 6. Deutschendorf originated from a wartime re-settlement. Its former inhabitants were removed and scattered Germans were moved in.

The Church of the Holy Trinity at Kronau, as it was in 1942. The Communists had taken the bell tower off the roof in the 1930's, had arrested the last pastor and converted the church building to profane uses. It was used as a church again during the German occupation 1941-1943.

The church building at Kronau as it is now. It is being used as a theatre.

Pictures from Die Kirchen und das religioese Leben der Russlanddeutschen, Evangelischer Teil, by Joseph Schnurr, p. 357. 10 A BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF SETTLEMENTS IN ILAVLIN COUNTY, KAMYSHIN DISTRICT A translation of a Russian article of 1890 Alexander Dupper

Mr. Edward R. Gerk, a member of AHSGR living in Kelowna, British Columbia, has given the society a copy of a Russian article which he obtained from the Lenin Library in Moscow in October 1982. It describes the villages on the west side of the Volga in which Mr. Gerk's forefathers lived. The original appeared in Saratovskiia Gubernskiia Vedomosti (Saratov Provincial Reports), No. 46 (1890), pp. 356-358. We thank Mr. Gerk for providing us -with a copy of this article, which we give in English translation below.

* * * * *

THE SETTLEMENT MARIENFELD This settlement is located on the left bank of Mokraia Ol'khovka (Wet Alder) creek. Around 1828, the colonist B——(?)1 from Ust'Kulalinka2, who was called by the nickname "Spatz" (sparrow), founded a khutor3 on this site and started to grow grain. This is why this settlement has been popularly called Spatzenkhutor up to the present time; sometimes it is also called Novaia Avilova, because of its close proximity to the lands owned by the Avilanikov Association. The official name Marienfeld (Mary's Field), in honor of the Mother of God, was given to the settlement in 1852 at the request of the settlers. In time other settlers from Kamenka and Norka counties rounded out the community.

At the time of the tenth census4, there were 275 males and 304 females in the settlement. At the present time there are 696 males and 639 females, all of the Roman Catholic faith.

This settlement has 1 wine shop, 1 water mill, 1 windmill and 1 oil mill.

The allotted community land includes: farmyards, pasture and unproductive land, 1987 desiatinas5; arable land, 5062 des.; meadows, 50 des.; forest, 195 des.; total; productive land, 5161 des. and unproductive land, 3133 des.

There is in the settlement one community parochial school, which was established in 1852 in a community- owned house and is supported by the settlers of the community. There are 115 boys and 96 girls in this school.

THE SETTLEMENT JOSEFSTAL This settlement is located on the left bank of Mokraia Ol'khovka creek. Around 1833 several colonists from the county of Kamenka founded a khutor on this site and started growing grain. Among the first settlers was a colonist named Schwab, and for that reason the settlement was popularly called Schwabenkhutor, but because among the first settlers there were also musicians who played the fiddle, the surrounding Russian inhabitants commonly called it Skripalevka (Fiddletown).6 The official name Josefstal (Joseph's Valley) was given the village in 1852, at the request of the settlers, to honor Saint Joseph. As in Marienfeld, the settlement of Josefstal was completed in 1852, when settlers from the counties of Kamenka and Norka arrived.

At the time of the tenth census there were in this settlement 299 males and 254 females. At the present time there are 603 males and 544 females, all of the Roman Catholic faith, except 7 persons, who belong to the Orthodox faith.

There are in the settlement 1 small country store, 1 wineshop, 1 water mill, 1 windmill, and 1 brickyard.

The allotted community land includes farmyards, pasture and unproductive land, 2804 desiatinas; arable land, 3715 des.; meadows, 72 des.; forest, 171 des.; total: productive land, 4834 des. and unproductive land, 1929 des.

There is in the settlement a community parochial school, which was established in 1852 in a community house and is supported by the settlers. There are 103 boys and 83 girls in this school.

THE SETTLEMENT ERLENBACH This settlement is located on the left bank of Mokraia Ol'khovka creek. In 1828 a merchant by the name of Remennikov founded a khutor on this site. Soon afterwards several colonists from various counties of the Kamyshin district also settled here to grow grain. This khutor was called Remennikov Khutor, which has been its popular name up to the present time. The settlement received its official name Erienbach (Alder Creek)7 [the original page 12 started here] in 1852, when other colonists from the Kamyshin district settled here. The name Erienbach was inspired by the alder shrubs which grow near the settlement along Ol'khovka creek. 11 At the time of the tenth census there were counted in the settlement 309 males and 284 females. At present there are 741 males and 717 females, the majority of whom belong to the Lutheran faith.

There are in the settlement 2 wineshops, 3 water mills and 1 windmill.

The allotted community land includes: farmyards, pasture, and unproductive land, 3470 des. arable land, 3827 des.; meadows, 39 des.; forest, 193 des.; total: productive land, 4816 des. and unproductive land, 2713 des.

There is a community parochial school in the settlement. It was established in 1852 in a community house and is supported by the settlers of the community. There are 140 boys and 310 girls in this school.

THE SETTLEMENT OBERDORF This settlement is located on the right bank of Mokraia 0l’khovka creek, on a small hill. Around 1828, a colonist by the name of Becher, from Kamenka county, founded a khutor on this spot, where he was soon joined by more colonists from the same county. The settlement was originally called Becher's Khutor, a name which has been preserved in popular usage to the present time . Because at the beginning a peasant by the name of Kuptsov lived in the khutor for some time, the Russian population in the neighborhood called the settlement Kuptsovo. In 1852, after the settlement of this khutor was completed by arrivals from the German-settled counties of the Kamyshin district, the settlement was given the name Oberdorf (Upper Village), because it is the farthest upstream of the German villages along Mokraia Ol'khovka creek.

At the tenth census there were counted here 335 males and 261 females. At present there are 786(?) males and 754 females, the majority of whom are of the Lutheran faith.

Establishments existing here are: 2 small country stores, 4 water mills, 1 windmill, and 1 oil-mill.

The allotted community land includes: farmyards, pasture and unproductive land, 4383 desiatinas; arable land, 4565 des.; meadows, 56 des.; forest, 65 des.; total: productive land, 5246 des. and unproductive land, 3823 des.

The school was founded in 1852, established in a community-owned house, and is supported by the settlers in the community. Its pupils consist of 126 boys and 143 girls. THE SETTLEMENT NEU-NORKA This settlement is located on the right bank of the river Ilavlia. Around 1847 several colonists from the county of Kamenka founded a khutor here. Among them was the colonist Valentin Gette, who was colloquially called Shutnik (Joker) for fun; as a result the khutor was popularly called Shutnikovskii Khutor (Joker's Hamlet), which was abbreviated as Shutka (Joke). In 1852 settlers from the village of Norka settled here and the settlement received the official name Novaia Norka (Neu-Norka = New Norka).

In the tenth census there were counted in this settlement 279 males and 259 females. At present there are 590 males and 591 females, most of whom are of the Reformed faith.

There are in the settlement 1 small country store and 1 water mill. In addition there is a water mill on a plot of land bought by the settlers of the community, which is called Koshkinsk Mill.

The allotted community land includes: farmyards, pasture and unproductive land, 1829 desiatinas; arable land, 3112des.; meadows, 81 des.; forest, 104 des.; total: productive land, 3871 des. and unproductive land 1255 des.

There is in the settlement a community parochial school, which was established in 1852 in a community house and is supported by the settlers in the community. There are 70 boys and 76 girls in this school.

THE SETTLEMENT ALEXANDERTAL This is situated on a large hill, on the right side of the Astrakhan postal highway, one versta8 from the river Ilavlia. The first settlers came from the village Sosnovka, Sosnovsk county, in 1853, and at first settled along the ravine toward the center of the communal land allotted to them. The settlers who arrived after them, however, did not like this spot and they, together with the first settlers, moved to a lower place along the postal highway and there dug out their huts. The next spring, however, in 1854, the high water flooded their dugout huts and forced them to leave that place also to re-settle on higher ground, where the settle-

12 ment has remained to the present.

Since the settlers, with few exceptions, came from Sosnovka, the settlement is popularly called Novaia Sosnovka (New Sosnovka) by the Russians, and Neu-Schilling by the Germans, because their original home Sosnovka was called Schilling by them. Later the new settlement received the official name Alexandertal (Alexander's Valley), in memory of the blessed Emperor Alexander II9, God rest his soul!

At the tenth census there were counted in this settlement 189 males and 171 females. At present there are 378 males and 350 females, most of whom are of the Lutheran faith.

The settlement does not have a store or flour mill, but it does have an oil-mill.

The alloted community land includes:, farmyards, pasture and unproductive land, 1753 desiatinas; arable land, 2525 des.; meadows, 27 des.; forest, 78 des.; total: productive land, 2606 des. and unproductive land 1777 des.

The school was established in 1854 in a community house and is supported by the settlers in the community. There are 47 boys and 47 girls in this school.

In the summer a few men from the various settlements of Ilavlin county, after finishing their own farm work, go to the Don region and the Novouzensk and Tsarevsk districts to supplement their income by agricultural work, such as cutting hay and grain, threshing grain, constructing dams, etc.

Translator's Notes

1. The name is illegible. 2. Ust'Kulalinka was commonly called Galka by the Germans. 3. Khutor =HamIet. 4. The tenth census took place in 1857-58. 5. 1 desiatina = 2.7 acres 6. Skripka = fiddle (violin). Hence Skipalevka == Fiddletown. 7. Ol'Kha = Erie in German === Alder in English. 8. 1 versta = 0.66 mile. 9. Tsar Alexander II was assassinated in 1881.

13

S. S. Wieland

S. S. Teulonia

14 SHIPS BRINGING THE LARGEST NUMBER OF RUSSIAN GERMANS TO NORTH AMERICA * Emma Schwabenland Haynes If one compares ships which brought the largest number of Volga Germans, Black Sea Germans, and Mennonites at a single crossing to North America, ships bringing Mennonites would win by a substantial margin. One vessel, the Teutonia, brought nearly 1,000 Mennonites at a single crossing, and during 1874 there were four other ships which brought more than 400 Mennonites each. These were: 1. TheS. S. Hammonia, which arrived in New York from Hamburg in July with 500 Mennonites, most of whom were who settled in South Dakota.1 2. The S. S. Cimbria, which arrived in New York from Hamburg in August with 576, practically all of whom came from Alexanderwohl. After staying in Lincoln, Neb., for several weeks, they settled in Kansas. 3. The S. S. City of Richmond, which arrived in New York from in August with 441 Mennonites. These were Swiss Volhynians who settled for the most part in Moundridge, Kansas. Others went to Freeman, South Dakota. 4. The S. S. Teutonia, which has already been mentioned, came to New York from Hamburg on September 3, 1874 with 995 Mennonites. All of them went to Kansas. 5. The S. S. Vaderland, which arrived on Dec. 26, 1874 in from with 628 Mennonites.

Passengers of the Vaderland had a particularly difficult time. Their ship was badly damaged on its voyage to Philadelphia due to bad storms. It lost three of its propellers but kept limping onward and finally reached its destination after 21 days, whereas ordinarily it took just 14 days to cross the Atlantic. The passengers were Volhynian Mennonites who came in the midst of winter without sufficient money to buy bread and other supplies. They spent only two days in Philadelphia and then took a train to Hutchinson, Kansas, where they arrived at 11 p.m. on a cold wintry night when the thermometer registered 12 below zero. They wandered about the streets without food and without a place to shelter them. Finally a man came along and opened up an empty store building into which the whole party crowded. Several of the group left for Great Bend, Kansas, where they spent the winter in Santa Fe railroad cars. The rest of the party was taken to Florence, Kansas, where the Mennonite Board of Guardians and the Santa Fe Railroad Company housed them in poorly constructed buildings for the winter. The death rate was very high among them. It is said that a child passed away every other night. The next spring they were settled on Santa Fe Railroad land in Lonetree Township, McPherson County, Kansas.2

A German genealogist named Karl Werner Kluber had done much work on Mennonites who left Russia in the 1870's. When I told him that my people were Germans from Russia too, he exclaimed, "Then you must be a Mennonite." "No," I told him. "My ancestors were Lutherans." Since he still looked skeptical, I added that more Lutherans than Mennonites had come to the United States from Russia. He asked how I knew this, and I answered that a historian named Richard Sallet had earned his doctor's degree by examining census statistics of the United States for 1920. He showed that the largest single group of Russian Germans in the United States were Volga German Protestants. Mennonites had come in very large numbers in the 1870's, but immigration had practically ceased after that, whereas Black Sea Germans and Volga Germans continued coming until the outbreak of in 1914.

Ships bringing Mennonites to America were usually of the Hamburg-America Line, the Inman Line, and the . The Mennonite Board of Guardians had contracted with the Inman Line to give Mennonites special rates on their trip to the United States, while the Pennsylvania Executive Aid Committee had contracted with the Red Star Line, whose ships docked in Philadelphia.

During the following years, ships of the Red Star Line brought a particularly large number of Mennonites to the United States. Thus the S. S. Nederland arrived July 25, 1875 bringing 652 Mennonites from Antwerp to Philadelphia. On July 28, 1876 the S. S. Vaderland brought 529 Mennonites, and on June 29, 1877 the Vaderland came again to Philadelphia with 613 Mennonites. Although the Teutonia brought the largest number of Mennonites at a single crossing, the Vaderland brought 1142 in its two crossings.

Other ships with large numbers of Mennonites were the State of Nevada, which arrived in Philadelphia from Antwerp on August 4, 1875 with 570 Mennonites, the S. S. Strasburg, which came to New York from ------* An address delivered on 16 June 1983 at the 14th International Convention of AHSGR in Lincoln, Nebraska. 15 Bremen in July 1878 with 670 people, and the S. S. , which came to Philadelphia from Antwerp in June 1879 with 729 Mennonites.

In an article written in Mennonite Life for December 1981, Mr. John F. Schmidt, formerly of the Mennonite Library and Archives in Newton, Kansas, says that a total of over 13,000 Mennonites arrived in the years 1873- 1893, and that of these 5,000 came in 1874 alone.3

In contrast, other groups of Protestants and Catholics from Russia never came in such large numbers at a single crossing. The reason is that whole colonies of Mennonites such as those from Alexanderwohl, Bergtal and Fuerstenland came to the United States en masse. This never happened in the Volga or the Black Sea colonies. The largest number of non-Mennonites were 452 Volga German Protestants who came on the S. S, Wieland 5 June 1878 from Hamburg to New York. I picked out the 14 ships bringing the largest number of non-Mennonites at a single crossing. You will remember that in the case of the Mennonites I gave the names of all ships that carried 400 or more Mennonite passengers, but in the case of the non-Mennonites I chose 200 or more. This doesn't seem quite fair, but it was the only way I could talk about the Volga Germans and Black Sea Germans.

The first two ships on my list were the S. S. Thuringia, which arrived in 1873, and the S. S. Schiller, which came in 1874 bringing Black Sea Protestants to the United States. Passengers for the Thuringia were compiled by Gwen Pritzkau and Dr. Georg Rath in his book The Black Sea Germans in the Dakotas.4 These first Black Sea Germans came primarily from the colonies of Worms and Rohrbach and had as leaders Johann Grosshans, a teacher in Worms, and Heinrich Griess, a wealthy farmer who had owned a large estate near Rohrbach. He sold this estate for $50,000 and took the money with him. A third leader was Heinrich Hoffman, also a teacher, but he was not as important as the other two men. The group went through Berlin to Hamburg, where they had to wait three weeks for the Thuringia. During this time one of the children of Heinrich Griess and several of the Hoffman children got sick. As a result, the group had to separate with 80 families leaving on the Thuringia and 8 on the Cimbria. The Thuringia had a very stormy crossing but arrived in New York on the 30th of July, 1873, whereas passengers on the Cimbria arrived on the 6th of August. Both groups stopped first in Burlington, Iowa, where friends were already living. The newly arrived immigrants were advised to buy firearms and plenty of ammunition before leaving for Lincoln, Nebraska, because of the danger of wild animals. In Lincoln most of them stayed in the B&M Emigrant Home, where sickness broke out and many children died. After investigating the Dakotas, Nebraska and Kansas, many of them bought land at Sutton, about seventy-five miles from Lincoln, but others went to South Dakota, where they joined other immigrants who had arrived earlier. Passengers on the S. S. Schiller consisted of 383 Black Sea German Protestants who came primarily from Worms, but also from Johannestal and Gliickstal. They were all friends of the people on the Thuringia and were met in New York by Michael Griess, who accompanied them to Sutton. Dr. Rath tells how joyful cries of "Michael, Michael. Look, there's Michael Griess,” arose from the German passengers when they saw Michael Griess waiting for them at the dockside.

