Deutsch-Wymysle 3

There is no substitute for consulting primary sources oneself, since those who have consulted the records before may have made mistakes in their work or may have overlooked elements that would interest us. So it is, with apologies for the data-heavy (potentially boring) aspect of this post, that we examine the list of Mennonites who came from some other place to join the Deutsch-Wymysle church.

This list of 234 individuals indicates a birth village for 200 of those persons. The fact that 34 people show only ? in that column is actually comforting, since it demonstrates that the creator of the list did not feel a need to make up information that was unknown to him or her. Consequently, we can place a reasonable amount of confidence in the accuracy of the information recorded.

The remaining 200 people were born in 49 different locations, as follows:

Alt-Bielitz	2
Brenkenhoffswalde	23
Deutsch Kunopath (Konopath)	9
Dorposch/Dorposz	9
Dulinow/Dulinowo/Dulinowa	4
Franztal	13
Gluchowka	1
Goglin, Preußen	1
Grentze	3
Groß Lubien (see also Klein Lubien)	2
Groß Lunau (see also Lunau)	2
Groß Niszewka (see also Niszewka, Klein Niszewka)	1
Groß Sanskau (see also Sanskau)	1
Hohenwalde	1
Jamerau/Jammerau	2
Jammerauerhorst	1
Jurke	1
Klein Lubien (see also Groß Lubien)	2
Klein Lunau (see also Lunau)	2
Klein Niszewka (see also Niszewka, Groß Niszewka)	5
Kleinsee (Jeziorka)	3
Kompany	3
Lunau	1
Montau	1
Netzebruch	1
Neubuden	4
Neudessau (Neu Dessau)	1
Neusaß	1
Neusaß-Treul (see also Treul)	1
Niederausmass	4
Niedergruppe	3
Niszewka (see also Groß Niszewka, Klein Niszewka)	29
Obergruppe	1
Ostrower Kempe (Ostrower Kämpe)	17
Podwitz	2
Przechowka	16
Rehhof	1
Sanskau	6
Schöneich	2
Schönsee	1
Schweingrube	1
Steinwage	1
Strijowka	3
Treuel (see also Neusaß-Treul)	4
Vinedia	3
Vinodigen	1
Westpreußen	1
Wilhelmsbruch	2
Zieglerhube (Zieglershuben)	1

What can we possibly learn from, or at least observe in, this bare list of names and numbers? Your mileage may vary, but I find  a few things of interest here.

1. We begin with a correction: the village of Brenkenhoffswalde was the birthplace of 23 people, not 22, as reported by Ratzlaff (1971, 35).

2. Some of the village names are by now familiar: Brenkenhoffswalde, Franztal, and Neu Dessau in the Neumark; Deutsch Konopath, Kleinsee (Jeziorka), Ostrower Kämpe, and Przechowka in the area around Schwetz. These were both locations with a significant Buller presence, although the Bullers in Deutsch-Wymysle came primarily from a single village in Neumark: Brenkenhoffswalde.

3. Interestingly, two entries in the list are not villages at all (as far as I know). Westpreußen, or West Prussia, was a province of the Prussian Empire, so presumably the listing of this “village” for David Bartel indicates that his precise birthplace was unknown. Friedrich Wedel, on the other hand, has the “village” Netzebruch listed for him; as we saw earlier in our Neumark posts, the term Netzebruch is another label for the lowlands along the Netze River. Ratzlaff (1971, 151) records this birth village as Franztal, which is perhaps correct (Friedrich’s siblings were born in Franztal), but the church records clearly identify the area, not the village.

4. Although 49 villages/areas are listed, five account for nearly half of all birthplaces:

Niszewka	29
Brenkenhoffswalde	23
Ostrower Kempe	17
Przechowka	16
Franztal	13

Two of these are from Neumark, two from the Schwetz area. This leaves Niszewka, which provided more members to Deutsch-Wymysle than any other village. Such a significant village merits further exploration.

