Translator's Preface

Political Changes In The Region Between The Vistula And The Oder

This subject will be covered only in very general terms. The reason for this is that I notice again and again among the people expelled from the [former German lands in the] east that they lack even a rudimentary knowledge of this region's history. The political question is separate from the entitlement question, with each of the two being a different field [of study]. Therefore, this [discussion] will concern, for the region between the Oder and the Vistula, only a simplified account of the [ruling] powers coming and going throughout the last two thousand years, and the extent of their control, power and authority in the normal course of their reign.

The Kashubian Wends [=Sorbs] were a West-Slavic tribal group [identified with the Baltic Slavic Pomoranes, living] between Danzig and the line from Neustettin to Belgard on the Persante. Their dukes [resided] in the fortress at Danzig. An old, very sketchy map of Pomerania shows the word "Cassubia" placed near Neustettin. These people had, between the years A.D. 400 to 1000, migrated into this region which had formerly been settled by Germanic peoples such as the Goths[, Rugians, Burgundians] and Skirians.

The Poles, likewise a West-Slavic tribe, had their center near Gniezno. They were Christianized there around 1000 and considered the Christianization of the Pomeranian tribes as one of their tasks while pushing toward the Baltic Sea. [Their king Mies-ko I and his court adopted the Roman Catholic faith in 966.] The entire region bounded by the Oder and Vistula rivers and the still uninhabited Netze-Warthe marshland was thinly settled by the Pomoranes, whose numbers are estimated at 100,000. Peace between the Pomoranes (known only later as the Kashubes) and the Poles did not last, nor did it exist with the Teutonic Knights who appeared [in 1228] in [that part of} Masuria called the Kulmer Land. The Pomoranes struggled just as hard and fiercely as did their enemies, and the war was filled with devastation, murders and storming of fortresses. However, these Pomoranes were eventually Christianized and the dukes at Danzig had no choice but to encourage the advance of western [Europeans] into their lands, if they were to halt the incursion [from the east by taking advantage of/ contemporary developments. They therefore restrained their vassals from making war against the villages, cloisters and towns established [by westerners}. The eastern PornQtanianf-Pomerelian Samboride] princely house died out in 1295. There ensued a confused wrangling over [control of] the region among the Brandenburg Askanians, the Teutonic Order, the Polish [monarchy] and the western and middle-Pomeranian ducal house of Greifen, whose princes bore names such as Bogislaw and Wartislav. The Teutonic Order took over a large part of the former territory of the extinct [Samboride] house, and a present-day reminder of this is the remarkable fortress at Buetow.

After the victory of the Lithuanian-Polish alliance [with the Prussian League] against the [Teutonic] Order near Tannenberg in 1410, the Order sought to maintain its [power] against the Poles and Pomeranian dukes. However, its zenith had passed. Today [1988] the Poles display a placard naming the years 1410 and 1945, next to which are pictured two shattered German [war] helmets. They illustrate the two decisive defeats of the Germans.

The realm of the [ Crusader-]Knights, which [had formerly] extended over Lauenburg, Stolp (for a short time), Buetow and part of Neumark, shrank down to its East Prussian core territory, after an insurrection against the Order had further weakened its power. This insurrection occurred in 1453 and the years following. Poland from 1465 to 1772 had sovereignty over the region between Danzig and the vicinity of Lauenburg. Actually, the Lands of Lauenburg [and Buetow] went over to Poland as expired pledges in 1637 [upon the death of Bogislaw XIV, the last Pomeranian duke], but already 20 years later (1657) they were transferred to Brandenburg under the treaties of Wehlau and Bromberg. This was the time of [ Friedrich Wilhelm] the Great Prince-Elector, who reigned from 1640 to 1688. ["Great" because he built Brandenburg-Prussia into a powerful state, partly by betraying each of his allies at a crucial moment. ]

The Greifen lineage endured since 1000 and maintained continual sovereignty over that [part of] Pomerania between the Darss [bottomland] beyond [the island of] Ruegen on the west and the Leba-Lauenburg district on the east. Already in 1181 the Pomeranian prince [Duke Bogislaw I] had joined with the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation when he received his land [back] as a fief from the hand of Friedrich I Barbarossa in front of the Luebeck gate. Midway in the course of the Thirty Years War, in 1637, the Greifen rule ended with the death of Bogislaw XIV, and in 1653 the Pomeranian lands east of the Oder were taken over by the prince-elector of Brandenburg and became [part of Brandenburg-] Prussia. [Duke Bogislaw XIV had sought to preserve the Pomeranian duchy by appointing his nephew Ernst Bogislaw von Cray as his successor. However, this was frustrated by the machinations of neighboring rulers.]

Thus, after 1181 the Pomeranian principality was no longer an autonomous Slavic state, but stood bonded to and protected by the [Holy Roman] Empire, which now stretched from the Rhine on the west to the Leba on the east. Pomerania [eventually] became a Brandenburgian [possession] and later a province of the Prussian kingdom, belonging [from 1871] until 1945 to the Prussian federal state within the German empire. <Return>

The Land-Entitlement Picture

The Poles speak of Pomerania today as [their] aboriginal possession, regained after 700 years. A [n ethnic] German housewife, now Polonized and misled by Polish propaganda, asked me: "Tell me, were Pomeranians in fact always Polish?". I looked into her obviously Germanic face with the blue eyes and gave her the factual answer. This woman was the youngest daughter in a family of [my former] closest neighbors in a village near Gross Garde [now Gardna Wielka] in the county of Stolp [now Sl/upsk].

It is hardly helpful to respond with exasperation to such obfuscation and distortion of the historical facts. Rather, we should with a quiet mind correlate the events of the distant past to the forces acting at the time, like Leopold von Ranke does in his objective historical writings. It therefore behooves both the Polish and the German sides to depart from a strictly nationalistic path, like that which afflicted the relations between European peoples after the Romantic Era until the early 1800's, especially in Germany during the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars (1806-1813). [Happily, the years since 1988 have seen the fall of Communism in eastern Europe, the re-unification of Germany, a German-Polish peace treaty, and an upsurge in tourism and commerce between those two countries.] From this [background] the question of land-entitlement must be answered for [Middle- and] Eastern Pomerania, the land between the Oder and the Leba district.

If one reasons that a permanent right of possession is guaranteed by the settlement of a distinct, historically identified people in a region, then the Germanic [tribes] and not the West-Slavic Pomoranes are the rightful heirs of the land for all time. [Except that before the Germanic peoples swept into Pomerania, the Celts lived there, and before them the Thraco-Illyrians, and before them the Proto-Balts and Aestian nomads, etc.] Then between A.D. 400 and 1000 the advancing Western Slavs appeared as secondary titleholders. How successful this type of property claim can be is [being argued today] in the relationship between the Arabs and the Jews in Palestine. The Arabs say they were the aboriginal inhabitants before the Israelite tribes pushed in from the wilderness, and are still today the rightful owners of the land. We were first, [the Arabs assert] and our ancestors were robbed of their rights by force.

[But] with the settlement of Pomerania by the Lechite Slavs it was of course a different matter. These people from the east took over a land more or less abandoned by its owners, until the Germanic kinsmen of the aboriginal inhabitants re-appeared from the western region after 1150. under completely different circumstances. The Polish attempt after 1000 to subjugate the land of the Pomoranes had failed. The arrival of BisRop Otto von Bamberg, former secretary to the Polish princely court, is interesting in this regard. This was purely a Christian missionary campaign, and not a quest for political power.

Otto's first expedition miscarried. He appeared that time under the protection of Polish soldiers. The Pomoranes resented their being subjugated by the Poles in league with the church, and they fled [from the soldiers] and held back [from the missionaries]. The Pomoranes were of course part of the Slavic family of peoples and related to the Poles in race and language, but they did not want to become Poles. They would rather have remained heathen and free.

Already the second missionary attempt, in which Otto appeared under the protection of soldiers from the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, was successful. The Pomoranes [reluctantly agreed] to become an independent Christian body, and not one dominated by [the heirarchy of] Poland. [Remaining "heathen and free" was no longer a viable option in the face of mounting pressure from Poland, Germany, and now Denmark.] With the [signing of] the historic document outside the Luebeck gate in 1181, the duke of Pomerama [-Stettin, Bogislaw I] bound himself and his land on the [Baltic] Sea to the empire of middle Europe and put himself decisively under its military, cultural and political influence.

