History of the Russian Mennonites

To outsiders, the Mennonite reality in South Russia appeared almost utopian—with their “mild and peaceful ethos.” While it is easy to find examples of all the "holy virtues" of the Mennonite community, only when we are honest about both good deeds and misdemeanors does the Russian Mennonite tradition have something authentic to offer—or not. Rudnerweide was one of a few Molotschna villages with a Mennonite brewery and tavern , which in turn brought with it life-style lapses that would burden the local elder. For example, on January 21, 1835, the Rudnerweide Village Office reported that Johann Cornies’s sheep farm manager Heinrich Reimer, as well as Peter Friesen and an employed Russian shepherd, came into the village “under the influence of brandy,” and: "…at the tavern kept by Aron Wiens, they ordered half a quart of brandy and shouted loudly as they drank, banged their glasses on the table. The tavern keeper objected asking them to settle down, but they refused and...

Two evangelical Quaker missionaries and Bible distributors, Stephen Grellet and William Allen, visited the Mennonite colonies in 1819. They were invited to Russia by their “friend” Tsar Alexander I four years earlier ( note 1 ). The missionaries were advocates of prison reform, good hospitals and schools—including for girls—religious lessons and the broad distribution of Bibles. Their purpose was to teach, to “strengthen,” “comfort” and “give much counsel to Mennonite elders and ministers,” and to distribute Christian reading materials” ( note 2 ). The Quakers found kindred spirits. Allen wrote his daughter that “the whole subject of these [Mennonite] colonies is so interesting, that I hardly know how to keep my letter in moderate compass” ( note 3 ). Two years later the Molotschna was visited by a delegation from the non-denominational British and Foreign Bible Society and the Russian Bible Society—the latter headed by the Minister for Ecclesiastical Affairs and Education in the gov...

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 ...

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...

Recently an acquaintance shared a photo from a Saskatchewan picnic, likely from the late 1930s. Twenty-seven individuals, children, parents and grandparents, are dressed in festive but comfortable clothing. The group includes her grandparents—both children of Mennonites who came to the US from Russia in the 1870s—and other relatives and friends. In the middle of the photograph, spread out like a picnic blanket, is a large swastika flag with the iron cross—the symbol of the German veterans’ association ( Deutscher Reichskriegerbund ; note 1 ); a young boy holds one corner of the flag. There are good reasons to think that this photo was taken at “German Day” ( Deutscher Tag ) celebrations, which were held annually in the 1930s in each prairie province. Saskatchewan German Day rallies rotated annually between Regina and Saskatoon, between seeding and harvest time. Its first gathering was in 1930 which drew some 4,000 attendees ( note 2 ). In 1932, six months before Hitler’s seizure of pow...

On October 12 and 13, 1941, as many as 10,000 Mennonites at two Molotschna-area train stations--awaiting deportation to Kazakhstan--were liberated by German military and were free to return to their homes ( note 1 ). Ten days earlier most had been ordered to pack and be ready within two hours to be taken by wagon to the Stulnewo train station (between Hamberg, Klippenfeld and Waldheim) or the station at Nelgovka, east of Franzthal. Advance German reconnaissance spies were active in the Molotschna villages, some in NKVD (Soviet secret police) uniform seeking hidden Soviet military assets. In the villages men “armed with manure forks and pitchforks,” as well as Russian activists and party members in Gnadenfeld with semi-automatic weapons, for example, were sent out in the early mornings to scout for armed German paratroopers ( note 2 ). German spy planes also air-dropped leaflets written in both German and Russian: “Jews and Communists, flee! Not one of you will survive. We will find y...