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“The way is finally open”—Russian Mennonite Immigration, 1922-23

In a highly secretive meeting in Ohrloff, Molotschna on February 7, 1922, leaders took a decision to work to remove the entire Mennonite population of some 100,000 people out of the USSR—if at all possible (note 1).

B.B. Janz (Ohrloff) and Bishop David Toews (Rosthern, SK) are remembered as the immigration leaders who made it possible to bring some 20,000 Mennonites from the Soviet Union to Canada in the 1920s (note 2).

But behind those final numbers were multiple problems.

In August 1922, an appeal was made by leaders to churches in Canada and the USA:

“The way is finally open, for at least 3,000 persons who have received permission to leave Russia … Two ships of the Canadian Pacific Railway are ready to sail from England to Odessa as soon as the cholera quarantine is lifted. These Russian [Mennonite] refugees are practically without clothing … .” (Note 3)

Notably at this point B. B. Janz was also writing Toews, saying that he was utterly exhausted and was preparing to quit his leadership post later that same month. The letter is important, and I quote at length:

“I would like to share something personal, if you don't mind. ... My dealings with Russian authorities have left me terribly exhausted, physically and even morally. I don't think I can do it anymore, and therefore I am certain that I will submit my resignation at the autumn conference in August. I've rolled the boulder of Sisyphus long enough, there's too little purpose — at least for me. ... If I kill myself in the process, the family breadwinner is taken away. We are a family with 6 children, the oldest 15 years old etc., who are just now starting out in life. It is time for them to be transplanted into a new garden. ... Nonetheless, my position does not allow me to be the first to leave, so to this point I have always just sought to open the way for others. But now I want to do this for my family as well. Why am I telling you all this? To make a request. Please demonstrate good will and benevolence to this distressed worker from afar and his family, and offer him a resting place in the vast Canadian prairies in the form of a farmstead, which are now being acquired for the south Russian Mennonites! On general terms. Although not among the very first, I wanted, as God otherwise allows, to leave the arena here for good this autumn. Leaving aside the economic motives, it would be good for me - because of the government orientation - to leave. Maybe what I am saying makes sense. Should God possibly think differently, then he will certainly ‘do it well’ and help me to understand this as well. As far as I can see and judge, this is the way.” (Note 4)

To make matters worse, Toews’s for-profit plan to raise $10 million through the sale shares to finance transportation and land acquisitions was met not only with little enthusiasm but outright opposition in Canada and the USA. In August 1922, sidelined Manitoba leader H. H. Ewert of Gretna wrote his brother in Hillsboro, KS about the “overthrow” of the original committee: “The evil spirit behind the entire putsch is Gerhard Ens of Rosthern, and David Toews has let himself be completely hypnotized by him” (note 5). Ens had served provincially as member of the Saskatchewan legislature, federally as an immigration agent, and had left the Mennonite Church to join the Church of the New Jerusalem.

By Fall 1922, the ships had not yet sailed because of the cholera outbreak at Odessa and political instability in the Black Sea region. One more attempt was considered with persons who could finance their own rail fare and lodging from Ukraine north to the Latvian port at Riga on the Baltic Sea. This plan too failed because of Canadian health inspection requirements and the Soviet refusal to allow the inspectors to enter the USSR. In the end there was no mass Russian Mennonite immigration to Canada in 1922 (note 6).

And to make matters more complex, at least two American Mennonite relief directors in Russia were actively dissuading larger groups of Russian Mennonites from application for emigration (note 7).

Throughout these months, B. B. Janz was still trying to retire from his leadership role and sought an individual sponsorship to North America by the Kansas-based Mennonite Executive Committee for Colonization. The committee however rejected his request (note 8).

Early in 1923 Toews and the Canadian Mennonite Board of Colonization changed course. The controversial figure Gerhard Ens resigned from his position on the fundraising association. And in a letter to H. H. Ewert’s brother—secretary of the Mennonite Executive Committee for Colonization in Kansas—Toews outlined a new strategy as a charity, and only one-tenth of the original capital funds was required (note 9). But Toews refused to adopt the less visionary plan of individual, family and small group sponsorship, and to give up on the idea of a mass immigration.

In May 1923, Janz wrote to his North American partners that the Soviet government had given permission to allow up to 20,000 Mennonites emigrate that year. Janz added, that if they had difficulty acquiring land in Canada or US, the Russian Mennonites would be happy to be settled in Mexico (note 10).

In the end 2,759 Mennonites were able to immigrate to Canada in 1923—far short of what the Soviet regime was willing to allow that year—but much greater than could have been possible if Toews had relented and focused on individual sponsorships (note 11). The way was finally opened.

