Gourt Home::Gourt :: Russian Mennonites
The Russian Mennonites are a group of Mennonites descended from Dutch and mainly Germanic Prussian Anabaptists who established colonies in South Russia (present-day Ukraine) beginning in 1789. Since the late 1800s, many of them have come to countries throughout the Western Hemisphere. The rest were forcefully relocated, so that none of their descendants now live at the location of the original colonies.
Origins in the Vistula Delta
In the early-to-mid 1500s, Mennonites began to move from the Low Countries (especially Friesland) and Flanders to the Vistula delta region in Royal Prussia, seeking religious freedom and exemption from military service. They gradually replaced their Dutch and Frisian languages with the Plautdietsch dialect spoken in the area, blending into it elements of their native tongues. Plautdietsch is the distinct Mennonite language which developed over a period of 300 years in the Vistula delta region and south Russia.
In 1772, most of the Mennonites' land in the Vistula area became part of Prussia in the first of the Partitions of Poland. Frederick William II of Prussia ascended the throne in 1786 and imposed heavy fees on the Mennonites in exchange for continued military exemption.
Migration to Russia
As the Vistula Delta became a part of Prussia in 1772, Catherine the Great of Russia sent an invitation offering land where settlers could have partial autonomy and military exemption, particularly directed to Mennonites and other Germanic groups. The Mennonite migration to Russia from Prussia was led by Jacob Hoeppner and Johann Bartsch. The territory was northwest of the Sea of Azov, and had just been acquired from the Ottoman Empire in the Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774. Many of the Mennonites in Prussia accepted this invitation, establishing Chortitza on the Dnieper River as their first colony in 1789. The other primary colony, Molotschna, was founded in 1803.
Prosperity and division
In the Mennonite colonies of Russia, the Mennonites grew financially prosperous, in sharp contrast to the ex-serfs around them. Industrial operations were started and grew. Farms grew large and successful. With prosperity came a certain amount of licentiousness, including reported fondness for alcohol and greed. Although by no means accepted by all, these habits created strife within communities, especially when leadership was unwilling to ask for changes in behaviour.
Occasionally, Pietist movements, often influenced by German Baptist or Lutheran evangelists, formed groups opposed to some accepted community ways. In 1814, the Kleine Gemeinde, which would become the Evangelical Mennonite Conference, separated from the main body of the church in Molotschna. The Mennonite Brethren Church (Brüder Gemeinde) was formed in 1860.
Emigration from Russia
Eventually, after many years of prosperity, the colonies of Russian Mennonites were torn apart by war, famine, disease and finally mass expulsions under the Soviet Union.
The introduction of a conscription law in 1871 was one of a number changes ending special privileges, prompting community leaders to seek immigration options. In 1873 a delegation of twelve explored North America, seeking large tracts of fertile farmland. This group consisted of Leonhard Sudermann and Jacob Buller representing the Molotschna settlement; Tobias Unruh from Volhynia settlements; Andreas Schrag of the Swiss Volhynia congregations; Heinrich Wiebe, Jacob Peters and Cornelius Buhr from the Bergthal Colony; William Ewert from West Prussia; Cornelius Toews and David Classen of the Kleine Gemeinde and Paul Tschetter and Lawrence Tschetter representing the Hutterites.Kaufman p. 78. This group returned with positive reports of good land available in Manitoba, Minnesota, South Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas. Consequently between 1874 and 1880, 18,000 of the approximately 45,000 Mennonites in South Russia left for North America.
The state of Kansas owes its reputation as a wheat-producing state to its early Mennonite settlers. As a result of their time on the Russian steppes under Catherine the Great, they were familiar with a strain of wheat known as winter wheat that was resistant to the cold of the American plains. It was planted in the fall and harvested in the following summer, and was therefore ideally suited to hot, dry Kansas summers. They brought it with them when the railroads were seeking farmers for the land owned on either side of the tracks, and today Kansas is a top producer of wheat in America. Swiss Volhynian Mennonites settled in the Moundridge, Kansas and Pretty Prairie, Kansas areas. The Swiss Mennonite Cultural and Historical Association tells their story. Mennonites of Dutch-Prussian descent(who speak a dialect known as Plautdietsch, which can be loosely translated as "Low German") settled much of South Central Kansas. One of the largest churches with Plautdietsch roots is the Alexanderwohl Mennonite Church in Goessel, Kansas.
After 1870 many Russian Mennonites, fearing state influence on their education systems, emigrated to the Plains States of the US and the Western Provinces of Canada. They brought with them many of their institutions and practices, including separate denominations heretofore unseen in North America, like the Mennonite Brethren. The largest group of Russian Mennonites came out of Russia after the bloody strife following the various Russian revolutions and the aftermath of WWI. These people, having lost everything they had known, found their way to settlements in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, British Columbia and Ontario and in many regions of the United States. Some joined with previous Mennonite groups, while others formed their own. From there, many groups, fearing state persecution and searching for a way to "live quietly on the land," have left to form groups in Paraguay, Belize and Mexico beginning in the 1920s. Old Colony Mennonites went from Mexico and Belize in the early 1970's and to Argentina in 1986. A smaller number of Russian Mennonites emigrated as refugees along with the retreating German army after the failed German campaign of World War II.
See also
- Alexanderwohl Mennonite Church
- General Conference Mennonite Church
- German minority in Russia and Soviet Union
Notes
References
- Kaufman, Edmund G. (1973), General Conference Mennonite Pioneers, Bethel College, North Newton, Kansas.
Bibliography
- Dyck, Cornelius J. An Introduction to Mennonite History, Herald Press, 1993. ISBN 0-8361-3620-9
- Hildebrand, Peter "From Danzig to Russia", CMBC Publications, Manitoba Mennonite Historical Society, 2000. ISBN 0-920718-67-i
- Huebert, Helmut T. Molotschna Historical Atlas, Springfield Publishers, 2003. ISBN 0-920643-08-6
- Kroeker, Wally An Introduction to the Russian Mennonites, Good Books, 2005. ISBN 1-56148-391-5
- Peters, Victor, Thiessen, Jack Mennonitische Namen / Mennoniite Names, N. G. Elwert Verlag, 1987. ISBN 3-7708-0852-5
- Schroeder, William, Huebert, Helmut T. Mennonite Historical Atlas, Springfield Publishers, 1996. ISBN 0-920643-04-3
- Toews, Aron A. Mennonite Martyrs: People Who Suffered for Their Faith 1920-1940, Kindred Press,1990. ISBN 0-919797098-9
- Toews, John B. Journeys: Mennonite Stories of Faith and Survival in Stalin's Russia, Kindred Press, 1998. ISBN 0-921788-48-7
- Voth, Norma Jost, Mennonite Foods & Folkways from South Russia, Volumes I & II, Good Books, 1990 & 1991. ISBN 0-934672-89-X & ISBN 1-56148-012-6
External links
- Early Russian Mennonite History
- Plautdietsch-Freunde e.V. (Russian Mennonites in Germany)
- California Mennonite Historical Society GRANDMA (The Genealogical Registry and Database of Mennonite Ancestry)
"Russian Mennonites"