Christmas and New Year’s Letter to the New King, 1797

On Christmas Eve Day 1797, Orlofferfelde Elder Heinrich Donner took time to write the new 28-year-old monarch, Friedrich Wilhelm III, King of Prussia, on behalf of the entire Mennonite West Prussian ministerial:

“We, your humble servants, prostrate ourselves in deep reverence before your Honourable Royal Majesty at this year end, to offer our most loving congratulations on the occasion of our Honourable Royal Majesty’s ascendence to the supreme throne. No wishes are more heartfelt and fervent than ours, because our entire well-being is dependent on the great happiness brought about by being subject to the glorious and wise scepter of your Honourable Royal Majesty. Therefore, we wish for our Honourable Royal Majesty perpetual happiness, to the highest of all your government: May God grant His Royal Majesty, as well as your dearest wife, Her Majesty the Queen, the pleasures of all desired wealth and rewards and also infinite years for the welfare of the whole country. Then our joyous hope will be satisfied in receiving grace and protection from our Honourable Royal Majesty, the wisest monarch, in regards to our religion and our sustenance in favourable measure, and may we enjoy them forever. We pledge our Honourable Royal Majesty all the loyalty and servility your righteous subjects are capable of, and eagerly look forward to the time, Honourable Royal Majesty, just as our immortalized ancestors, to give the highest of all our solemn promise of homage publicly and deepest reverence.

Honourable Royal Majesty, your humble servants, the Elders and Ministers of all the Mennonite congregations in West Prussia: Heinrich Donner [Orlofferfelde; Frisian], Dirk Thiessen [Tiegenhagen; Flemish], Cornelius Warkentin [Rosenort; Flemish].” (Note 1)

The response reads as follows:

"His Royal Majesty, our most gracious ruler, acknowledges with gracious pleasure the congratulations and good wishes, which the Elders and Ministers of all the Mennonite congregations in West Prussia wish to express on the 24th of December at the approaching New Year, and does not fail to thank them for this with the assurance of his highest paternal grace.” Frederick Wilhelm Berlin December 31, 1797." (Translation slightly altered)

Since 1772, “full parity” between Catholics and Lutherans was established in the Marienwerder, whereas Mennonites were only to be “tolerated” and “the numerous beggar Jews (Betteljuden)” were designated for “gradual removal” (note 2).

Donner, Warkentin and Thiessen were politically astute Mennonite leaders for these very uncertain times. Notably five years later, hundreds of Mennonite families would leave Prussia to form the new Molotschna Colony in Russia.

Already under the new king’s father, Friedrich-Wilhelm II, the view from Berlin had turned toxic towards the “slothful and useless” Mennonites, and the benefits of expulsion were seriously weighed (note 3).

This came to a head with the Mennonite Edict of 1789, which made it almost impossible for Mennonites to increase their land holdings in number or size:

“We wish, therefore, to order and command [that Mennonites]:

… shall no longer be able to easily acquire the most comfortable and productive properties out from other subjects who serve in the military;

… shall be required to pay the same fees proportional to the value of their properties as Protestant members toward the support of Protestant church buildings, parsonages with chapels, and parsonages, as well as teacher residences and school buildings;

… shall … be required to pay the same church fees for births, weddings, and funerals where they are required of Protestants … [as well as] the supplemental pastoral fees in kind;

… concerning the children of mixed marriages … they shall be raised in the faith of their non-Mennonite parent.” (Note 4)

If their “religious opinion” kept Mennonites from “fulfilling one of the pre-eminent duties of loyal subjects—the defence of the fatherland”—it followed that they “may not have all those civil privileges enjoyed by subjects who willingly undertake this duty” and who are “more useful to the state,” according to Friedrich-Wilhelm II (note 5).

The land restrictions and new fees meant impoverishment for many, and no prospects for the poor and their children. The vast majority of Mennonites in Prussia still hoped that they would be able to negotiate a fair resolution as they had done so often in the past. After all, the Prussian state exempted the whole upper stratum of society from military service, including artisans and workers in industries. Elder Donner was convinced that the best political strategy was--as in the past--not to boast of their virtues, achievements, and economic contributions before the king, but simply plead for his grace. Like God, a sovereign king tolerates his subjects not on their merits, but because of grace alone (note 6). This assumption and tactic was behind the Christmas/New Years letter to the new king as well (this approach would change some years later on the advise of a leading lawyer; note 7).

