Johann Cornies Papers: Free Settlers

The previous post drew upon correspondence from Andrei M. Fadeev, chairman of the Ekaterinoslav Bureau of the Guardianship Committee, to Johann Cornies in order to highlight the key elements of the Privilegium, the grant of rights from the Russian royal house (Catherine the Great and Paul II in particular). An earlier letter from Cornies to fellow Mennonite Johann Wiebe rounds out the picture and, in the process, provides background to our own family’s situation.

Who this Johann Wiebe was is not explored in the Cornies volume, although there are hints that may help us to identify him. The letter was written on 30 December 1830 and sent to Wiebe in the West Prussian (Polish) village of Tiege (22 miles southeast of Gdańsk/Danzig). GAMEO includes several Johann Wiebes, one of whom was born in 1806 (which would make him twenty-four when the letter was written) and who lived in Tiege until 1870 (see also Grandma 507764). We cannot with certainty that this was the recipient of Cornies’s letter, but he is a strong candidate.

Fortunately, we do not need to identify the exact recipient in order to understand the letter. Cornies himself provides the background to it: “You ask if the Duke of Anhalt-Koethen’s settlement in Tavrida is making land available for foreign settlement, and also if that land is on the steppes or in the Dnieper lowlands” (Cornies 2015, 205). As noted previously (here), the Taurida Governorate was the large administrative district within which the Molotschna colony was located (the area below the red line in the map). Wiebe’s question, then, was whether a particular estate within the Taurida district was available for settlement and was located in the lowlands or the steppes.*

Cornies’s reply to Wiebe’s inquiry is enlightening in a number of ways:

In reply, I can say that the Duke has concluded an agreement with the Russian state requiring that a specific number of colonists be settled within ten years. The Dnieper lowlands are not mentioned in the terms of the agreement. The Anhalt-Koethen administrators would naturally like to attract Mennonite settlers, but what rights and privileges could they provide? Their Charter of Privileges offers them no more than what our Privilegium guarantees us. In their own interest, the Anhalt-Koethen administration could decide not to give its settlers all these rights directly, but grant them in stages.

In my opinion, a settler whose rights are confirmed directly by the Crown is always in the best position. Remember that foreigners brought into Russia by estate owners can only conclude twenty-year contracts. They are never considered colonists, but are always strangers who can move about Russia after their contract has ended. They receive no Crown land for settlement, nor are they under the colonial administration. They have the right to live in the empire on leaseholdings. Mennonites at Michalen, Ostrog, Dubno, and other places live under such an arrangement. When I visited St. Petersburg, they authorized me to present their situation to the Ministry and to petition for their inclusion in the colonist estate. This was not granted. It was ruled that they were to remain as free people.

I would not advise anyone to settle as a free man under the authority of a particular lord. Please, dear friend, give my advice to anyone interested in concluding a contract for Anhalt-Koethen land. They must not think that, after their contract has expired, they can move to the Molochnaia if that seems more suitable and hope to be accepted and registered among their brethren-in-faith, with the same advantages and rights. There is a wall of separation here, anchored in law, that cannot and will not be easily breached. (Cornies 2015, 205–6, text 202)

Here Cornies distinguishes between two types of foreign—including Mennonite—settlers: colonists, who lived on crown land with rights granted by the Russian crown; and free people, who lived on the land (estates) of nobles and enjoyed whatever rights the noble granted. Cornies clearly considers the colonist status as superior, for several reasons:

1. A noble was under no obligation to give a settler the rights of the Privilegium and thus could grant them in stages—or presumably not at all.
2. The contract between a noble and a settler could not exceed twenty years, after which a new agreement needed to be concluded if the settler wanted to remain.
3. Although free people could move about the empire, they did so as sojourners, as it were, with no place to call their own and no guarantee of any rights—including the right to remain in the land.
4. Mennonites who were not colonists had no claim to join the Molotschna colony, once their contract with a noble had run its course. 

Cornies offers an interesting and insightful perspective on the different arrangements under which Mennonites lived within Russia. However, he also sheds light on our own family’s situation. To be specific, Cornies notes that the Mennonites living at “ Michalen, Ostrog, Dubno, and other places” (Cornies 2015, 206). Michalin, Ostrog, and Dubno were Mennonite villages in Volhynia, where our ancestor Benjamin Buller and his family (including David, father of Peter D, father of Peter P, father of Grandpa Chris) lived in the early nineteenth century.

The next post will pick up the story here, to explore what relevance Cornies’s comments about a colonist versus a free settler have for our ancestors.

Note
* For further information on the estate, including identification of the duke as Ferdinand Friedrich, a member of the German nobility, see here.


Works Cited

Cornies, Johann. 2015. Transformation on the Southern Ukrainian Steppe: Letters and Papers of Johann Cornies. Volume 1: 1812–1835. Translated by Ingrid I. Epp. Edited by Harvey L. Dyck, Ingrid I. Epp, and John R. Staples. Tsarist and Soviet Mennonite Studies. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Thiessen, Richard D. 2011. Wiebe, Johann (1806–1872). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Available online here.