Skip to main content

Warthegau, Nazism and two 15-year-old Mennonites, 1944

Katharina Esau offered me a home away from home when I was a student in Germany in the 1980s. The Soviet Union released her and her family in 1972. Käthe Heinrichs—her maiden name (b. Aug. 18, 1928)—and my Uncle Walter Bräul were classmates in Gnadenfeld during Nazi occupation of Ukraine, and experienced the Gnadenfeld group “trek” as 15-year-olds together. Before she passed, she wrote her story (note 1)—and I had opportunity to interview my uncle.

Käthe and Walter both arrived in Warthegau—German annexed Poland—in March 1944 (note 2), and the Reich had a plan for their lives.


In February 1944, the Governor of Warthegau ordered the Hitler Youth (HJ) organization to “care for Black Sea German youth” (note 3). Youth were examined for the Hitler Youth, but also for suitability for elite tracks like the one-year Landjahr (farm year and service) program. The highly politicized training of the Landjahr was available for young people in Hitler Youth and its counterpart the League of German Girls, after the completion of school at age 14. Applicants had to be fit—physically, genetically (Aryan), and mentally (notes 4); both Walter and Käthe Heinrichs were steered toward the “elite” tracks.

For Volksdeutsche (ethnic German) boys, Hitler-Jugend was obligatory, and a prerequisite for any future roles in civil (Volks-) society. For Walter, HJ began with the compulsory labour service unit (Arbeitsdienst) and pre-military camp (Wehrertüchtigungslager). The latter included rifle training and trench digging (note 5). Already in Ukraine, the HJ organization enticed Mennonite boys with opportunities for sport, collegiality, shooting exercises, theoretical and practical training under the leadership of a reserve officer, at no cost with a small stipend, decent lodging and food more “plentiful than mother’s cooking pot” (note 6). The HJ camp at Posen/Warthegau stressed the importance of camaraderie and taught boys, e.g., how to fight in pairs in the trenches. Practice included entering an “enemy” trench in the darkness and throwing out whomever they encountered. Because Walter did this well and without fear, he was encouraged to sign up for the officers training track when he turned 16 in April.

Käthe Heinrichs arrived in Warthegau with typhus, but after a recovery she entered preparatory training for the Landjahr in May and then entered the Landjahr and Landdienst schooling program in August 9, 1944, together with Käthe Rempel (note 7). Their Landjahr school was in Scharfenort, Kreis Samter. Here they learnt “to cook, to do laundry, to iron clothing and bedding, to clean, and to do garden work." They apprenticed in the mornings at different farmsteads or estates, and then would change groups every two weeks. Fitness training was part of the program, and here she learnt to swim and dive. “As long as it was warm in the fall, we had swimming once a week in the afternoons. We also learnt to dive into the water from a diving board at a height of three meters … for this I had to go to Poznan to use the indoor pool, because it was already too cold outside” (note 7).

The regime was grooming these 15-year-olds to be elite farming families and communities for Germany’s eastern borders at war’s end. The vision called for a genetically healthy German peasant stock in fortified agricultural villages along Warthegau’s border. Accordingly, Warthegau’s emblem was the plough and sword, Mennonite resettlement in Warthegau, and perhaps later again back to Ukraine, was to help fulfill this plan. “This future, too, can only be a soldierly future. … Only a soldierly generation proud of its military will know how to preserve the heritage of the victory. When these young people will one day live as soldier-farmers (Wehrbauern) in the German East on their own land, we will no longer have to worry about our German future” (note 8). The Wehrbauer ideal—a plough in one hand and the sharpened sword in the other (note 9)—was introduced in HJ and in the Landjahr programs in Warthegau.


Already in 1939, a memorandum by the Nazi Party (NSDAP) Office of Racial Policy indicated their expectation that large numbers of ethnic Germans from Canada and “primarily Mennonites” from Paraguay, Uruguay, Argentina and Mexico would also desire to “return home” and could be settled in the newly annexed eastern German territory. Ethnic German resettlers would be given generous space as “soldier-farmers” (Wehrbauern) to freely allow their "natural mastery (Herrentum) to enfold," and Poles would be forced off their land to serve exclusively as labourers and servants of the ruling German racial class. The Party memo was optimistic that a next generation of Mennonites would gradually grow out of their narrow “confessionally-conditioned way of life and no longer be distinguishable from the larger German population” (note 10).

