Chapter 1
The Family
This is my story—the story of my life as I remember it. After many years of hard and conscientious work, I felt that I could afford to retire early in order to have time to serve the church, to pursue some of my interests and to commit to writing the memories of my life. This writing is for the benefit of children, grandchildren, relatives and future generations, who will wonder from time to time where they came from and what the history of their people is.
I was born on October 3, 1909 in the village of Schöneberg near Chortitza in the district of Zaporozhye in the Ukraine, South Russia, as the fourth child of Dietrich Daniel Hildebrand and Maria Bückert Hildebrand. My parents were married in Schöneberg in January 1904 and lived there for the first six years of their marriage. This was during the time when the Czars still ruled Russia and there was peace in the land. My brother Abram, the first-born of the children, arrived on October 31, 1904. The first Dietrich, born June 1, 1906, died before he was two years old. My sister Agatha joined the family on December 13, 1907, and then I came along as the second Dietrich. Five more children were born after me: Johann, October 23, 1911; Maria, October 6, 1913; Jakob, January 15, 1916; Heinrich, February 1, 1919; and Sarah, January 1, 1921. Unfortunately, the youngest two did not survive infancy; Heinrich died of blood poisoning at the age of three and Sarah succumbed to pneumonia a month after her first birthday.
That left six of us to grow up together in what were often less than ideal times. In many ways the early years, during the reign of the Czars, were the best years for the Mennonites in Russia. They were fortunate to be living in the most beautiful, fertile part of the country, often called the “bread basket of Europe”, with the mighty, much-loved Dnieper River flowing through it. Many Mennonites became very prosperous at that time; they lived in beautiful mansions staffed by servants, built enormous factories, flour mills, or owned and operated huge farms. Some even became very influential politicians, like John Esau who was mayor of Dnepropetrovsk at one time. It is ironic that Mennonites, who fled from Holland because of religious persecution and who were from the poor working classes in Prussia, became rich and influential in Russia and that, as their material wealth increased, their religious faith often declined proportionately.
Our family was quite humble in comparison to some others. In 1910, when I was only six months old, my parents purchased a small farm (halbe Wirtschaft, 32 Disjatin) almost 40 hectares of land in the village of Rosengart. It had a connecting house, barn and hayloft on the property. The house was somewhat smaller than the others in the area because it did not have a ‘Sommerstube.’ But the doors to our home were always open to welcome in friends and even strangers if the need arose. Our parents loved people and were known for their hospitality. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” is a golden rule they practised and believed in. For example, when we were young, our father hired a Russian fellow to help him with the farm work. This young man stayed with our family for seven years until he got married and he called our parents Mama and Papa just like we did. He always received a gift at Christmas as well. After he got married he came with his wife to visit us at least once a year and they never went away empty-handed.
With six children in the family, four of them being boys, it would be less than honest to say that there was no sibling rivalry in our home. We were no different from other families in that respect. I remember always wanting to be older and stronger than I really was. I wanted to be like my brother Abram who was my senior by five years and my sister Agatha, older by two. Already at the tender age of two I admired and looked up to Abram. I was proud to have such a big, strong brother. Little did I realize then how much our father leaned on him and depended on his help. We enjoyed watching Abram and his friends wrestling out by the straw pile and were so proud that he was always the winner. At school, his teacher called him “ein goldener Student”, an outstanding student. Everyone liked him. We couldn’t help feeling a little jealous of him.
On winter evenings when there was more free time, Abram’s friends frequently came over to play musical instruments and sing together. He played guitar, and Johann Kasdorf played violin, mandolin and balalaika. Many others in the group were gifted musicians as well. Those were the years before the advent of radio and television when young people still created their own fun. They usually met in large groups in homes and making music was a popular form of entertainment. The music they made was very beautiful; we enjoyed listening to it. Most families were blessed with many children and the younger ones were allowed to observe their older siblings and learn the songs from them, so that they could join in when they were old enough to participate.
On summer Sunday evenings the young people of both sexes usually got together in the great outdoors to play circle games like “Schluesselbund” and “Gruenes Gras.” When they tired of that they would sit on the grass and sing old familiar German songs such as “Du, du liegst mir im Herzen” and “Im schönsten Wiesengrunde.” Those were wonderful times! Watermelons were plentiful in our area and many were consumed on these occasions. They were particularly good when eaten with “Rollkuchen.” Watermelon eating and watermelon seed spitting contests were common pastimes and produced their champions.
My brother Hans, two years my junior, and I were very compatible in temperament and enjoyed working together in the fields. He was a bright student and picked up languages easily, but I usually got better grades because he didn’t think he needed to study and I knew that I had to. He had a sharp wit and a good sense of humour. One day when Johann Kasdorf arrived to visit Abram, Hans went out to the carriage to greet him. “How old are you now?” he asked rather jauntily. “Twenty,” replied Kasdorf. “Oh, I just can’t wait until I am twenty,” my eleven year-old brother said.