In 1793 Donner and Warkentin met with the Governor of Prussia who restated that he would strongly oppose any Mennonite petitions. Donner informed the Governor that as a consequence many more Mennonite families would want to emigrate. “Let them go,” was the Governor’s response. But when asked if he would approve applications for emigration, he said no (note 8).

A year and a half after the Christmas letter above, on June 30, 1799, in a response to an unwisely formulated letter by a lone minister, the King reaffirmed his father’s 1789 policy that linked any Mennonite land acquisition to military service. The normally calm Frisian Elder Heinrich Donner was livid in his response: “Under Prussian rule we have never received such a disgraceful resolution as this. … [It] even seeks to prove that the station of a soldier is a duty based on the teachings of Jesus, and that we should unite this duty with our religious principles. … Lord have mercy!” It now seemed to Donner that they were like the people of Israel when a new king came to power in Egypt, “according to the description in Exodus 1:8–13,” who was ignorant of their legacy and call, and enslaved and oppressed them (note 9).

---Arnold Neufeld-Fast

---Notes---

Note 1: Heinrich Donner Diary (Tagebuch) (1774-1803), translated by Elfriede Rempel and Glenn Penner, Mennonite Heritage Archives Winnipeg, Feb 2023, https://www.mharchives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Heinrich-Donner-Diary-12-Feb-2023.pdf. Translation slightly altered. German: Orlofferfelde Chronik, transcribed by Werner Janzen and Merle Schlabough, 2022, Mennonite Library and Archives-Bethel College, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/cong_303/ok63/orlofferfeldechronik.html.

Note 2: Prussian policy did not change. Cf. Hans Maercker, “Geschichte des Schwetzer Kreises 1466–1873,” Zeitschrift der Westpreussischen Geschichtsvereins 17 [1886], 67, https://dlibra.bibliotekaelblaska.pl/dlibra/publication/52346/edition/49705#structure. Cf. also “Obermedizinalrat” and “Bericht der westpreussischen Kammer, 1803,” cited in Karge, “Die Auswanderung,” 70, 74f. It was argued that the state “would gain more than it would lose with the emigration” of this “soft” and “lazy type of humanity.” Conscription should be expanded to include every Mennonite, and such a policy could only be bettered, in the view of one regional official, if the same policies were enforced against “that similar type of humanity to the Mennonites in this province, namely the Jews.”

Note 3: Paul Karge, “Die Auswanderung ost- und westpreussischen Mennoniten nach Südrussland (nach Chortiza und der Molotschna), 1787–1820,” Elbinger Jahrbuch 3 (1923), 70, http://dlibra.bibliotekaelblaska.pl/dlibra/doccontent?id=13874; https://media.chortitza.org/pdf/0v760.pdf.

Note 4: Frederick William II, King of Prussia, “Edict Concerning the Future Establishment of the Mennonites in All Royal Provinces Excluding the Duchy Silesia, 1789,” in Mark Jantzen, Mennonite German Soldiers: Nation, Religion, and Family in the Prussian East, 1772–1880, translated by Mark Jantzen, Appendix, Document 2, 256–260 (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2010). Original: “Edict, die künftige Einrichtung des Mennonisten-Wesens in sämmtlichen Königlichen Provinzien exklusive des Herzogthums Schlesien betreffend,” Berlin, July 30, 1789. Decker, 1789. From Staatsbibliothek Berlin, https://digital.staatsbibliothek-berlin.de/werkansicht/?PPN=PPN806951052.

Note 5: In Jantzen, Mennonite German Soldiers, 256; cf. also the "1801 Declaration," ibid., 262.

Note 6: Donner, Orlofferfelde Chronik [German], 57 (1799).