Hitler’s evolving vision was for an agricultural renaissance of armed German soldier-farmers on the eastern front prepared to defend the land at all times, to teach the next generation, and to keep the racial order. “The Wartheland is a living rampart in the German East, but also a farming province and province of front-line soldiers …Germany's largest agricultural province is only secure if, in addition to the plow, the sword also remains sharpened” (note 11).

Here is a curious interim report by the Landjahr national director upon her visit to a camp with girls who started April 1, 1944:

“The Black Sea German girls [Mennonites would be included in this group]seem willing to work and eager to learn. Nevertheless, the educational work turns out to be extremely difficult, as they have a completely different attitude to work than our German girls.

The camp leader reported that it was very difficult to train the girls to be companionable and eager to do their work. In Russia they are used to being assigned a certain amount of work that they either do quickly or very slowly. If they work faster, they can use the spare time for themselves. Furthermore, they only do the work that has been assigned to them and explained in detail. Any additional work that may arise ... is not done because it is not ordered. This kind of attitude toward the performance of work, which runs counter to our German attitude ..., is very difficult for the Black Sea German girls to get used to. In addition, there is a certain distrust that the girls have in principle towards the orders of Germans. They are only slowly being convinced that they are treated on an equal footing with the German girls.

Another difficulty arises from the fact that the girls are used to different foods than we eat here in Germany. Vegetables or salads are foreign to them, and they are only used to eating a limited variety of fruit.

Linguistically, they try to speak perfect German. They have a very poor command of proper spelling, and no grammatical knowledge whatsoever. Elementary arithmetic skills are also poor. However with firm, purposeful and understanding guidance, the Black Sea German girls will adapt well to our way of life. The Black Sea Germans will need a very long time to acclimatize, however." (Note 12)

As Walter and Käthe were starting their training, Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler gave a speech to his officers (July 1944) noting that Germany’s goal must be to push “the German national border at least 500 km eastwards from the border of 1939. It is necessary to settle this area with Germanic sons and Germanic families, so that a planted garden of Germanic blood is created, so that we continue to be an agricultural people” (note 13).


Already during German occupation of Ukraine, the Volksdeutsche were reminded time and again that this was a righteous battle for German freedom, German blood, and German living space—so that Germans will never again be brought to their knees in hunger like after the Great War (note 14).

The Nazi German racially-based ideals were failures on all levels. In different ways Hitler’s bizarre plans cost the lives not only of millions of Jews, Poles and other peoples, but also of three of Walter’s brothers and a sister (all siblings to my mother). Young Käthe Heinrichs fell into the hands of advancing Soviet troops, and her misery took on whole new dimensions for the next two decades. 

            ---Arnold Neufeldt-Fast

---Notes---

Note 1: Katharina Heinrichs Esau (#1407884, born August 18, 1928), “So bleibt es nicht. Erinnerungen aus meiner Kindheit [bis 1945],” 2002. In author’s possession. Katharina Heinrichs (Esau) was born August 18, 1928.

Note 2: “Von der Molotschna bis zur Warthe,” Ostdeutscher Beobachter 6, no. 71 (March 12, 1944), 5, https://www.wbc.poznan.pl/dlibra/publication/125852/edition/134988/content.

Note 3: February 25, 1944, Governor for Reichgau Wartheland, Unterbringung der Schwarzmeerdeutsche. Der Reichsstatthalter im Reichsgau Wartheland Posen (GK 62) / Namiestnik Rzeszy w Okręgu Kraju Warty. From NAC, 53/299/0, series 2.2, file 1978, 140, no. 145, https://www.szukajwarchiwach.gov.pl/de/jednostka/-/jednostka/1049367.

Note 4: August 4, 1944, State Health Office Eichenbrück, Transport of Germans from the Black Sea to the Wartheland (Transport Niemców znad Morza Czarnego na teren Kraju Warty), 318, no. 327. From Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe (National Digital Archives Poland), 53/299/0, series 2.2, file 1979, https://szukajwarchiwach.pl/53/299/0/2.2/1979/.