On another occasion, when he was about fifteen, he came out to the field one noon hour to tell us with an air of authority that “the old man will not be coming to work this afternoon. His brother Cornelius has just arrived for a visit.” Of course, there was no brother Cornelius and no visitor either. We couldn’t figure out how he came up with this story. Besides, we were a little shocked to hear him call our father “the old man.” Elders were treated with a lot of respect in those days. In fact, when our father turned fifty in 1926, we thought he was very old—half a century—and we told him that he would not have to work anymore—we would do everything while he sat and relaxed in his favourite spot. Unfortunately, when the ‘collective’ farms were organized two years later, he was expected to do his share of the work and he found it quite difficult. The heavy carpentry work gave him a hernia and he had to undergo an operation in 1930.
In today’s modern world, it is almost impossible to comprehend how primitive everything still was on the farm at the beginning of the twentieth century. For instance, in our electricity-dependent world, it is difficult to imagine that people ever survived without electric power. As a matter of fact, we managed quite nicely with kerosene lamps for light and straw for baking, cooking and heating the house.
All of us children learned to help with the work at an early age. Even during the primary school years, when we returned home from school, we had to change our clothes immediately, for there was much work to be done. We were expected to sweep the barn floor, and to keep the kitchen supplied with straw because wood was scarce and coal was used only to heat the school building. Water, of course, did not come out of taps either; it had to be drawn from the well and carried to the house and the barn. We had to feed and water the cattle at least three times a day and to milk the cows two to four times daily. Mother always needed a large supply of water for cooking, washing and bathing as well and we boys had to carry it. The girls were generally kept busy in the house, helping mother with all the daily chores. There were a lot of meals to prepare and clothes to wash and mend. Besides they had to keep the lamp cylinders spotless on a daily basis and make sure the lamps were filled with oil. Male and female roles were very clearly defined then.
Whenever the bake oven was being heated with straw someone had to stay near to keep an eye on it. If mother was still baking cookies when we arrived home for lunch, it was our responsibility to assist her. We didn’t really mind this job, because the hot cookies were delicious! But all too often, once we had satisfied our hunger, we tended to forget about the straw!
It may seem now that much was expected of us as young children. And it was, but it was never ‘all work and no play’ in our family. We had many good times playing with each other and with children in the neighbourhood. The big families of those days were a blessing in many ways—one was never alone, there was always someone to hang around with.
I must not forget to mention the dogs that shared our lives. Almost every farm had a large chained watchdog. The chain was attached to a strong wire line that was strung across the front yard, so that the chain could slide from side to side, allowing the dog a certain amount of freedom of movement. When we would be coming home after working on the land all day and were still quite a distance away, we could often hear the dog barking in anticipation of our return. How he would jump for joy when he saw us! We also had a small terrier-type dog at one time whose job it was to catch rats, mice and gophers. She took her responsibilities very seriously, was ever watchful and extremely quick. A gopher just poking its nose out of a hole didn’t stand a chance—it was snapped up in an instant. Then there was the dog that loved to ride in the carriage with us and accompanied us everywhere except on shopping trips into town; then he absolutely refused to come along and we were never able to figure out how he knew the difference. Even though their diet, when times were hard, consisted mainly of coarse bran mixed with water, they survived and were very loyal and devoted dogs.
Now a few more comments about my school days. I was very excited when I was finally old enough to attend school like my older siblings did. The school building was quite beautiful and fairly new. At one end of the building was the teacher’s residence. The rest of the building was one large room, in which forty to fifty students in grades one to seven were being taught, often by only one teacher. When there were two teachers, a curtain was used as a divider. In the elementary grades we attended classes for five and a half days a week, Monday to Saturday noon. Believe me, the weekend was always greeted with a lot of enthusiasm! I was in grade five when the Metric system was introduced into Russia and we found that it made Mathematics much easier. Our favourite teacher was Mr. Johann Froese who had five children of his own. We loved and respected him and were grief-stricken when he died of typhoid fever in 1920.
Being part of a rural community as we were, it was common practise for the schools to be closed from the middle of May to the beginning of September so that the children could help with the farm work. Summer was a busy time and everyone was needed. We had no tractor yet, but we did have a binder, a threshing machine and six workhorses to pull them. There were four milking cows and a number of pigs in the barn to be looked after. Often there were also several young calves and foals to be cared for until they were sold. Like everyone else, we also had a nice set of horses and a carriage for transportation to and from church, for visiting friends and relatives in neighbouring villages or for running small errands.
The first tractors did not arrive in the Ukraine until 1924 when a few of the more affluent farmers acquired Fordsons. That was real progress. In 1929 the Russian government began producing an imitation of an American combine for harvesting grain. It took 16 months to build the first one; four were built in the following year and by the end of the 1930’s combines were produced in great numbers, changing farm work forever.