The third ship to arrive with over 200 passengers from Russia was the S. S. Ohio, which sailed from Bremen to Baltimore, bringing 310 Volga German Catholics and 17 Protestants. (It should be said that other Volga German Protestants had come in small numbers previously.) Catholics on the Ohio had come from Katharinenstadt, Herzog, Liebental, and Obermonjou on the east side of the Volga and Kamenka and Pfeifer on the west side. They spent their first winter in Topeka, Kansas, and then settled in Ellis County, Kansas. On January 5, 1876 the City of arrived in New York from Liverpool bringing 185 Volga German Protestants who had come with Peter Ekkert, a Mennonite minister who had done much evangelistic work among Volga Germans. Passengers who came on the City of Montreal can be found in Journal, Volume 2, Number 1, on pages 69-70. Since printing this list, I have learned that it should have included 15 more names. These passengers were left out because they said that they were from Germany rather than from Russia. Five of them were named Simon, six Hein, two Schnerch, and one was named Schmidt. This is an example of how difficult it is to be completely accurate with passenger lists. Not only did people give the wrong country of origin, but often their ages were given inaccurately. Any child who was less than a year old was not charged for his passage. It is simply amazing how many women had eleven-month old babies. Mistakes were also made in the names of the passengers. On the City of Montreal I found the name Aschenmeyer and printed it in this fashion. About a year later I was told that it should have been Aschenbrenner, which is a familiar name found in Norka. In the last issue of Clues people named Steinbrecher said that they had come from the colony of Doennhof, but evidently the shipping clerk did not understand because he wrote down Ternhoff. Fortunately a Steinbrecher granddaughter was able to make the correction. In the coming issue of Clues I plan to print the names of the parents of Mrs. David Miller. I knew that her Alles family came from Walter, but after the name of Adam Alles there was written very plainly [ the original page 16 ended here] Luke. This puzzled me very much. I could not understand how even the most stupid clerk could have mistaken Walter for Luke. Then I looked up the Russian name for

16 Walter and found that it consisted of the two words Gretschinnaja Luka, spelled with an "a". And so the mystery was solved.

The fifth ship was the City of Berlin, which brought 249 Volga German Protestants from Liverpool to New York. However, all of these people were listed as Mennonites. It is possible that the Volga Germans said that they were of this religion to take advantage of the lowered rates that had been granted to the Mennonites. Families named Beisel, Frick, Socolosky, Ehrlich and Walter came on this ship. Just as was true of the passengers on the City of Montreal, these were pietistic people who in many cases joined the Baptist, 7th Day Adventist, or Mennonite churches.

Then on July 29, 1876 the S. S. Mosel arrived from Bremen to New York bringing 345 Volga German Catholics from such colonies as Herzog, Marienthal, and Semenowka, plus 19 Protestants named Toepfer from the colony of Fischer. When one of the men named Toepfer died, his widow married a Catholic, but her sons kept the name Toepfer. This name has become well known through Amy Brungardt Toepfer, the author of Conquering the Wind, which I hope that many of you have read.

On August 3, 1876, just five days after the Mosel arrived from Bremen, the Suevia came from Hamburg to New York, bringing 306 Volga German Catholics. They came primarily from Obermonjou and included many people named Leiker. There were also passengers from the colonies of Louis, Schoenchen, Graf, and Wittman. This shipping list was printed in Workpaper No. 9 and continued in Workpaper No. 10. It is among the earliest passenger lists published by AHSGR.

October 24, 1976 the S. S. Mosel came from Bremen to New York with 264 Volga German Protestants and 12 Catholics named Kreutzer and Rohr. Most of the Protestants came from the colonies of Schoenfeld and Schoendorf on the east side of the Volga. These villages were daughter colonies of Jagodnaja Poljana and Pobotschnaja on the west side. Since relatives named Ochs and Scheuerman had already arrived on the S. S. Ohio and settled near Otis, Kansas, about 200 passengers from the Mosel, including Peter Brach, chose such towns as Otis, Pawnee Rock, and Great Bend, Kansas, at the border of Rush and Barton counties.

June 5, 1878 the S. S. Wieland came. As was stated earlier, this ship brought 452 Volga German Protestants, the largest number of non-Mennonites to come on a single crossing. Families from Norka named Spahn, Deines, Jost, Glanz, Schwindt, Sauer, and Hamburger were on board. People from Frank had such names as Amen, Wacker, Schaeffer, Hoff, and Leonhard. From Kolb there were passengers named Koch, Thiel, Ruth, Rosenauger, and Kanzler. These people went either to Kansas or to Hastings, Nebraska.

On April 22, 1889 the S. S, Ems arrived in New York from Bremen. On this ship came 285 Black Sea Germans including Wilhelm Schumacher from Gluckstal, in the Odessa area. It was about this immigrant that Life Magazine wrote, "This is the face of the man who broke the Northern Plain." The shipping list also contains the names of some of the earliest Black Sea Catholics. They were the last of the major groups to start emigrating to America.

All names given so far have been printed either in Workpapers, Clues, or the Journal. However, there are two other ships which have not been given as yet. In 1889 a ship arrived in Baltimore from Bremen bringing 243 Black Sea Protestants, and in 1898 another ship arrived with 250 Black Sea Protestants and 40 Catholics who were going to such places as Eureka, South Dakota, and Kulm, North Dakota. I hope to include these two ships in coming issues of Clues.

July 4, 1893 the S. S. Stubbenhuck came from Antwerp to . It brought 211 Volga German Protestants. Some of them had taken a ship from Libau, Russia, to Antwerp, Belgium, and then transferred to the Stubbenhuck for the rest of the journey. They had no intention of staying in Canada, but chose this line because it was cheaper. They took a train from Quebec to Detroit and then went on through Chicago to Nebraska. Others settled in Illinois on the way. This passenger list was compiled by Pauline Dudek for Clues 1979, Number 2, pp. 66-67.

The last ship, the Assyria, left Hamburg on December 6, 1902. Its destination was given as New York via Halifax. It brought Black Sea Catholics from Elsass and Black Sea Protestants from Arzis, Albota, Borodino, Friedenstal, and Kloestitz in Bessarabia. This ship caused me quite a bit of trouble. The passenger list was compiled by Gwen Pritzkau, who said that the ship left Hamburg on on December 6, but she did not give the date of arrival in New York. Since it usually took two weeks for a ship to reach New York, I looked for it in the National Archives around December 20, but all of my searching was in vain. Finally I happened to read a family history called Uncle Pete by Sheila Saxelby. In it she told that a relative of hers named Peter Wiesenburger had sailed on the Assyria. Smallpox broke out among the passengers, and they were all quarantined on an island near Halifax. After three weeks they were released and took a train [the original page 17 ended here] for Montreal and 17 then crossed the border into the United States at Saulte Ste Marie on January 14, 1903. Their first winter was spent in Bridgewater, North Dakota, but later they moved to other locations.

It is possible that there were other ships bringing large numbers of people to the United States on single crossings, but on the basis of what we have learned so far, the following conclusions can be drawn:

1. It is primarily in the early years that people came to America in large groups. Of the fourteen ships listed, nine of them arrived between 1873 and 1878. This is, of course, very understandable. People hesitated to come to the New World without the help and support of friends and relatives. They knew that a different language — English — was spoken in America and that the customs were also different. But after friends and relatives had established homes here, they came without hesitation, often travelling all by themselves. Thus there were just five ships bringing more than 200 Russian Germans at a single crossing between the years 1879 and 1914.

2. Mennonites and Volga German Catholics left Russia in compact groups during the 1870's but almost stopped coming after that. It should be said, however, that this was more true of Catholics from the east side of the Volga. In Catholic villages on the west side, such as Kamenka, Pfeifer, and Rothammel, emigration continued at a steady rate into the 20th century.

3. Early groups of Volga German Protestants were strongly influenced by Baptist or Mennonite Brethren missionaries. They often believed in adult baptism, and for this they were subjected to ridicule and animosity. Many of their Lutheran pastors did not take kindly to this evangelistic movement and were relieved when many of these people left for the New World.

4. The Hamburg-American and the North German Lloyd Lines were great competitors for the immigrant trade. The Hamburg- was more popular at first, but the North German Lloyd seems to have been the choice of later immigrants. After 1890 people often came to the U.S.A. by way of Canada, something that rarely happened in earlier years.

5. Black Sea Catholics were the last of the large groups to leave for the United States, but after 1885 they surpassed the Volga German Catholics who had started out with such enthusiasm. Neither they nor the Volhynian Germans ever came in groups of more than 200 on a single ship.

6. And finally, one must be very careful in compiling passenger lists. Mistakes were made in the spelling of the names and ages of passengers and also in the villages from which they came. As the Reverend Bichhorn once wrote to me, "the gods themselves struggle in vain" in trying to determine what the lists actually mean. It has also always amused me that in giving occupations of the people who came to America a woman who might be the mother of as many as six or more children had the word "none" or "no occupation" listed after her name. I wonder if the male chauvinistic clerk who wrote that the woman had no occupation would have been willing to take her place in the steerage with a small baby and six other lively children and bring them safely and well to the New World.

Notes

1. To obtain the number of Mennonites who came on a particular ship, I consulted both Clarence Hiebert's Brothers in Deed to Brothers in Need (Hillsboro, Kansas, 1974) and the list of ships compiled by John F. Schmidt and Jacob A. Duerksen of Washington, D.C. (Mennonite Library and Archives, Newton, Kansas). There is often slight disagreement between these two sources because of the question who was actually a Mennonite. I usually used the figures given by Mr. Schmidt, except in the case of the Teutonia, where Mr. Hiebert's figure of 995 agreed with the information I had collected. 2. Abe J. Unruh, The Helpless Poles, (By author 1973), pp. 115-117. 3. John J. Schmidt, "Passenger Ship Lists as an Archival Resource." Mennonite Life, December 1981, p. 5. 4. George Rath, The Black Sea Germans in the Dakotas (Pine Hill Press, 1977), pp. 385-392, and Owen Pritzkau, Heritage Review, Nos. 5 and 6, June 1973, pp. 43-47.

18 IMMIGRATION OF REFUGEES FROM RUSSIA TO CANADA IN THE 1920's Adam Giesinger As a result of the famine of 1921-1922 and general dissatisfaction with conditions in the Soviet Union, large numbers of Germans from the Volga and the Black Sea colonies made efforts to leave Russia in the 1920's. Many thousands succeeded. They came to Germany, which received them kindly but could not at that time offer them a permanent home. They were kept in refugee camps, mainly in Frankfurt on the Oder, until new homes could be found for them overseas. The United States then, under the Harding and Coolidge administrations (1920-1928), pursued restrictive immigration policies. A quota system introduced in 1921 severely restricted the admission of immigrants, particularly those originating in eastern and southern Europe. Germans from Russia could not therefore come to the United States in any large numbers during that period. Canada was more receptive. Under the first Mackenzie King administration (1921-1930), Canadian immigration laws permitted ready entry to able-bodied farm workers, with their dependents. Many of the German refugees from Russia, stranded in Germany, unfortunately did not have the means to come. These were helped by immigration societies set up by various church groups in Canada for their co-religionists. The best known of these were the Canadian Mennonite Board of Colonization, the Lutheran Immigration Board, and the Association of German Canadian Catholics (Volksverein Deutsch-Canadischer Katholiken, VDCK).

The Mennonites had the most elaborate organizational set-up to bring their refugee people to Canada, and they brought in the largest number, some 20,000 persons over the years 1921-1927. These were settled predominantly in the existing Mennonite communities in western Canada. The story of this immigration is told in considerable detail in scholarly books by John B. Toews1 and Frank H. Epp.2

The Lutheran and Catholic societies are said to have sponsored 10,000 German refugees from Russia during the same period.3 Research into the work of the Lutheran Immigration Board during the 1920*s still awaits scholarly attention, but much interesting information about the immigration work of the Catholic Volksverein has been gathered by Edward Roy Gerk, an AHSGR member living in Kelowna, British Columbia.

Mr. Gerk's grandfather, Paul Gerk, who fled from Josefstal on the Volga in 1921, is No. 235 on the "List of Volga German Refugees" that appeared in our Spring 1982 Journal and is mentioned in my article on "The Volga German Refugees of 1921-1922" in the Fall 1982 Journal.4 Edward Roy Gerk, keenly interested in his grandfather's history, discovered that Paul Gerk had been brought to Canada in the spring of 1924 by the Volksverein. In the course of his researches, he acquired a variety of items connected with the work of this society. These he has now donated to the AHSGR Archives.5

The negotiations of the Volksverein (VDCK) with the Canadian immigration authorities regarding the admission of refugees began on 21 February 1924. There are two letters of that date from F. I. Hauser, general manager of VDCK, to Hon. J. A. Robb, minister of immigration and colonization, Ottawa. In the first letter Mr. Hauser told the minister that VDCK would supply funds to bring 150 refugees from Germany to Catholic parishes in Saskatchewan. The second letter added the information that the following Catholic priests would be the society's immigration secretaries: Rev. Bernard Schaeffler, O.S.B., Rev. Mathew Michel, O.S.B., and Rev. C. A. Kierdorf, O.M.I. Very soon thereafter the last of these, Father Kierdorf, became full-time immigration secretary.

The immigrants that would receive support from VDCK were chosen for them by a Catholic refugee aid society in Hamburg, Germany, the St. Raphaels Verein. Whenever this society had a group of acceptable refugees ready, they informed VDCK, which then negotiated their admission to Canada with the officials of the Department of Immigration.

On 12 March 1924, a wire from Hauser and Kierdorf to W. J. Eagan, deputy minister of immigration, informed the department that VDCK had 86 refugees prepared to come to farms in Saskatchewan and hoped that their admission would be expedited. A letter of the same date from Hauser to Egan repeated the message in the wire and included a copy of the contract form that would be signed by the immigrant and by the farmer who would employ him. (This same contract form was used also by the Lutheran Immigration Board.)6 On 13 March, Egan informed Kierdorf that the department would accept the refugees as requested, subject to the health regulations and a literacy test.

19 Facsimile Immigration Contract from the Immigration Branch (RS 76, Volume 241, File 148405, part 1) Public Archives Canada:

THIS AGREEMENT made the _____ day of _____ A.D. 1924, BETWEEN:-______Hereinafter called "the Immigrant,” OF THE FIRST PART, and ______Hereinafter called “the Employer,” OF THE SECOND PART, and ______Hereinafter called "the local.Committee,” OF THE THIRD PART.

WITHESSETH: THAT in consideration of the covenants, agreements and undertakings on the part of tho other or others of them hereinafter contained, the parties hereto covenant and agree each with the other or others of them, as follows: 1. The Immigrant hereby agrees to enter into the service of the employer and serve him faithfully and diligently as a farm laborer for the period commencing the ____ day of ______192__ and ending the _____ day of ______192__. …..2. The Employer hereby agrees to take the said Immigrant into his service as farm laborer for the said period at the yearly wages of $_____ payable monthly to the Local Committee as hereinafter provided, and further agrees to furnish the said Immigrant and hls family with suitable living quarters and board on his farm during the said period. …..3. The Immigrant hereby assigns, transfers and sets over to the Local Committee all wages due or to become due to him by the Employer, or any other Employer to whom the said Immigrant may be assigned to by the Local Committee as hereinafter provided. The receipt of the Local Committee to the said Employer for such wages shall be sufficient discharge to the Employer therefor. …..4. The Local Committee shall allow the Immigrant a reasonable amount from time to time out of said wages for clothing and other necessaries for himself and family and shall apply the balance of such wages in payment of any costs or expenses incurred or guaranteed by the Employer or Local Committee for the transportation of the Immigrant and his family from _____ to _____ and any other amounts which may be due by the said Immigrant to the Employer or the Local Committee, that is a reasonable amount for clothing and other necessaries for the Immigrant and his family and the manner in which said wages shall be applied as aforesaid, shall be in the sole discretion of the Local Committee. 5. In order to prevent disputes and misunderstandings between the Immigrant and the Employer all matters of dissatisfactlon on the part of the Immigrant caused by lack of sympathy of the Employer, maltreatment, abuse, unsuitable living quarters or board, or unreasonable labor demands, and generally all matters of dissatisfaction on the part of the Immigrant or on the part of the Employer shall be adjusted between the Immigrant and the Employer by the Local Committee and the said Local Committee shall be and is hereby made, constituted and appointed sole umpire to decide such questions and matters. The decisions of the Local Committee which may be given from time to time as questions come up shall be binding and conclusive upon the Immigrant and the Employer. 6. In the event of any dissagreement between the Immigrant and the Employer, or if for any other reasonable cause the Local Committee deem it advisable that the Immigrant shall be removed from the service of the Employer, it shall notify the Employer accordingly and thereupon the contract of service hereby entered into between the Employer and the Immigrant shall cease, but the Employer shall continue to be liable for all obligations incurred by him prior to such termination. In such an event-the Local Committee shall have the right to allot the Immigrant to another Employer, and the Immigrant hereby agress to enteer the service of such other employer for the then remaining portion of the period referred to-in paragraph 1 hereof, or such other period as maybe agreed upon, upon the same terms and conditions as are herein containded. IN WITTNESS WHEREOF the said Parties have hereunto set their hands and affixed their seals on theday and year first above written.

