“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.

Comments

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 ...

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 ...

Last Days of Mennonite Life on the Molotschna, September 1943

The Molotschna Mennonite Colony was established in 1803; 140 years later its villages were evacuated by retreating German armies. A map of the larger German operation of 1943 and the various "Trecks" is attached. The tens of thousands of evacuees included some 35,000 Mennonites. Nazi Germany had utterly failed Ukrainians, but continued to have plans for their "ethnic Germans" in the east. On Sept. 8, 1943 , the Red Army successfully took Donetsk (Stalino), 230 km east of Molotschna. The next day, S.S. administrators gave orders that every Molotschna family should load one wagon with their possessions and prepare for an orderly evacuation. Hitler was intent on holding Crimea, and sought to set up a defensive line from Zaporizhzhia to Melitopol and south to the Sea of Azov. Evacuation plans east of this line were in place since late June—initially to be resettled “somewhere” west of the Dnieper; on Aug. 17 first steps were taken to move 8,000 hospital beds west o...

Fraktur (or Gothic) font and Kurrent- (or Sütterlin) handwriting: Nazi ban, 1941

In the middle of the war on January 1, 1942, the Winnipeg-based Mennonitische Rundschau published a new issue without the familiar Fraktur script masthead ( note 1 ). One might speculate on the reasons, but a year earlier Hitler banned the use of the font in the Reich . The Rundschau did not exactly follow all orders from Berlin—the rest of the paper was in Fraktur (sometimes referred to as "Gothic"); when the war ended in 1945, the Rundschau reintroduced the Fraktur font for its masthead. It wasn’t until the 1960s that an issue might have a page or title here or there with the “normal” or Latin font, even though post-war Germany was no longer using Fraktur . By 1973 only the Rundschau masthead is left in Fraktur , and that is only removed in December 1992. Attached is a copy of Nazi Party Secretary Martin Bormann's official letter dated January 3, 1941, which prohibited the use of Fraktur fonts "by order of the Führer. " Why? It was a Jewish invention, apparent...

Russia: A Refuge for all True Christians Living in the Last Days

If only it were so. It was not only a fringe group of Russian Mennonites who believed that they were living the Last Days. This view was widely shared--though rejected by the minority conservative Kleine Gemeinde. In 1820 upon the recommendation of Rudnerweide (Frisian) Elder Franz Görz, the progressive and influential Mennonite leader Johann Cornies asked the Mennonite Tobias Voth (b. 1791) of Graudenz, Prussia to come and lead his Agricultural Association’s private high school in Ohrloff, in the Russian Mennonite colony of Molotschna. Voth understood this as nothing less than a divine call upon his life ( note 1; pic 3 ). In Ohrloff Voth grew not only a secondary school, but also a community lending library, book clubs, as well as mission prayer meetings, and Bible study evenings. Voth was the son of a Mennonite minister and his wife was raised Lutheran ( note 2 ). For some years, Voth had been strongly influenced by the warm, Pietist devotional fiction writings of Johann Heinrich Ju...

The Shift from Dutch to German, 1700s

Already in 1671, Mennonite Flemish Elder Georg Hansen in Danzig published his German-language catechism ( Glaubens-Bericht für die Jugend ) as preparation for youth seeking baptism. Though educational competencies varied, Hansen’s Glaubens-Bericht assumed that youth preparing for baptism had a stronger ability to read complex German than Dutch ( note 1 ). Popular Mennonite preacher Jacob Denner (1659–1746), originally from the Hamburg-Altona Mennonite Church, lived in Danzig for four years in the early 1700s. A first volume of his Dutch sermons was published in 1706 in Danzig and Amsterdam, and then in 1730 and 1751 he published two German collections. Untrained preachers would often read Denner’s sermons: “Those who preached German—which all Prussian preachers around 1750 did, with the exception of the Danzig preachers—had no sermons books from their co-religionists other than this one by Jacob Denner” ( note 2 ). In Danzig and the Vistula Delta region there were some differences...