Since the revolution, the depression and the famine all hit Russia during my school years, I was able to complete only seven years of formal training. I enjoyed school and would have loved to attend the Zentralschule in Chortitza but my parents could not afford to send me there. Now I think that it probably was for the best because the school, we learned later, was staffed by communist teachers and some of the students who returned from there had serious psychological problems. Of the three that had been my classmates, one had a nervous breakdown and another died as an alcoholic. They were really sad cases.
As already mentioned, prior to 1917 Russia’s regal family was headed by Czar Nicholas II, who was married to Queen Victoria’s granddaughter. In history books he has been called the most intelligent and also the most autocratic ruler in all of Europe. The Mennonites, being industrious and progressive, were favoured by him and enjoyed a degree of religious tolerance, civil liberty, and special privileges. This degree of freedom remains unparalleled in Mennonite history. All this was to change drastically, however, within a short time. I was not quite five years of age in 1914 when WWI broke out and I was too young to comprehend many of the horrors of that time. I do remember that most of the horses were needed for the war and that there were sometimes German soldiers on the streets and in our homes. But even though it was wartime, there was still a degree of order in the land as long as the Czar was in control.
We began to notice the big changes in 1917 during the Russian Revolution when different factions struggled to take control of the country. Czar Nicholas II had abdicated on March 15, 1917 and had gone into hiding with his family. We now know that they were not safe for long; the whole family was captured the following year and executed on July 16, 1918. From March until November of 1917, Alexander Kerenski, a Menshevik, gradually assumed leadership of the provisional government. Then on November 6th the Bolshevik Revolution broke out and on the following day, November 7th, ‘The Council of the People’s Commissars’ was established with Lenin as its head and Leon Trotsky and Josef Stalin among its members. This is when the great suffering began and much innocent blood was shed. Russia, being a vast country, was not easily controlled and chaos and crime threatened to destroy it. Commerce and trade quickly came to a halt. Soon all supplies began to dry up, so that even ordinary items like kerosene for our lamps and matches were not available anymore.
To add to the instability and unrest, terrible atrocities were being committed by bands of armed robbers who terrorised the German villages at night. The Bandit Machno, who had been imprisoned during the Czar’s time and released at the time of the revolution, led the very worst and most ruthless of these gangs. He had grown up in the vicinity of the German villages and had, in fact, worked for Mennonite farmers. He may even have been in love with a Mennonite girl. Perhaps he was mentally ill. It is not known why he felt such fierce hostility towards the Mennonites. But in 1917 Machno organized a large gang of rebels, all armed with guns and ammunition that were freely available during the war. They went on to torture, rape and murder ruthlessly hundreds of men, women and even children. In some towns all male persons young and old were massacred. Sometimes whole villages were wiped out. Many houses were looted and burned to the ground. The bandits helped themselves to the choicest horses and carriages in the village and slept in the most beautiful rooms and the softest beds in the homes they fancied. They forced the housewives to prepare all their favourite dishes for them, which the women did, hoping that that was all that was going to be demanded of them. Sometimes it wasn’t. And when the bandits moved on after a week or two, they left other unwelcome reminders of themselves behind—namely venereal disease, lice and fleas, which were the carriers of more illness and disease. The result was that far too frequently, these terrible atrocities were followed by a trail of disease epidemics such as spotted typhus, cholera and venereal disease, resulting in many more deaths.
Although it would appear that the Mennonites took the worst brunt of these attacks, other German non-Mennonite villages and some Russians in the Ukraine were attacked as well and suffered similar fates. I think historians are still trying to understand the reason for this carnage.
I remember so clearly how our parents, when they heard that the bandits were approaching our village, locked the house and quietly escaped with us children into the orchard behind the barn. There the whole family, tense with fear and apprehension, huddled together for prayer and mutual support. The biggest worry was that one of us children would panic, scream in terror and betray our hiding place. Thank God that did not happen!
One day when we came home from school, we were quite surprised to find a dozen strange-looking men sitting at our kitchen table, and our mother preparing ham and eggs for them. We were even more astonished when, after they had eaten, they picked up their weapons and left without incidence. There was no doubt in our minds as to their identity—they were bandits, of course. Since there was no government in control, these bandits had a lot of power. Usually, when they left, they would trade horses with the farmer or even just take the farmer’s horses with them. Anyone who dared to complain or oppose them was often shot on the spot or sometimes hacked to pieces. For some reason they had made an exception in our case. Neither the family nor the animals were harmed. We thanked God for that.