SIGNED, SEALED AND DELIVERED)

In the presence of: ______

20 On 26 March a letter from a Canadian immigration official in Hamburg to the Department of Immigration in Ottawa informed the department that out of 79 applicants brought forward on behalf of VDCK, 50 had been granted visas, 21 were rejected for trachoma, 1 for a crippled hand, and 7 for illiteracy. Those granted visas were destined for farms in the following districts in Saskatchewan: 9 to Tramping Lake, 5 to Kendal, 4 to Salvador, 8 to Holdfast, 5 to Allan, 2 to Vibank, 2 to Kronau, 13 to Primate, 1 to Prelate, and 1 to Denzil.

[the original page 21 began here] The rejection of some applicants for illiteracy brought an immediate reaction from Father Kierdorf. He wired Ottawa, asking the department to waive the literacy test in these cases, because the immigrants were urgently needed as farm help. In a later wire, he reinforced his argument by promising that VDCK would make the illiterate immigrants literate within two years. They were admitted.7

The first group of the refugee immigrants sponsored by VDCK left Hamburg on 28 March 1924 on the Canadian Pacific S.S. Monfrose and arrived in St. John, New Brunswick, on 5 April 1924. Father Kierdorf met them at the port city and accompanied them west to Saskatchewan, where he saw them placed on the farms to which they had agreed to go. We have the names of a few of the men, all Volga Germans, who were in this group:

Sebastian Martel, 22, from Brabander. Married. Nearest relative in Russia: his father, Adam Martel. Going to a farm in Primate, Saskatchewan. Andreas Rolsing, 24, from Seelmann. Married. Nearest relative in Russia: his brother-in-law, Michael Specht. Going to a farm in Tramping Lake, Saskatchewan. Friedrich Richelhof, 34, from Neukolonie. Married. Nearest relative in Russia: his mother, Catherine Richelhof. Going to a farm in Primate, Saskatchewan. Reimund Schamber, 32, from Degott. Married. Nearest relative in Russia: his brother, Joseph Schamber. Going to a farm in Salvador, Saskatchewan. Georg Stremel, 25, from Josefstal. Married. Nearest relative in Russia: his brother, Jacob Stremel. Going to a farm in Salvador, Saskatchewan. Florian Abt, 29, from Brabander. Married. Nearest relative in Russia: his brother, Ferdinand Abt. Going to a farm in Primate, Saskatchewan. Paul Gerk, 22, from Josefstal. Married. Nearest relative in Russia: his wife, Elisabeth Gerk. Going to a farm in Holdfast, Saskatchewan.

Early in July, VDCK asked the immigration department for the admission of wives, children and siblings of some of the men who had arrived in Canada in the spring. The first group of these listed in the correspondence, then still in the refugee camp at Frankfurt/Oder, were the following:

Margareta Abt, nee Martel, wife of Florian Abt. Anna Richelhof, with two sons, Friedrich and Florian, wife and children of Friedrich Richelhof. Barbara Roelsing, 16, single. Barbara Roelsing, nee Specht, widow, with two children, Josephine and Anna. Barbara Roelsing, with baby son Andreas, wife of Andreas Rolsing. Anna Schewalie, with two children, Florian and Maria. Katharina Stroemel, with son Johannes, wife and son of Georg Stroemel. Margareta Gerk, single. Katharina Schamber, wife of Reimund Schamber. Joseph Schroefel, single. Alexandra Martel, with two children, Paulina and Maria, wife and children of Sebastian Martel. Raimund Mildenberger, 15, single. Anton Terre, single.

A wire from Hauser of VDCK to Egan, the deputy minister of immigration, on 31 July 1924, promised that the dependents of the immigrants, whose admission had been requested, would not become a public burden, but would be provided for by the farmer employers and by VDCK. This appears to have expedited the admission of the dependents.

Additional refugees and their dependents were admitted during the following months. On 31 January 1925 VDCK reported to the department of immigration in a letter that the society had sponsored 245 immigrants during

21 the year 1924 and that homes had been found for them on farms in Saskatchewan. Of these, 20 were German nationals, the rest were German refugees from Russia.8 It was hoped that 1000 refugees could be helped during the year 1925.

It is interesting to note that wives and other dependents were also able to come (legally) from Russia itself to join the refugee immigrants who had come to Canada. Paul Gerk, for instance, who had come with the first group in the spring of 1924, brought his wife, Elisabeth (Dieser) Gerk, from his home village of Josefstal on the Volga in the fall of 1925. She travelled with an official Soviet passport permitting her [the original page 22 began here] to leave the Soviet Union to come to Canada. A copy of this document, supplied to us by her grandson, Edward Roy Gerk, appears on the page following this article.9 The immigration work of VDCK continued through the years 1925, 1926 and 1927, but we do not have statistics regarding the total number of refugees helped or how many of them were Germans from Russia. More research should be done in this area.

Notes

1. John B. Toews, Lost Fatherland, (Scottdale, Penn.: Herald Press, 1967) (GR — 164 in AHSGR Archives) 2. Frank H. Epp, Mennonite Exodus, (Altona, Manitoba: D. W. Friesen and Sons, 1962). (GR — 386 in AHSGR Archives) 3. Henry Seywerd, "People of German Origin", Encyclopedia Canadiana, Vol. 4, p. 358. 4. AHSGR Journal, Vol. 5, No. 3 (Fall 1982), pp. 24-25. 5. The most informative of these items is a microfilm obtained from the Public Archives of Canada (microfilm C-7390), which contains copies of the correspondence of the years 1924-1927 between the Volksverein and the department of immigration regarding the admission of German Catholic refugees. (This microfilm is GR — i459 in the AHSGR Archives) 6. A copy of this contract from appears after the first page of this article. 7. The names of these seven immigrants are given in the correspondence. It should not surprise us that some German refugees from Russia in those troubled years were illiterate. Often they lived in areas where no schools were available. 8. The report included the information that of the refugee immigrant farm workers sponsored by VDCK in 1924 only three were failures: one refused to work, a second found the work too hard, and a third left to go to South America. 9. Note that the passport is in the Russian and French languages, although it was issued in the Volga German Republic. The use of the French language by Russian officialdom was common in Tsarist days. Obviously some of the old routines still survived under the Communists as late as 1925.

A group of German refugees from Russia living in a refugee camp (Heimkehrlager) in Frankfurt on the Oder in 1924. *

* Editor's Note: Edward Gerk informs us that the following persons, all except one of them born in Josefstal/Volga, have been recognized on this photograph: Georg Stremel, Katharina (Burgardt) Stremel, Margareta (Stremel) Gerk, Jacob Mildenberger, Anna (Schaefer) Mildenberger, Heinrich Dieser, Katharina Dieser. Some of these were among the group of refugees that arrived in Frankfurt on 9 December 1922, published in the Spring and Summer 1982 Journal. 22

25

26 MY RETURN TO RUSSIA Jacob Hieb, Sr. In the fourth instalment of his story, which appeared in our Spring issue, Mr. Hieb described his visits with relatives and friends in his ancestral village area during the winter of 1928. Here he tells us about his experiences with Soviet red tape, which made the process of leaving Russia a nightmare.

V. Problems on the Way Out The roads were fairly good, as there had been quite a bit of snowfall the night before, and our driver made good progress. We kept going till about three o'clock in the afternoon, when we stopped for a few minutes in a small Russian village. In the days of the czar this had been the home of a big landowner and all its people had worked for him. The fine castle in which he had lived was still there, but the large barn, the granaries and other buildings had been torn down, as such large buildings were no longer needed. They had been brick buildings and the bricks were now piled up to be used for other purposes. We stopped in front of the saloon and, because we were somewhat chilled, although it wasn't a very cold day, we had some wine and hot tea. It seemed that the saloons were open on Sunday the same as any other day. Just across the street there was the community store, also wide open on Sunday. I went in there to buy some cigarettes. Because cigars were not available anywhere in Russia, I had to switch to cigarettes. We stayed only a few minutes and then drove on towards the railway station.

About six miles farther on we came to a little village named Lidle, after its former landowner. He had a fine residence there on a hill, but his barns and other buildings had already been torn down. There were four German families in the village. When we arrived there, they had us unhitch our horses. Mrs. Lidle, whose husband had been a very rich man and had been killed during the revolution while trying to leave the country, made a hot lunch for us, which we ate while the horses were being fed. She told us that all that she and her two children now owned was 15 acres of land, two horses and two cows. All their other property had been taken from them and divided up among the poor.

As soon as our horses had been fed, we started out to complete our trip. When we were about three miles from the railway station, the sun went down and it rapidly grew dark. Our driver drove very fast and we soon arrived at the railway station, Vessely Kut. Within half a mile of the station there was a small settlement of German farmers. Because we had two hours to wait for our train, we drove there and were invited for a nice hot supper. At nine o'clock in the evening we were taken to the station, where we found that the train would be twenty minutes late. There was no heater in the depot and it was quite cold. We bought our tickets through to the holy city of Kiev, the former pilgrim city. They had tickets for soft beds or hard beds. We bought ours for the "soft" beds.

The train was late more than the twenty minutes first reported, at least half an hour. It was very uncomfortable waiting that long in such a cold room. I walked out on the platform to see whether the train was in sight and, to my surprise, saw there two dogs belonging to my nephew Balzer. They had followed us all the way from Neudorf to this station. I could not take them along on the train, of course, although presumably they wanted to go to America also! They had got so used to following me around wherever I went, from one village to another, and it looked as if they wanted to continue to do so. I felt sorry for the poor animals and took a piece of Kuchen out of my satchel, which had been sent with me for lunch, and gave it to them to keep them alive. Since that time I've heard from Balzer that the dogs made it home again, a day earlier than our driver did.

At last our train arrived and we got into the car with the "soft" beds, where we found a good place for ourselves. The car was heated fairly well and otherwise comfortable. My partner and I each lay down on one of the narrow beds and covered ourselves with our overcoats. We were able to sleep till about three o'clock in the morning, when a lady came in with four children. She took up one-half of the compartment and my partner had to move over to my side. Because the children were noisy, we got no more sleep that night.

It was six o'clock in the morning when we reached a fair-sized city, whose name I have forgotten. Our train stopped here for twenty-five minutes and a young man came into the car with a large can and a tray of glasses, calling out "Chai" (tea), accompanied by another young man who carried cake and Kuchen. We had them fill up two glasses of tea for us and ate some of the Kuchen. The tea was very good and so we had our glasses re-filled. They charged us 40 kopecks (about 20 cents) for the four glasses of tea and the Kuchen. That's something for which I must give Russia credit, they have good tea all over the country. 27 The farther north we went towards Kiev, the colder it got and the more the country was covered with heavy snow. Our train was running at about twenty to twenty-five miles per hour. They are still using the small locomotives over there, such as we had many years ago. About eleven o'clock our train stopped again and more tea and Kuchen was brought in, so that we were kept well supplied with tea. The surrounding country here was more heavily forested. There are more Great Russians (Kazapps) in this part of the country. Farther south, around the Black Sea, there are very few of them, but mostly Little Russians (Ukrainians). The Great Russians are a different type of people. They hitch up their horses in a different way than the people farther south and they wear heavy sheepskin coats. The Great Russians and Little Russians don't like each other very well. Each group has its own church. The Great Russians are more particular about what they eat and drink. They drink much tea and also vodka.

We were not asked for our passports anywhere on the way until we reached the holy city of Kiev. It was early in the morning when our train stopped at the large Union Station at the bottom of a valley. When we entered the depot we noticed that there were many Great Russians with droshkies who wanted to drive us down town, which was about three miles from the station, but we took the street car instead. There were also a few automobiles, more here than I saw anywhere else in southern Russia.

It was the coldest morning that I have ever known in my life. You could not see anything through the street- car window, as there was very heavy frost on it, and they had to use the light in the car. When we reached the middle of the city, we got out. We were very cold and it was bitterly cold in the streets. We entered a restaurant, which was also a saloon, had some vodka and then sat down at a table and had some tea, which warmed us up somewhat. The room itself was not really warm and so we had to warm up our insides.

We inquired at the restaurant where we could find the German Consulate and the Polish Consulate and the Russian government office to which we had to report our arrival in Kiev that morning. From the latter it was not far to the Polish Consulate. Here we were given some forms to fill out, which we had to take into the room of the Polish Consul. He asked us in broken German how long we wanted to stay in Poland. We told him that we only wanted to travel through his country. He then gave us visas for this purpose, for which we paid him 14 rubles.

From there we went to the German Consulate, quite optimistic that all was going well. When we entered the Consulate, an official asked what our wishes were. We told him we wanted a visa into Germany. He took us into the room of the German Consul, who was very kind to us. He looked at our passports and, to our surprise exclaimed: "What are you men doing here? You have to go back to the city of Balta. You have made a foolish trip for nothing to Kiev and will have to go back to get your release and visa from Balta or from Odessa." We were thunder-struck, as we had only three and a half days left until our passports to Russia expired. It would take us two days to go back to Balta or Odessa and as much time to come back again, and at least a day to get our papers fixed up, a total of five to six days, when we had only three and a half days until our passports expired. We had not forgotten what we were told when we entered Russia about a month before, that we should see to it that we were out of the country before our passports ran out. Staying in Russia without a passport is risking your life.

The German Consul must have noticed the effect that his words had had on us. He told us that he would help us all he could to find a way out. He would go to the Soviet official in Kiev with us to see what could be done about our passports, since it was obviously impossible for us to go back again to Odessa or Balta. But the Russian officer, when he saw our passports, told us that we would have to go back to the to get our release and visa out of Russia. We told him that the head official in Grigoriopol had told us that we did not have to go to Balta but could go directly to Kiev and get our release there. We took his word for it and came directly to Kiev. The German Consul then had a long talk with the Russian officer. After their conversation they told us that they would wire the head man in Moscow and get his permission to allow our release and visa to be made out at the city of Kiev, since we had not time to go back to Balta. They told us that we could come back about noon for our answer.

Because we were almost out of Russian money, we now went to a government bank, which was about fifteen blocks away. It was a large building, about four stories high. This was the great center of the banking business in Kiev and we found the building filled with people. We had a guide with us from the German Consulate, who intorduced us to the manager of the bank, who spoke broken English. He took us to his office and asked a lot of questions about America and the banking business in our country. He also asked us our opinion of the present government in Russia. We told him that we didn't think their system was as good as ours, but we were afraid to say much more. He cashed a couple of small travellers' checks for us and showed us around the bank.

28

After leaving the bank, when we turned into the next block, we could see way up the street the great museum building, said to be almost the best in Russia. Because we were too worried that forenoon about the answer we would receive from Moscow, we did not go to see the museum. We should have, as there are undoubtedly many things there that would be of interest to us Americans. The weather was no longer so extremely cold as it had been earlier that morning or the day before. There were therefore many people out in the streets. They were mostly Great Russians, but also some Little Russians. The Great Russians are mostly heavy, tall men and the women are also big. Both men and women wear heavy sheepskin coats and felt boots, all very much alike. Besides the Russians, we saw also some Polish people and a few Greeks and Germans. Turks are seen only rarely; this is too far north for them.