By joining with the Holy Roman Empire, which represented, passed down, and in many respects carried on the ancient traditions, the Pomeranian people secured their freedom from the Polish threat. But this alone was not decisive. An influx of advanced technology and learning reached into all aspects of life throughout the national territory of the Pomoranes, who nevertheless resisted it all, like obstinate children who would rather freeze than put on a warm sweater. [The German threat to the Pomorane culture was more palatable but no less real than the threats from Poland and Denmark. Pomerama was the focus of political ambitions by all three states and the ecclesiastical missions under their protection. Denmark actually controlled the northern third of Pomerania in 1223.]

The Christian culture was at that time the bearer and guarantor of advancement in all fields of life. The people, summoned by heralds out of the west [to settle] in the east, came from Flanders, Westphalia, Lower Saxony and the Rhineland. They came not as conquerors and oppressors, but as industrious [colonists] in need of lands and homes, with the intention of pursuing their occupations and becoming settled residents. They were successful in the thinly settled, underdeveloped region, and soon became more numerous than the Pomoranes.

In the same way that one compares a cloister complex with a timber or clay hut of the native Slavs, one may further compare the Pomeranian styles of construction and agriculture with the West Prussian-Polish living standards when that region was annexed to Prussia in 1772. Who would reject the improvement of his living standard if this is brought to him at his home? This was the situation among the Wends, Pomoranes and Kashubes when the westerners [first] appeared. Not only the prince, but the Slavic noblemen issued the invitations, and the clerical orders built cloisters and churches. The monks cultivated the land and thereby relieved the poverty of the Pomoranes, and this resulted in [their] assimilation and accommodation.

Klaus Juergen Hofer in his book "Ruegen -- Pictures of an Island" describes these events in this way: "After the victory of the Danes over Arkona in 1168, Ruegen indeed stood under Danish suzerainty, but the Danes, because of a population shortage during the following decades, were not in a position to influence the inhabited area by founding Danish farm-villages or settlements. Thus, Ruegen initially remained a land inhabited by Slavs. And neither the Danes nor the Ruegeners (Rugian Slavic princes) could derive much wealth from the fishermen and farmers by imposing taxes or levies on their natural produce. The Slavic nobility therefore willingly permitted the immigration of German settlers who began arriving around 1190 from Westphalia, Lower Saxony and Lower Franconia, primarily because the settlers had better agricultural skills and brought with them a more productive farming technology such as the iron plow, and bred better races of domesticated animals. In this way the noblemen were assured of higher revenue".

Thus, a new, progressive life [style] steadily developed in all areas. The Slavs lived up on the heights [because] draining the swamps was for them not possible. Construction with brick was unknown to them, as were the three-field agriculture [one field cultivated, one in green manure and one fallow] and an intensive livestock-breeding [program]. The improved lifestyle made it difficult for the Pomoranes, accustomed to their own ways, to accept such strange people coming from far away with a different language, who then cleared arable land from the wilderness and grew crops. There might have been [ethnic] hatred [at first], but this gradual assimilation process provided the means of expressing this medieval Christian all-encompassing culture, in which the Low-German dialect of the German language was the medium of understanding for all. This language always accompanied the changes in techniques and likewise proclaimed the new technological and philosophical concepts. These could not [easily] be expressed in the vocabulary of the Pomeranes, which sufficed to represent the nature-deities that they worshiped [and the natural environment of their homeland].

The epoch of the High Middle Ages (around 1250) is seen culturally and historically as the [time when] Christian piety culminated in reverence for Mary ["mariolatry" to its critics] and when St. Thomas Aquinas produced his "Concerning Theological Philosophy and Theology" as a gigantic spiritual framework encompassing all other fields for the present and the hereafter. Faced with this spiritual-intellectual zenith of a culture which combined a heritage from antiquity, the Greek intellect, the Roman machinery for law and order and the Christian religious foundation, the Pomorane people lay as though in a pristine morass. They did not understand that in that time and under those circumstances they were slipping unknowingly into the jaws of a fate based not on history, but solely on power-politics. The seats of the Slavic noblemen served at that time as crows' nests, which the dwellings of their subjects must have resembled at first. It should also be remembered that the fortresses of the [German] princes were typical stone towers and that in 1914 the Russians, most of whom lived in wooden houses, marveled at the stone dwellings and work-buildings of East Prussia when they came across the border.

It is significant that the process of Middle-European/German settlement in the East (which reached as far as Narva, 140 kilometers from St. Petersburg) was entirely peaceful in nature, at least in Pomerania. The Slavic princes and aristocrats, the cloisters and the towns invited the western [colonists] and they came. And the land blossomed to an unprecedented level. Town and village names remained Slavic, as did the family names. Peaceful integration, not extermination, [took place in Pomerania. But of course the outcome was not so happy for the Baits farther east, whose lands were taken over by the Teutonic Order by heavy-handed means]. If only the [Polish] Slavs would now withdraw behind the Persante, and eventually behind the line bisecting the county of Stolp. [Not likely, in view of the Polish-German treaty of 1990 and the continuing Polonization of the Baltic Slavs still residing in Pomerania!] It seems quite evident to me that the influence of the westerners on the Slavs now called Kashubes was not so intensive that the Slavic element, more self-contained in this region, could not be preserved. It was true, however, that up until the Hardenberg Reform [Act] of 1808, the arrangement of social classes into farmers, townspeople, [clergy] and aristocrats, with their [respective] service duties and land-tied peasants, held sway [throughout Prussia. This applied] to the churches/, cloisters] and towns with their [satellite] villages, as well as to the German-speaking new settlers from Middle Europe and the native [Slavic] populace. The medieval order of business was the popular thesis: "God has created three life [classes]; peasants, knights and clerics", in which everyone had his fixed position.

The reason why the so-called Kashubes are so especially and uniquely conservative today, having adhered to their ancestral ways until the start of the Industrial Revolution (around 1850), lies in the former isolation of the countryside and upon two tolerant or liberal [institutions], the Evangelical-Lutheran [Church] and the Prussian [state]. Luther [decreed that] "The people shall henceforth hear the precious Gospel of Jesus Christ in their [own] language, [whereby] they may accept it. Therefore the Kashubes [are to] maintain bilingual pastors, who on Sundays conduct two worship services, one after the other, each held in the language those attending. And this [shall apply] at Glowitz in Stolp County, the Kashubian Jerusalem, as this important Slavic center was once popularly called. But [it shall apply] elsewhere also!"

Arriving along with those [instructions] were the Evangelical-Lutheran pastors, who show in their reports a [relatively] unbiased literary description of the people and their living habits [as seen from the viewpoint of a more worldly outsider].

The Prussian state did not represent [a single] nation in its politics, but was a transnational power in its organization and authority. It was tolerant and liberal in its religious policies, as demonstrated in 1613 by the conversion of the [Brandenburgian] prince Sigismund to the Reformed confession of Calvin, after which the [common] people remained Lutheran or Roman Catholic, even culturally and politically. [Of course, many of the noblemen felt it prudent to convert the churches on their manorial estates to the Reformed confession, or a local modification thereof.] It mandated not a Germanization of the Slavs, but a "to each his own" for the Letts, the Poles, the Germans, the French, or whomever else, and finally for the Jews also. [This policy of toleration for diversity was maintained for nearly two centuries, but began to change in 1830 with the mandate for exclusive use of the German language in the schools, the massive emigration of ethnic Germans in the mid- to late-1800's and the resulting re-Germanization programs of Bismarck and his successors down to 1945.] The people were the capital assets of the state.

Thus, the Kashubes remained true to their own ways in language and customs. It is nevertheless noteworthy that Friedrich the Great placed value on a lingual harmonizing of the Kashubes [with the German-speaking mainstream society]. There were several reasons for this, among which is that when sons were inducted from the villages into the army or served as government officials or moved into the towns, it was better for them to have a grasp of German instead of continuing to use their Kashubian form of speech. They certainly had to be familiar with the German-language business environment. The actual breakaway from Kashubian to German was seen in the mid-1800's, and after that only pitiful remnants of the Kashubian language survived. Rapid technological advances in Prussia after 1850 overran the little Kashubian world between the Garder and Leba Lakes and closed it off, but not from the changes brought about by the [Industrial] Revolution and the blessings derived from it. <Return>

The Countryside Between Stolp And Leba

From numerous conversations with Pomeranians expelled from their homeland, I know that the deprecating and ironic remarks concerning the Kashubes from the counties of Stolp and Buetow are connected with the landscape. Preconceived opinions or prejudices have an obstinately persistent lifespan. And yet, as it so often happens, the opposite is true. Apart from the [derogatory] assessment of the Kashubes, which rests on sheer ignorance of the people and their mentality and history, [the same deprecating remarks] are even being made of the countryside itself, which, thank God, cannot be substantially impaired in its uniqueness and permanence by any changeover of inhabitants, whether they are now German or Polish. Indeed, one must admit that the Poles living there now and taking small steps to exploit the enduring charm of the landscape [through tourism and scenic arts, are doing] as the Germans [would have done].