Then, just when the night was at its darkest, there was a ray of light, a pleasant interlude. During the month of September 1918 the German army occupied Russia. There were German soldiers everywhere. Some were staying in our village, and what a pleasant time it was—we were very happy—simply elated! We were so proud of our German heritage at this time, but later this definitely worked against us. The soldiers were educated, well dressed and friendly and we liked them immensely. Sometimes they shared small treats with us. Much to our dismay, their victory was short-lived; before long they were forced to retreat again. However, when that happened they left piles of weapons and ammunition behind. These were picked up and later used by the ‘Selbstschutz’ which was formed by men and boys who decided to take up arms to defend themselves and their loved ones when the Mennonite way of non-resistance did not seem to work for them anymore. This certainly caused controversy in the faith community and it is one of the ironies in the history of the Mennonites that some among them were non-resistant only as long as they and their families were not personally threatened by violence.
How vividly I remember the Christmas season of 1919 when I was ten years old. Both my parents and my two brothers, Abram (16) and Hans (8), were extremely ill with typhus. Now all work on the farm fell into the immature hands of my twelve-year old sister Agatha and me. To this day I cannot believe that we really did it, but we managed somehow to take care of the farm, the house and the family, including the four invalids. Our brother Heinrich was still a baby, less than a year old. Maria, who was six, had to look after him and three year-old Jakob. Agatha and I pushed ourselves out of bed very early in the morning to heat the house with straw, wood and dried manure. Then we fed and watered twelve cattle, milked the cows, took care of the invalids and made breakfast for the rest of the family. Mother was unconscious for quite a while, so we could not ask her for advice, but the good work habits which we had learned early in life now stood us in good stead. The jobs which we found most difficult were cleaning the barn and carrying water from the well to the barn. The heavy wooden pails were hard enough to carry when they were empty, but pulling them out of the well, when they were filled with water was very difficult! More than likely the cattle didn’t get water as often as they should have, but I believe that we did our best!
Telephones were still unheard of at that time and the mail service was not working very efficiently either, so we were unable to contact our relatives to ask for help. But just before Christmas, our neighbours went to Schöneberg, where mother’s family lived, and we managed to send a letter along with them. The response was prompt and much appreciated. On Christmas Eve, after eight very difficult days, we were overjoyed to receive a visit from our mother’s brother and sister-in-law, Jakob and Agatha Bückert, newly-weds who were still childless and were able to stay with us for several months until everyone had recovered. Uncle Jakob had worked in the Medical Corps during the war, so he was very familiar with typhoid patients and knew how to treat them. It was probably due to his good care that both our parents and our brothers survived. Many other families were not so fortunate. Tragically, death became an almost daily occurrence in our village.
Since no lumber was available for making coffins, boards had to be pulled off barns for this purpose. Sometimes old wooden crates were nailed together to bury the dead. Doctors were available only in hospitals and these were few and far between. Many more lives could probably have been saved if there had been sufficient medical help available. Quite frequently, when patients were beginning to recover, they regained their appetites and enjoyed a hearty meal with their families. This was the worst possible thing they could have done and often caused their death. Sound medical advice and practice would have made a difference. Our family was living proof of that.
By the summer of 1920 the epidemic was almost over but other major problems loomed large on the horizon. Since many men had died and the bandits had confiscated most of the horses in the village, the women and children often had to work the land. Those were very stressful times, especially when the weather did not co-operate and the rains failed to come in time to germinate the seeds that had been planted. A heartbreaking crop-failure was the inevitable result. By that fall there was no more bread available in the stores and the endless lines of beggars began to arrive in the villages. Our parents were compassionate and generous people. They shared what they had for as long as they could. By Christmas, however, the supply of flour was exhausted and we all began to suffer. When in January 1921 our baby sister Sarah was born, Mother needed to eat in order to be able to nurse her. That was difficult. Now there were ten hungry mouths to feed just in our family. Many starving people resorted to eating dogs, cats, crows and gophers, whatever they could throw into the pot along with the herbs and grasses that grew in the garden. As is always the case, desperate times led to desperate measures.
We were fortunate enough to have one cow, which we were able to milk all that winter. We used the milk for ourselves after the cream had been skimmed off the top. This heavy cream we churned into butter and on the next day father took it into Zaporozhye, twenty-five kilometers away, to trade it in for flour or “Makucha” (the solid wastes left over after oil was pressed, which was usually fed to cattle but which we were now surviving on). We did have horses at that time, too, but they were too weak to make the long journey into town, so father went on foot, carrying a heavy load each way. I remember how he would return home late at night, dead-tired to find us waiting up for him, ready to grab whatever he had brought for us. Mother was then able to prepare some meals again and we could not have been happier. She often baked small biscuits, which we loved and could never get enough of. However, when beggars came to the door they would each receive one as well.