After walking three or four blocks farther, we saw in the distance the golden towers and cupolas of their Great Holy Church (Cathedral of St. Sophia, ed.). We wanted to see this church, but it was a considerable distance from where we were. The central part of Kiev is beautiful. It has buildings six or seven stories high, most of which the government has taken over. There are still quite a few stores run by private individuals, but two or three of these told me that the government, as a result of the enormously high taxes it imposes on them, would soon own these stores.

When it was nearly noon, we went into a large restaurant in the center of town. We found it pretty well filled up. It was a government restaurant, which had big long tables in a large room, with benches on each side of the tables. On each table there were large plates of rye or barley bread, mostly rye, with each plate having bread about a foot high on it. As soon as you sat down, they brought you vegetable soup, borsht, which was very good. They also had some wine and tea. The prices were very reasonable.

We watched the clock very closely at the restaurant and as soon as it struck twelve we left at once for the government building. When we arrived there the officials told us that the answer had not yet come from Moscow. They asked us to come back about four o'clock, that they might have an answer then. A cold feeling came over us when we heard that there was no word from Moscow, for our passports were due to expire very soon.

We walked down about four blocks to the Great Holy Church. From there we could see those golden cupolas better than in the forenoon. When we arrived in front of the church, we saw that it was an enormous structure. To our surprise, the doors were not open and so we could not enter the church and see the inside. But we looked it all over from the outside.

While looking at this church I recalled an experience in Odessa when I was in Russia in 1894. I was walking up the stairway to the passport office at the police station and saw about fifteen men lying around on the stairway. I had to go there several times until my business was finished. Every time I went these same men were still there. Finally I asked them why they were lying there so long. These poor Russians then told me that they had been there for the last twelve days waiting for their passports, as they wanted to go on a pilgrimage to the Holy City of Kiev on foot, for which they had to have a passport. They had no money to give tips to the officials and so these men made them come back again and again. How long they had to wait I don't know. But it made me realize what a great influence the Holy Church in Kiev had on these people. They would put up with almost any kind of abuse for the sake of getting there. The present government has, of course, stopped these pilgrimages.

From there we went to the Union Station and got all the information about the trains that went out towards the Russian frontier, so that we would be ready as soon as we received our exit visas. We then went back to the government building. It was nearly the time that had been set for us. We waited till the time was up and then asked the official whether an answer had been received from Moscow regarding our passports. He said it had not come. We then asked him how long he would stay open in the evening. He said that he would stay till eight o'clock and also that he would wire Moscow again for an answer. We left, had supper at our hotel and returned to the government building at 7:30 in the evening. When we entered we saw a smile on the official's face, which was a good sign for us. The answer had been received from Moscow, permitting our documents to be approved at Kiev. The cost was 50 rubles. We offered the official a few rubles for his trouble, but he refused it. We left the money lying on the table and said goodbye to him, thanking him many times for being so accommodating as to stay late for us.

29 When we left the government building and went out into the street, we found that it was dark and that there were street lights only every second block. While walking along, I suggested to my companion that we walk on opposite sides of the street and watch for possible hold-up men. We had hardly got under way, when my companion told me that someone was following us on his side. We therefore ran as fast as we could up to the third block, where there were lights. We were both very much out of breath when we reached the lighted post, but it was probably because of the scare more than anything else. We were fortunate enough [the original page 29 ended here] to find a policeman at the light post. We asked him to be our guide to the hotel, which was still ten blocks away, and promised to pay him well. He went along with us and brought us there safely. We paid him and then took him into the restaurant at the hotel and bought him some hot drinks. My companion and I were very happy that evening, because we now had our exit visas and could take the early morning train. With good luck we would be out of Russia the following night.

The hotel manager told us that there was a good picture show in the next building, but I had seen one of those in Odessa and did not understand much of the language and found the show of poor quality as compared with ours. We therefore told him that we were going to bed early. Before going to bed we went into their fine dining room and had some tea to warm us up. They had a small orchestra playing there that evening, which was the first music I heard during the time that I was in Russia. We listened for a while and then went up to our room. It wasn't as cold outside as it had been the night before, but it was cold enough in the room to make anyone feel chilly. Before we went to bed we examined the blankets and quilts that they supplied and found that they were worn-out and torn, as they had been in other Russian hotels. We therefore did not undress, but went to bed with all our clothes on. In spite of the cold room and the cold bed, we slept fairly well that night. We no longer had to worry about our exit visas that had bothered us so much the last few days. We understood from the railway officials that we would be out of Russia before our passports would expire.

When I awoke early in the morning, I felt cold all over and my legs were badly swollen from running away from the hold-up man the night before. We went down to the dining room as soon as they turned the lights on and waited for breakfast to be prepared. They gave us an early breakfast and we were able to go to the railway depot at daybreak. Before we left the hotel, all the waiters crowded around us, making sure that they wouldn’t be forgotten. We asked them to get a droshky for us, which took us to the depot, about three miles from the hotel.

The large station was filled with all kinds of people going in different directions. There was also a group of soldiers with their guns, who occupied a special room. It looked to me as if the soldiers are well cared for in Russia now, for the new government needs to be on good terms with its soldiers. They are said to be getting fairly good pay now; under the czar's rule they were not paid any wages and were treated very poorly. They are better dressed now than any other people in the country. In one part of the depot there were many tables spread and plenty of tea was served. The droshky drivers were well represented there. They often got into fights among themselves and the soldiers had to intervene to restore order.

When the ticket office opened up, we bought our tickets to the Russian border town of Shepetovka. As all our travelling that day was in daylight, they had only one class of ticket for the trip to the Russian frontier. Before we left the depot our passports were examined. We boarded the train about twenty minutes before it left and felt much better now that we had the hope at last of getting out of Russia without further problems. \

(To be concluded in our next issue)

30 GERMAN CONGREGATIONALISM* William G. Chrystal Without the influx of large numbers of German-speaking natives of Russia into the United States and Canada in the decades before and after 1900, the history of German Congregationalism could be presented in a few paragraphs, highlighting a small band of traveling preachers {Reiseprediger) and the congregations they gathered in the midwest.1 Congregationalism was ideally suited to the frontier, and Missionary Superintendent Julius Reed, one of Iowa Congregationalism's "sacred seven”, thought it could provide German immigrants a well- anchored religious life. According to George Eisenach, premier historian of the German movement, Reed "secured a number of German ministers and missionaries from Germany and Switzerland and from denominations in this country which had German preaching." He also petitioned the American Home Missionary Society (AHMS) for financial support.2

The AHMS, organized by four denominations in 1826 but funded and directed in the main by Con- gregationalists and Presbyterians, supported a variety of German pastors and churches, including Lutheran, Reformed, Presbyterian and Evangelical, in addition to Congregationalists. For example, no fewer than 21 pastors of the Kirchenverein des Westen (later the German Evangelical Synod of North America) received half of their salaries from the AHMS between 1841 and 1862.3

Members of the AHMS had grown uneasy about aiding pastors and churches with lax membership standards, however, abhorring the custom of admitting to full communion anyone who had a confirmation certificate, though this was a common practice in Germany.

That the membership of the German churches, in many instances, is made up without what appears to American Christians sufficient evidence of regeneration by the Spirit of God, there is no longer reason to doubt ... to aid in building up churches on such a foundation . . . would lower the standard of godliness, encourage formality, and prepare the way for a religion of external display, and thus produce the very state of things which our pious fathers crossed the ocean to escape."

Congregationalism among the Germans as championed by Reed offered a form of church organization ideal for frontier communities. It also emphasized vital personal religion growing out of an experience of conversion. Yet the preaching of repentance and conversion was almost unknown to those raised in the German Landeskirche (State Church). Congregationalism's first missionary to the Germans, Peter Fleury, recruited by Julius Reed in 1846, was told by one, "In our country, thieves, murderers, and such people, have to do repentance, but we are Christians, by birth, baptism, and confirmation."5

Not simply a polity, Congregationalism spoke a religious language as foreign to most Germans as English. Though pastors labored with zeal, it remained numerically small. In 1883, there were 27 churches with 1,006 members.6 They were, George Eisenach noted in his Bachelor of Divinity Thesis at Chicago Theological Seminary, "unaided, alone, divided among themselves, the prey of religious tramps from other churches."7

Viewed suspiciously by those affiliated with traditional German churches, German Congregational pastors were culled from many sources. The Missionshauses of Germany and Switzerland supplied a number of them, particularly St. Chrischona in Basel. They had an ecumenical, missionary outlook. But it, too, failed to dispel the popular fear that being Congregational meant deserting the faith of one's ancestors. Peter Fleury told of a man who wanted to join a Congregational church being pulled from the room by his wife, who said, "You must not forsake the Lutheran faith." Another man, who, when asked if he liked Fleury's sermon, said, "Very much, it is all very good if it were but Lutheran."8

The immigration of large numbers of Germans from South Russia and the Volga region, beginning in 1872-73, brought a new urgency to the German work. Though foreign to most native Germans, Congregationalism appealed to Protestant Russlanddeutschen, particularly those from Lutheran parishes. Not only had they been raised in a milder Lutheranism than often encountered in the United States, a number of them had actually experienced revival and regeneration in Russia. Mid-nineteenth century American Congregationalism offered a style of church life seemingly designed for them — a fact made clear when one looks at their unique social and religious development.

"A German is like a willow tree, stick it anywhere and it will take," an old Russian saying went — a tribute to the industriousness of the thousands of Germans who emigrated to Russia beginning in the mid------*An address delivered on June 12, 1983, at the Centennial Observance of the General Conference of German Congregational Churches in Lincoln, Nebraska. 31 eighteenth century, first to the North or Volga region around the city of Saratov, and later, to the Ukraine and to Bessarabia in the South.9 The Russia Germans had transformed barren steppes into rich farmland, creating tidy communities which preserved their German heritage in unique ways.

At the center of their life was religion. A pledge of "unhindered freedom of worship" by Catherine the Great in 1763 helped lure the Volga Germans from their homeland. Yet the colonists brought their own religious backgrounds. Of the 104 colonies established on the Volga from 1764-1768, for example, 29 were Catholic. Of the remaining colonies, three-quarters were Lutheran and the rest, Reformed.10

A chronic shortage of clergy existed from the beginning. Priests sometimes ministered to Protestants, and theological differences between Lutherans and adherents of the Reformed faith were often minimized.11 Though Russia German Lutherans embraced the Konkordienbuch (Book of Concord) as did Lutherans everywhere, one observer nonetheless noted, "the confessional status of the colonies is unclear."12 Provincial in many ways, Russian German Protestants heard good sermons, although they were sometimes read by the local school teacher from a predigtbuch or book of sermons, since the large parishes and scarcity of pastors made it impossible in all places for a minister to officiate each Sabbath.

Pastors in Russia were well trained, even by German standards. Many, however, did affect one Russian Orthodox decoration. Pictures of a number of pastors reveal the traditional pulpit gown and linen tabs along with a large crucifix suspended from a chain around their necks.13

A theological seminary had been founded at the University of Dorpat in 1833 to train pastors for the Protestant colonies.14 Some of Germany's best theologians taught there, including Luther scholar Theodosius von Harnack, who himself had attended Dorpat, and whose son Adolf, one of Protestantism's most famous scholars, also studied there. The elder Harnack and church historian Moritz von Englehardt, who made a lasting impression on young Adolf, grappled with modern theology's weightiest themes. A strict Lutheran, Theodosius Harnack had even written a book condemning Herrnhut (Moravian) influence on the Lutheran church in Livonia, while Englehardt, teaching textual and source criticism almost radically, had reportedly known Herrnhut pietism in his youth. Without doubt, Dorpat's seminary offered a theological spectrum as broad as any found in Germany.15

Pastors of Russia German churches, like all who deal in practical theology, spoke to concerns and temptations of everyday life. Aware that most parishioners owned just three books — the Bible, Luther's or the Heidelberg Catechism depending on whether one was Lutheran or Reformed, and a gesangbuch or hymnal — pastors illustrated sermons biblically and exhorted people to live their faith. They preached in irenic terms, appealing to the Bible rather than the symbolic books of the Reformation.

People wishing to scoff at us call us "Lutherans." Now, we are not ashamed of Luther's name. But when people mean our Lutheran church was built by Luther, so we say with Luther himself: That is untrue. Not Luther but Christ is the ground and cornerstone of our faith.16

Pastor C. Blum of Krasnojar on the Volga, author of the sermon from which the above excerpt was taken, included it in Gnade urn Gnade (Grace upon Grace), a predigtbuch intended for church use in the pastor's absence. Offering a sermon for each Sunday of the church year and for special days, opening and closing with a hymn selected from the Wolga Gesangbuch, each sermon was built around a biblical text, which was quoted. The emphasis in the predigtbuch is uniform. Blum urged his hearers to live holy lives. On Reformation Sunday he sounded his theme plainly enough: "We Evangelical Christians are clever enough at debate, but are lazy at a holy way of Life."17

Despite strong faith in many homes, enough people turned their backs on the church to be noticed.

If the pastor's exceptionally sensitive Singing and drinking arouse his anger. He thunders and he threatens; Has done so many years; But in our village It's like it's always been.18

Heinrich Peter Ehlers, a Volga villager, liked to amuse his friends by imitating clergy. But he was eventually brought to his knees and conversion. Ehlers became a leader of the Brotherhood, a lay movement outside the church proper, that introduced prayer meetings in many villages, effecting the kind of regeneration the American Home Missionary Society looked for in frontier German-American churches. A similar movement began in South Russia about the same time, only there more pastors took part than in villages along the Volga.19

32

The Brotherhood, which gained special prominence during the Great Revival of 1872 (which continued [the original page 32 ended here] until the early 1890's) owed its origin to a number of influences, including a variety of anabaptist and millenialist neighbors: Moravians, Mennonites and Stundists. Prayer meetings held in private homes by itinerant members of such groups, coupled with the irenic pietism already prevailing in the village churches, quickly spread a new personal religion. In lay meetings, always attended by church members, sometimes without the pastor's blessing, people sang, read Scripture and offered testimonials that spoke of fellowship with God in Jesus Christ.20 While confirmation remained important for Russia Germans who joined Congregational churches in the United States — a catechism was written for that purpose — prayer meetings stayed at the center of their religious lives. They honored the German tradition of religious education while maintaining the prayer meetings of Russia, which had brought them closer to God than they had imagined possible.

Were it not for the Brotherhood, Russia Germans would not have joined Congregational churches following their immigration to the United States. Participation in the Brotherhood required membership in a church, and Congregationalism's emphasis on the autonomy of the local church and the priesthood of all believers appealed to them. So many members of the Brotherhood belonged to Congregational churches, in some towns it was called "die Bruder Kirche."21

Unlike Russia where there was one church in the village, many denominations wooed the Russia Germans in the United States, confusing them with competing claims. The Missouri Synod, American Lutheran Church, Reformed Church in the United States (German Reformed Church), German Evangelical Synod of North America, German Methodists, German Baptists and Adventists are among the denominations which organized congregations made up of Russia Germans. Statistically, roughly forty-five percent of those from Protestant churches in Russia remained Lutheran, twenty percent were divided among Methodists and Baptists, and five percent joined with the Reformed Church. Yet fully thirty percent of the Russia German Protestants in the U.S. by the 1930's had joined Congregational churches.22

The immigration of Russia Germans to the United States resulted from several causes, the most significant of which was the revoking by Czar Alexander II in 1871 of one of the guarantees made to the first Volga colonists by Catherine the Great: freedom from military service. In 1892, Alexander III curtailed land acquistion by non- Orthodox citizens in the west. To land-starved colonists who had established many "daughter" colonies and who doubtless had plans to start more, such a policy seemed to aim at their freedom of religion, which Catherine had also guaranteed.

Many families did send sons off to the army and navy. Even today, pictures of young Germans in Russian uniforms are found in the homes of their American offspring. But an anti-German wind was blowing across the steppes, and the colonists felt it. They had lost faith in the manifesto which brought their ancestors to Russia. Consequently, many sought new homes, some coming to the United States and Canada, while others journeyed to South America.

Beginning with a few scouts who located cheap land in the early 1870's, Russia German immigration reached massive proportions. By 1920, 303,532 first and second generation Russia Germans resided in the United States.23 They constituted the third and final great "wave" of German immigration, the first arriving in colonial times and the second in the mid-nineteenth century.