Note 7: Eventually Mennonites retained an influential and well-connected lawyer from Königsberg. Rather than references to scripture or old Polish Privilegia, his strategy was to highlight the huge loss of technical knowledge and vast human resources in industry and agriculture because of the state’s policy. Cf. Karge, “Die Auswanderung,” 73.

Note 8: Donner, Orlofferfelde Chronik, 44f.; 47.

Note 9: Donner, Orlofferfelde Chronik, 57.

---

To cite this post: Arnold Neufeldt-Fast, “Christmas and New Year's Letter to the New King, 1797,” History of the Russian Mennonites (blog), December 24, 2023, https://russianmennonites.blogspot.com/2023/12/christmas-and-new-years-letter-to-new.html.

Comments

Turning Weapons into Waffle Irons!

Turning Weapons into Waffle Irons: Heart-Shaped Waffles and a smooth talking General In 1874 with Mennonite immigration to North America in full swing, the Tsar sent General Eduard von Totleben to the colonies to talk the remaining Mennonites out of leaving ( note 1 ). He came with the now legendary offer of alternative service. Totleben made presentations in Mennonite churches and had many conversations in Mennonite homes. Decades later the women still recalled how fond Totleben was of Mennonite heart-shaped waffles. He complemented the women saying, “How beautiful are the hearts of Mennonites!,” and he joked about how “much Mennonites love waffles ( Waffeln ), but not weapons ( Waffen )” ( note 2 )! His visit resulted in an extensive reversal of opinion and the offer was welcomed officially by the Molotschna and Chortitza Colony ministerials. And upon leaving, the general was gifted with a poem by Bernhard Harder ( note 3 ) and a waffle iron ( note 4 ). Harder was an inf...

Soviet “Farmer Giesbrecht” and the German Communist Press, 1930

The 1930 booklet Bauer Giesbrecht was published by the Communist Party press in Germany —some months after most of the 3,885 Mennonite refugees at Moscow had been transported from Germany to Canada, Paraguay and Brazil ( note 1 ). In Fall 1929 Germany set aside an astonishingly large sum of money and flexed its full diplomatic muscle to extract these “German Farmers” (mostly Mennonites) who had fled the Soviet countryside for Moscow in a last ditch attempt to flee the "Soviet Paradise". About 9,000 however were forcibly turned back. Communists in Germany saw their country’s aid operation—which their crushed economy could ill afford—as a blatant propaganda attempt to embarrass Stalin with formerly wealthy ethnic German farmers and preachers willing to tell the world’s press the worst "lies." With Heinrich Kornelius Giesbrecht from the former Mennonite Barnaul Colony in Western Siberia they finally had a poster-boy to make their point: in Germany he had seen an...

Swiss and Palatinate Connections

Sometime after 1850 Andreas Plennert and his family immigrated to South Russia from the Culm Region of West Prussia. Though there was at least one Mennonite “Plehnert” who had already immigrated to Russia in 1793, it is not a very common Prussian-Russian Mennonite name. As such, however, it is easier to trace than many and offers a minority narrative and identity within the longer and broader Russian Mennonite story. The account below is adapted largely from information in Horst Penner, Die ost- und westpreußischen Mennoniten , vol. 1, though I have expanded upon his work to offer a slightly different narrative. In 1724 there was a group of Mennonites forced out of the Memel region in East Prussia for political and religious reasons and were given assistance to resettle back to West Prussia in areas populated by Mennonites. Among the 23 households that went to the Stuhm region there is one Plenert listed, namely Christian Plenert. We know that Mennonites entered the Memel region ...

Snapshots of Danzig Mennonites, late 1600s & early 1700s

A picture can be worth a thousand words. We do not have photographs, but we have a few colour paintings of life in and around Danzig in the late 1600s and early 1700s, as well as maps. We also have a limited number of "textual snapshots" of Mennonites at this time and place, which offer an instructive window into that foreign world. These snapshots of work, worship, health, education, community relationships, smaller repressions, and security can contribute to the creation of a larger collage of Mennonite life in Danzig and Polish Prussia. Snapshot 1 : In 1681 there were approximately 180 Mennonite families who lived in the “gardens” or villages outside Danzig, with 113 of those families within the jurisdiction of the city. At this time Mennonites were barred from owning houses within the walls of the city. Of these 113 family heads, we know: 43 were retailers of spirits, 24 merchants, 9 lacemakers, 7 dyers, 3 silk dyers, 3 pressers, 2 brokers, 2 treasurers, 2 waitresses, et...

