History of the Russian Mennonites

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 with

When the first Mennonites arrived at Chortitza in 1789, they landed in the immediate vicinity of Fortress Alexandrovsk , today Zaporizhzhia. March 23, 1788 : The first organized Mennonite group to leave Danzig for Russia was led by land scout Jakob Höppner; they were advised to leave on smaller ships docked near the village of Bohnsack to avoid attention, and not from Danzig itself ( note 1 ). After a short early-morning farewell near the Lutheran parish church in Bohnsack on Easter morning, Höppner family plus seven others totaling fifty individuals embarked on their journey to Russia ( note 2 ). Because official permission for visas was granted only with pressure from St. Petersburg, the first groups of families—much smaller than originally expected, “mostly people without property such as milkmen, carpenters and labourers”—prepared to leave quietly in March 1788. But membership in this group too was not automatic with a visa; for example, “Arendt Fast and Jakob Willms … were lef