The Russia Germans were different from earlier German immigrants, however. German-Americans thought their speech was archaic, and it was laced with unfamiliar Russianisms. Along with their English-speaking neighbors, German-Americans referred to them as "Russians," and their settlements as "Russiatown."24 At the bottom of the social ladder, they did jobs others avoided. Women were domestics, men worked on railroad construction or farmed. Yet all who encountered them admired their ability to work.25

The prejudice felt by most Russia Germans made Congregationalism even more attractive. The Congregational Church — when they tried to pronounce it came out “congraylish" — was made up of people just like them. Eventually, its pastors were even Russian-born or the children of people who were.

33 The first Russia German ordained to the congregational ministry was Emmanuel Jose, who founded many churches in Nebraska and Dakotas. Jose traveled widely establishing and maintaining contact with little groups, since there were few resident pastors. A pastor who accompanied Jose on one such trip described a visit to a group of Russia Germans living in a remote part of Nebraska:

Isolated, these people live in their sod-houses, scattered all over the prairie. Here they pray and sing praises to the Lord. Brother Jose, who resided in Sutton, served these people once in about three months. They are as sheep, having no fold and no shepherd. Not a church of any kind did I see in that whole region of country.

After supper we had prayer meeting ... to which all the German railroad hands working there were invited. The house was filled, and we had a blessed time. The next evening a number of [the original page 33 ended here] the brethren and sisters gathered for another prayer meeting. . . . The people were not satisfied with an hour and a half; they remained until about 11 o'clock that night, singing their accustomed German-Russian melodies, intermingled occasionally with prayer.

The Sabbath was a glorious and blessed day . The house was packed full. Brother Jose preached with great effect. ... At 2 p.m. the house was overfilled again, and with much joy and freedom of heart I delivered the Lord's message, which was gladly received. . . . After the people were dismissed they requested us to have another meeting at night, to which we gladly agreed.26

Large groups of Germans from Russia settled in Nebraska, the Dakotas, Kansas, Colorado, Washington and California, and they responded eagerly to the ministrations of Congregational Reiseprediger, who gathered them into small congregations. The shortage of pastors presented a major stumbling block, however. European Missionshauses still provided the bulk of them, but they were not Russia German and sometimes had difficulty ministering to them. Occasionally, particularly able Russia Germans were brought into the ministry. Johannes Koch, an evangelist in Russia, was examined for ordination by several English-speaking Congregational ministers through an interpreter. He went on to found a number of Pacific Northwest churches.27 And in South Dakota, an old country schoolmaster John Lich, was ordained in 1885, serving many years in Lincoln, Nebraska.28

In 1878, a seminary was founded in Crete, Nebraska in conjunction with Doane College. Few students and a lack of money kept it from taking hold. A German Department was organized at Chicago Theological Seminary (CTS) in 1882, Crete serving as a feeder school or proseminar. That the German Department flourished was due to Professor Samuel Ives Curtiss of CTS, who had earned a Ph.D. in Germany.

Curtiss was a gifted scholar and pastor, who, along with teaching started several Chicago mission churches and the Chicago Congregational City Missionary Society itself. "Throughout his career at the seminary," Arthur Cushman McGiffert, Jr,, wrote, "Curtiss did the work of three men." One of the three took a particular interest in the German work, seeing to it that two German faculty members were appointed. His influence and that of colleague Hugh Macdonald Scott, helped Chicago Theological Seminary become a "polyglot seminary", whose foreign department trained not only Germans, but Danes, Norwegians and Swedes as well.29 As German-trained church historian Scott put it,

With immigrants landing in this country at the rate of 750,000 a year, ignorant of American life, strange in speech, not a few opposed to our civilization and our Christianity, the eyes of the most obtuse have at last been opened to the need of thorough Gospel work among this part of our population. Until very recently our Congregational churches paid no attention to this field.30

The energetic Curtiss was on hand on October 3, 1883, when a small group of German pastors met in Crete, organizing Die Allgemeine Evangelische Kirchenversammlung der Deutschen Kongregationalisten (The General Evangelical Church Assembly of German Congregationalists). Four items of business accompanied the new organization. One centered around moving the seminary from Crete to CTS, another discussed the appointment of a general superintendent for the work and the last two dealt with publication of a newspaper and church manual.

George E. Albrecht, a native German who graduated from Oberlin and served an English-language church in Ohio, was appointed superintendent in 1883, just after completing a stint with the AHMS in Davenport, Iowa, where he directed the Sunday school efforts. Albrecht was himself a product of regeneration.

I was working in a machine shop in Ohio, as far from God and Christ as the East is from the West, as much lost in sinful pleasures as any of my shopmates. A young Englishman, member of a Congregational church, who worked near me and heard my godless speech, began to pray for me, and with kind words induced me to go to church, afterwards to Sunday School. After a few weeks I was in his pastor's study on my knees beseeching God to have mercy on me, and since then the Lord has led me on with marvelous love.

34 Albrecht provided a solid organizational base on which the German movement could grow. "God seemed to have called the Congregational church to anew work," he wrote in a report, "and the voice was obeyed."

Old and erroneous ideas pertaining to various methods by which the Germans should be approached were cast aside, and the pastors simply went to the Germans with the plain Gospel. It was this method that bore the most fruit.31

By 1885, German Congregational churches had been established in nine states. No longer were churches only in rural areas. Though the going was tougher in cities, persistence paid off, as one pastor demonstrated.

When I began to call upon the people to invite them to gospel services I often had the pleasure (?) to see the door shut on me, instead of inviting me to come in and call again. I generally left [the original page 34 ended here] my card of invitation behind me, telling the hours of service and Sunday School, and also a tract or two. In a week I went again to the same places, taking my wife with me. I hoped they would not shut the door on her; but found only a few who did not. Some braced themselves in the door and listened to the inviting words; then remarked, "If we find time, we may come once." The next time I went I took my wife and daughter. I went every two or three weeks. Now, thank God, there is a great change. The doors are open to us, and we can have Christian conversation, and sometimes even reading the Word of God and prayer. I opened the Sunday School in a fire engine hall, which I fixed up with a stand, seats, chairs, stove, etc., also books for the service at my own expense. I began with three children and six teachers. The teachers were my wife, three sons and two daughters, the youngest being fifteen years old. In a short time we had twenty-seven scholars and three visitors, and from that time continual growth. We now have sixty-eight scholars and the same six teachers.32

In 1886, Albrecht explained that the work now had "a good start." But a dangerous shortage of pastors hampered its growth. "We need money," he wrote, "in order to get men; not to buy men, nor to coax them, but to pay them living salaries, and above all to train them for lasting work." Albrecht held a special conference with Professor Curtiss, several American ministers and representatives of some of the German churches. Sometime afterward he wrote, "Nothing is more trying and discouraging to a home missionary than to see the doors swinging wide open in scores of places, and to call and write in vain for men to enter them. Golden opportunities are lost. Important fields pass into the hands of others, or, what is worse, remain wholly uncared for. The whole work is dragging heavily for want of workers . . .""

Superintendent Albrecht resigned to become a foreign missionary in 1887.34 He was replaced the following year by Civil War veteran Moritz E. Eversz, also a native German and Oberlin graduate. Eversz had been converted while serving in the 20th Wisconsin volunteers and throughout the war participated in a small prayer group. According to George Eisenach, during Eversz's superintendcy "centers of influence" began to be identified, and "people who longed for more spiritual life and for freedom from arbitrary domination of stricter denominations" discovered Congregationalism.35

Lutheran in name only, a number of Russia Germans found the kind of spirituality they had known in Russia in the small Congregational churches. By 1890, pastors trained in CTS's German Department had begun serving in local churches. Russia Germans, they understood the people and their ways. Revivals broke out in many places. New churches were founded. In 1895, there were 110 churches with 4,728 members. Fifteen years later that number had more than doubled, to 202 churches with a combined membership of 11,435.36

Growth also led to more stable educational institutions. Crete Proseminar was moved in 1894 to Wilton, Iowa, and reconstituted the "Wilton German English College." In 1904, the poorly-financed two-building college merged with Redfield College in Redfield, South Dakota, forming "a Christian institution of learning under the general supervision of the German Congregational churches of the United States of America," with the mandate "specificially to provide an academic and college course for all German young men looking toward a German Congregational ministry."

Redfield was a good location, since most of Wilton's students had been Russia Germans from the Dakotas. Though finances remained a problem, Redfield College survived, and, in 1916, the German Institute at CTS moved there, becoming the "Redfield College Seminary." The depression signaled an end to Redfield, but the School of Theology moved to Yankton College in 1932,37 and later, became one of the institutions which formed United Theological Seminary in the Twin Cities.

35 The growth of German Congregationalism spawned associations and state conferences in those areas where churches were concentrated. The first German association was organized in Iowa in 1862 and the first state conference in Nebraska in 1879.38 German Congregational associations and conferences were separate from their English-speaking counterparts, but they did maintain relations with them, to a greater or lesser extent, depending on local leadership.

The same was true of the General Conference of the German Congregational Churches of the United States, which saw itself as being in relationship to the National Council of Congregational Churches of the United States. Superintendent George E. Albrecht attended the sixth session of the National Council which met in Chicago in 1886.i9 Yet it wasn't until 1927 that the General Conference of German Congregational Churches was officially recognized by the National Council of Congregational Churches of the United States as having "parity" with state conferences.40 This move doubtless was influenced by the 1925 "recognition" of the Evangelical Protestant Conference, a group of 22 "union" churches (Lutheran and Reformed), some dating back to the colonial period. Interestingly enough, some of those churches were served by German Congregational pastors.41 [the original page 35 ended here]

Following the retirement of Superintendent Eversz in 1920, Herman Obenhaus became superintendent, serving until 1936, when Jacob Hirning was appointed. Hirning was the first Russia German to head the German work and was Russian-born. In the first year of his superintendency, there were six state conferences and three state associations, representing 197 churches with a total membership of 22,166.42 By then, many churches no longer functioned exclusively in German. Native-born young people Americanized at a rapid rate. At the end of the Second World War most worship services were in English — a trend reflected by the publication in 1952 of an English hymnal. Only the Brotherhood clung to German, their prayer meetings offering a window into an increasingly distant past.

At the founding of the General Conference in 1883, two of the four items of business centered around publication. An eight page newspaper founded by Professor Theo. Falk of Crete Seminary in 1880, Zionsfreund, had a two year run before folding. Der Kirchenbote (Church Messenger), which followed Zionsfreund, was published by Henry Hess until 1888, when the Congregational Publishing Society at the instigation of Professor Samuel Curtiss purchased it and placed it under the editorship of Gustav Zimmerman, who taught in CTS's German Department. Der Kirchenbote, a semi-monthly until 1897 when it became a weekly, was avidly read by most German Congregational families. It contained devotional articles as well as denominational news, and along with the Ilustrierter-Kirchenbote-Kalendar was standard reading, the Kalendar being a daily devotional with Scripture lessons, a brief message and prayer, and sometimes even a hymn.

The German Congregational publishing operation was located in Chicago from 1888 until 1895, when it was moved to Michigan City, Indiana. In 1905, it moved back to Chicago. "The German Congregational Publishing Society," as it was officially known, printed works bearing a picture of a pilgrim and the name "The German Pilgrim Press."43

The first gesangbuch was authorized by the General Conference which met in Chicago in 1896. It was in use by 1898. Both the first and second editions were "ohneNoten" —without music —requiring someone to lead the singing who had memorized all the melodies.44 The third and final edition had the music and all the words. This was the preferred hymnal of most church members, who proudly carried them to worship services and prayer meetings.

Two supplementary hymn books were used in prayer meetings. Social Gospel theologian Walter Rauschenbusch and Ira Sankey, who had accomplished Dwight L. Moody on so many of his tours, produced a collection of American gospel songs in German translation, Evangeliums-Sdnger, which was very popular. Der Kostliche Schatz was prepared for Brotherhood use by a Russia German Evangelical Synod pastor in Portland, Oregon, Elias Hergert, who had been an Eden Seminary classmate of theologian Reinhold Niebuhr. It contained some Brotherhood songs from Russia as well as recent compositions by Hergert and others, a few of which were in English.45

A catechism for the German Congregational churches first appeared in 1904. Attempting to include the basic teachings contained in Luther's Small Catechism and the Heidelberg Catechism, it had 150 questions and answers and 50 questions to be answered by confirmands during a final oral examination before the entire congregation. It had five sections: the Apostles' Creed, the Ten Commandments, the Uses of the Law, the Lord's Prayer and the Sacraments.

36 Unlike Luther's or the Heidelberg Catechism, the German Congregational Katechismus began by asserting the centrality of Scripture.

How can one discern that Holy Scripture is God's Word? (a) The divine strength of so many souls in life and death has proven it already; (b) because it has been confirmed through divine prophecy and miracles, and (c) because it was written by holy men of God at the impulse of the Holy Spirit.46

Rather than beginning with the Law or humanity's need as Luther's and the Heidelberg Catechism do, the German Congregational Katechismus started by establishing the place of the Bible in people's lives.

English-language materials became widely available after the Second World War. In 1947, the General Conference of the German Congregational Churches in the United States, meeting in Lodi, California, elected a hymnal committee to select songs and hymns which "could be used with both our own German Hymnal and the Wolga Gesangbuch."47 The resulting Pioneer Hymnal which came out in 1952, including many familiar American hymns as well as translations of some of the better known German hymns.

The Pioneer Press of Yankton, South Dakota, publishers of the new hymnal, succeeded the Redfield College Press, which had taken over the German Pilgrim Press in 1923. The Pioneer Press remained in operation until 1968, publishing hymnals, catechisms and church and Sunday school materials in both English and German.48 [the original page 36 ended here]

The catechism was first translated into English in 1928. It was revised and reissued in 1955. Instead of 150 questions, there were 119 plus an Appendix of 14 questions and answers on "The Congregational Fellowship." One asked, "What institutions and projects do our churches especially sponsor through the General Conference?" The answer was, "The Yankton College School of Theology, the Pioneer Press and our South American Mission.49

The Mission to Argentina was the second foreign field tended by German Congregationalists. Thirty-one churches in Canada that had been affiliated with the General Conference became part of the United Church of Canada when that denomination came into being in 1925.50

The work in South America began in 1921, when four Argentinian churches sent an urgent call asking that denominational recognition be given George Geier, who was serving them. The Illinois Conference licensed Geier, who worked among Russia Germans alike in every way to those in the United States and Canada. In 1924, general missionary John Hoelzer, in Argentina for a brief visit, organized six churches.

The South American Germans from Russia had learned about Congregationalism in letters from relatives in the U.S. Despite attacks from the Missouri Lutheran La Platta Synod, the Congregational mission grew. By 1937, thirty-six churches had been established with a total of 3,015 members — all served by five ministers.51 The need for a trained ministry was acute, and eventually a theological school was founded. Even today, the South American churches are in contact with the United Church Board for World Ministries, though they, like their American cousins, have adapted to the surrounding culture.

Most German Congregational churches affiliated with the United Church of Christ, which came into being in 1957, with the merger of the Congregational Christian Churches and the Evangelical and Reformed Church, itself a merged denomination representing the 1934 union of the Reformed Church in the U.S. and the Evangelical Synod of North America — two groups that labored among Russia German immigrants. Since then a number of former German Congregational churches have withdrawn, and many more are served by pastors of other denominations.

The descendants of the Russia Germans who embraced Congregationalism are troubled by the United Church of Christ's emphasis on social action. The UCC seems too political and not grounded enough in Scripture. This reaction is characteristic. Their unique heritage laid great stress on the Bible, religious experience and sanctified living. It was an individual gospel, expressed in prayer meetings, worship and performing kind deeds among one's neighbors.52 Though prayer meetings have almost disappeared, and revivals are no longer a feature of church life, such piety remains powerfully latent, German Congregationalism has made a unique contribution to the United Church of Christ. Though its outward form is changed, the inner spirit continues to radiate.