The countryside in which the Kashubes [predominated] until the start of the Industrial Age, and still lived on in pockets within the Prussian federal state on into the [late] 1800's, and whose ancestors lived relatively bound to their ancient ways since the 600's, was one of the prettiest in Pomerania. Pomerania is unique with its 465-kilometer- long Baltic seacoast [now shared by Poland and Germany], where the beaches in 1938 were the most-visited vacation spots in Germany, drawing eight million daily bookings. This visitor-count was unsurpassed by any other province or [similar-sized] country. The zone between the Garder and Leba Lakes, in its turn, has a special charm in its contrasting landforms, which are not found in such [abundance] anywhere else in Pomerania. Garder Lake (10,000 morgen [about 3 square kilometers] in area and only 4 or 5 meters deep) is bordered on the south by a remarkably high chain of hills. Among these are the Wassenberg, Friedensberg, Geschietenberg and Kuesterberg between Wittbeck and [the heights] above Gross Garde. They are all grown over by mixed woodlands and extend from west to east along the legendary Revekol, which is an imposing promontory and in the far distant past was a bulwark against the [encroaching] Baltic Sea, which along with the northwest winds re-shaped the foreland at the Garder Inlet. Nearby, a tongue of land with three bright silvery dunes is wedged between the sea and the lake. Looking from the Revekol [summit] toward the northeast, one finds another unchangeable panorama. This is the green, meadowed wetland of Leba Lake, which is itself protected on the north from the Baltic Sea by a chain of dunes, crowned by the 42-meter-high Lonzke Dune. [This is] a shifting dune between the Baltic Sea (formerly called the East Sea) and Garder Lake, opposite the much larger Leba Lake with its southern horizon blurred in a dusky blue during all seasons of the year.

The majesty of this region is unforgetable for the quiet hiker when he strikes out northwesterly over the dunes and finds dry sand along the path of his easterly descent, while the breaking waves of the sea strum their rumbling melody, almost fearsome as a profound loneliness looms over the giant dunes under the cloud-covered sky. The descent to Leba Lake is treacherous as one slips down one of the sand fingers into the waiting water of the lakeshore. It is well known that this lake-basin is swampy and without solid footing.

In our time, when people have become creatures of mass anonymity amidst the whirl of transitory events, it is hard to appreciate the uplifting and nostalgic energy that comes from such a landscape, and how a person is spellbound by the countryside and its changes of surface cover over the course of the four seasons: [One stands] totally removed from the mainstream [society] and alone with himself, his ancestral village and its [rustic] inhabitants. [The feeling] is quite different from that of dashing here and there like a weathervane [in response to] world events and being filled each day with sensations which come in various guises but actually remain the same. It is entirely understandable that here between the two lakes and the sea, the indigenous inhabitant found his contentment, homeland and shelter when he lived [undisturbed] in this primeval solitude, without spending much time reflecting over it. These basic [longings] strike deep [in one's thoughts of] village, landscape, acquaintances, school, family and church. One must be permitted to revisit this region which has produced people who have travelled the oceans to obtain wealth and enjoyment of life, and built themselves a little house with their savings, if only to re-discover their guidepost to a better future and long-lasting peace of mind. [This convoluted sentence has been paraphrased in translation.]

A countryside is like a mother who gives her child the pure milk of life from her breast. H[einrich] von der Dollen has stated his overall impression of this stretch of land, the homeland of the "last" Pomeranian Kashubes, in his highly informative book "Excusions through Pomerania" (Anklam, 1885): "We know that already in the Middle Ages a very famous calvary-chapel stood on the Revekol mountain, and [even] if today no more absolution is bestowed at the mountain summit, enabling one to descend from there purified, it still remains forever a mountain from which one is shown the glory of God's beautiful earth, the limitless sea, the beautiful blue mirror of the lakes, the endless changing of the landscape, desolate marshes and the pleasantest scenes unspoiled and pristine alongside each other. When viewing this sublime and lovely nature, the heart is still uplifted and purified today. Thus, the Revekol even today is still a holy mountain." <Return>

Overview Of The People In The Zone Between Stolp And Leba

That portion of eastern Pomerania in which the Kashubes could maintain their unique lifestyle and customs the longest holds a special interest. [This of course refers to the Slovinces, or Leba-Kashubes. The Kashubes ofPomerelia were under German influence for a shorter period (1772-1918), and have managed to maintain more of their ethnic identity until the present day, although reduced in number by massive emigration in the late 1800's and heavily Polonized after 1918.] Despite very vague source data, it is possible to ascertain relatively accurate details.

Where did the Kashubes come from, goes the popular saying: "From Stolp, from Stolp; they are like sand [grains] on the seafshorej. Around 1500 (or the 1483 birth of the reformer Martin Luther) the counties of Lauenburg, Buetow and Stolp were still inhabited to a large extent by Kashubes, but not exclusively. Cloisters, farm villages, the Kashubian settlements themselves, and above all, the towns were settled by people from the West. The [available] data do not provide a precise delineation of the region's borders. Around 1700, Kashubian worship services were discontinued in Stolp. This town /'originated from] a Slavic settlement on the Sandberg, along the right bank of the Stolpe [ River], while the new "German" town ([founded in] 1310) lay along the left bank. About a century later, in 1778, worship services in Kashubian were still conducted in the following church parishes: Rowe at the mouth of the Lupow [River] (not originally Kashubian, but settled [by people] from Gross Garde and its vicinity), Freist, Dammen, Lupow, Gross Duebsow, Budow, Zedlin and Alt-Kolziglow. Thus, one could draw a rough arc from the northern seacoast toward the southeast. The Evangelical pastors were trained by German Evangelical faculties and spoke both German and Kashubian. From the West came the steady advance of civilization, enterprise and [Western] culture, along with the Prussian argument against Napoleon. The broadening of this state's power toward the south and the west promoted almost inevitably the adoption of the German language and German ways throughout the Prussian realm. [Friedrich II the Great had promoted French liberalism and scorned German conservatism, but his successors felt threatened by the imperialistic ambitions of France under Napoleon.] Who would want to be left behind?

For that reason, only the larger church parishes of Gross Garde, Schmolsin, Glowitz and Zezenow still had an appreciable number of ethnic Kashubes around 1856. The Kashubian worship service was discontinued at Schmolsin in 1832, at Gross Garde in 1834, and at Glowitz just a decade later! One could say that the Kashubian flame flickered out over eastern Pomerania around 1850. The communion attendance figures for the large congregation at Glowitz in Stolp County give clear evidence of the dwindling Kashubian ethnic element. In 1713 (when Friedrich Wilhelm 1 was the citizen- and soldier-king of Prussia) only 559 Germans attended communion service, compared to 3,152 Kashubes. In 1829 it was 1,551 Germans and 3,284 Kashubes. And so very noticeably had the numbers shifted in favor of the German-speaking populace by 1850 that in that year there were 3,752 German and only 1,370 Kashubian communion-guests. It is reported that at this time the Kashubian worship service was visited more and more only by the elderly, while outside the church the well-dressed German-speaking youngsters awaited admission to the church [services in German which followed]. In 1884 there remained [only] 71 Kashubes, and the [communion attendance] of the Kashubes at Glowitz thus ended in 1888 with zero!

[The] Kashubian historian Aleksander Majkowski in his book "History of the Kashubes" (Gdingen, 1938) writes about these events in an almost wistful mood: "In this year [1888] the last Kashubes died, their prayer-books going into the grave with them. In the same year, lightning struck the timber church at Glowitz, as if heaven itself could not [bear to] look down upon the complete repression of the Kashubian language." [Noffke remarks that] 1888 was the year of the three [German] emperors, and that 1878 had been the year of the Berlin Congress with Bismarck acting as "honest broker" between the great [European] powers.