It was during the years 1921-23, that the Ukraine experienced one of the worst famines in all of Russian history. One fifth of the population died of typhoid, cholera and starvation. The Mennonites began to look to their relatives in Europe and America for aid. And, thank God, aid did arrive! The American Mennonites had formed the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) by late summer of 1920 and they sent several representatives to Russia to organize the relief program. Food kitchens were set up by March 16, 1922, and continued for three years. Later clothing was also distributed. Almost simultaneously, but quite independently, the Dutch carried on a similar work. There is absolutely no doubt that the combined efforts of the American and Dutch Mennonites saved thousands of lives and for that the Russian Mennonites have always been deeply grateful.
In our immediate family we experienced help from the MCC food kitchens as well. Starting in March, my younger sister and brothers were receiving one hot meal a day each. My father was able to work in the kitchens and he always brought his food rations home and shared them with us. Even in our great need we felt that God had not forsaken us.
When spring came, our situation began to improve somewhat. Our garden came alive again—soon there were greens to be picked and put into hot soups to fill our empty stomachs. We had often been hungry during the winter, but now the pain was eased somewhat. But there was a real concern at this time that there would not be enough seed grain left in the spring because most of it had been consumed for food. The American MCC, however, came to our aid by supplying us with a large quantity of corn for planting. Corn was versatile; it could be cooked and eaten, or ground into cornmeal and baked into bread. Barley for grits was also available. Once again our lives were saved!
However, an unbelievable amount of hard work was involved in getting the corn to the table. First of all, there were very few horses left on the farms and the ones remaining were so weak that they had to be assisted to their feet before they could walk. We had to take them out to pasture to feed at night so that they would be strong enough to work during the day. We also trained two of our cows to pull the plough and the wagons that brought the corn home from the fields. Because no one else was available to do it, the responsibility fell to Johann and me. Since I was the older and stronger one, I had to take charge. It was a most difficult thing to do; cows do not take to training very enthusiastically, to say the least. As a fourteen-year-old boy I also had to take my turn along with other boys and usually one adult, to guard the horses at night. I really hated that but I knew I had to do it and with God’s help I did. My older brother Abram was busy elsewhere and my younger brother Hans was small for his age and only twelve at the time, so I had to help as much as I could.
Our father was a gifted carpenter; he was very handy with his hands and could usually build whatever was needed in the home or on the farm. My brother Abram loved to assist him. Sometimes opportunities arose where they were able to earn some extra money by going out and working for others.
Dad’s talents extended beyond home, into the church, as well, where he had the honoured position of being a ‘Vorsänger’. This was usually an elected position for life. We need to remember that there were no musical instruments allowed in the churches and no hymn books either. We were simple people with a simple faith. All singing was in done in unison and the ‘Vorsänger’ sat at the front of the church and announced and started the songs. The congregation followed his lead and sang along heartily, mostly from memory.
In 1922, unexpected tragedy struck not only once but twice in our family. First, on February 3, in the middle of winter, our one-year old baby sister Sarah was very ill with pneumonia. She had to be taken to the doctor in Chortitza, six kilometers away. The only mode of transportation available was the horse and sleigh. Due to the bitterly cold weather, Sarah was snugly wrapped in blankets and nestled in pillows. Forty-five minutes later, when they unwrapped the covers at the doctor’s office, they were shocked to find that she had already died. We were all grief-stricken when our parents returned and showed us the tiny corpse. Many tears were shed for our dear little sister. We missed her sorely and mourned for her for a long time. It cannot be denied, however, that it was easier on Mother not to have to breast-feed a baby when food was so scarce. Sad but true.
Just three months later, on May 2, tragedy struck again. It was a day I will never forget. The problem began early in the morning in our father’s workshop. Since there were no shoes available for purchase in the stores, our father made wooden sandals for all of us. They were quite comfortable and we liked to watch him at his work. Our youngest brother Heinrich, a bright and clever boy, and a favourite with all, was no exception. He never wanted to miss anything. On this particular day, while he was taking in all the activity, and being his lively self, he accidentally scratched his foot with a chisel. It didn’t look serious; there was a little blood but it got wiped away. Before too long he went out barefoot to the garden to play in the dew-covered grass. By lunchtime he was complaining about pain in his foot and we noticed that it was badly swollen. Mother steeped camomile flowers and made a compress for him but the pain got progressively worse and the situation became extremely worrisome. It definitely looked like blood poisoning. Since there was no doctor in our village, Mother desperately tried every home remedy she could think of, but to no avail. Heinrich’s condition deteriorated rapidly and our little brother who had been happy, robust and full of life in the morning died at one o’clock that night. He was three years and three months old. A second funeral in our family in such a short time was devastating. With the help of our neighbour, Mr. Toews, father made both coffins. It was heart-breaking to watch them. The graves were dug with shovels and spades and filled in later by compassionate church members. Friends and relatives gathered in our home for the sad funerals, events that were all too common in those days. I know it was the strong faith of our parents that sustained us even through those gut-wrenching times.