37 Notes 1. The oldest congregation still in existence is Sherrill United Church of Christ in Sherrill, Iowa, which was organized by Peter Fleury in 1849. 2. George J. Eisenach, A History of the German Congregational Churches In the United States (Yankton, S.D., 1937), p. 3. 3. Carl E. Schneider, "The Home Mission Zeal of an Immigrant Church," in Missionary Trails: The Story of Missions in the Evangelical Synod of North America as told by missionaries and friends of missions (St. Louis, 1934), P. 5). 4. Home Missionary; January, 1851. Reprinted in Carl E. Schneider, The German Church on the American Frontier (St. Louis, 1939), p. 494. 5. Eisenach, A History, p. 7. 6. Ibid., p. 51. 7. Quoted in Arthur Cushman McGiffert, Jr., No Ivory Tower: The Story of The Chicago Theological Seminary (Chicago, 1965), p. 60. 8. Eisenach, A History, p. 7. 9. The saying is quoted in Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-1956, V-VII (New York, 1979), p. 400. 10. George J. Eisenach, Pietism and the Russian Germans in the United States (Berne, Indiana, 1948), p. 31, and Adam Giesinger, from Catherine to Khrushchev: The Story of Russia's Germans (Battleford, Saskatchewan, 1974), p. 156. Giesinger places the Lutheran and Reformed mix at 80%-20%. 11. Eisenach, Pietism, p. 31, quotes Catholic priest Gottlieb Beratz, Die deutschen Kolonien an der Unteren Wolga in ihrer Entstehung und ersten Entwicklung (Saratov, 1915), p. 230, regarding the clergy shortage. 12. "Russland" in Real-Encyklopadie fuer protestantische Theologie und Kirche, zweiter Auflage, Dreizehnter Band (Ritschl bis Scotus), (Leipzig, 1884), p. 126, [the original page 37 ended here] 13. Photos of pastors wearing crucifixes may be found in 80th Anniversary of The Free Evan. Lutheran Cross Church, 1892- 1972 (Fresno, California, 1972), pp.14, 16 and Karl Stumpp, "Verzeichnis der ev. Pastoren in den einzelnen deutschen und gemischten Kirchenspielen in Russland bzw. der Sowjetunion, ohne Baltikum und Polen," in Joseph Schnurr (ed.), Die Kirchen und das religioese Leben der Russfanddeutschen, Evangelischer Teil (Stuttgart, 1978), pp. 120-82. 14. See Harry Anderson, "Die Universitaetsgemeinde in Dorpat und ihre Kirche," in Schnurr, op. cit., pp. 310-15. 15. See G. Wayne Glick, The Reality of Christianity: A Study of Adolf von Hamack as Historian and Theologian (New York, 1967), pp. 23-34, for a glimpse of Dorpat and its influence on Adolf. 16. C. Blum, Gnade um Gnade. Evangelien-Predigten fuer das game Kirchenjahr (Jurjew (Dorpat), 1901), p. 613. Stumpp, Verzeichnis, p. 198, lists Blum as "Johannes Nikolaus Blum." 17. Blum, op. cit., p. 615. 18. Quoted in Eisenach, Pietism, p. 64. 19. Ibid., p. 81. 20. Some pastors forbade such meetings in their parishes; in other places meetings were broken up and Elders punished. See Eisenach, Pietism, pp. 174-76. 21. The church in Endicott, Washington, was one. See Anna B. Weitz, A Century of Christian Fellowship: Evangelical Congregational Church, Endicott, Washington, 1883-1983 (Colfax, Washington, 1983), p. 6) 22. Richard Sallet, Russian-German Settlements in the United States, translated by Lavern J. Rippley and Armand Bauer (Fargo, N.D., 1974), p. 90. 23. Ibid., p. 17. 24. See S. Joachim, Toward An Understanding of the Russian Germans (Moorhead, Minnesota, 1939), for a contemporary attempt to explain faulty impressions of the Germans from Russia. 25. Roland Bainton, in his biography of his father Herbert Bainton who served the Congregational Church in Colfax, Washington, noted that the only domestic help available to his mother "were some German-speaking immigrants lately come from Russia whose women would come sometimes for half a day." See Roland Bainton, Pilgrim Parson: The Life of James Herbert Bainton, 1867-1942 (New York, 1958), p. 74. 26. Eisenach, A History, pp. 45-46. 27. Koch was a moderator of the Brotherhood conference in Russia, working with Ehlers. Gottfried Graedel, in an undated newspaper article entitled "German Congregational Churches In the State of Washington," in the possession of Richard Scheuermann, states, "It was in 1888 when our own Atkinson, Wolters and Jonathan Edwards met in Endicott. Johannes Koch represented the Germans. He used to be an evangelist in the old country. The three former ministers informed themselves about the condition of things and found it advisable to ordain Mr. Koch. As Mr. Koch before that had organized two churches, Ritzville and Endicott, the two were accepted into Congregational fellowship with their pastor, and so the Pacific German Congregational church was established." 28. Eisenach, A History, p. 60. 29. McGiffert, op. cit., pp. 54-64. 30. Eisenach, A History, p. 175. 31. Ibid., pp. 49, 57-58. 32. Ibid., p. 59. 33. Ibid., pp. 64, 70. 34. WilliamE. Strong, The Story oj'the American Board (Boston, 1910), p. 362, reveals that Albrecht served in Tokyo, Japan, where he helped translate many works into Japanese. 35. Eisenach, A History, p. 75. 36. Ibid., p. 123. 38 37. Ibid., pp. 183-202. 38. See Henry Vieth, "A History of German Congregationalism in Nebraska," in A History of the Churches and of the Present Conference, Nebraska Conference, United Church of Christ, Volume 1, 1976, pp. 114-42. 39. E. Lyman Hood, The National Council of Congregational Churches of the United States (Boston, n.d,), p. 125, lists Albrecht as being from "the Nebraska phalanx." This session of the Council commended the attempt to create a German Academy at Crete, Nebraska. See Eisenach, A History, p. 172. 40. Louis H. Gunnemann, The Shaping of the United Church of Christ (New York, 1977), p. 61. 41. Eisenach, A History, p. 145. 42. Ibid., p. 61. 43. Ibid., pp. 204-07. The following logo appeared on the title page:

44. Family tradition recalls the author's grandmother was a song leader, 45. Walther Rauschenbusch und Ira D. Sankey (Hrsg.), Evangeliums-Saenger (Kassel, n.d.), and Elias Hergert (Hrsg.) Der Koestliche Schatz (Portland, Oregon, n.d.) both books went through many editions. [the original page 38 ended here] 46. Katechismus der biblischen Heilswahrheitenfur die evangelischen Kongregational-Gemeinden von Nord-Amerika (Chicago, 1919), p. 10. English editions omit this question. 47. "Preface," The Pioneer Hymnal (Yankton, 1952), p. 3. 48. Walter Kranzler, "German Congregationalism," in Edward C- Ehrensperger (ed.), History of the United Church of Christ in South Dakota, 1869-1976 (Freeman, S.D., 1977), pp. 199-200. 49- Congregational Catechism of Religious Instruction (Yankton, 1955), p. 46. 50. Eisenach, A History, p. 213. 51. Ibid., p. 217. 52. An exception to this pattern was the massive relief effort to Volga Germans in the post-revolutionary period, bankrolled by Russia Germans in the United States. See Emma D. Schwabenland, A History of the Volga Relief Society (Portland, Oregon, 1941). ------*Editor's Note: This essay by Rev, William G. Chrystal will appear in the forthcoming United Church Press Book, Some Hidden Histories in the United Church of Christ, edited by Barbara Brown Cikmund, and is used here with permission.

Zion United Church of Christ, located at Ninth and D Streets in Lincoln, Nebraska was the site of the Centennial Observance of the General Conference of German Congregational Churches.

The original Zion Congregational Church was founded and built in 1900 and enlarged in 1907. The last services held in this structure were on May 22, 1927.

39 BOOKS AND ARTICLES RECENTLY ADDED TO THE AHSGR ARCHIVES Emma S. Haynes

GR — 1403 Reich, Mr. and Mrs. Martin Gierscher, and Mr. Aerial Photographs of Volga German and Mrs. William Wunsch. Paperback. 62 pp. Villages from the National Archives. Donated Published 1981. by Glenn H. Mueller. GX 1868 SK Exp. 109 …….. Dreispitz Chutor GR — 1385 GX 1263-A SK Exp. 90 .. Neu Galka and Davick, Carol (nee Walker), compiler. countryside, including Pallasovka Saskatchewan Canada Church Records. GX 1263-B SG Exp. 127 .………... Neu Galka Includes Evangelical, Catholic and Lutheran GX 1743 SG #60 ...... …………….... Galka Church Cemetery and Marriage Lists. GX 1472"B#45 ….. Muller and Tscherbakovka Typewritten. 77 pp. Donated by the compiler. GX 1442-A SD Exp. 61 ....…………… Grimm GX 1465 SK #105 ...... ……………. Dobrinka GR — 1356 "Desperate Struggle of the Soviet Germans for GX 1465 SK #104 .……... Dreispitz, Galka, their Human Rights and for Permission to Dobrinka, Holstein emigrate to Germany.”. A document in the GX 1743 SG #65 ...... ……………...... Schwab Russian language sent to one of our AHSGR GX 2560 SG #90 ...……………...... Kamyschin members from the Soviet Union. A translation by Alexander Dupper appeared in the Journal, Vol. GR — 1384 6, No. 1 (Spring 1983), pp. 1-8. American Family Records Association. Family Records Today. A quarterly publication. Vol. I. GR — 1436 (April 1980) to date. Deufsche in der Sowjetunion. Bericht ueber die 2. Arbeitskonferenz am 5. Oktober 1982 in GR — 1432 Koeln (Cologne). Donated by Herr Buchholz of Busch, E. H. Cologne. Ergaenzungen der Materia lien zur Geschichte This is a report on the second of two und Statistik des Kirchen und Schulwesens der conferences discussing the problems of the Ev. Lulh. Gemeinden in Russland. Vol. I. Der St. Germans in the Soviet Union. The report on the Petersburgische, der Moskausche, und der first conference is GR — 1361, described on page Kurlaendische Consistorialbezirk. Vol. II. der 57 of the Spring 1983 issue of the Journal. Of Rigasche, der Livlandische und der Estlandische special interest to us is a report by Dr. Hagin at Consistorialbezirk. St. Petersburg 1867.1275 pp. the second conference, giving the titles of 48 Photocopied from the original owned by Dr. books on the Germans from Russia published in Irma Eichhorn. North America. All of these are in our Archives. All German colonies were in the St. Petersburg and Moscow consistorial districts. All German GR -- 1386 Ev. Luth. colonies then existing are mentioned. Dueck, Peter H., compiler. GR — 1459 Abraham L. und Elisabeth Dueck und Ihre Canada, Public Archives. Records of the Nachkommen. Donated by Delbert F. Plett, Immigration Branch of the Department of Steinbach, Manitoba. Immigration and Colonization. Microfilm C- The history of a Mennonite family that settled 7390. Donated by Edward Roy Gerk. in Manitoba. Includes a copy of File 148405, the GR — 1458 correspondence of the Association of German Epp, Frank H. Canadian Catholics (VDCK) with the Mennonites in Canada, 1920-1940. A People's Immigration Department regarding the admission Struggle for Survival. Toronto: Macmillan of of German Catholic refugees (many of them from Canada, 1982. 640pp. Russia) 1924-1927. This is the second volume of a definitive history of the Mennonites in Canada. We have GR — 1402 the first volume in our Archives (GR-667). Colorado High Plains Chapter of AHSGR. Old Time Songs and Sayings. Compiled by Mr. and GR — 571 Mrs. Alex Shuppe, Mr. and Mrs. William Die Evangelisch-Lutherischen Gemeinden in

40 Russland. Ein historisch-statistische Darstellung. GR — 1391 Band I: Der Petersburgische und der Keil. Reinhold. Moskowische Konsistorialbezirk. St. Petersburg: "Sprichwoerter und Redensarten aus Buchdruckerei J. Watsar, 1909. 633 pp. wolgadeutschen Siedlungen," Jahrbuch fuer Photocopy. Ostdeutsche Volkskunde, pp. 217-226. A few pages from this book have been in our Archives for some years. We now have the whole Paperback. Donated by Sally Caskey of Powell, book. Wyoming. GR — 1387 GR — 135 Gaede, Delton A. Keller, Konrad. Ancestors and Descendants of Henry Peter Die deutschen Kolonien in Sundrussland. Gaede, 1865-1919. First edition May 1970. Band 11. Odessa 1914. A bound photocopy Paperback 15 pp. donated by Dr. Anthony Becker. The Gaede family, Mennonite in religion, We have had a photocopy of this in our emigrated to America in 1879 and settled in Archives for some years. This is an additional Marion County near Hillsboro, Kansas, but later copy of this important work. We also have the moved to Oklahoma. Becker translation, GR — 1159, which is now GR — 1388 published by AHSGR. Goering, Mrs. John D. The von Riesen — Friesen Genealogy, 1756- GR — 1355 1966. Steinbach, Manitoba, 1967. Paperback Klippenstein, Lawrence. 240 pp. Donated by Delbert F. Plett of Steinbach. David Klassen and the Mennonites. Agin- Mrs. Goering tells us that the name was court, Ontario: The Book Society of Canada Ltd., originally von Riesen but was changed to Friesen 1982. 76pp. at the beginning of the 19th century. A This book was reviewed in the Journal, Vol. committee of eighteen people helped her to write 6, No. 1 (Spring 1983), p. 54. this history of a prominent Mennonite family. GR — 1392 GR — 1389 Knell, Victor, compiler. Griess, Gloria E. Yost. The Complete Family Record of John C. Yost. The Past and the Present. An Adolf History. Also a brief and incomplete record of the brothers Paperback, 1982. Typewritten, 119pp. Donated of John C. Yost and a brief record of the by the author, who lives in Fargo, N.D. Preisendorf Family. 1982. Donated by the author. The Daniel Adolf and Karl Adolf families The John C. Yost family came from Norka in came to the United States from Brienne, the Volga region and arrived in America in Bessarabia. They arrived in April 1889 on the S. January 1892. They lived in various places in S. Ems. At first they lived in North Dakota, but Nebraska, but finally bought a farm near Harvard, soon moved to Newburg, Oregon. A third where they remained until their deaths. The author brother, August Adolf, moved to Burlington, of this book married Rudy Griess, a Black Sea Colorado, with his family. In 1978 there were German, whose ancestors had settled in Sutton. still 15 Adolf families near Burlington. GR — 1390 Haar, Alfred. GR — 1393 FredHarr Company Anniversary. Founded by Kramer, Dr. Julius, compiler. Fred Haar of Freeman South Dakota. Paperback Heimat Galizien. Ein Gedenkbuch. Printed by 14 pp. Original artwork by Mrs. Leona Graber the Hilfskomittee der Galiziendeutschen, 1965. and Mrs. Bertha Preheim. A gift from Alfred Hard cover, 560 pp., 70 photographs and 3 maps. Haar of Freeman, South Dakota. Donated by the Hilfskomittee in Bad Canstatt, An attractively illustrated pamphlet on the Germany, in 1983. Haar Company which sold agricultural machinery to the farmers of the area. The company is now in GR — 1457 the fourth generation. Donated by Harriet Lohrenz, Gerhard. Schaeffer ofMenno, South Dakota. Sagradowka. Die Geschichte einer men- nonitischen Ansiedlung im Sueden Russlands. Rosthern, Saskatchewan: Echo Verlag 1947. Photocopy. The history of a Mennonite settlement on the Inguletz river in southern Russia, a daughter settlement of the Molotschna Mennonites. 41 Gr — 1394 auf das Jahr 1900. Photocopy of pp. 30-54 and Mai, Brent Alan, compiler. 59-79 inclusive, containing the following lists: 1) Deines Dynasty. A Family History. Sharon the members of the Russian royal family (pp. 30- Springs, Kansas, 1982. Hard cover. 420 pp. 31); 2) the officials of village and district Donated by the author. governments in the German areas of the Black The Deines family came from the colony of Sea region (pp. 32-54); 3) the medical doctors, Kratzke on the west side of the Volga. In 1876 pharmacies and hospitals in the German villages families named Deines, Bender, Mai, Doetz, etc. of this region (pp. 59-60); 4) the pastors and came from Kratzke to America on the S. S. Frisia teachers, of all faiths, in the same villages (pp. and settled at Bender Hill eleven miles south of 61-79). Russell, Kansas. Brent Mai gives the dates of all people named Deines who came from Kratzke, as Note: AHSGR also owns a microfilm of all well as telling about other people named Deines issues of this Kalender which still exist in the who remained in Germany or came to America library of the Institut fuer Auslandsbeziehungen from Norka, Russia. It is amazing that this work in Stuttgart, Germany. was done while Brent was still a high school student! GR — 1396 Pauls, Peter Jr. GR — 1455 Urwaldpioniere. Persoenliche Ertebnisse Mehnert, Klaus. Mennonitischer Siedler aus den ersten Jahren am "Deutsche — vom Sturm verweht." Volk auf Krauel undvon Stolzplateau in Santa Catarina. dem Weg, August, September, October 1956. (Pioneers of the Virgin Forest. Personal Donated by Adam Giesinger. Photocopy, Experiences of Mennonite Settlers on the Krauel A visitor from Germany among Germans in and the von Stolz plateau in Santa Catarina). Asiatic Russia. Paperback. 83 pp. Donated by the author, GR — 1395 GR — 1454 Meyer, Earl R. O.F.M. Cap. Peterreins, Gertrud. Grains of Wheat. St. Francis Parish Records of "Unsere Rueckkehr nach Deutschland.” Volk Deaths and Burials, 1876-1982. Paperback, 75 pp. auf dem Weg, November, December 1953, Donated by Martha Issinghoff of Wichita, January, February, March 1954. Photocopy. Kansas. The diary of a participant in the trek of the people of Hoffnungstal, Odessa region, to GR — 1401 Germany in the spring of 1944. National Archives Trust Fund Board, Wash., D.C. GR — 1433 The 1910 Federal Population Census. 1982 Poell, Father John M. Edition. Paperback, 44 pp. The Cross in the Valley, 1887-1976. Pfeifer, A catalogue of microfilm copies of the census Kansas. Paperback, 58 pp. schedules. This book tells the story of Holy Cross Church in Pfeifer, Kansas. The original church was built GR — 842 in 1890-1891 and the first parish school in 1897. Neuer Haus- und Landwirtschaftskalender Father Peter Burkard became the first resident fuer deutsche Ansiedler im Suedlichen Russland pastor of Pfeifer in 1906 and was responsible for auf das Jahr 1890. Photocopy of pp. 20-57 building the lovely present-day church. In spite inclusive, containing the following lists: 1) the of the objections of some of his parishioners, members of the Russian royal family (pp. 20-21); work went steadily ahead, and the church was 2) the officials of village and district governments dedicated on May 3, 1918. The interior is in all German areas of the Black Sea region (pp. modelled after the church in Father Burkard's 22-39); 3) the medical doctors, pharmacies and native village in Bavaria. The structure is of hospitals in the German villages of this region (p. Romanesque Gothic architecture and is 40); 4) the pastors and teachers, of all faiths, in considered by some people to be the most the same villages (pp. 41-56); and 5) the beautiful of all the Ellis County churches. secondary schools (Zentralschulen) existing in these villages (p. 57). GR — 1354 Rcmpcl, Hans, compiler. GR — 842 Waffen der Wehrlosen: Ersatzdienst der Neuer Haus- und Landwirtschaftskalender fuer Mennoniten in der UdSSR. Winnipeg, Canada: deutsche Ansiedler im Suedlichen Russland