[Translator's note: Noffke omits mentioning that Otto von Bismarck, despite his having married into a wealthy family of Germanized Slavs (the Puttkamers), despised the Kashubes and their way of life. His harsh nationalistic policies helped to drive many of the Kashubes into the encroaching sphere of Polish political influence. Indeed, 1888 was a fateful years for the Kashubes. Widespread crop failures in the 1880's and the imminent threat of war with France and Russia persuaded massive numbers of Pomeranians to emigrate overseas. My own ancestral family of mixed Saxon-Kashubian rural heritage departed the Buetow area in 1888, amidst the growing animosity between Germans and Poles, neither of whom showed much sympathy for the regional aspirations of the local Kashubes.]

While this represented the end of an era and marked the extinction of the Kashubian ethnic element in eastern Pomerania, the memory of this bygone Wendish population was preserved until 1945 in geographic names, place-names, family names and fragments of language. [Until] the National Socialists [came to power], Prussia [had] tolerated all of this [diversity] and gave no thought to eradicating it. Whatever had evolved peaceably was assimilated into a new unity, with nothing to fear from the memory of a bygone world. The historical legitimacy of this past had the direct result that the descendants of half-Slavic or full-Slavic ancestors were not ashamed [of their heritage]. There was no cause for suspicion when German [given] names appeared in those families with Slavic [sur]names[, or vice versa]. No one had come upon the idea of igniting a disharmony based on race. This extended moreover into the schools, churches, businesses, military and government offices, and was evident also in the sciences, where the people of this region did not lag behind. [Actually, ethnic animosities were already surfacing in the mid-1800's with the rise of nationalism in both Germany and Poland.] Thus, [we have] cleared away the prejudice that one must deprecate the qualities of character and mentality in the Kashubian people, as compared to those of the ethnic element coming from the West. The absorption of an advanced culture into a still unimproved economy was exceedingly difficult for rural families in the 1800's [because] it made for an inequality of opportunities between the urban and the rural populations. <Return>

Overview Of The People In The Zone Between Stolp And Leba

That portion of eastern Pomerania in which the Kashubes could maintain their unique lifestyle and customs the longest holds a special interest. [This of course refers to the Slovinces, or Leba-Kashubes. The Kashubes ofPomerelia were under German influence for a shorter period (1772-1918), and have managed to maintain more of their ethnic identity until the present day, although reduced in number by massive emigration in the late 1800's and heavily Polonized after 1918.] Despite very vague source data, it is possible to ascertain relatively accurate details.

Where did the Kashubes come from, goes the popular saying: "From Stolp, from Stolp; they are like sand [grains] on the seafshorej. Around 1500 (or the 1483 birth of the reformer Martin Luther) the counties of Lauenburg, Buetow and Stolp were still inhabited to a large extent by Kashubes, but not exclusively. Cloisters, farm villages, the Kashubian settlements themselves, and above all, the towns were settled by people from the West. The [available] data do not provide a precise delineation of the region's borders. Around 1700, Kashubian worship services were discontinued in Stolp. This town /'originated from] a Slavic settlement on the Sandberg, along the right bank of the Stolpe [ River], while the new "German" town ([founded in] 1310) lay along the left bank. About a century later, in 1778, worship services in Kashubian were still conducted in the following church parishes: Rowe at the mouth of the Lupow [River] (not originally Kashubian, but settled [by people] from Gross Garde and its vicinity), Freist, Dammen, Lupow, Gross Duebsow, Budow, Zedlin and Alt-Kolziglow. Thus, one could draw a rough arc from the northern seacoast toward the southeast. The Evangelical pastors were trained by German Evangelical faculties and spoke both German and Kashubian. From the West came the steady advance of civilization, enterprise and [Western] culture, along with the Prussian argument against Napoleon. The broadening of this state's power toward the south and the west promoted almost inevitably the adoption of the German language and German ways throughout the Prussian realm. [Friedrich II the Great had promoted French liberalism and scorned German conservatism, but his successors felt threatened by the imperialistic ambitions of France under Napoleon.] Who would want to be left behind?

For that reason, only the larger church parishes of Gross Garde, Schmolsin, Glowitz and Zezenow still had an appreciable number of ethnic Kashubes around 1856. The Kashubian worship service was discontinued at Schmolsin in 1832, at Gross Garde in 1834, and at Glowitz just a decade later! One could say that the Kashubian flame flickered out over eastern Pomerania around 1850. The communion attendance figures for the large congregation at Glowitz in Stolp County give clear evidence of the dwindling Kashubian ethnic element. In 1713 (when Friedrich Wilhelm 1 was the citizen- and soldier-king of Prussia) only 559 Germans attended communion service, compared to 3,152 Kashubes. In 1829 it was 1,551 Germans and 3,284 Kashubes. And so very noticeably had the numbers shifted in favor of the German-speaking populace by 1850 that in that year there were 3,752 German and only 1,370 Kashubian communion-guests. It is reported that at this time the Kashubian worship service was visited more and more only by the elderly, while outside the church the well-dressed German-speaking youngsters awaited admission to the church [services in German which followed]. In 1884 there remained [only] 71 Kashubes, and the [communion attendance] of the Kashubes at Glowitz thus ended in 1888 with zero!

[The] Kashubian historian Aleksander Majkowski in his book "History of the Kashubes" (Gdingen, 1938) writes about these events in an almost wistful mood: "In this year [1888] the last Kashubes died, their prayer-books going into the grave with them. In the same year, lightning struck the timber church at Glowitz, as if heaven itself could not [bear to] look down upon the complete repression of the Kashubian language." [Noffke remarks that] 1888 was the year of the three [German] emperors, and that 1878 had been the year of the Berlin Congress with Bismarck acting as "honest broker" between the great [European] powers.

[Translator's note: Noffke omits mentioning that Otto von Bismarck, despite his having married into a wealthy family of Germanized Slavs (the Puttkamers), despised the Kashubes and their way of life. His harsh nationalistic policies helped to drive many of the Kashubes into the encroaching sphere of Polish political influence. Indeed, 1888 was a fateful years for the Kashubes. Widespread crop failures in the 1880's and the imminent threat of war with France and Russia persuaded massive numbers of Pomeranians to emigrate overseas. My own ancestral family of mixed Saxon-Kashubian rural heritage departed the Buetow area in 1888, amidst the growing animosity between Germans and Poles, neither of whom showed much sympathy for the regional aspirations of the local Kashubes.]

While this represented the end of an era and marked the extinction of the Kashubian ethnic element in eastern Pomerania, the memory of this bygone Wendish population was preserved until 1945 in geographic names, place-names, family names and fragments of language. [Until] the National Socialists [came to power], Prussia [had] tolerated all of this [diversity] and gave no thought to eradicating it. Whatever had evolved peaceably was assimilated into a new unity, with nothing to fear from the memory of a bygone world. The historical legitimacy of this past had the direct result that the descendants of half-Slavic or full-Slavic ancestors were not ashamed [of their heritage]. There was no cause for suspicion when German [given] names appeared in those families with Slavic [sur]names[, or vice versa]. No one had come upon the idea of igniting a disharmony based on race. This extended moreover into the schools, churches, businesses, military and government offices, and was evident also in the sciences, where the people of this region did not lag behind. [Actually, ethnic animosities were already surfacing in the mid-1800's with the rise of nationalism in both Germany and Poland.] Thus, [we have] cleared away the prejudice that one must deprecate the qualities of character and mentality in the Kashubian people, as compared to those of the ethnic element coming from the West. The absorption of an advanced culture into a still unimproved economy was exceedingly difficult for rural families in the 1800's [because] it made for an inequality of opportunities between the urban and the rural populations. <Return>

The Role Of The Roman Catholic And Evangelical Lutheran Confessions

In this age of ecumenism, one religious belief scarcely permits a judgment upon another, and one would prefer to remain silent out of genuine respect for harmonious cooperation. Nevertheless, one may speak openly and it is necessary [for me to express a conviction] in the controversy over Kashubian [religious history].