Village Reports Commando Dr. Stumpp, 1942: List and Links

Each of the "Commando Dr. Stumpp" village reports written during German occupation of Ukraine 1942 contains a mountain of demographic data, names, dates, occupations, numbers of untimely deaths (revolution, famines, abductions), narratives of life in the 1930s, of repression and liberation, maps, and much more. The reports are critical for telling the story of Mennonites in the Soviet Union before 1942, albeit written with the dynamics of Nazi German rule at play. Reports for some 56 (predominantly) Mennonite villages from the historic Mennonite settlement areas of Chortitza, Sagradovka, Baratow, Schlachtin, Milorodovka, and Borosenko have survived. Unfortunately no village reports from the Molotschna area (known under occupation as “Halbstadt”) have been found. Dr. Karl Stumpp, a prolific chronicler of “Germans abroad,” became well-known to German Mennonites (Prof. Benjamin Unruh/ Dr. Walter Quiring) before the war as the director of the Research Center for Russian Germans...

Catherine the Great’s 1763 Manifesto

“We must swarm our vast wastelands with people. I do not think that in order to achieve this it would be useful to compel our non-Christians to accept our faith--polygamy for example, is even more useful for the multiplication of the population. … "Russia does not have enough inhabitants, …but still possesses a large expanse of land, which is neither inhabited nor cultivated. … The fields that could nourish the whole nation, barely feeds one family..." – Catherine II (Note 1 ) “We perceive, among other things, that a considerable number of regions are still uncultivated which could easily and advantageously be made available for productive use of population and settlement. Most of the lands hold hidden in their depth an inexhaustible wealth of all kinds of precious ores and metals, and because they are well provided with forests, rivers and lakes, and located close to the sea for purpose of trade, they are also most convenient for the development and growth of many kinds ...

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...

Easter and Molotschna's First Ethnic German Cavalry Regiment of the Waffen-SS, 1942

For the two years of German occupation, 1941-43, the Molotschna Settlement area—renamed “Halbstadt” after its largest village—was under S.S. ( Schutzstaffel ) control. During this time, new National Socialist ceremonies and liturgies were introduced to the Mennonites in Ukraine, including Easter. Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler named Halbstadt with its surrounding 144 villages a district commando. SS-Storm Unit Leader ( Sturmbannführer ) Hermann Roßner was appointed the Special Command R[ussia] leader for Halbstadt. Halbstadt had Waffen-SS doctors, a Waffen-SS pharmacist team and pharmacy, hospital equipment from the medical offices of the Waffen-SS and soon a Waffen-SS cavalry self-defense regiment of some 500-plus Mennonite young men ( note 1 ). Two of my uncles became members of the cavalry unit; a later, long-time lay minister in my home congregation was in the regiment as well. SS-celebrations for “Easter” were deliberately non-religious and anti-Christian, though careful ...

Molotschna's 50th Anniversary Celebration Plans, 1854

There is no mention of this celebrative event in Hildebrand’s Chronologischer Zeittafel, no report in the newly launched Prussian church paper Mennonitische Blätter , or in the Unterhaltungsblatt for German colonists in South Russia. But plans to celebrate five decades of Mennonite settlement on the Molotschna River were well underway in 1853; detailed draft notes for the event are found in the Peter J. Braun Russian Mennonite Archive ( note 1 ). Perhaps most importantly the file includes the list of names of the first settlers in each of the first nine Molotschna villages (est. 1804). While each village had been mandated a few years earlier to write its own village history ( note 2; pics ), eight of these nine did not list their first settler families by name. The lists with the male family heads are attached below. By 1854 Molotoschna’s population had increased to about 17,000; more than half of those living in the original nine villages were landless Anwohner ( note 3 ). Celeb...

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...

History of the Russian Mennonites

Search This Blog