Village Tour 1: Eichenfeld, Adelsheim, Hochfeld

Three days of our Ukrainian journey were dedicated to visiting villages of our ancestors. Relatives from both sides of my family traveled with me on the Heritage Tour and I was excited to visit the homestead of my father's family (in Ohrloff) on Day 2 of our tour and then visit the homestead of my mother's family (in Halbstadt) on Day 3. This first day was spent in the former Yazekovo Colony which also has personal significance to my family and to so many other families with a Mennonite background.

Venturing from a city into the rural interior of the Ukraine was quite the adventure in and of itself! Our ship docked in Zaporozhia where we boarded buses and drove over seeming war-torn roads to get to the villages.

I think everyone on the bus (less our guide and driver) were surprised at the conditions of the roads. I know I have not experienced anything quite like it in all my travels! Endless potholes forced traffic to slow down and swerve. But despite the rough ride, I valued our time traveling via road because it gave me a wonderful view of the countryside that was so familiar to our relatives.

When asked why the roads were so bad, our guide mentioned that the potholes are created by grain trucks with loads so heavy that they tear up the pavement. Apparently there are not enough trains to transport the cargo so companies resort to using highways. Again, I appreciated the Ukrainian humor of the situation where numerous jokes abound, including this one:

Q: How do you tell a drunk driver from a sober driver in the Ukraine?
A: The drunk driver drives straight!

   John, Becky, Jonathan, Louise, Rita, David, Nancy and Jamie

Our first stop was a small village called Eichenfeld where we immediately gathered for a ceremony dedicated to the 136 innocent men, women and children who were massacred during the night on October 26 to 27, 1919. What a stark reminder of the travesty of the Bolshevik Revolution, standing next to the mass grave containing these innocent victims. A number of visitors at the ceremony spoke about how their ancestors suffered on that horrendous night; one family had 37 members killed at one time.

As we walked around the village, our guide pointed to a small side street that led to a former schoolhouse and a likely location where the mission tent stood. This is where my Great-Uncle Jash, one of the leaders of the Tent Mission, was dragged to a neighboring shed and beaten to death.

Here is my Grandfather's account of the massacre and his later visit to this area in 1923 before emigrating to Canada:

"After the slaughter of the five Tent Mission missionaries in Eichenfeld (a village in the Yazykovo Mennonite Settlement), the village had been set on fire and its many farmyards were burned. Tina and her son had lived in the area during those frightful days and she still knew several families here. ...Tina's Christian friend drove us to find the mass grave where Jash Dyck [Tina's young husband] and the many murdered villagers were buried in the former Eichenfeld/Dubovka. The cemetery was covered in rank weeds, but our driver knew his way and brought us to a large mound covered in a few wilted flowers. We stood here quietly for a long time, everyone following his or her own thoughts. Tina probably thought of the last kiss and hug before Jash left her. How he lifted the tiny Siegfried [their son] into his arms and hugged and kissed him once more. Jash, always so exuberant, so hearty and loving, had been only 30. It was hard to understand why he had to go when he still had a long fruitful life ahead, but God's ways are unknowable." (Fehderau, Mennonite Estate Family, p. 301-302)

Volunteers of the Tent Mission; Jash and Tina seated in the middle row on the left

Our next stop was the small village of Nikkolaifeld where a Mennonite school and church remain standing. The school is still used as a school but the church is now a school gymnasium.

This Heritage Tour revealed to me just how many family stories exist among our Mennonite community! It seemed like every family came with their own stories, and it was wonderful to piece them together to get a picture of what life was like back in the 19th and 20th centuries.

When I was standing in the former church building, an older gentleman next to me told me that his father attended this church when he was a young man. Apparently this teenager (his father) and his young friends did not appreciate the lay minister who would often get up during church services and start by saying, "Nun, was soll ich sagen?" ("Now, what should I say?") Well, this teenager who was expecting the lay minister to stand up and say this, spoke up from the balcony suggesting that the minister "start your sermon with an 'Amen' and sit down" =) No doubt, the young man was thoroughly reprimanded for such a witty comment.

Next on the list was the village of Adelsheim. This is where my Great-Aunt Tina stayed with her baby when she heard about her husband being murdered in the neighboring village of Eichenfeld. Knowing they would likely never be able to visit this area again, my Grandpa and Great-Aunt Tina walked here on foot from Halbstadt before they emigrated to Canada shortly after.

As we stopped by the side of the road to eat a bagged lunch, I thought this was what it was like for our ancestors when they traveled on foot: stopping to rest by the side of the road.

Knowing we would visit Hochfeld next, where my paternal Grandmother was born, my relatives and I reviewed Grandma's bio as we traveled. Our bus briefly stopped where Hochfeld once stood and where I could take a couple pictures before we traveled to Solona, which is the word for "salty" in Ukrainian.

What remains of Hochfeld

Unfortunately, there is little that remains of many Mennonite villages today for a number of reasons, including bandits burning down villages during the Revolution, aging of buildings over the past century (for those that survived the Revolution), and also the trend for current-day Ukrainians to dismantle Mennonite buildings and reuse the brick when building new. Apparently the Mennonites produced a high-quality brick that has kept its strength all these years!

Even though not all villages remain, I am satisfied to know we were able to experience the area where our ancestors once worked, played and prayed.