42 CMBC Publications, 1980. 175 pp. graduating from high school and university. As This book was reviewed in the Journal, Vol. Joseph Voeller wrote in 1940 "the shortest terms, 6, No. 1 (Spring 1983), pp. 53-54. the lowest teachers' salaries, the most inadequate equipment, and the most irregular attendance are GR — 1435 found in German-Russian communities." After Schach, Paul. World War II, however, this picture changed "Russian Wolves in Folktales and Literature completely. Today there is absolutely no of the Plains: a Question of Origins.” Great difference between Norwegian and German- Plains Quarterly, Vol. 3, No. 2 (Spring 1983). Russian communities in the interest shown by Lincoln, Nebraska: Center for Great Plains parents in education and in the number of students Studies, University of Nebraska, pp. 67-78. attending the universities. The author has been for several years recording folktales of Germans from Russia GR — 1398 living in Nebraska, Kansas and the Dakotas. He Thielmann, Gerhard P., compiler. has found that many of these folktales include Bericht von dem Pletten-Tag zu Giroux, wolf stories in which human beings are thrown to Manitoba am 2. Juli 1945. Druck: Steinbach Post, wolves pursuing a sleigh. Such stories occur in Steinbach, Manitoba. Paperback, 52 pp. Donated Willa Cather's My Antonia, in Browning's Ivan by Delbert F. Plett, Steinbach, Manitoba. Ivanovich, and more recently in Mela Meisner This is the Plett family history, as told at a Lindsay's Shukar Balan: The White Lamb. gathering of the descendants of the Plett Professor Schach believes that the stories as told immigrants of 1874. by Gather and Lindsay can be traced ultimately to a French writer, Frederic Lacroix, who tells it GR — 1456 in his book, Les mysteres de la Russie, published Unsere Wirtschaft. Organ der Kooperativen in 1845 and soon thereafter translated into Beratung des Gebiets der Wolgadeutschen. German. Illustrierte Halbmonatsschrift zur Aufklarung der Landbevolkerung in Land- und Wirtschafts- GR — 1397 fragen, sowie in Wissenschaft, Kultur und Schiller, Fredrich. Technik. Sondernummer 19 Oktober 1923. Der Wolgadeutsche. Gedichte von Friedrich Pokrowsk. 68 pp. Photocopy. Schiller mit Scherenschnitten von Georg Her- A special edition of this periodical to celebrate mann. (Poetry of Friedrich Schiller). Kultur the fifth anniversary of the autonomous region of Verlag Georg Hermann. Donated by Sally the Volga Germans. Contains the decree of 19 Caskey of Powell, Wyoming. October 1918 granting autonomy to the Volga Friedrich Schiller has been living in Germany Germans and numerous articles, by Communist during the past ten years. These poems, which writers, on developments in the autonomous were written in Russia, reveal his deep love for region over the years 1918-1923. his original home on the Volga. GR — 1430 GR — 1434 Verein der Wolgadeutschen, Berlin. Mit- Sherman, William and Playford V. Thorson. teilungen des Vereins der Wolgadeutschen: No. 1, Education and Ethnicity. A Study of German- June 15, 1919; No. 2, August 1, 1919; No. 3, Russians and Norwegians in North Dakota. August 15, 1919; No.4, September 1, 1919; No. 5, Unpublished manuscript, 56 pp. Donated by Rev. October 1, 1919. Donated by Dr. Irma Eichhorn William Sherman. of Saginaw, Michigan. This is a fascinating comparison of the Norwegians and the German-Russians who settled GR — 1399 in North Dakota at the turn of the century. The Vrooman, Nicholas Curchin, editor and project authors compared four counties that were largely director, and Patrice Avon Marvin. inhabited by German-Russian people with four Iron Spirits. Fargo, North Dakota: North counties that were largely Norwegian. They Dakota Council on the Arts, 1982. Photographers found that until World War II the Norwegians Jane Gudmundson and Wayne Gumundson. consistently excelled over the German-Russians in Paperback, 116 pp. Donated by Nicholas the physical plan of their school buildings (toilet Vrooman. facilities, wash basins, etc.), in the number of This is a book about the iron crosses on graves, books in the school libraries, in the length of the which were prevalent among the Catholic school year, and in the number of students 43 Black Sea Germans and the Catholic Volga had a difficult time at first but eventually Germans in Russia and were brought to the prospered. In 1915 the Germans in Volhynia United States by them. The book is beautifully were deported to Siberia as a war measure. At conceived and illustrated and will be enjoyed by the end of the war the Wentlands took advantage all who read it. Timothy Kloberdanz wrote a final of a German army offer to transport them to chapter entitled "Iron Lilies, Eternal Roses: Germany. From Germany they came to America German-Russian Cemetery Folk Art in in 1923 and 1925, settling in Forest Park, Illinois. Perspective." The book ends with a number of fascinating short biographical sketches of members of the GR — 1400 Wentland family. Wentland, Theodore. Torn Roots. Offset printing by Kopy Kwick of GR — 1431 Urbana, Illinois. Paperback, Spiral binding, 115 Zhirmunskii, V. M. pp. Donated by the author. "Itogi i zadachi dialektologicheskogo i This is one of the most interesting family etnograficheskogo izucheniia nemetskikh histories that we have in our Archives. It is poselenii SSSR." Sovetskaia etnografiia, No. 2 written with great care and beautifully illustrated (1933) 84-112. (Results and Tasks of Dialectical with the author's own sketches. The Wentlands and Ethnographical Studies of the German originated in Pomerania or West Prussia, from a Settlements of the Soviet Union.) region called Wentland in the Middle Ages after a An excellent summary of research done on Slavic tribe that lived there. They moved to German dialects and ethnic studies in the Russian Volhynia in Russia in the 1860's, where they and Soviet empires.

Soviet German Literature The following twenty-six books were donated to our archives by Emma S, Haynes. They were all printed in the Soviet Union, and were given to her by Soviet German authors to whom she had sent photocopied material or German dictionaries, for which they had asked. It is interesting to see what is omitted from these books. Nowhere is there a mention of the fact that the Germans were deported in 1941. Instead it is said that they were moved east to avoid being bombed by the Nazis. The trials that they suffered during and after the deportation are either glossed over or ignored entirely. If they are mentioned at all, it is to compare the difficulties of the early years with the comfort in which the Germans are living today. In contrast, the loyalty of the Soviet Germans to Russia is stressed throughout.

GR — 1404 GR — 1407 Bolger, Friedrich. Henning, Alexander. Des Dichters Herz. Moscow: Verlag Progress, Fuer Gedeihen und Neuerbluehen. Alma Ata: 1973. Paperback, 144pp. Verlag , 1970. Hard cover, 129 pp. This is a book of poetry, with five humorous A book of critical essays on Soviet German stories called "Schwanke" at the end. According authors. Alexander Henning was born in to Dr. Stumpp, Friedrich Bolger was born in Katharinenstadt on the Volga in 1892. Reinwald on the Volga in 1915. GR — 1408 GR — 1405 Herdt, Waldemar, Karl Herdt and Leo Marx. Debolski, Alexei. Der lustige Jaeger. (The Merry Hunter). Alma Dieser verlaengerte Sommer. Alma Ata: Ata: Verlag Kazakhstan, 1969. Paperback, 139 Verlag Kazakhstan, 1975. Hard cover, 126 pp. pp. This is the story of how a bridge leading to his The two Herdts, who are not related, were German village was accidentally destroyed and of born on the Volga, whereas Leo Marx comes how three different persons offered to repair it. from the Bashkir Republic. Karl Herdt has been Debolski was born in Kharkov in 1916. living in Germany since the early 1970's. He was a teacher in Frank before the deportation and is GR — 1406 now teaching in Espelkamp, Germany, Frank, Lia Improvisationen. Moscow: Verlag Progress, GR — 1409 no date given. Paperback, 65 pp. A book of Hollniann, Dominik. poetry and short stories. Menschenschicksale. Alma Ata: Verlag Kazakhstan, 1970. Paperback, 110 pp.

44 This is a collection of short stories, one of Mit einem heiteren, einem nassen Aug'. which tells of a boy who recalls the famine of Moscow: Verlag Progress, 1967. Paperback, 94 1921 and its consequences for his family. pp. Dominik Hollman was born in Kamyshin on the The first half of this book is a diatribe against Volga. the United States as a warmonger nation. The second half consists of humorous poems. In one GR — 1410 of these he describes his wife taking him Hollman, Dominik, compiler. shopping for some badly needed clothes. She Er lebt in jedem Volk. (He lives in every peo- finds fault with every suit he tries on and he ple.) Moscow: Verlag Progress, 1970. Hard comes home without anything new, whereas she cover, 230 pp. has found many things for herself. Sepp A series of articles and poetry in praise of Oesterreicher was born in Germany. Lenin by Soviet German authors. GR — 1416 GR — 1411 Oesterreicher, Sepp, compiler. Katzenstein, Ewald. Wo faengt denn unsere Heimat an? Moscow: Regenbogen. Alma Ata: Verlag Kazakhstan, Verlag Progress, no date given. Paperback, 175 1976. Paperback, 183 pp. pp. This book provides literature for young people A book of poetry, to which 158 Soviet German for every month of the year in the form of poetry, poets contributed. fairy stories, riddles, and texts of songs. For this reason the author calls it "Regenbogen" GR — 1417 (Rainbow). Ewald Katzenstein was born in Oesterreicher, Sepp. Georgia in the Caucasus in 1918. Wir singen Deutsch. Moscow: Verlag Prowestschenija, 1975 GR — 1412 This book consists of 178 German songs with Katzenstein, Ewald. notes. None of the traditional German folksongs Meister Kleister. Barnaul: Altaier Buchverlag, is included. Instead such revolutionary songs as 1971. Paperback, 62pp. the "Internationale" and "Partisanen von Amur" A collection of humourous poetry for children. are given. In addition, Oesterreicher often changes the words of the old songs. For example, GR — 1413 "Die Lerche, die Lerche, die fuehrt die Braut zur Klein, Viktor and Johann Warkentin. Kerche" becomes "Die Lerche nahm sie bei der Lesebuch Sowjetdeutscher Literatur fuer die 7. Hand und fuehrte sie ins Standesamt." (The lark und 8. Klasse. Moscow: Verlag Prowestschenije, leads the bride to the registry office rather than to 1971. 371 pp. the church). A reader on Soviet German literature for the 7th and 8th grades. The book contains brief GR — 1418 biographies of Soviet German authors and gives Oesterreicher, Sepp. examples of their writings. Included are questions Reise von A bis Z. Alma Ata: Verlag for teachers to ask their pupils about the stories Kazakhstan, 1970. Paperback, 39 pp. told. Viktor Klein was born in Warenburg on the A humerous train ride through the alphabet Volga and Johann Warkentin in the village of Spat from A to Z for children. in the . GR — 1419 GR — 1414 Ran, Georg. Mai, Peter, compiler Kasachstaner Kaleidoskop. Alma Ata: Verlag Bis zum letzten Atemzug. Vol. I. Alma Ata: Kazakhstan, 1973. Paperback, 79 pp. Verlag Kazakhstan, 1968. Hard cover, 212 pp. The author tells of the changes that have taken A collection of stories about the heroes among place in Kazakhstan since the October Revolution the Soviet Germans during the Revolution and of 1917. The country was formerly a desert World War II. The stories are told, as can be inhabited by wandering Kazakhs, but now people imagined, from the Communist point of view. have fixed abodes. Coal mines have been developed in the north around Karaganda; there GR — 1415 are major oil fields at the northern tip of the Oesterreicher, Sepp. Caspain Sea, and hydraulic stations have become a major source of power. The cotton industry has been developed in the south and there

