The Bessarabia Germans (; ; ) were a German ethnic group (formerly part of the Germans of Romania) who lived in Bessarabia (today part of the Republic of Moldova and south-western Ukraine) between 1814 and 1940.
From 1814 to 1842, 9,000 of them migrated from the German areas of Baden, Württemberg, Bavaria, some Prussian areas of modern-day Poland and Alsace, France, to the Russian governorate of Bessarabia on the Black Sea. The area, was part of the Russian Empire, with the name of Novorossiya; it later became the Bessarabia Governorate.
Throughout their 125-year history, the Bessarabia Germans were an overwhelmingly rural population. Until their remigration to Greater Germany (resulting from the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact), they were a minority consisting of 93,000 people who made up some 3% of the population. They are distinguished from the Black Sea Germans who settled to the east of Odessa, and from the Dobrujan Germans in Dobruja.
Perhaps the most prominent person of Bessarabian German ancestry is former German President Horst Köhler (elected on behalf of the CDU). Before emigrating in 1940, his parents lived in the German colony of Rîșcani in northern Bessarabia; later they were moved to Poland, which was by that time occupied by Nazi Germany, where Köhler was born.
Coat of arms
The coat of arms of the Bessarabia Germans (created after the Second World War) symbolises the homeland at the Black Sea, left at 1940. The coat of arms consists of a shield as the main component of the heraldic emblem. On four divisions, the crest symbolises the country's colours and other properties. Azure symbolises the blue sky over the steppe; Or stands for the golden fields; Gules is taken out of the Romanian flag – the state whose citizens the Bessarabia Germans were; The well symbolises the importance of water; The cross is a symbol for the Church and religion; The horse symbolises the dearest friend of the farmer.
Anthem The Bessarabian anthem Bessarabisches Heimatlied was created in 1922 by Albert Mauch, the director of the Werner-Seminar, a German university in Sarata.
Origins
The eastern part of the Principality of Moldavia was conquered by the troops of the Russian Czar Alexander I in the Russo-Turkish War between 1806 and 1812. In this Moldavian region, he established the Bessarabia Governorate, the smallest of the Russian Empire. The capital was the central Bessarabian Chişinău.
Nomadic Tatars from the southern region of Bessarabia, Budjak, were banished or emigrated voluntarily after the Russian conquest, leaving the area almost deserted. Russia tried to entice foreign settlers to populate the area and work the farms, since her own farmers were mainly serfs. The aim of this was to re-establish agriculture on the rich black soil. Tsar Alexander I issued a manifesto on 29 November 1813, in which he promised German settlers the following privileges: Land donation; Interest-free credit; Exemption from taxes for 10 years; Autonomy; Freedom of religion; Exemption from military service.
The agents of the Russian crown went with these promises to Württemberg, the northeast German area (Mecklenburg) and into the Duchy of Warsaw, where German settlers had established themselves only a few years before.
Emigration
Between 1814 and 1842 over 2,000 families consisting of approximately 9,000 people migrated to the Russian Bessarabia. Most came from the South German areas of Württemberg, Baden, the Palatinate, Bavaria and Alsace, France, the peak occurring in 1817.
After the distribution of passports by German authorities they began the journey in larger groups, known as Kolonnen (lit. "columns"). The time taken for the 2,000 km journey was between two and six months, depending upon travel route. Many of those emigrating due to religious reasons formed Harmonien (harmonies).
For the emigrants from South Germany, the journey usually followed the course of the River Danube, which they followed as far as Ulm (about 100 km south-east of Stuttgart and 130 km north-west of Munich). There they boarded Ulm boxes, a sort of one-way boat. Many emigrants fell ill and died while travelling on these boats. The journey carried them downriver to the Danube delta shortly before the Black Sea. Upon arrival at Izmail, the migrants were quarantined for weeks on an island in the delta which claimed further victims. About 10% of the emigrants are thought not to have survived the voyage.
Emigrants from the northern and eastern German regions, as well as from Poland, travelled by horse and cart. They were the first Germans to arrive in Bessarabia, in 1814, and were known as Warsaw Colonists because of their origins.
Reasons for emigration
Reasons for emigration from the Duchy of Warsaw were: Objection to Polish rule; A worsening economic situation.
Reasons for emigration from South Germany were: Compulsory military service; Serfdom; The oppressive regime; Crop failures and famine; High taxes; Land shortages; Religious; Pietism – Protestant Reformation movement for practical piety; Millennialism – Belief in a Golden Age where "Christ will reign" for a thousand years.
Colonisation under Russian rule
Settlement
Tsarist Russia settled the German migrants in Bessarabia according to plan. They kept land in the southern region, on assigned far, treeless steppe surfaces in the Southern Bessarabia (Budjak; germ. Budschak). In the first settlement phase, up to 1842, twenty-four main German colonies developed. The settlements were put on usually in a valley with gently sloping hills. The farms were up to 50 m wide, and bordered by acacias. While properties were only 20 metres wide at the roadside, they extended up to 250 metres in depth. The elongated, single-storey houses always stood with the gable facing the road. The whitewashed buildings were built of loam bricks or natural stone. On the farmyard were stables, threshing-rooms and a stockroom and wine cellar. In the rear part of an estate lay fruit and vegetable gardens and vineyards.