The intimate symbiosis of the Polish national aims and the interests of the Roman Catholic Church led to Polish [being regarded] as an ecclesiastical language, which the Catholic Kashubes adopted under a continuing Polish influence. They increasingly lost their [ethnic] individuality, so to speak. Pomerelia (Kashubia), roughly [defined by] the [Polish] Corridor [between 1919 and 1945], belonged to the Roman Catholic bishoprics of Kujawy and Gnesen during the [Teutonic] Order period. This somehow led to a most bizarre situation in Lauenburg County during the Brandenburg-Prussian period, wherein the congregations were Evangelical, but tax monies were paid to Catholic priests without congregations. The Roman Catholic Church of Poland even insisted upon continuing the Polish ecclesiastical language [in Pomerelia and the counties of Lauenburg andBuetowJ, and around 1850 it planted pro-Polish political agitation fin those areas]. This induced the Polonized Kashubiam, who had been relatively indifferent in their national outlook, to misinterpret the taxing of church bells [by the Prussian government] during the 1914- 1918 war as an infringement and attack upon the most holy [spiritual institution]. This happened in spite of the fully equal rights [afforded to] the Kashubes integrated within the Prussian state and in its service, whether they be soldiers or [public] officials. After the loss of the First World War [by Germany], Pomerelia (geographically situated between Grossboschpol on the Pomeranian border and the Vistula [River]) was handed over to Poland as a matter of course, thereby opening a corridor-like access to the [Baltic] Sea. The French, in their hatred of Germany, supported the Polish claim.

The Evangelical Church had from the beginning a different relationship with the Kashubes in Hinter-Pomerania. These had become Evangelical-Lutheran in 1534 when the Reformation was introduced by the Diet at Treptow on the Rega. In the counties of Lauenburg, Buetow and Stolp, the parishes were organized into superintendencies, just as [they were] in the rest of Pomerania and [other] German Evangelical lands. The pastors had to proclaim the gospel in the vernacular tongue and to respect the [locally] accepted manners and customs. The Brandenburg-Prussian state had no [coercive] Germanization policy, but at most an established colonization policy (land-development and founding of new villages), [promoting] more people, more enterprise, more inventions, more manufacturing, more military strength and more international importance. [King] Friedrich Wilhelm I, who along with the Lutheran professor August Hermann Francke made Pietism the so-called "Prussian state religion", introduced the confirmation instruction and founded 2,000 public schools which were always staffed by non-seminarian teachers. This again benefited the [Prussian] people, be they Kashubes, Poles or Germans. Progress without education was impossible. The noteworthy value of the Evangelical devoutness with the Pietist stamp was the success in having Jesus Christ held as the Son of God in thoughts and actions. This lifestyle likewise valued every practical activity, be it artistic, agricultural or intellectual, quite in the Lutheran sense that the individual Christian had to prove his faith by higher spiritual self-accountability, achievement, righteousness and honesty. Deep heartfelt devotion was bound up with sober, competent, responsible daily work.

The Chorale of Potsdam (Garrison-church, 1732/33) ties these beliefs and ways of life together in the following verse: "If always faithful and righteous unto your cold grave, and straying not a finger's breadth from God's path, then you shall be as walking on green pastures throughout a pilgrim's life, and can then look death in the eye without fear and dread".

In old Prussia the organization of estates [i.e., social classes], as already shown, was a [rigid] construction, like a timber framework, but Prussia's superior and yet solicitous organization benefited all, including the Kashubes. (As [for example] the laying in of grain stores for possible bad harvest years.) One has only to consider the economic progress [which occurred] in the Province of West Prussia after 1772 (the First Partitioning of Poland) when Friedrich the Great invested several hundred thousand talers in the construction of canals, the laying out of villages, etc. This money helped all the inhabitants, and the Kashubes derived great advantage from it. King Friedrich, who said of himself: "I am the first servant of the state.", demonstrated his liberality and humanity by learning the talents and weaknesses of the various ethnic groups within his state's populace, and seeking to make use of them. Thanks to the religious education of the people through preaching, catechism-instruction within the worship service, and catechism-testing (no longer practiced today) in the churches and schools, the Kashubes were here and there deciding to give up their addiction to alcohol. During the worship service they heard not sacred legends but biblical text, and had to memorize Luther's catechism, in which the first main passage [comprises] the Ten Commandments. In eastern Pomerania it was almost taken for granted until 1945, although no longer mandatory, that Catholic was the same as Polish and Evangelical was the same as German. [Actually, a substantial part of the Catholic minority consisted of ethnic Germans who had immigrated from the states of the upper and middle Rhine and from Electoral Saxony. Moreover, some of the Catholics entering from Poland were of German descent and German-speaking.

The chronic wrangling between Catholicism and Protestantism was not so much neighbor-against-neighbor or community-against-community. It was instigated primarily by princely houses and state governments with territorial ambitions. For instance, when the Lutherans at Borntuchen in Buetow County were building a chapel around 1640, they had to disguise it as a warehouse, "for fear of the Catholics". This was during the 20-year rule by Poland, when the suppression of Protestantism was a policy of the Polish monarchy. Borntuchen's local Catholic farmers almost certainly were aware of the true purpose of the building, but chose not to interfere or complain.] <Return>

The Interesting Village Of Klucken On The Leba Lake

The people from Schmolsiner-, Selesener- and Zemminer-Klucken were objects of interest around 1930, not only to the residents of the Stolp vicinity, but to those around a wider area [including ethnologists and anthropologists]. There were occasional ironic references to "Kluckish Man" [which connotated both "clucking" (like a chicken) and "glugging" (as when audibly swallow ing a drink)]. In the [formerly] German section of Stolp, on the former Kassube Street at the exit-road toward Schmolsin, the Poles have built a restaurant with the name "Kluki", constructed of timber, of course.

How did the peculiarity of the three-membered Klucken (= "cottages") come about? Until the end of the 1800's, access from Schmolsin to this location was very difficult. The residents themselves saw their world cut off from the progress of civilization. Their centuries-old fishery tradition and their very unique manners and customs strongly favored this self[-contained] existence.Moreover, the men were not above suspicion for harboring banditry and poaching, and wanting to be lords of their countryside. During the 1820's a forestry aide, who was performing his duty out of Rumbske near Leba, was shot on the dunes between the [Baltic] Sea and the lake beach, and had to suffer miserably until he died. The suspicion [for this crime] fell on a Kluckener. A large crucifix was erected as a warning and memorial at the site where the [victim] was found. These inhabitants along Leba Lake built their dwellings only half a meter above the lake surface as smokehouses of timber, loam and reeds until shortly before 1900. [That is, the chimneys ended underneath the roof and the smoke escaped through openings under the eaves. A very few of these huts still stand here and there in Pomerania, but it is no longer permissible to use their fireplaces.] These people have been identified by anthropologists as a "manifest" remnant of the Kashubian ethnic group in eastern Pomerania. Their lifestyle and character have thus attracted the attention of those scientists who have studied the Kluckeners and reported on them, partly for pure research but partly out of Slavophile motives.The Slavophile [researcher] Hilferding of [St.] Petersburg has made a Slavophile interpretation of the Kluckeners' life[style], in any case [possibly to justify Polish efforts to assimilate them, under the former Communist regime].

What once had been found throughout a wider extent of eastern Pomerania was still preserved here, a settlement of unmixed aborigines. Thus, we are not so well informed in detail about any other Kashubian settlement as we are about Klucken. As Goethe truly observed: "Thus it is [that] wherever you travel, it is interesting there." [We] shall therefore proceed in this short presentation to select the significant [facts] from a substantial amount of [available] information [about Klucken].

[Let us take] ourselves to the years between 1880 and 1900. War veterans are telling their grandchildren about their roles in the wars of 1866 [Austro-Prussian War] and 1870-71 [Franco-Prussian War] and are very proud to have participated in them. The Kluckeners are not only Prussians but also Germans with full hearts and pure conscience. But their life in the village follows the ancient ways of their ancestors. And now [we have] quite concrete descriptions: The huts stand in the marshy meadowland, some close together and some at a distance. On the western horizon is the Revekol [mountain], to
the northwest is the lighthouse-tower of Scholpin, to the east is Leba Lake, and to the
southwest [are] the wooded Pustinke Heights. All three Klucken [components together]
comprise a total of 550 souls; the Seleseners with 150 persons in 20 families, the
Zemminers with 150 persons in 18 families, and the Schmolziners with 250 persons in 60
families. -

In 1738 the /.vc/zoo//teacher was Pollex, and in 1743 Heuk. Only after 1863 was there a schoolhouse. One of the first teachers was Klueck, a former seaman. Then after many more expedient measures [to provide a marginal] education, the first seminary-educated teacher, Froehling, arrived in 1886, replacing Stodtmeister. Froehling not only understood the children['s needs] but [helped] the village residents as an active pioneer in the cultivation of fruit [trees], berry bushes, flowers, vegetables and better grain-crops.