5. The first thing we notice in the list is that Niszewka is linked to two associated villages: Groß Niszewka and Klein Niszewka, which one might loosely translate Greater Niszewka and Lesser Niszewka. One also cannot miss the fact that Niszewka sounds more Polish than German; in fact, Niszewka is the Polish form of the town name otherwise known as (Ober, or Upper) Nessau (see Hege and Thiessen 2012).

Groß Nessau on the upper left, Ober Nessau in the center, and Klein Nessau on the lower right.

All three of these villages, as well as others not named here, were associated with the Obernessau congregation, which was located on the south side of the Vistula, roughly 60 miles south of Schwetz. It thus was between Schwetz and Deutsch-Wymsyle, which was 60–65 miles upstream (i.e., southeast). Lying farther upstream than Schwetz and thus closer to Deutsch-Wymysle than Schwetz was, it is no surprise that Obernessau provided the largest number of Deutsch-Wymysle members.

6. That many Deutsch-Wymysle residents came from the Obernessau congregation is not unusual. In fact, most of the villages listed can be identified with one of six Mennonite congregations (or area),* as follows:

1. Montau-Gruppe. 2. Neumark. 3. Obernessau. 4. Przechowka. 5. Schönsee. 6. Tragheimerweide. 7. Deutsch-Wymysle.

Montau-Gruppe

Groß Lubien
Klein Lubien
Neusaß-Treul
Niedergruppe
Obergruppe
Sanskau
Treul

Neumark (area)

Brenkenhoffswalde
Franztal
Netzebruch (area)
Neu Dessau

Obernessau

Dulinow/Dulinowo/Dulinowa
Groß Niszewka
Klein Niszewka
Niszewka (Nessau)

Przechowka

Goglin (6 miles east of Schwetz?)
Kleinsee (Jeziorka)
Ostrower Kempe
Przechowka

Schönsee

Dorposch/Dorposz
Grentze
Groß Lunau
Jamerau/Jammerau
Lunau
Neusaß
Niederausmass
Podwitz
Schöneich
Steinwage
Strijowka
Vinedia

Tragheimerweide

Rehhof
Schweingrube
Zieglershuben

Only seven locations are unknown or are not associated with a known Mennonite church:

Alt-Bielitz: circa 215 miles south–southwest of Deutsch-Wymysle
Gluchowka: circa 260 miles south–southwest of Deutsch-Wymysle
Kompany (?)
Neubuden (Nowe Budy?): circa 60 miles southeast of Deutsch-Wymysle
Vinodigen (?)
Westpreußen (province)
Wilhelmsbruch: in East Prussia?

Note: See here for an update to and correction of the list in point 6.

Identifying these villages in terms of their congregations is not merely an academic exercise; rather, it opens up to us new places to search for Bullers. Suffice it to say for the moment that the Schönsee congregation did include Bullers (Zipp and Thiessen 2012). In addition, as late as 1935, two Bullers were associated with the Montau-Gruppe church (here). The lesson we should draw from all this is that we should not narrow our focus to one or two Mennonite communities; our ancestors may have lived somewhere other than the Schwetz area or the Neumark. We must keep a wide perspective and an open mind as we continue to look for the generations prior to Benjamin Buller, father of David, father of Peter D, father of Peter P, father of Grandpa Chris.

Note

* The association of village with congregation is based in many cases on the listing of the village in a given church book, as reported by Adalbert Goertz. I invite any corrections to this information or to my use of it.

Works Cited

Goertz, Adalbert. Mennonite Villages in the Marienwerder District, West Prussia, 1820. Available online here.

Hege, Christian, and Richard D. Thiessen. 2012. Obernessau (Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, Poland). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Available online here.

Ratzlaff, Erich L. 1971. Im Weichselbogen: Mennonitensiedlungen in Zentralpolen. Winnipeg: Christian Press.

Zijpp, Nanne van der, and Richard D. Thiessen. 2012. Schönsee (Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, Poland). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Available online here.