Note 5: “Randbemerkungen,” Deutsche Ukraine-Zeitung (DUZ) 1, no. 100 (May 19, 1942), 2, https://libraria.ua/en/all-titles/group/875/.

Note 6: "Besuch in einem Wehr-Ertüchtigungslager unserer HJ," Litzmannstädter Zeitung 27, no. 338 (December 22, 1944), 3, https://bc.wimbp.lodz.pl/dlibra/publication/31689/edition/30230/content. The article provides a very good description of the schooling. See also articles in papers available in the Molotschna during German occupation: “Schule für künftige Soldaten: Warum Wehrertüchtigungslager,” DUZ 1, no. 255 (November 15, 1942), 8, https://libraria.ua/en/all-titles/group/875/; cf. also“300.000 lernen Schilaufen,” Ukraine Post, no. 19 (May 15, 1943), 5f., https://libraria.ua/en/all-titles/group/878/.

Note 7: Landjahr pics from Wir erleben das Landjahr. Ein Bildbericht von dem Landjahrleben, 4th ed., edited by Walter Höfft (Braunschweig: Appelhans, 1941), 85.

Note 8: “Berufssoldaten von morgen,” DUZ 2, no. 38 (February 14, 1943), 8, https://libraria.ua/en/numbers/875/32166/.

Note 9: E.g., Litzmannstädter Zeitung (March 18, 1944), 6, http://bc.wimbp.lodz.pl/dlibra/publication?id=31097&tab=3.

Note 10: E. Wetzel and G. Hecht, NSDAP Office of Racial Policy, November 25, 1939, “Denkschrift: Die Frage der Behandlung der Bevölkerung der ehemaligen polnischen Gebiete nach rassenpolitischen Gesichtspunkten,” in Rolf-Dieter Müller, Hitlers Ostkrieg und die deutsche Siedlungspolitik: die Zusammenarbeit von Wehrmacht, Wirtschaft und SS (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 1991), 122f; 124.

Note 11: “27 July 1941,” Hitler’s Table Talk, 1941–1944: His Private Conversations, 3rd ed., translated by N. Cameron and R. H. Stevens (New York: Enigma, 2008), 15; cf. also Valdis O. Lumans, Hitler’s Auxiliaries: The Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle and the German National Minorities of Europe, 1933–1945 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1993), 212; cf. also “Landwirtschaft im Ostraum,” DUZ 1, no. 253 (November 13, 1942) 4; “Heimatdank für den Soldaten,” DUZ 2, no. 256 (October 31, 1943), 8, https://libraria.ua/en/numbers/875/32144/.

Note 12: Beschulung russlanddeutscher Jugendlichen, October 21, 1944, APP 53/299/0, series 3.5, file 2650, 27f., no. 30f.

Note 13: "Rede Himmlers vor dem Offizierkorps einer Grenadierdivision auf dem Truppenübungsplatz Bitsch am 26. Juli 1944," in Müller, Hitlers Ostkrieg, 113.

Note 14: DUZ 1, no. 216 (October 1, 1942) 3; “Landwirtschaft im Ostraum,” DUZ 1, no. 253 (November 13, 1942), 4, https://libraria.ua/en/all-titles/group/875/.

---

To cite this page: Arnold Neufeldt-Fast, “Warthegau, Nazism and two 15-year-olds, 1944,” History of the Russian Mennonites (blog), May 12, 2023, https://russianmennonites.blogspot.com/2023/05/warthegau-nazism-and-two-15-year-old.html.

 


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Vaccinations in Chortitza and Molotschna, beginning in 1804

Vaccination lists for Chortitza Mennonite children in 1809 and 1814 were published prior to the COVID-19 pandemic with little curiosity ( note 1 ). However during the 2020-22 pandemic and in a context in which some refused to vaccinate for religious belief, the historic data took on new significance. Ancestors of some of the more conservative Russian Mennonite groups—like the Reinländer or the Bergthalers or the adult children of land delegate Jacob Höppner—were in fact vaccinating their infants and toddlers against small pox over two hundred years ago ( note 2 ). Also before the current pandemic Ukrainian historian Dmytro Myeshkov brought to light other archival materials on Mennonites and vaccination. The material below is my summary and translation of the relevant pages of Myeshkov’s massive 2008 volume on Black Sea German and their Worlds, 1781 to 1871 (German only; note 3 ). Myeshkov confirms that Chortitza was already immunizing its children in 1804 when their District Offic...