Among the Schmolsiner-Kluckener families were 29 named Klueck, 10 Pollex, and 8 Reimann (a Kashubized and later re-Germanized family!). Other family names were Ruch, Czirr, Kirck, Prog, Gabbey, Schimanke, Gromoll, Wogatzki, Krietzsch, Eik, Kaitzschick, Damaschke and Barnow [with some variations in spelling, of course]. As a rule, these people lived and married among themselves, and resented the influx of foreigners, depriving them of equal rights in community affairs.

Toward the end of the 1800's the economic conditions improved appreciably and the Klucken settlements on Leba Lake partook of the revolutionized civilization and adopted stone houses in place of wooden huts. Two things nevertheless remained the same; [namely,] the unique ancient lifestyle and the fisheries as the chief occupation. Belonging to the first [of these] are quite peculiar customs in the conducting of ecclesiastical sacraments (baptism, confirmation, marriage and burial), far [distant] from Klucken in the beautiful church at Schmolsin. This church was built in the midst of the Thirty Years War [(1618-1648)] by the duchess [Anna] von Croy, and is where the pastor Pontanus [= Bruggemann] did his significant work for the Kashubes at that time [described further on under the Schmolsin sub-heading].

Peculiarities [of the ancient lifestyle] included the communal pasturage of livestock under a herdsman on community land, wherein all the cows were assembled in response to a signal each morning and driven to the pasture. At noontime, they were taken home to be milked. In the afternoon they were again placed under the herdsman's care to be pastured, and then led back [home] toward evening. The schedule of fishing still used at that time involved an eaily[-morning] embarkation onto the lake, and the selling of fish wrapped in reed-grass and carried on the backs of the women to the surrounding villages. [Another Kashubian invention was the strapping of "clumpy" wooden shoes to the hooves of horses, to facilitate their movement across marshes and sand dunes.]

Romanticism and hard toil were linked together in those days, and it is understandable that the women, who handled the cash, kept a [firm] hand on the purse and allowed the men only a rationed amount for the enjoyment of alcohol. In still earlier centuries, when as many as 20 people occupied a cottage, one survived with extreme frugality on fish and poorly grown cereals, avoided sugar, and baked bread from a mixture of milled oats and barley or rye. Potatoes [were introduced in the mid-1700's and supplemented or replaced rutabagas and peas in the diet]. It is reported that the Kluckeners had healthy white teeth, because sugar was considered to be a "medicine" [besides being expensive, and its use was limited accordingly]. It is remarkable that these people, living so closely crowded together, experienced little quarreling. This was probably because worship services were attended on the Sunday holidays, and the Kashube was devout; that is, he perceived and accepted the biblical scriptures as the actual word of God. [Contemporary writers agree that the preaching and devotional services were rather effective in enticing these simple peopfe away from the cheap brandy and fisticuffs which formerly provided the Sunday entertainment!]

As stated previously, the Kluckeners were in a location [off the beaten track and] accessible [only] with difficulty. However, in the Russian invasion of 1761 during the Seven Years War [1756-1763] they suffered just as much from the capricious and violent crimes of the Russian occupation forces as they did [during and] after 1945. The Poles, who entered the German villages in the summer and autumn of 1945, did not spare the Kashubes, their alleged blood-relatives, [but] shot randomly into the houses, drove the defenseless women in their bedclothes out into the cold with the shout of "Fire!", and gave themselves over to capricious actions, as proof that they would henceforth be the landlords. They mistakenly believed that they had a standing claim to Pomerania [and seized it under the terms of the 1945 Potsdam Accord. The Poles] also found Slovinces who [presented] themselves as racial kinsmen of a common descent, who lent themselves to Polish propaganda and flattery, took advantage of other Pomeranians, and then became traitors to the Germany now confined and united in the Federal Republic. It is reported that these people, just like the Poles, have demolished [neighboring] buildings just to have dry firewood for their stoves. [But for those few who were offered the choice of keeping their home and livelihood, it would not be easy to abandon it all, just to become a homeless refugee inside a shattered Germany!]

In 1979, when I visited this region and [viewed] the cemetery and the emptied-out Museum of Slovincian Lifestyle and Fishing, the warm June sun shone over the landscape. The cemetery had not been ransacked like nearly all the others throughout Pomerania. The names of former Kluckener families spoke to me from the brightly polished reddish-granite gravestones. [As late as 1979, all but one of the names were inscribed in German "Gothic" lettering, and epitaphs were in German. Only the grave-marker of Ruth Koetsch was inscribed in Polish.]

The Kluckeners were never Poles and never wanted to be, any more than did the former Pomer/e//ian [Samboride] princely house at Danzig. These [dukes] defended themselves against the Polish attacks between 1000 and 1300, and struggled for the independence of their nation. Just as the [Wends] between Stettin and Belgard fended off the early Polish expansionism, it was the same between the Persante and the Vistula, where the Poles eventually emerged victorious in the wrangling among the [political] powers of that time. Whoever presumes to equate a Kluckener's Kashubian origin with that of Poland insults him, because of his pride in being his own man with the heritage of his ancestors, and still belonging to the Evangelical confession which holds for him a special value, [standing him] apart from the Catholic Poles.

The eastern Pomeranian people in general [carry] no hatred against the Poles, but the sentiment is that [the Poles] are a different and foreign people in language, religion, viewpoint and behavior. The Poles [formerly] came as harvest-time workers, resided in quarters built for that purpose, and then departed. They were paid a negotiated wage, but were not comparable to the [locally-based] wage earners of a manorial estate. The Prussian-German [loyalist] had a different religious culture and a different concept of life, based on the Evangelical ideals of dedication, accountability, modesty, integrity, organization and cleanliness. All of this filled the conscience of every villager along Leba Lake, whom the Polish side has all too readily identified with itself as the last remnant of racially pure Slavendom. Thus, the Kluckeners are proof that the so-called Slovinces were more independent and more productive economically, and overcame nationalistic restraints because they bestowed a better quality of life upon the///-/ people. Therefore, they are declaring in a steady stream that although Poland has [forced them to] forsake their [homejland and come to the Federal Republic [of Germany], they built up the territory of the [former] German eastern provinces and deserve its rewards.

In 1985 a German economic delegation visited Warsaw. One of the journalists assigned by the [Polish] government responded to the Germans' questions. To one such [question] as to why the economy of Poland was so depressed, he answered: "We have no Reformation". [Happily, Poland's socio-economic reformat ion finally began in 1989 •with the ending of the Communist regime.] For the German, in whose eyes there is scarcely any difference in economic productivity between Evangelical and Catholic regions, such an answer deserves study and gives reason to wonder. But if one thinks it over and has learned from history, then one must agree with the journalist. The Evangelical confession is not the sole authoritative, sanctified authority for the masses, but it brings the individual into direct accountability before God in thought and deeds. One must therefore understand that to a Roman Catholic in Germany, his [faith] works as an evangelistic Catholicism. [Noffke is apparently comparing the authoritarian stance of Polish Catholicism with the more liberal "conscience-based" outlook of today's German Catholics.]

[Additional details concerning the aforementioned events at Klucken are presented by Karl-Heinz Page! in his book "The Rural County of Stolp in Pomerania" (original publisher and year of publication unknown to this translator). Pagel -writes: "The old names of the individually owned parcels in Schmolsiner Klucken were Gorni. Grzendowi (Schangdow), Novidomski, Piaskowi, Jach, Lugowi, Zicker, Dambowi
and Powelki. •

The tendency to follow ancient ways was especially pronounced in Klucken .... When in 1848 the tax assessment for construction of the highway came due, Schmolsiner Klucken and Selesener Klucken refused to pay. Thereupon a military unit. . . . was sent via Schmolsin into Klucken and impounded 74 sheep and pigs. The end result was that the Kluckeners, instead of contributing the assessed 13 talers, had to pay collection costs as well, making a total payment of 126 talers. Their basis for refusal had some merit, however. They said that the highway was of no use to them. No one entertained the idea of building a good access road, despite their having the absolute worst roads. As late as 1873 the Kluckeners delivered the corpse of a woman to Neustrelow by boat along the Pustinke Brook, because in spring the roads were too deep in mud for traffic to move. . . .