45 are extensive wheat fields in the north. Germans year-old grandson. The poem begins with the sent to this area in 1941, such as Martin Kirks, poignant lines: Jacob Wall and Adam Hoffman, played an Der Junge denkt in meiner Sprache important role in the development. Und spricht in meinem Mutterlaut. Wie lange, schmerzlich, ich entbehrte GR — 1420 Das Deutsch von Kindermund gehaucht. Reimgen, Alexander. Menschen aus unserer Mitte. Moscow: Verlag The boy thinks in my language And speaks in my mother tongue. Progress, 1971. Paperback, 169pp. For so long, painfully, I did without This book tells the love story of Brend German spoken by a child. Wagner, a steel worker in a mill that was started Viktor Klein is probably here referring to his during World War II, and Liese Rapp, whose forced separation from his family during the mother was a deported Volga German and father period when his own children were small. was from the Black Sea region. Liese falls in love with Brend whom she sees every day GR — 1424 crossing a bridge to return home. Often he is Weber, Robert. with a divorced woman who rents a room from Vom Herz und Uhrschlag. Moscow: Verlag his family. Eventually the misunderstanding is Progress, 1975. Paperback, 111 pp. resolved, and the book ends with the marriage of Robert Weber was born near Moscow, but his the two lovers. parents were Volga Germans. He is one of the most sensitive of Soviet German authors. In his GR — 1421 poems he expresses his joy in the warmth of the Warkentin, Johann. sun and the change of seasons. There are also Stimmen aus den fuenfzehn Republiken. poems of love and there is one in which he is Moscow: Verlag Progress, 1974. Paperback, 151 watching his daughter as she rides on a merry-go- pp. round and imagines that some day his Warkentin has translated into German the granddaughter will be doing the same. poems of a variety of authors from the fifteen republics of the Soviet Union. GR — 1425 GR — 1422 Weidmann, Leo. Warkentin, Johann. Aufzeichnungen ernes Reporters. Alma Ata: Lebe nicht fuer dich allein. (Do not live for Verlag Kazakhstan, 1972. Paperback, 127 pp. yourself alone.) Alma Ata: Verlag Kazakhstan, In this, the first of Leo Weidmann's books, he 1967. Hard cover, 173 pp. tells the stories of people he has heard about or In this book of poetry Johann Warkentin talks met in his travels through the Kazakh Republic. about many subjects which lie close to his heart. Among them were: Woldemar Augsburg, who In one poem called "Marriage in Karaganda," he lost his life in 1941 defending Moscow against tells of the conflict of feelings among relatives of the Nazi attack; Rudolf Kehrer, who had to give a Mennonite girl who marries a Kazakh. Another up his dream of becoming a concert pianist when appealing poem, entitled "Du bist eine Sowjet the war broke out, but 13 years later, when an old Deutsche", is dedicated to his wife, who gave piano was given to the school in which he was a birth to their eldest son in Leningrad in 1942, teacher, began to practice again and eventually while the city was being bombarded by German won a national contest in Moscow which made artillery and many people were starving to death. him famous; and Hannelore, who was enticed to Eventually she is permitted to leave to go to emigrate to West Germany, but when she got Siberia, where she is later arrested as a German, there found that her dreams of happiness were an then released again. At the end of the war they illusion. settle in Alma Ata. GR — 1426 GR — 1423 Weidmann, Leo. Weber, Robert, compiler. Sag mir wer dein Freund ist. Alma Ata: Verlag Ein Hoffen in mir lebt. Moscow: Verlag Kazakhstan, 1974. Paperback, 120 pp. Progress, 1972. Hard cover, 363 pp. In this collection of short stories, Weidmann This book contains the poems of 45 Soviet tells of the difficulties of life in Kazakhstan when German authors. Included among the poems is an the German people were deported there and how interesting one by Viktor Klein, who describes they contributed to improving the situation. his childhood days in Warenburg to his four- Friedrich Lebsack, for instance, was one of the leaders in building canals for the irrigation of

46 the land and induced his men to continue working GR — 1428 even when they had nothing to eat. Another story Weininger, J. and J. Kunz. describes the life of Heinrich Bechtold, who was Harfenseiten. Frunze: Verlag Kyrgystan, 1967. left an orphan when his father, mother, and two Hard cover, 103 pp. sisters died of privations during the war, was This is a collection of poems. The first poem adopted by a kindly Kazakh, later married a in the set reads: German orphan girl, who had also been adopted In das Orchester unsrer Poesie by Kazakhs, and they now have seven children. A Reiht sich die sowjetdeutsche Dichtung ein. third story is about Eduard Eurich, who was born Obwohl ihr Platz noch in den letzten Reihn on the Volga, was drafted into the Soviet army at Ist sie ein Teil der grossen Symphonie. the outbreak of war, and became an organizer of athletic activities for Russian soldiers, in which he In the orchestra of our poetry was assisted by Jacob Appelhans, who specialized The Soviet Germans take their place. in hockey. Although they still stand in the last row, They are a part of the great symphony. GR — 1427 Weidmann, Leo. GR — 1429 Judas Kuss. (The Kiss of Judas.) Alma Ata: Wiedmeier, Kurt. Verlag Kazakhstan, 1976. Paperback, 152 pp. Was ein Vorsitzender vermag. (What a This book has probably received more chairman is able to accomplish.) Alma Ata: attention than any other written by a Soviet Verlag Kazakhstan, 1973. Paperback, 58 pp. German author. It purports to tell the story of This is the story of Jacob Gehring, the many Soviet Germans who have been enticed by chairman of the kolkhoz "Thirty Years their friends or relatives to emigrate to the west. Kazakhstan" near the city of Pavlodar in According to Weidmann, all these people have northeastern Kazakhstan. He was born in Georgia been disappointed in what they have found. They on the Caspian Sea, but was deported to Asiatic regard their emigration as the biggest mistake of Russia in 1941 along with all his fellow citizens their lives and are doing everything possible to of German extraction. The route they took was return to the Soviet Union. Reasons for by boat across the Caspian, then by train through dissatisfaction are given as the impossibility of the Kara-Kum desert to Semipalatinsk, and by making ends meet financially in the West; disap- steamer on the Irtysh to Pavlodar. Gehring first pointment in relatives there, and the cold and attracted attention by digging artesian wells to inhospitable treatment they receive from the irrigate the land of his kolkhoz. He also did German people. It is, of course, an outright lie research on various kinds of plants that could be that every Soviet German emigrant is dissatisfied used to check the erosion of the soil. He with life in the West. Many of them have written improved ways of feeding pigs and chickens, and letters to the editors of newspapers denouncing carried out experiments on fur-bearing animals. this book.

A Major Donation of Microfilms to our Archives We are very grateful to Mr. Charles Walters Jr. of Raytown, Missouri, a member of our Kansas City Chapter, for a donation of a set of very useful microfilms from the library of his deceased brother, George J, Walters, the author of Wir Wollen Deutsche Bleiben. Materials from these microfilms, featured in the book, have been found very interesting by many of its readers. To make these microfilms useful to researchers on specific topics, Dr. Adam Giesinger has prepared an inventory of the main contents of each film. Most of these microfilms, it should be noted, come from the U.S. National Archives in Washington, D.C., and can be purchased from there. They were prepared in the late 1950's from German Records captured during the second world war. Guides to these microfilmed records are included in the Walters donation. GR — 1437 GR — 1438 Guides to German Records Microfilmed for German Records, U. S. National Archives, the U. S. National Archives. Microfilm T-81, Roll 276. Four rolls of microfilm listing a total of sixty This film contains mainly statistical reports of collections of German records, dealing with a 1941 regarding the processing for resettlement of great variety of aspects of German affairs during ethnic Germans repatriated from Bukovina, the Nazi era. Bessarabia and Dobruja in 1940. There are some

47 other unconnected items, none dealing with Microfilm T-81, Roll 316. Germans from Russia. Main contents: (1) a 46-page diary, extending from 9 December 1939 to 23 January 1940, of GR — 1439 Professor Hans Koch, a member of the Nazi- German Records, U. S. National Archives, Soviet repatriation commission (Umsiedlungs- Microfilm T-81, Roll 277. Kommission), describing his experiences in Main contents, in the order in which they working with Soviet officials; (2) a description of occur, often interspersed with unconnected items: the repatriation of Germans from Galicia, written (1) material on the incorporation of the by a man who participated; (3) a description by repatriated ethnic Germans into the work force in Dr. Stumpp of a visit to the camps of Germans 1941-1942; (2) material regarding the repatriation recently repatriated from Polish Volhynia and of Germans from Polish Volhynia, Galicia, Galicia: (4) many reports of 1940 regarding the Bessarabia, Bukovina, Dobruja and Lithuania in repatriation of Germans from Volhynia and 1940-1941; (3) regulations for the transport Galicia; (5) Dorfberichte (village reports), one or leaders who carried out the repatriation; (4) the two pages each, from the German villages in employment of German students during vacation Bessarabia in the summer of 1940, just before the periods in 1940-1942 to help the repatriates to evacuation of their people to Germany, mainly adjust to their new life under Nazi rule; (5) statistical material. numerous sets of instructions and regulations for the personnel dealing with the repatriates; (6) a GR — 1442 report from Nation und Staat, August-September German Records, U. S. National Archives, 1944, giving statistics on all groups of ethnic Microfilm T-81, Roll 326. German repatriates (Umsiedler) from 1939 to Main contents: (1) a 30-page (incomplete) 1944. description of the trek of ethnic Germans from Galicia to the Reich, and fragments of other such GR — 1440 reports; (2) two articles by Dr. W. Quiring German Records, U. S. National Archives, reporting stories that he had heard from Microfilm T-81, Roll 294. repatriates about Bolshevik behavior; (3) many Main contents: (1) information about the reports of the years 1939-1943 by a DAI official, repatriation of Lithuanian Germans in January Dr. 0. A. Isbert, who travelled extensively in 1941; (2) reports on the work of the Nazi-Soviet areas inhabited by ethnic Germans; (4) songs, commissions of 1939-1940 that dealt with the poetry and proverbs of ethnic Germans in foreign repatriation of ethnic Germans from territory lands; (5) material on the repatriation of Germans newly occupied by the Soviets; (3) a 13-page from South Tirol; (6) correspondence and reports report by Captain Holzle of the German army on of January to June 1940 regarding the work of Dr. a group of Volga Germans he found in Minsk, in Stumpp gathering genealogical information from whom he took a friendly interest; (4) material on Volhynian Germans in the resettlement camps. the processing of repatriated Germans from Leningrad and Minsk by German immigration GR — 1443 officials (GR — 1027 in AHSGR Archives); (5) German Records, U. S. National Archives, statistics on the numbers of Germans evacuated Microfilm T-81, Roll 436. from various areas of Russia in the years 1942- Main contents: (1) a variety of DAI material 1944; (6) Russian and German copies of the of the years 1926-1929 regarding Germans in agreement signed in November 1939 regarding foreign lands (not including Russia) (2) of interest the repatriation of ethnic Germans from territory to us, because the inhabitants were Germans from newly occupied by the Soviets; (7) copies of Russia, a 12-page report of 1926 on the Germans newspapers, Ukraine Post and Deutscher Ruf, in the Dobruja, Rumania, with statistical with articles by Dr. Stumpp in the latter; (8) information about 28 German villages; tables of contents of issues of Deutsche Post aus (3) an interesting, handwritten autobiography of dem Osten of the years 1937-1941; (9) pages of a the Volga German teacher and journalist, Peter book dealing with the reconquest of old German Sinner, telling of his life experiences under the territory in the east; and (10) the list of Volga tsars and the Soviets, dated 1 February 1928, 69 Germans who arrived at Frankfurt-on-the-Oder pages, and an 11 -page bibliography of his books from Minsk on 9 December 1922 (familiar to and articles. us!). GR — 1444 GR — 1441 German Records, U. S. National Archives, German Records, U. S. National Archives, Microfilm T-81, Roll 529.

48 Main contents: (1) a variety of reports on the Microfilm T-81, Roll 626. Soviet Union in 1940; (2) a description by Dr. Main contents: (1) the constitution of the Stumpp of his visit to German villages in the Verband der Russlanddeutschen, Berlin, April Zhitomir region of Volhynia early in October 1938; (2) material about Dr. Stumpp's 1941; (3) more reports of 1940 about the Soviet Forschungsstelle des Russlanddeutschtums, set up Union, many of them articles in German in August 1937; (3) a brief bibliography of newspapers; (4) a report on the Germans in the material on the Volhynian Germans; (4) material South Caucasus by Theodor Hummel, October from the Staatsarchiv Danzig regarding 1940; (5) newspaper articles, date not shown, on emigration of Germans from the Danzig region to German villages in the Ukraine: Heidelberg, the Mariupol colonies from 1838 to 1860 (appears Mannheim, , Strassburg; (6) letters and in Stach, Grunau und die Mariupoler Kolonien, reports from German villages in the Black Sea pp. 46-57, GR — 500 in the AHSGR Archives); region.in July-August-September 1941, after the (5) material from Hessisches Staatsarchiv German advance into the region. regarding the migration of various groups of Hessians to Russia; (6) lists of Mennonites GR — 1445 planning to go to Russia 1796-1803; (7) the German Records, U. S. National Archives, "Privilegium" of the Mennonites, given to them Microfilm T-81, Roll 551. by Tsar Paul (appears in Epp, Die Chortitzer Main contents: (1) reports on Switzerland; (2) Mennoniten, GR — 1338); (8) a set of Russian reports on the Soviet Union prior to the German immigration regulations of the early 1800's; (9) invasion in June 1941; (3) newspaper reports of material about Hilfsstelle Bruder in Not, set up in September 1941 on the deportation of the Volga Germany in 1933 to help German famine Germans; (4) interviews with Volga German sufferers in Russia. prisoners-of-war in Germany. GR — 1449 GR — 1446 German Records, U. S. National Archives, German Records, U. S. National Archives, Microfilm T-81, Roll 636. Microfilm T-81, Roll 597. Main contents: (1) Kromm article of 1910 in Main contents: (1) many items on the Schottener Kreiblatt (GR — 381 in AHSGR Ar- Germans in Hungary, Rumania and Yugoslavia; chives); (2) lists of inhabitants of many German (2) several articles from Wanderweg der Black Sea villages, from Bessarabia m the west to Russland-deutschen (GR — 395 in AHSGR the South Caucasus in the east, of various dates Archives); (3) a letter from Dr. Stumpp to the and from a variety of sources; (3) alphabetical Bessarabian Germans in 1940, shortly before lists of family names occurring in many Volga their repatriation to Germany. German villages, prepared in Germany in the 1940's; (4) correspondence of 1944, when the war GR — 1447 situation was deteriorating; (5) statistics regarding German Records, U. S. National Archives, the Germans repatriated from various parts of Microfilm T-81, Roll 599. Russia up to 15 December^943; Main contents: (1) Rumanian government (6) correspondence of August to December 1943 interference in Catholic church affairs in Krasna, regarding Dr. Stumpp's work in Dnepropetrovsk Bessarabia, 1936-1939; (2) a series of reports in 1941-1943, including a final report of 15 Oc- from Russia by Dr. Stumpp in 1941-1942; (3) a tober 1943; (7) plans for the re-settlement of the variety of items of historical material on the Germans from Russia in the Warthegau; (8) a Germans in Russia in the pre-Soviet era, many of report by Dr. Stumpp about a tour of them dealing with church affairs; (4) repatriation Reichsminister Rosenberg in the Black Sea region of Germans from South America and the United in June 1942. States in the 1940's; (5) Kromm articles in the Schottener Kreisblatt in 1910 (GR — 381 in GR — 145O AHSGR Archives); (6) a bibliography of German Records, U. S. National Archives, materials on the Germans in eastern Europe; (7) a Microfilm T-175, Roll 580. copy of National und Staat, August 1943; (8) an Main contents: (1) a summary in English of article on the situation of the Germans in foreign the career of Heinrich Himmler; (2) an interesting lands; (9) some items on Hungary, Sudetenland series of articles by Dr. Stumpp, beginning with and Switzerland. "Stimmungsbild aus dem Osten" on 6 August 1941 and continuing on to May 1942, telling of GR — 1448 his experiences and his observations as he German Records, U. S. National Archives, travelled through Galicia, Volhynia and 49 the German villages in the Black Sea region; (3) GR — 1452 material on Nazi problems in occupied Norway Census Bureau, U.S.A., TenthCensus, 1880, and the occupied Netherlands, Kansas, Microfilm T-9, Roll 381. Contains the census of Ellis, Ellsworth, Foote, GR — 1451 Ford, and Franklin Counties. The Ellis County German Records, U. S. National Archives, records are on the first 130 pages. Microfilm T-454, Roll 20. Main contents: (1) several items that we have GR — 1453 in our Archives, obtained from the Bundesarchiv Peterson III, Charles Buckley in Koblenz: Lauer (GR — 1062), Maurer (OR — Geographical Aspects of Foreign Colonization 1063), Staub (GR — 1024), Weise (GR — 1025), in Prerevolutionary New Russia. Ph.D. and others; (2) historical material such as an Dissertation, University of Washington, 1969. Instruktion of 1824, Catherine's Manifesto of Microfilmed by University Microfilms, Inc., Ann 1763, and other items; (3) a report by Dr. Harbor, Michigan. Hermann Maurer, then an officer in the German This is a scholarly work on foreign army, describing his unit's stay in the colonization in southern Russia, which deals with Kutschurgan villages 13-25 August 1941; (4) Serbian, Greek, Swedish, German, Bulgarian, guidelines for radio propaganda regarding the Jewish and a few other minor colonist groups. Volga German deportation; (5) correspondence The author had access to some Russian sources regarding the Baltic states; (6) many pages of and to a number of the standard works in German guidelines (Richtlinien) and directives, issued by familiar to us. The work has a list of the German the Rosenberg ministry over the years 1941- mother colonies in the Black Sea region and 1943, for the politicial and economic much useful information about them. administration of the occupied eastern territories.

15th International AHSGR Convention June 26 to July 1, 1984 Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada * * *

Headquarters: Hotel Saskatchewan

* * *

Mark your calendar now and plan to attend.

50 END OF VOLUME 6, NUMBER 2, SUMMER 1983