Autonomy The autonomy of the German settlers promised by the Tsar during the recruitment took place via a Russian special authority by the name of Fürsorgekomitee (Welfare Service Committee), previously Vormundschaftskontor. It was concerned with the settlement of all German settlers in south Russia, with its location initially in Chișinău, later in Odesa. The official language of the department, to which belonged one president and approximately 20 co-workers (an official translator, a physician, a veterinary surgeon, a land measurer and so on), was German. Their presidents were:
NameTerm of OfficeGeneral Ivan Insov1818–1845Staatsrat Eugene von Hahn1845–1849Baron von Rosen1849–1853Baron von Mestmacher1853–1856Islawin1856–1858Alexander von Hamm1858–1866Th. Lysander1866–1867Vladimir von Oettinger1867–1871 The Committee protected the rights of the settlers and supervised their obligations with regard to the Russian government. Underneath the Fürsorgekomitee there were seventeen offices for those approximately 150 German municipalities, with one selected area chief (Oberschulz). Its tasks, among other things, included the administration of the fire service.
Place names Originally, the plots of land given to the settlers carried only numbers, e.g. "Steppe 9". In the early years of the settlement, the Fürsorgekomitee began renaming the villages. These designations were reminders of the places of victorious battles against Napoleon such as Tarutino, Borodino, Beresina, Dennewitz, Arzis, Brienne, Paris, Leipzig, Katzbach and Teplitz, where the Triple Alliance was signed. Later, after 1842, the settlers began naming their own villages after their own aspirations – Hoffnungstal (hope valley), Friedenstal (peace valley) – or religious motives – Gnadental (grace valley), Lichtental (light valley). Numerous German establishments of village took on Romanian or Turkish-Tatar origins, such as Albota (white horse), Basyrjamka (salt hole) Kurudschika (drying), and Sarata (salty).
Settlement development
Despite the incentives granted early on, the living conditions in the colonies were tough. Unusual climate and diseases extinguished whole families. Cattle disease, floods, epidemic diseases such as plague and cholera, crop failures and swarms of grasshoppers obstructed reconstruction work. The early dwellings were usually earth houses with reed roofs. Only in later generations a regulated and independent life in economic, cultural and religious areas prevailed in the German settlements. The colloquial language was German, the official language was Russian. Characteristic of the settlers were diligence, religious devotion, large families and thriftiness.
The first twenty-four villages of German emigrants were called "mother colonies". They still developed in the context of the national Russian Colonisation. Those settlements developed after 1842 developed were called "daughter colonies". They were mainly due to the private settlement of native Bessarabians already living in the country. The first 24 colonies were:
SettlementEstablishedSettlementEstablishedSettlementEstablishedBorodino1814Alt-Elft1816Neu-Arzis1824Krasna, a village in Bolhrad Raion1814Paris1816Neu-Elft1825Tarutino1814Arzis1816Gnadental1830Klöstitz1815Brienne1816Lichtental1834Kulm1815Teplitz1817Dennewitz1834Wittenberg1815Katzbach1821Friedenstal1834Beresina1815Sarata1822Plotzk1839Leipzig1815Alt-Posttal1823Hoffnungstal1842
Agriculture
As ordered by the Tsar during his recruitment, almost all newcomers worked as farmers. Each German family received 60 desyatinas (about 65 hectares) from the state. The settlement area lay in the Bessarabian black earth belt, whose earth is considered among the best farming land in Europe. As such, fertilisation was not needed. The main crops grown were wheat and corn. In some colonies wide viticulture was operated (see Moldovan wine), but most farms only produced enough wine for their own needs.
The Germans operated animal husbandry only to a small extent, because the resulting dung was not required due to the high soil fertility. Therefore, it was usually dried and used in the winter as fuel. Shepherding was more widespread, especially the fine-wooled Karakul sheep. The men's traditional black skin caps were made from the wool. Poultry farming for self-sufficiency was a matter of course on each individual farm. Unlike other farming people, the Germans used horses instead of oxen for ploughing.
New settlements
With the establishment of the last colony (Hoffnungstal) in 1842, the influx of emigrants from Germany ended. Afterwards, a self-colonisation began by private settlement within the country. The boundaries of the twenty-four Mutterkolonies had become limited due to increase in the population. Bessarabian Germans bought or leased land from large Russian landowners and created new villages.
In 1920, two years after the Union of Bessarabia with Romania, began the Romanian agrarian reform, in which large land owners with more than 100 hectares were expropriated of the land in excess of that. Their property was distributed to the peasants, who each received 6 hectares. Hektardörfer, or hectare-towns sprang up on the free land. Approximately 150 German settlements resulted during the presence of the Germans in Bessarabia between 1814 and 1940.
Departure from Bessarabia