The government devoted much constant attention to the propensity of the Kluckener fishermen toward poaching. Widespread outrage was provoked by the shooting of a forester by a Kluckener poacher. . . . . A suspect was arrested but he repeatedly swore his innocence. He declared, however, that although he knew the name of the perpetrator, he would not divulge it because the perpetrator had a large family to feed. The suspect went to prison and was only released when the actual perpetrator confessed his guilt on his deathbed. The government had little success in its campaign against poaching."

Pagel goes on to describe the horrendous events of 1945 and how the Polish militia unexpectedly arrived in Klucken at 2 a.m. on 3 January 1947 and offered the Slovincian residents the choice of accepting Polish identity papers or being deported to Saxony. The Poles installed Ruth Koelsch (or Koetsch) as village mayor. She was a German, about 40 years old and unmarried, who had recently settled with her parents at Klucken. The Poles presented her as a living example of the "Polish Kashubian" heritage, even though her father was from Upper Silesia and her mother was from Wintershagen, a village of ethnic Germans northwest ofStolp. After she died, a Polish museum was opened inside the house purported to be "hers". However, that house had never belonged to Ruth Koelsch, but instead had been the confiscated home of the fisherman and farmer Otto Reimann, who was arrested there on 4 October 1952 and imprisoned for three months on suspicion of leading a ring of political dissidents. ] <Return>

Lifestyle And Characteristic Behavior Of The Kashubes

Accounts of the habits and lifestyle of the [Pomeranian] Kashubes have been published by their Evangelical-Lutheran pastors. These [clergymen] were far better educated than their congregation members, were themselves German as a rule, and spoke German but had to preach and instruct also in Kashubian. They had to lead a Christian life and therefore stand against bad habits and gross sins such as drunkenness and adultery. The Kashubes themselves were either fishermen, peasants, [free] farmers or laborers, and lived under conditions so austere that modern people would consider them downright shameful.

Just as the Old Prussian nobility was absorbed by the Order of Teutonic Knights in [East] Prussia, so too was the Kashubian [nobility] absorbed by the Western aristocrats who had taken up residence alongside the Slavic [settlements]. The apportionment of hereditary vassals was the same, whether the landlord himself was a Kashube or a Westerner, or whether his name was von Flemming or Zitzewitz, Krockow or Below. We cannot assume that the pastors [distorted] the picture of their congregation members, and likewise it is logical that their behavior and lifestyle were strongly influenced in a negative way by the [prevailing] social, cultural and economic conditions. There are examples of extreme contradiction in the assessments of this ethnic group and its habits and lifestyle. Pastor Lorek (served 1806-1837), a comparatively recent, competent writer, has the following to say on the subject: "Depending on his situation the Kashube [can be] servile, discourteous [and] without grace or propriety. His form of address is [the intimate] 'thou' or 'thee'. The [polite] 'you' is unknown to him. [Germans reserve the intimate pronouns for their family members and close friends, and English-speaking people now reserve them for God only.] Moreover, he has no sense of gratitude or benevolence. [He] loves brandy. He wants to be rewarded. He works reluctantly and accomplishes only the [required] minimum. He is miserly and greedy, and dirty in his person, clothing and dwelling. [He] is often prone to cunning, deceit and duplicity, and steals wood and fruit. For mutually contrived [schemes], which come chiefly from the women [because they] handle the budget, he is at least open [and in agreement]. He is fawning when hungry, but if he has [enough for himself] he easily becomes overly courageous, a lion when unopposed, but a coward when opposed."

[The German historian Franz] Tetzner in his book "The Slovinces and Leba- Kashubes (Berlin, 1899) [quotes the foregoing passage and goes on to say:] "The picture is therefore bad. Are there grounds for this? I believe, more than enough. The most primitive living conditions [prevailed], with 15-22 people in a one-room farm [cottage. They] formerly existed like this, year in and year out, through all the seasons. How could privacy, individual betterment, cleanliness, good manners and orderliness be possible? Intolerable conditions. Perhaps in summer still bearable, but in winter, when all these [people] are present in one room? Is then the way to the tavern not very alluring? What entertainment can [alleviate] this primitiveness and hopelessness, where [one] must vegetate within, and when the lord of the manor still has the right to distribute, according to his whim, the available youthful manpower among the individual farms, as was the case on the Zitzewitz estate at Zezenow. [All of] which the silent observer cannot help /likening to] the slave market in America." All in all, [the Slovince is] a negatively portrayed and tormented victim of the circumstances!

Now for the good characteristics. [Tetzner goes on to describe the Slovince in more favorable terms:] "He is peaceable and accommodating. He has compassion. Divorce is out of the question [for him]. He is very loving of children and likewise solicitous of the sick. He is manageable when one is patient with him and shows an obliging demeanor. [His] dullness could be a result of his [low] social position and limited intellectual demands. He has a healthy understanding of people, and possesses a vigorous body and a strong spirit. The youngster learns well when he is encouraged, and is also agreeable to the acquisition and practice of a handicraft. He is then industrious and persevering when he works for himself. He leams well during his entire life."

All in all, whenever negative judgments are uttered about this small ethnic group, it is apparent that its folkways and lifestyle are the result of a long period of subjugation that blocked the way toward self-government and self-governing goals. How easily hopelessness reposes within [an environment] of paralysis and lethargy. In 1930 the stride of a farmer in eastern Pomerania was quite different from that of a day-laborer. The day-laborer goes slowly into the field, [whereas] the farmer knows that he goes [to accomplish] his personal production goals, and therefore has a quick stride. Proof of this has been shown in [very recent years] when free private enterprise was suppressed by the Communist social system. In reference to this, there [was] a saying in the [pre-1990] German Democratic Republic: "[Only] as much as directly required for the state; everything else for myself!"

There is [further] evidence [for gaining an] understanding of the Kashubes and their character and folkways. The flood-gates [of opportunity to hold public office in Prussia] opened [in the early 1800'sj for the generals Yorck von Wartenburg (1813 at Tauroggen) and von Tauentzien (both of whom were Kashubes), and for other aristocratic Kashubian officers and ministers. Toward the end of the 1800's [the same opportunity was offered] to all [social classes and ethnic groups] in Prussia, and the [social] separation between Kashubes and [ethnic Germans in] Pomerania very quickly vanished. If there might have been a genuine aversion among the Kashubes to the German-speaking Pomeranian Prussians in the 1600's and 1700's, or even yet into the 1800's, that was definitely ended in the [later] 1800's when [the Kashubes] participated in the technological advances which dovetailed with the wartime victories of Prussia and Germany. Equal opportunities made [the Kashubes] equal in status to the other people in Prussia. Actually, how could it be otherwise? [And yet the well-meaning but misguided efforts of the Bismarck regime and later German governments to assimilate the Kashubes only succeeded in driving many of them into the Polish sphere of influence, or causing them to emigrate overseas.]

Thus, there was no problem of [ethnic] self-identity for the Kashubes between the Garder and Leba Lakes. They were Pomeranian and Prussian and German [in their outlook], as were many others from whatever race,state or land they had come from, in order to live and work under the fundamental axiom that the people are the basic capital asset of the state, and [in order] to attain the goal of highest possible social justice, with everyone enjoying a life based on his achievements. <Return>

Recent Kashubian Centers In Eastern Pomerania

It seems [helpful] for me to make a summarized account of three large villages which have had a Kashubian past.

1. Glowitz (meaning "vicinity of the mountain top"; Kashubian Glava = head, top)

The shrine of a heathen cult existed on the site where the church later stood. An ancient Kashubian settlement was mentioned here in 1252, [when it was] reportedly under [the rule of] Duke Swantopolk [II ofPomerelia-JDanzig. A [Christian] mission was founded here around 1000 and the church tower was built in 1062. The first ecclesiastical visitation after the Reformation was in 1590. The Slavic aristocratic house of von Put/(/kamer (Polish: podkomorzen = under-chamberlain) built the church, originally constructed of timber in the long-hall design, with cross-nave erected in 1745- 49. This was intended to accommodate a substantial growth of the parish congregation. In 1889 it burned down [after being struck by lightning] and was rebuilt out of stone.