I am grateful to this day for the good example our parents set for us. Even though they were never rich, they were always generous and had many friends. There were frequent guests in our parents’ home, even Russian travellers were put up for the night and they and their horses were fed when at all possible, without any thought of remuneration. “Perhaps some day some one will do for our children what we have done for others,” father used to say.
We children loved and respected our parents and each other too. We had our share of normal childhood fights, of course, but we always made up and played together again. Our parents were good to us. Mother, who had most of the responsibility for raising us, did spank us when we needed it, but father never laid a hand on us. I still remember, however, the day when he taught me a lesson at the dinner table. The meal consisted of bean soup and I hated bean soup! “I am not going to eat it,” I said. “Good,” my father replied. “You don’t have to eat, but you will remain at the dinner table until everyone is finished and there will be no food for you until supper time.” As I sat and watched my sisters and brothers eat their soup with obvious enjoyment, I was starving! It was a long time till supper and, needless to say, I never complained about food again.
I want to insert a bit about my ancestry here. The Mennonites had started to come to Russia in 1788, at the invitation of Queen Catherine the Great, because of the religious persecution they were experiencing in Prussia. Two hundred and twenty-eight families came initially, mostly from the poorer working classes, because passports were denied to all those who owned property. Many of these first immigrants, having been city labourers, knew little about farming and found the first years extremely difficult. They were very poor, and life became a constant struggle for survival. The winters were cold and the work was exhausting and never finished. But through determination, frugality and hard labour they carved their destinies out of the Steppes of Russia, and became, in many instances, well-to-do farmers and businessmen.
My father was born on October 24, 1876, in Rosengart; a small village of not more than a few hundred people, with one store and a small school, located six kilometers south of Chortitza. He was of the second generation of Hildebrand’s born in the Ukraine. His grandfather, Daniel Hildebrand came from Prussia in 1830. My father was the ninth of the twelve children of Daniel and Agatha Toews Hildebrand, my grandparents, both of whom I never knew and don’t know much about. They had been born in Rosengart, had a whole section or eighty hectares of land, a big house with barns for cattle and hay attached to it, and a ‘Nebenhaus’, another small house on the property. Grandfather Hildebrand died in 1899 and Grandmother in 1915. Their son, my Uncle Jakob, was able to purchase the farm, so it stayed in the family and we were able to visit it.
On the other hand, our maternal grandparents, Abram and Maria Fröse Bückert, were very close to us. My mother was the second of their ten children and was born December 18, 1879 in Schöneberg, seven kilometers southwest of Rosengart. There were two pairs of twins in the family, but only one of each set survived, so that mother had seven siblings, six of whom were boys. There was Franz who died of typhoid fever at the age of twenty-four, Herman, the youngest, died of tuberculosis of the bone in his early twenties, and the other four brothers all disappeared between 1936-38 during Stalin’s regime and were never heard from again. Mother’s sister Sarah Bückert Fröse, born August 11, 1887, immigrated to Canada in the 1930’s and died in Altona, Manitoba in the 1960’s. Her children and stepchildren still live in the area.
Our Bückert grandparents were very well to do before WWI. When their old house was destroyed by fire (1907?) they built a brand new brick home and a large summer kitchen. The barns, hayloft, hog barn were all attached to the house, and were constructed of brick on the outside with painted wooden walls and floors inside. They had twelve very fine workhorses; I remember how much I admired them, and the two beautiful mares that pulled the carriages. They also had a motor for threshing, which was a rarity at that time. I have wonderful memories of the many times we went to Schöneberg to visit our grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins and of the occasions when they came to visit us. Unfortunately, grandfather Bückert did not live to see the arrival of the first tractors in the Ukraine; but then he also missed much of the suffering that was to come. We were very sad when he died of a stroke in 1923. It was not his first stroke; he had had one or two earlier which had caused partial paralysis and speech impairment. Grandfather was a short, stocky man, but grandmother was of a slim build. She lived until 1937 and was eighty years old when she died. Our daughter Helen still had the privilege of meeting her great-grandmother.
The Revolution and the world wars had taken their toll, not only on the Mennonite communities, but on all of Russia, and especially on the Ukraine. Disease epidemics, famine and destruction had been widespread. It is believed that as many as twenty million people may have perished in Russia during the two world wars. Now inflation was rampant. On occasion poor farmers became millionaires overnight. The sale of one horse could sometimes gross over one million rubles. We in our family, in fact, were multi-millionaires for a brief time as well! We did not take advantage of this new status, however, because we knew that the money was almost worthless. It had to be spent immediately if one wanted to benefit from it. Just a couple of days down the road it could have lost its purchasing power or prices could have doubled. It was a happy day when the government started to print new money—all the old money was devalued and burned without remuneration. Everyone was given a fresh and equal start.