Sesquicentennial: Proclamation of Universal Military Service Manifesto, January 1, 1874

One-hundred-and-fifty years ago Tsar Alexander II proclaimed a new universal military service requirement into law, which—despite the promises of his predecesors—included Russia’s Mennonites. This act fundamentally changed the course of the Russian Mennonite story, and resulted in the emigration of some 17,000 Mennonites. The Russian government’s intentions in this regard were first reported in newspapers in November 1870 ( note 1 ) and later confirmed by Senator Evgenii von Hahn, former President of the Guardianship Committee ( note 2 ). Some Russian Mennonite leaders were soon corresponding with American counterparts on the possibility of mass migration ( note 3 ). Despite painful internal differences in the Mennonite community, between 1871 and Fall 1873 they put up a united front with five joint delegations to St. Petersburg and Yalta to petition for a Mennonite exemption. While the delegations were well received and some options could be discussed with ministers of the Crown, ...

Landless Crisis: Molotschna, 1840s to 1860s

The landless crisis in the mid-1800s in the Molotschna Colony is the context for most other matters of importance to its Mennonites, 1840s to 1860s. When discussing landlessness, historian David G. Rempel has claimed that the “seemingly endemic wranglings and splits” of the Mennonite church in South Russia were only seldom or superficially related to doctrine, and “almost invariably and intimately bound up with some of the most serious social and economic issues” that afflicted one or more of the congregations in the settlement ( note 1 ). It is important from the start to recognize that these Mennonites were not citizens,  but foreign colonists with obligations and privileges that governed their sojourn in New Russia. For Mennonites the privileges, e.g. of land and freedom from military conscription, were connected to the obligation of model farming. Mennonites were given one, and then later two districts of land for this purpose. Within their districts or colonies , villages w...

What is the Church to Say? Letter 4 (of 4) to American Mennonite Friends

Irony is used in this post to provoke and invite critical thought; the historical research on the Mennonite experience is accurate and carefully considered. ~ANF Preparing for your next AGM: Mennonite Congregations and Deportations Many U.S. Mennonite pastors voted for Donald Trump, whose signature promise was an immediate start to “the largest deportation operation in American history.” Confirmed this week, President Trump will declare a national emergency and deploy military assets to carry this out. The timing is ideal; in January many Mennonite congregations have their Annual General Meeting (AGM) with opportunity to review and update the bylaws of their constitution. Need help? We have related examples from our tradition, which I offer as a template, together with a few red flags. First, your congregational by-laws.  It is unlikely you have undocumented immigrants in your congregation, but you should flag this. Model: Gustav Reimer, a deacon and notary public from the ...

Shaky Beginings as a Faith Community

With basic physical needs addressed, in 1805 Chortitza pioneers were ready to recover their religious roots and to pass on a faith identity. They requested a copy of Menno Simons’ writings from the Danzig mother-church especially for the young adults, “who know only what they hear,” and because “occasionally we are asked about the founder whose name our religion bears” ( note 1 ). The Anabaptist identity of this generation—despite the strong Mennonite publications in Prussia in the late eighteenth century—was uninformed and very thin. Settlers first arrived in Russia 1788-89 without ministers or elders. Settlers had to be content with sharing Bible reflections in Low German dialect or a “service that consisted of singing one song and a sermon that was read from a book of sermons” written by the recently deceased East Prussian Mennonite elder Isaac Kroeker ( note 2 ). In the first months of settlement, Chortitza Mennonites wrote church leaders in Prussia:  “We cordially plead ...