Pastors were Bachur, Butzke and Schwartz until 1577, Hecht until 1628, Gruenenberg and his successors until 1688, and Hering until 1731. During the period 1733-1775 Schimonsky founded a church-school. He was of the Moravian [Brethren], a courageous evangelist during the Seven Years War [1756-1763], when the Russians plundered, ravaged and ransacked the communities. The pastor was the right man for that unfortunate hour. He was large, stately, mild-mannered and yet strong, feared and yet loved, and severe with drunkards and adulterers. He was also outspoken against sinners. He supported the interest of the Kashubian children in the German language. Schimonsky was so competent and respected that he dared to appear before the Russian general to remark about the intolerable conditions caused by the Russian occupation and to ask for mitigation. The worship services were held in two languages, one following the other. The prayer-hours were [scheduled] likewise; first in Kashubian, then in German.

In 1784 Glowitz had 38 households, 3 inns, 1 blacksmith, 1 water-powered mill, 2 timber-warden dwellings, 1 parsonage, 1 sexton dwelling, 10 farmers and 6 small- farmers. The [Evangelical] parish of Glowitz comprised the church village itself, plus Giesebitz, Rumbske, Schorin, Zedlin, Zemmin, Rowen, Klenzien, Vixow, Ruschuetz, Warbelin, Dechow, Grossendorf and Zipkow. In 1784 there were [approximately] 3,000 Kasubian communicants and only 700 German. [The follow ing years saw] a growing tendency [among the Kashubes] to adopt the German language. In 1886 there remained only 18 Kashubian communicants.

Pastor Lohmann from the Rhineland served here from 1853 to 1885, and around 1890 there was no further trace of the Kashubian speech element. [Everyjone spoke German, but the residents were the same as before, [with their offspring constituting] the population increase.

2. Schmolsin (meaning "tar-burning shed")

In 1281 this village was bequeathed to the Belbuk [Premonstratensian] Cloister [which assigned it to the Dominicans at StolpJ. The Revekol (114 meters high) is a pilgrimage-site with a chapel [at the summit, dedicated to] St. Nicholas, the patron-saint of fishermen and sailors. It was formerly the center of a heathen cult. The pilgrimage industry at the Revekol died out with the [advent of the] Reformation. [Pilgrims had received indulgences from the Dominican friars on the mountain, and the Lutherans from Lauenburg forcibly ended this practice.] In 1582 [an Evangelical] chapel was erected at the foot of the mountain. With the general ecclesiastical visitation in 1590, Schmolsin was assigned a pastor from [Gross] Garde [in response to the notice:] "Seeking a courageous, learned, modest person fluent in both languages - German and Kashubian".

The place had a princely background. Erdmute, the daughter of the Prince-Elector of Brandenburg Johann Georg, inherited Schmolsin. After Erdmute's death in 1620, the district of Stolp passed to [Duchess] Anna von Croy und Archot. She was the sister of Bogislaw XIV [the last Pomeranian duke]. She built the beautiful church dedicated in 1632 and furnished with the Biblia pauperum. Anna von Croy died in 1663. The Biblia pauperum [= pauper's bible] provides biblical history for the illiterate, represented by [a series of] rhombic-shaped paintings mounted on the [church] ceiling. In 1945 the ceiling could still be seen with the pictures'from this period, but no longer with all [of them].

The [duchess] had a learned, courageous and adaptable pastor [named] Pontanus, who was born in 1578 as a son of the Brueggemann family of Stolp. He wrote books in Kashubian and translated others, such as Luther's catechism, the Psalms of David and the Passion Story. This pastor was, in accordance with the Lutheran [requirements], quite proficient in both [the Kashubian and the German] modes of speech [and of course could read Latin and Greek besides]. A portrait of him exists [where?]. He must have been a very impressive personality, and certainly rich in knowledge.

The pastor from 1734 to 1782 was Engeland. He [also] was an imposing personality. In 1760-61 the Russian invasion brought devastation, poverty and misery. It was the same throughout all of eastern Pomerania. The parish itself [and its inhabitants] did not escape this cruel event. In 1761-62 there were six illegitimate Russian children [baptized here]', a proof of the commonplace sexual assaults on the women at that time. [Sad to say, the same pathetic scene was repeated by the Russians soldiers in 19451]

Already by 1792 the catechism instruction in Kashubian had ceased. In 1816 Pastor Friderici served [this parish]. He campaigned against music and dancing, and preached lengthy [sermons], but joined with the farmers in [the enjoyment of] tobacco and beer. He was therefore neither a Moravian nor a Pietist. In 1816, Pastor Thomasius complained [in recorded writings] about the coarseness of the Kashubes.

Pastor [H.A.] Kypke came here in [1817 and served without controversy until] 1830. Under him, despite his Christian efforts, occurred the rebellion of the [local] Kashubes against the increase in school taxes. [The Prussian government ordered in 1830 that henceforth all teaching in schools would be in the German language only. However, the tax increase applied to Germans and Kashubes alike, which the Kashubes resented, and Kypke, as the schoolteacher, was responsible for collecting the tax.] The pastor operated [despite fierce opposition] but was replaced after further disturbances, gave up his position and became a mill owner near Stolp. The ringleaders of the rebellion were punished with imprisonment and a fine [which the other villagers collected a paid out of sympathy]. The head of the conspirators/, the farmer Schimm, later departed from a wedding celebration] "drunk", and drowned in the Lupow [River].

In 1832 Schmolsin received a pastor named Edelbuettel from Bernburg on the Saale. He had been a soldier in the war of liberation [against Napoleon's forces] and knew the world. He was criticized for his failure to preach in Kashubian, but eventually reached a peaceful compromise with the Kashubes. Edelbuettel stood against superstition, devil-worship and rebelliousness throughout [his career]. He had strong support by King Friedrich Wilhelm IV, who knew the pasior[personally]. Shortly before 1835, preaching in Kashubian was terminated at [Gross] Garde and Schmolsin.

3. Gross Garde (Slovincian: "large fortress-town") [Garde was the fortress site, and came to be called Gross Garde after the neighboring village of Klein (= small) Garde was founded.]

This village is also very old. [It was founded in 1265.] In 1282 the St. Stanislaus church was established by the Pomerelian prince Mestwin II of Danzig. [It was re- dedicated to] St. John during the course of the Reformation. The patrons of this church in 1284 were the St. Nicholas church at Stolp and the Belbuk cloister. During the general visitation in 1590, Pastor Blascenius complained of the gigantic size of the parish/, which caused him to be] overworked. A bilingual pastor was taken for granted at that time.

Later pastors followed: Staroste until 1669, Vizichius until 1711, Gulich until 1751, Starckow until 1765, and Kummer until 1808. (Kummer belonged to the Herrnhuters, an emphatically pious and devoted [group affiliated with] the Evangelical Church, and reaching back to Count Nikolaus von Zinzendorf [who sheltered Moravian Brethren revivalists on his estate at Berthelsdorf, Saxony, and in 1722 founded the Herrnhut settlement, which was soon augmented by German Lutherans]. Kummer's son Theodor was pastor [from 1808] until 1836. By this time the parishioners] were fall] German- speaking. Since 1780, during the reign of Friedrich the Great, the people had been exhorted to speak German. Confirmation instruction in Kashubian was discontinued in 1828, and there was sadness over the demise of the Slovincian speech. The village had two annual market-fairs fat this time]. Haefner was the local pastor until 1844. He was a rationalist; i.e., an elucidator of the modernistic view toward the Christian faith.

Pastor Mueller served at Gross Garde until 1858. He could speak only German. Teachers and clergymen together brought about the lingual unification of this area by preserving Slavic word-fragments. In smaller villages like Wittstock (Wysoko) on Garder Lake, the remnants of [Slovincian] speech were preserved longer. Under Pastor Franz, who served here until 1876, there arose a revival movement, with campaigning against the godless living exemplified by card-playing, drunkenness, adultery, uncouth habits and superstition. Goerke was the pastor until 1886. From then on, Gross Garde became a sort of commemorated past for the generation still living. The last pastor was Wilhelm Kypke. He remained in place, loyal to his parishioners during the Russian invasion of 1945. [He] endured the horrors of that period and then, like all his other parishioners, was expelled by the Poles.

This admittedly fragmentary account of three recent Kashubian centers (Glowitz, Schmolsin and Gross Garde) might induce the interested reader to research [the source documents] which provide a still better picture of the historic territory of the Kashubes between the Garder and Leba Lakes. <Return>

The Kashubian People - a piece of Eastern Pomeranian folk history	Kashubia Homeland of the Baltic Slavs The historic lands of Pomerelia and Easternmost Pomerania
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