In my lifetime I have had several different experiences as far as money is concerned. In 1941, for instance, when the German army occupied the Ukraine, a new currency was introduced and for ten Russian rubles we received one karbowanez. When we arrived in Germany in 1943 we had to exchange money again and for ten karbowanez we received one Reichsmark. Then, in 1948, just before we emigrated to Canada, on a July 1st Saturday, I had a visit from two government officials who told me that my money was worthless again and that I was to hand it to them. I gave them my two hundred Reichsmark. Two days later I received, in return, forty German marks per person, that is two hundred and forty marks for our family of six, to go to Canada with. We were satisfied with that because we were lucky enough to be leaving, our family was intact and our faith in God sustained us. The silver change which we were allowed to keep we had melted down and fashioned into a bracelet by a local jeweler. It is still as beautiful as ever.
Before 1914 the Mennonites in Russia enjoyed religious freedom and special privileges to a degree which has not been paralleled in their history. After WWI they suffered a succession of tragedies—political oppression, religious persecution, destruction of property, famine, disease, rape, slave labour, deportation, family separation and wholesale massacre far worse than that suffered by their ancestors in Europe. That is another of the ironies of Mennonite history.
It is not surprising that during these desperate times many of our Mennonites became disenchanted with their ‘Promised Land’ and began exploring possibilities of settling elsewhere. They wanted to again find the peaceful life and religious tolerance which they had originally sought. Canada offered hope, and by 1923 the Great Trek had begun. When the first long train rolled away from Chortitza that summer, tears flowed like a river. Many families were being separated, never to see each other again. From our village only our dear Uncle Peter, father’s youngest brother, decided to leave. He had lost his wife during the birth of their fourth daughter and he was despondent. His oldest daughter was my age, fourteen at the time, and we were friends. They eventually settled in British Columbia and we corresponded with them when we came to Canada.
It is estimated that by 1930, 21,000 Mennonites had immigrated to Canada. Quite a number of our relatives were in that group. After the Second World War these relatives were instrumental in sponsoring their European cousins, making it possible for them to immigrate to Canada and thereby reuniting many families. God works in mysterious ways his wonders to perform!
For various reasons we had decided to remain in the Ukraine in the 1920’s and by the year 1924 the situation in our family gradually began to improve. Since my father owned only half a section of land, he needed to supplement his income by working part-time as a carpenter. Brother Abram, who didn’t much like farm work, often assisted him. The additional income was of tremendous benefit to the whole family.
When our father was offered a contract to dismantle a large granary in Osterwick, to move the lumber to Rosengart and build a huge hog barn there, he and Abram had to hire additional help to get the job done. The financial rewards of this project were substantial and helped us to buy much-needed farm equipment.
By the time I was fifteen and my brother Hans thirteen, we were capable of doing all the work on the farm and enjoyed doing it. I remember how we used to come home at night, hot and tired after a hard day’s work, and how after supper, when the whole family was together, we would sit around and plan the following day’s activities with our father. Next morning we were up at daybreak again, first feeding and brushing the horses, then eating a hearty breakfast and off to the fields, usually until sunset.
If at all possible, father and Abram worked together with us at harvest time. In fact, it was common practice at that time for farmers to co-operate and share their resources so that there would be enough horsepower to pull the threshing machines. It was an exciting time of year—there were lots of people around, lots of food prepared by the women and lots of work to be done. The days were long and the nights were short, but we loved it!
In the spring of 1926, when Abram was twenty-one years of age, he, together with all the young men his age, was called for non-combative service to Cherniegou. He was desperately needed at home during the summer months, but there was no choice. A dam was being built for the railroad and workers were needed to transport the huge amounts of sand, earth and gravel required for this massive project. Wheelbarrows were provided for the task, and our fellows worked long, strenuous, sweaty hours on meagre food rations, and without pay, for five consecutive summers.
When Abram returned every year in October, he had a chance to recuperate, because the farm work was already done and there was not much work during the winter months. There was not much income either, so as a result young men like him tended to wait until after their service was completed before getting married. In the spring of 1930, Abram and his sweetheart, Helena Enns from Burwalde, celebrated their engagement, and in the fall, after his service was done, their marriage. Lena Enns was a beautiful young lady, five years younger than my brother was. We all liked her and welcomed her into our family. On June 8, 1932 they were blessed with a baby girl and on March 3, 1936 with a son. It was common practice in those days for the parents to name the children after themselves, which they did. However, the daughter Helena was later renamed ‘Helga’ as a young teen in Germany. My brother Abram died in Siberia in 1942 of hard labour, hunger and cold. His wife Helena came to Canada in 1948 with the children, and remarried in 1950. Daughter Helga married Corny Nikkel and they have four children: Rudy, Walter, Linda and Irmgard. Son Abe and wife Tina (Neufeld) have three children: David, Kathy and Peter. Lena enjoyed many good years with her second husband, Rev. Arndt Lehn, and lived in Winnipeg until 1993. Since I had lost my own brothers during the war, I came to regard Arndt as a beloved brother.