Mennonite Literacy in Polish-Prussia

At a Mennonite wedding in Deutsch Kazun in 1833 (pic), neither groom nor bride nor the witnesses could sign the wedding register. A Görtz, a Janzen, a Schröder—born a Görtzen – illiterate. “This act was read to the married couple and witnesses, but not signed because they were unable to write.” Similarly, with the certification of a Mennonite death in Culm (Chelmo), West Prussia, 1813-14: “This document was read and it was signed by us because the witnesses were illiterate.” Spouse and children were unable to read or write. Names like Gerz, Plenert, Kliewer, Kasper, Buller and others. 14 families of the 25 Mennonite deaths registered --or 56%--could not sign the paperwork ( note 1 ; pic ). This appears to be an anomaly. We know some pioneers to Russia were well educated. The letters of the land-scout to Russia, Johann Bartsch to his wife back home (1786-87) are eloquent, beautifully written and indicate a high level of literacy ( note 2 ). Even Klaas Reimer (b. 1770), the founder t...

On Becoming the Quiet in the Land

They are fair questions: “What happened to the firebrands of the Reformation? How did the movement become so withdrawn--even "dour and unexciting,” according to one historian? Mennonites originally referred to themselves as the “quiet in the land” in contrast to the militant--definitely more exciting--militant revolutionaries of Münster ( note 1 ), and identification with Psalm 35:19f.: “Let not my enemies gloat over me … For they do not speak peace, but they devise deceitful schemes against those who live quietly in the land.” How did Mennonites become the “quiet in the land” in Royal Prussia? Minority non-citizen groups in Poland like Jews, Scots, Huguenots or the much smaller body of Mennonites did not enjoy full political or economic rights as citizens. Ecclesial and civil laws left linguistic or religious minorities vulnerable to extortion. Such groups sought to negotiate a Privilegium or charter with the king, which set out a legal basis for some protections of life an...

Eugenics and Euthanasia: Russian Mennonites and the Third Reich

Little surprises me when I write about Russian Mennonites caught “between the devil and the deep blue sea.” A 1944 letter I found recently from Mennonite Prof. Benjamin H. Unruh however offers a new and disturbing snapshot of this leader and the Russian Mennonite community under the umbrella of the Third Reich ( note 1 ). It is not too much to say that this larger-than-life leader stands at the centre of almost every significant Russian Mennonite story between 1915 and 1945, including community decisions during the revolution, the formation of MCC, the emigration of 20,000 Russländer, the miracle release of thousands gathered at the gates of Moscow, 1929-30, the creation of the Paraguayan Fernheim Colony, famine relief in the 1930s, the Canadian debates about identity and worldview in Der Bote and the Rundschau papers, and almost everything that happened with Mennonites in Ukraine from 1941 to 1945. His importance for the Mennonite story cannot be understated. Even for many conte...

Why Danzig and Poland?

In the late 16th century, Poland became a haven for a variety of non-conformists which included Jews, Anti-Trinitarians from Italy and Bohemia, Quakers and Calvinists from Great Britain, south German Schwenkfelders, Eastern Orthodox, Armenian, and Greek Catholic Christians, some Muslim Tatars, as well as other peaceful sectarians like the Dutch and Flemish Anabaptists. Unlike the Low Countries and most of western Europe, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was a “state without stakes,” and as such fittingly described as “God’s playground” ( note 1 ). In the view of 17th-century Dutch dramatist Joost van den Vondel, it was “the ‘Promised Land,’ where the refugee could forget all his sorrow and enjoy the richness of the land” ( note 2 ). Over the next two centuries an important strand of Mennonite life and spirituality evolved into a mature tradition in this relatively hospitable context ( note 3 ). Anabaptists from the Low Countries began to arrive in Danzig and region as early as 15...

History of the Russian Mennonites

Search This Blog