Andreas Andreas Buller

Having hit a (temporary) roadblock in tracing back our own family line (we did learn that David’s father was named Benjamin and his mother Helena but nothing beyond that) we have turned our attention these past few months to whatever primary historical resources we can find that mention any Buller at all. Our goal in broadening our scope of inquiry is simply to collect as much data as we can, so that, even if we do not find Benjamin’s parents and grandparents, we still will come to know the wider family (among whom our family lived) a little bit more.

So it was that we examined carefully the Buller chart that Glenn Penner first developed, then spent time in Volhynia, the Schwetz area, and, most recently, the villages of Neumark. We have thoroughly explored the Bullers who are reported to have lived there (we should keep in mind, however, that not all the Bullers who lived in any of these locations appear in the records available to us), so now we are ready to draw a few lines between the Bullers we have encountered along the way.

We begin with Andreas Andreas Buller, whom we first met in the village of Antonovka in Volhynia (see here). If you recall, the 1819 census for the area recorded all the members of Andreas’s family both for 1816 and 1819.

name		age in 1816		age in 1819
Andreas Andreas Buller		43		46
sons David		15		18
Benjamin		12		15
his wife Anna		49		52
daugher Maria		18		21

Antonovka (modern Antonivka), the Volhynian village where Andreas Andreas Buller and family were registered.

What makes Andreas so interesting now is that he is quite likely one of the Bullers just encountered in the Neumark villages. The evidence in favor of that conclusion includes the following:

1. The name Andreas Andreas indicates that this was the son of a Buller also named Andreas.

2. His age in 1816/1819 implies that his birth year was around 1773.

3. The 1793 tax list for Franztal (here) lists an Andreas Buller on plot 14.

4. The 1805 tax list for Franztal (here) lists an Andreas Buller on plot 20 and an Andreas Buller Jr. on plot 14. The fact that in 1805 Andreas Jr. leased the plot that the other Andreas leased implies rather strongly that Jr. was the son of the other Andreas (Sr.).

4. If Andreas Jr. was born in 1773, he was probably slightly too young to lease a plot in 1793, but he would have been in his prime working years in 1805.

5. Both Andreas Bullers were gone from Franztal by the time of the 1826 tax list.

6. According to Abe J. Unruh (see earlier post here), the Mennonites who populated Antonovka came from Neumark, that is, the villages of Franztal and Brenkenhoffswalde.

On the basis of the cumulative evidence, one might reasonably conclude that Andreas Andreas Buller of Antonovka was the same as Andreas Jr. of Franztal. All the evidence lines up: the names of the son and father, the birth years, and the location of Andreas Andreas before he moved to Volhynia. One might also reconstruct this family line’s history in greater detail.

1. Given Andreas Jr.’s year of birth (1773), Andreas Sr. could have been born anytime from the 1740s to the early 1750s.

2. If it was 1745 or after, Andreas Sr. was not yet an adult when the main group of Mennonites moved to the Neumark area in 1765. This explains why he is not listed as a lease holder in 1767.

3. According to the Przechowka church book, Andreas 345 was married in Franztal. This supports the notion that he was not yet an adult when he went to Franztal (i.e., he was not married when we went there). Thus, one might suggest that his year of birth was probably sometime between 1745 and 1753.

4. If Andreas Sr. was born around 1750 (to choose a middle date), he was in his early forties when he leased Franztal plot 14 in 1793. His son Andreas Jr. was twenty and thus likely living at home but not far from establishing his own household.

5. Andreas Jr. was born in 1773. As the firstborn son in the family, Andreas Jr. was given his father’s name. Formally he was known as Andreas Andreas Buller.

6. Given the age of his oldest child in 1816 (Maria, eighteen), Andreas Jr. probably married Anna and established his own household by 1797. This was after the 1793 tax list but well before the 1805 one, when Andreas Jr. first appears as a lease holder.

7. Andreas Jr. and Anna had at least two more children after Anna: David in 1801 and Benjamin in 1804.

8. By the time of the 1805 tax list, Andreas Jr.’s family was complete.

9. Sometime after 1806 (when Andreas Jr. last appears on the tax list) but before 1816 (when he first is on the Antonovka census), Andreas Jr. and family moved hundreds of miles east to the Russian-controlled region of Volhynia. How long the family stayed or where they went from there we do not (yet) know.

10. We do not know what happened to Andreas Sr. after the 1806 tax list. He probably was at least in his mid-fifties by then. He may have passed away in Franztal; he may have emigrated to some other place. At present we have no evidence hinting one way or another.

Although the reconstruction sketched above is not absolutely certain, it has, as they say, the ring of truth. The puzzle pieces are all accounted for and all fit together smoothly to create a coherent and sensible picture. In this case, an earlier hunch seems to be confirmed. That is, the 27 April 2016 post suggested the hypothesis that

Andreas Andreas was the son of Andreas 345, that he was a generation 5 descendant of Hans 340. If the generation 4 descendants of the Hans 340 line were born in the early 1750s (as seems to be the case with columns B and C), then it would be entirely feasible for Andreas 345 to have been born in, say, 1753 and to have had a son born to him in 1773. In other words, it is possible that the Andreas Andreas of the Ostrog census was the son of Andreas 345. (here)

Based on the evidence delineated above, the earlier “possible” should be changed to “probable,” in my opinion. Based on this reconstruction, we can also suggest something about Andreas Sr.’s father, something that has not previously come to mind, but that must await another post.