My sister Agatha, “the good one” as she has been called, was from a young age very helpful to our mother. Milking the cows became her job, because this was considered to be women’s work. Out of curiosity, I wanted to learn to milk as well, and I did, at age eight. Many years later, in Germany, I was able to use this skill when I found work on a large farm. I realized then that you could never have too many skills. Agatha married Peter Jakob Pries on November 12, 1929. He was seven years her senior and worked as a veterinarian. Agatha and Peter had four children: Peter, Dietrich, Maria and Helena, but Dietrich died on his first birthday and Maria in her fifteenth year. Like many other men, Agatha’s husband Peter Pries died in Siberia in 1942. After having lived in Germany for a while, Agatha and her children were repatriated back to Russia where they lived until the late 1970’s. When it became possible to return to Germany, Agatha, her son Peter and his wife Liese with their children Peter, Maria, and Elsa, and her daughter Helena and son-in-law Andreas Schwarzenberger and their children Andreas, Natalie and Helene made the decision to leave Russia. They settled near Bielefeld with many other Umsiedler and the German government treated them very generously, doing everything to make the transition as easy as possible. We corresponded regularly with them for many years and Agatha made several extended visits to Canada and we went to Germany as well. She died in 1995.
My brother Johann married Helena Hoeppner in December 1933. She was nearly nineteen years old and he was twenty-two. Their first son Hans was born the following year, followed by Dietrich (Dick) in 1937 and then by Helga in 1940. Angelika (Gayla) was born in Germany in 1944. Johann was forcibly separated from his family in the early 1940’s and sent to Siberia. Helena and the children managed to escape to Germany, aided by the German army. Sadly the oldest son Hans died there at the age of ten, just after the war was over. In 1947 the family immigrated to Canada and settled in British Columbia. Helena eventually remarried in 1954, after many years of waiting for her husband to return. She and her new husband, Sepp Dyck, agreed to foster a five-year old boy named Eddy and raise him to maturity. Helena’s son Dick married Margaret Spenst and they have three sons: Jan, Mark and Dale. Helga and husband Helmut Stobbe also have three children: Robert, Cathy and Michael. Gayla is married to Ken Kehler and their children are: Sean, Conan and Lani. To everyone’s surprise, my brother Johann miraculously survived the war and was located living in Siberia. Just recently we learned that a local woman had found him lying on the road, more dead than alive. She took him to her home and nursed him back to health. He later married a Russian woman and had another daughter, Katja. He was able to re-establish contact with his British Columbia family before he died in 1970. Helena was widowed for the second time in 1984 and lived near her children and grandchildren until she passed away in 1995.
My sister Maria, known as the pretty one, married Jakob Klassen from Osterwick on June 16, 1935. They had a daughter Mika in 1937, a son Jakob in 1938, twin daughters Anna and Anganetha in 1941 and a son Peter in 1949. Mika married Rubin Schattschneider in 1958 and had seven children, one of whom died accidently at age eighteen. Jakob died in a motorcycle accident in 1967, leaving a widow, Frieda, and three children. Anganetha died in 1974, leaving husband Erich Siebert with seven children. Anna then married her brother-in-law in 1975 and became a mother to her sister’s children. She bore another daughter the following year. Peter married Maria Anzelm in 1971 and they have three daughters and a son. My sister Maria’s husband Jakob was lucky enough to survive the war and they escaped to Germany in 1943, together with my parents and my sister Agatha’s family. However, Stalin’s army caught up with them eventually and repatriated them back to northern Russia where they made a life for themselves in a small village. Both my parents died and are buried there. In the 1980’s Germany opened its doors to these ex-German citizens and many took the opportunity to make the move back to the land of their ancestors. My sister Maria was among them. She, together with her son Peter and his family, came in January 1989 and the rest of her family followed gradually. They are all together in Germany now and at last count there were over one hundred and twenty-five of them.
My brother Jakob, the youngest in the family, who actually got to be taller than I, married Anna Klassen from Burwalde in 1940. She was a sister to my deceased girlfriend, Maria. Her parents had died in Siberia and my sister Agatha took Anna in to help with the work. In 1940, when she was nineteen years old, she married my brother Jakob. A daughter Anni was born to them in September 1941 while Anna was a refugee fleeing from communism. Jakob had already been banished to Siberia, where he perished the following year, without ever having held his daughter. Anni has felt this loss all of her life. She and her mother lived in Paraguay for a number of years after the war and Anna married Martin Epp there and had five more children. They moved to Germany in the 1960’s where all the children are settled now and Anna is still alive in 2004, married for the third time. Anni married Dietmar Baumert in 2001 just before she turned sixty. They are living in northern Germany now and are very happy there.