Przechovka Emigration 2

The first post in this series set forth a simple hypothesis: the 1820 group under Elder Peter Wedel was neither the first nor the largest group of Przechovka church members to emigrate to Molotschna. That post also laid the groundwork for testing the hyphothesis, namely, evidence about an 1819 migration of Przechovka-area Mennonites as recorded in Rempel 2007. With this post we are ready to proceed with our investigation.

We will begin by listing all the information for the 1819 emigrant families that Rempel offers, then seek to identify each one, so that we can draw fact-based conclusions about where these Mennonites originated and where they went.

As observed in the previous post, Rempel lists the head of household’s name, occupation (or status), and village of residence, followed by the number of other members of the family and, finally, the place and date at which the Prussian passport was issued. Since all the passports were issued from Marienwerder within a three-week period, we will dispense with that in our listing of families. Also, to save on space, we will not list the occupation. All told, thirty-two families emigrated at the same time from the Przechovka area. The following table standardizes the spellings of personal and village names.

	Name	Village	Family Members
1	Peter Becker	Przechovka	wife, one son, two daughters
2	Jacob Wedel	Glugowko	wife, three sons, three daughters
3	Heinrich Unrau	Przechovka	wife
4	Peter Wedel	Dworzisko	wife, one son
5	Heinrich Ratzlaff	Konopath	wife, one son, one daughter, servant Johann Ratzlaff
6	Anna Pankratz	Przechovka	one daughter, driver Peter Pankratz
7	Jacob Becker	Przechovka	wife, three sons, two daughters
8	Adam Ratzlaff	Konopath	wife, three sons, three daughters
9	George Nachtigal	———	wife, three sons, two daughters
10	Peter Unrau	Przechovka	wife, two daughters
11	Martin Cornelsen	Konopath	wife, two sons, three daughters
12	Martin Köhn	Przechovka	———
13	Maria Schmidt	Przechovka	one son, one daughter
14	Benjamin Ratzlaff	Jeziorka	wife, two sons, two daughters
15	Peter Pankratz	Przechovka	wife, three daughters, driver Peter Pankratz, servant Katharina Ratzlaff
16	Andreas Schmidt	Przechovka	wife, two sons, his mother
17	Peter Frey	Jeziorka	wife, two daughters
18	Jacob Ratzlaff	Przechovka	wife, one son, one daughter
19	Peter Becker	Konopath	wife and five daughters
20	Kornelius Richert	Przechovka	wife, one son, two daughters, brother-in-law Peter Pankratz
21	Peter Ratzlaff	Bek(e/o)rntz	wife, one son
22	Daniel Unrau	Glugowko	wife, one son, two daughters
23	Jacob Schmidt	Glugowko	wife
24	Heinrich Schmidt	Przechovka	wife, one son
25	Peter Wedel	Glugowko	wife, five sons, two daughters
26	Peter Block	Konopath	wife, five sons, three daughters
27	Benjamin Ratzlaff	Przechovka	wife, two daughters, one son
28	Tobias Schmidt	Przechovka	wife, five daughters
29	Adam Ratzlaff	Przechovka	wife and his step-daughter (daughter-in-law)
30	Peter Becker	Przechovka	wife, one daughter
31	Peter Abrahams	Konopath	wife, two sons, one daughter
32	Widow Ratzlaff	Przechovka	two daughters

Before we examine each individual family, it is worthwhile to observe some broad patterns.

1. These thirty-two families resided in a small number of villages: Przechovka (17), Konopath (6), Glugowko (4), Jeziorka (2), Dworzisko (1), and Bek(e/o)rntz (1) (one family’s village is not listed). Some of these are already well known to us (see the map below and Glenn Penner’s list of villages here).

• Przechovka, also known as Wintersdorf, was the village where the church was located. 
• Konopath is obviously Deutsch-Konopath, a village immediately to the west of Przechovka. 
• Glugowko was also close by, roughly a mile southeast of Przechovka.
• Dworzisko is, I suspect, the Dzikowo immediately to the southwest of Glugowko.
• Jeziorka was located roughly ten miles west-northwest of Przechovka (see further here).
• The spelling of Bek(e/o)rntz is uncertain; Beckersitz, whose precise location is unknown, is probably meant.

It is beyond dispute that all these villages were in the Przechovka area; therefore, it is reasonable to ask whether the Mennonites who lived within them were associated with the Przechovka church.

2. The families listed have thirteen family names (alas, no Bullers): Ratzlaff (8), Schmidt (5), Becker (4), Unrau (3), Wedel (3), Pankratz (2), and one each for Abrahams, Block, Frey, Köhn, Cornelsen, Nachtigal, and Richert. Each one of these surnames appears in the Przechovka church book, many as prominent families within the church. On the face of it, then, we have good reason to suspect that these individuals were members of that church.

Viewed from this big-picture perspective, the hypothesis seems reasonable. It may well be that most or all of this group of thirty-two families were the first (in 1819) and largest group from Przechovka to emigrate to Molotschna. Whether the specific details that we discover about each family listed confirm or contradict the hypothesis remains to be seen. The next post in the series begin the process of identifying those details. 

Work Cited

Rempel. Peter. 2007. Mennonite Migration to Russia, 1788–1828. Edited by Alfred H. Redekopp and Richard D. Thiessen. Winnepeg: Manitoba Mennonite Historical Society.