Janz remained in the USSR until Spring 1926. The doors for emigration were now beginning to close around quickly again. After his departing sermon in his home congregation in Tiege, Molotschna on May 24, 1926, Janz escaped in disguise, just a few hours before his scheduled arrest as a key “agitator” for emigration (note 12).

Passengers by year of immigration (note 13)

  • 1923 - 2,759
  • 1924 - 5,048
  • 1925 - 3,772
  • 1926 - 5,940
  • 1927 - 847
  • 1928 - 511
  • 1929 [into 1930] - 1,019
  • 1930 - 305

---Arnold Neufeldt-Fast

---Notes---

Note 1: B.B. Janz and Ph. Cornies to Study Commissioners A. A. Friesen, Βenjamin Η. Unruh, C. H. Warkentin; (also) to the General Commission for Foreign Needs of Holland and the American Mennonite Relief, Scottdale, PA, early March 1922. Translated and edited by Harold Bender, “A Russian Mennonite Document of 1922,” Mennonite Quarterly Review 28, no. 2 (April 1954), 143–147; 144f.

Note 2: For brief biographies, cf. GAMEO, "Janz, Benjamin B. (1877-1964), https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Janz,_Benjamin_B._(1877-1964); and "Toews, David (1870-1947)," https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Toews,_David_(1870-1947). For longer studies, cf. John B. Toews, With Courage to Spare: The Life of B. B. Janz (1877–1964) (Winnipeg, MB: Christian, 1978) https://archive.org/details/WithCourageToSpareOCRopt; and Helmut Harder, David Toews was here, 1870-1947 (Winnipeg, MB: CMBC, 2002).

Note 3: Memorandum, August 1922, “Um Kleider benötigt,” D. H. Bender, Mennonite Executive Committee for Colonization and David Toews, Canadian Mennonite Board of Colonization. In Mennonite Library and Archives, Bethel College, North Newton, KS (MLA-B), https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/024%20General%20correspondence%201922%20May-September/201.jpg.

Note 4: Letter, September 1922, B. B. Janz to David Toews, Canadian Mennonite Board of Colonization, in MLA-B, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/024%20General%20correspondence%201922%20May-September/243.jpg.

Note 5: Letter, August 2, 1922, H. H. Ewert (Gretna, MB) to W. J. Ewert (Hillsboro, KS), in MLA-B, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/024%20General%20correspondence%201922%20May-September/169.jpg. For a fulsome background, cf. Frank H. Epp, Mennonite Exodus (Altona, MB: Friesen, 1962), ch. 9 and 10. Epp does not cite any H. H. Ewert letters.

Note 6: Letter, October 30, 1922, Col. J. S. Dennis (Montreal), to David Toews (Rosthern, SK), in MLA-B, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/025%20General%20correspondence%201922%20October-December/22.jpg. Cf. Epp, Mennonite Exodus, 139f.

Note 7: See previous post, https://russianmennonites.blogspot.com/2023/02/immigration-to-canada-1923-background.html.

Note 8: Letter, March 1, 1923, D. H. Bender (Hesston, KS) to W. J. Ewert (Hillsboro, KS), MLA-B, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/026%20General%20correspondence%201923%20January-June/064.jpg; AND Letter, March 1, 1923, D. H. Bender (Hesston, KS) to Levi Mumaw (Scottdale, PA), MLA-B, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/026%20General%20correspondence%201923%20January-June/065.jpg AND Letter, March 17, 1923, D. H. Bender (Hesston, KS) to Levi Mumaw (Scottdale, PA), MLA-B, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/026%20General%20correspondence%201923%20January-June/092.jpg.

Note 9: Letter, May 1, 1923, David Toews to W. J. Ewert (Kansas), MLA-B, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/024%20General%20correspondence%201922%20May-September/183.jpg.

Note 10: Letter, May 2, 1923, B. B. Janz to D. H. Bender, via Alvin J. Miller, American Mennonite Relief (Russia), MLA-B, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/ms_6/026%20General%20correspondence%201923%20January-June/134.jpg.

Note 11: Epp, Mennonite Exodus, 282.

Note 12: Cf. A. A. Töws, ed., Mennonitische Märtyrer der jüngsten Vergangenheit und der Gegenwart, vol. 2: Der große Leidensweg (North Clearbrook, BC: Self-published, 1954) 487. For more detail, cf. J. Toews, With Courage to Spare, 55f.

Note 13: Epp, Mennonite Exodus, 282.

---
To cite this post: Arnold Neufeldt-Fast, “'The way is finally open'—Russian Mennonite Immigration, 1922-23,” History of the Russian Mennonites (blog), December 5, 2023, https://russianmennonites.blogspot.com/2023/12/the-way-is-finally-openrussian.html.

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