What is the Church to Say? Letter 3 (of 4) to American Mennonite Friends

Irony is used in this post to provoke and invite critical thought; the historical research on the Mennonite experience is accurate and carefully considered. ~ANF Mennonite endorsement Trump the man No one denies the moral flaws of Donald Trump, least of all Trump himself. In these next months Mennonite pastors who supported Trump will have many opportunities to restate to their congregation and their children why someone like Trump won their support. It may be obvious, but the words can be difficult to find. To help, I offer examples from Mennonite history with statements from one our strongest leaders of the past century, Prof. Benjamin H. Unruh (see the nice Mennonite Encyclopedia article on him, GAMEO ). I have substituted only a few words, indicated by square brackets to help with the adaptation. The [MAGA] movement is like the early Anabaptist movement!  In the change of government in 1933, Unruh saw in the [MAGA] movement “things breaking forth which our forefathe...

Widows, refugees, the unchurched, orphans and decommissioned soldiers: Building Church in Neuland, Paraguay

They were in unchartered waters when the Neuland (Colony) Mennonite Church in Paraguay was organized on November 12, 1947 under the innovative leadership of Hans Rempel (1908-2001). Rempel was ordained during German occupation of Ukraine, when “simple, untrained men and women called the believers together, read the Word, sang, and prayed” ( note 1 ). And for the others? In resettlement camps in Warthegau (annexed Poland) Rempel was encouraged by Heinrich Winter, the "last elder of Chortitza" to “make a new beginning ... like a farmer breaking up hard unplowed ground” (Jeremiah 4:3). After the refugees arrived in Paraguay in 1947, the church issues were many and the need for innovation was urgent. First , what should be the role of women in church leadership ? The tradition was very restrictive. The men however were largely missing and many of the women had experience of leadership in the re-establishment of church services during the German occupation of Russia. Innov...

Flooding as a weapon of war, 1657

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then these maps speak volumes. In February 1657, the Swedish King Carolus Gustavus ordered an intentional breach of the embankments along the Vistula River to completely flood the villages of the Danzig Werder. See the vivid punctures and water flow in 1657 map below; compare with the 1730 maps with rebuilt villages and farms ( note 1 ). In Polish memory this war is appropriately remembered as "The Deluge". Villages in the Danzig Werder (delta) from which Mennonites immigrated to Russia include: Quadendorf, Reichenberg, Krampitz, Neunhuben, Hochzeit, Scharfenberg, Wotzlaff, Landau, Schönau, Nassenhuben, Mönchengrebin, and Nobel ( note 2 ). In the war the suburbs outside the gates of Danzig suffered most; Mennonites lived here in large numbers, e.g., in Alt Schottland and Stoltzenberg. First, these villages were completely razed by the City of Danzig to keep the invading Swedes from using the villages to their advantage in battle. ...

What is the Church to Say? Letter 1 (of 4) to American Mennonite Friends

Irony is used in this post to provoke and invite critical thought; the historical research on the Mennonite experience is accuarte and carefully considered. ~ANF American Mennonite leaders who supported Trump will be responding to the election results in the near future. Sometimes a template or sample conference address helps to formulate one’s own text. To that end I offer the following. When Hitler came to power in 1933, Mennonites in Germany sent official greetings by telegram: “The Conference of the East and West Prussian Mennonites meeting today at Tiegenhagen in the Free City of Danzig are deeply grateful for the tremendous uprising ( Erhebung ) that God has given our people ( Volk ) through the vigor and action of [unclear], and promise our cooperation in the construction of our Fatherland, true to the Gospel motto of [our founder Menno Simons], ‘For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ.’” ( Note 1 ) Hitler responded in a letter...

1929 Flight of Mennonites to Moscow and Reception in Germany

At the core of the attached video are some thirty photos of Mennonite refugees arriving from Moscow in 1929 which are new archival finds. While some 13,000 had gathered in outskirts of Moscow, with many more attempting the same journey, the Soviet Union only released 3,885 Mennonite "German farmers," together with 1,260 Lutherans, 468 Catholics, 51 Baptists, and 7 Adventists. Some of new photographs are from the first group of 323 refugees who left Moscow on October 29, arriving in Kiel on November 3, 1929. A second group of photos are from the so-called “Swinemünde group,” which left Moscow only a day later. This group however could not be accommodated in the first transport and departed from a different station on October 31. They were however held up in Leningrad for one month as intense diplomatic negotiations between the Soviet Union, Germany and also Canada took place. This second group arrived at the Prussian sea port of Swinemünde on December 2. In the next ten ...