Abstract
The majority of contemporary Soviet Germans are ancestors of agricultural settlers invited to Russia by Catherine the Great and Alexander I.2 During 1763–1862, approximately 100 000 Germans migrated to Russia and founded over 3000 colonies. These so-called ‘German Russians’ consisted both of the Volga Germans, who arrived as early as 1763 and formed agricultural communities principally along the lower Volga River, and the Black Sea Germans (or Ukrainian Germans), who came to Russia in the early nineteenth century and settled in towns, cities and rural areas near the Black Sea. Other German immigrants joined German communities in the Caucasus, Bessarabia and Volhynia.
One would have thought that the War had clearly shown who was who, and that the groundless accusations made against Soviet Germans, along with the legal restrictions, would have faded of their own accord. However, these hopes were not borne out….
A certain segment of Soviet citizens of the German nationality, people, who, as a rule, have only a very remote notion of what life is like in the FRG, are setting off on trips thousands of kilometers long to their ‘historic homeland’ in search of a ‘better lot’. We won’t hide the fact that their choice is sometimes influenced by the negative experience of the past and the unresolved state of some of our current problems.
V. Auman and V. Chernyshev, 19881
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Notes
V. Auman and V. Chernyshev, ‘Sovetskie nemtsi pered voinoi i segodnya’ [Soviet Germans Before the War and Today], Pravda (4 November 1988 ), p. 8.
The first German settlers in Russia arrived in the mid-sixteenth century to help modernize the country and improve the army. Those Germans were urban dwellers — merchants, administrators, craftsmen, technical workers, professionals and military officers — invited by Ivan IV and his successors. The total number who remained permanently was not large and consequently not many of today’s Soviet Germans are descended from the original German immigrants. For detailed histories of German immigration to Russia see Karl Stumpp, The Emigration from Germany to Russia in the Years 1763 to 1862 (Lincoln, Nebraska: American Historical Society of Gemans from Russia, 1973 );
Fred C. Koch, The Volga Germans ( University Park, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1977 ), pp. 4–89;
Adam Giesinger, From Catherine to Khrushchev: The Story of Russia’s Germans ( Battleford, Saskatchewan, Canada: Marian, 1974 ), pp. 1–246.
For additional details on the various groups of Germans in Russia and the USSR, see Sidney Heitman, The Soviet Germans in the USSR Today, Berichte des Bundesinstituts für ostwissenschaftliche and internationale Studien no. 35 (Cologne: Bundesinstitut für ostwissenschaftliche and internationale Studien, 1980), pp. 32–5; CDU/CSU Group in the German Bundestag, White Paper on the Human Rights Situation in Germany and of the Germans in Eastern Europe ( Bonn: CDU/CSU Group in the Bundestag, 1977 ), pp. 55–8.
Pinkus contends that the favorable policy towards the Soviet Germans in the first half of the 1920s related to both international and domestic factors. The former included the belief among Bolshevik leaders that a German revolution was imminent and that the Soviet Germans would be mobilized to help achieve the revolution. The latter related to the policy of co-opting the nationalities. Benjamin Pinkus, ‘From the October Revolution to the Second World War’, in Ingeborg Fleischhauer and Benjamin Pinkus (eds), The Soviet Germans Past and Present, with an Introduction by Edith Rogovin Frankel (London: C. Hurst in association with Marjorie Mayrock Center for Soviet and East European Research, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, 1986 ), p. 42.
The deportation decree appears in translation in Robert Conquest, The Nation Killers ( London: Macmillan, 1970, reprint edn, London: Sphere, 1972 ), pp. 62–3;
Ingeborg Fleischhauer, ‘“Operation Barbarossa” and the Deportation’, in Fleischhauer and Pinkus (eds), The Soviet Germans Past and Present, p. 81. Conquest and Fleischhauer cite Vedomosti Verkhovnogo Soveta SSSR, no. 38 (2 September 1941), item 153 as the source of the decree.
Karl Stumpp, ‘Sterben die Russland-Deutschen aus?’ [Are the Russian Germans Dying Out?], Die Zeit (23 April 1976), p. 40.
Ann Sheehy and Bohdan Nahaylo, The Crimean Tatars, Volga Germans, and Meskhetians: Soviet Treatment of Some National Minorities, 3rd edn, Minority Rights Group Report no. 6 (London: Minority Rights Group, 1980 ), p. 19.
Sidney Heitman, ‘Soviet German Population Change, 1970–79’, Soviet Geography: Review & Translation 22 (November 1981), p. 553.
Giesinger, From Catherine to Khrushchev, p. 316. Benjamin Pinkus cites a figure of 9678 in ‘The Emigration of National Minorities from the USSR in the Post-Stalin Era’, Soviet Jewish Affairs 13 (February 1983), p. 10.
Angela Stent uses the figure of 9628 German POWs in From Embargo to Ostpolitik: The Political Economy of West German–Soviet Relations, 1955–1980 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), p. 43.
Wolf Oschlies, ‘The Status of Germans Living in the Soviet Union’, in Karin Schmid (ed.), The Soviet Union 1982–1983: Domestic Policy, The Economy, Foreign Policy (London: Holmes & Meier, published with assistance of the Bundesinstitut für ostwissenschaftliche und internationale Studien, Cologne, 1985), vol. 7, pp. 109–10; Heitman, The Soviet Germans in the USSR Today, p.39; Pinkus, ‘The Germans in the Soviet Union since 1945’, p. 132.
By the end of the 1960s, a small number of Soviet Germans had returned to their former residences, apparently without encountering any obstacles, despite the express provisions in the December 1955 decree forbidding such resettlement. Koch, The Volga Germans, pp. 293–4. See also Giesinger, From Catherine to Khrushchev, p. 321. Today there are said to be approximately 40 000 Germans who have returned since the mid-1970s from Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Kirghizia and Siberia to live in the area formerly called the Volga German ASSR. See Victor Chistyakiv, ‘German Autonomy — Projects and Realities’, Moscow News, no. 35 (3–10 September 1989 ), p. 9.
Mikoyan also agreed to work toward increasing Soviet-German representation in the Supreme Soviet. Sheehy and Nahaylo, The Crimean Tatars, p. 21. For an excerpt from the transcript of the meeting between Mikoyan and the German delegation on 7 June 1965, see ‘The Question of the Restoration of the Volga German Republic’, trans. by Ann Sheehy, in American Historical Society of Germans From Russia, Work Paper no. 11 (April 1973), pp. 13–15. For details of the visits of the German delegations to Mikoyan in 1965 and 1967 see E. Schwabenland-Haynes, ‘The Restoration of the German Volga Republic’, American Historical Society of Germans From Russia, Work Paper no. 11 (April 1973), p. 12;
Ann Sheehy, American Historical Society of Germans From Russia, Work Paper no. 13 (1973), pp. 5–6; American Historical Society of Germans From Russia, Work Paper no. 22 (Winter 1976), p. 1;
Boris Levytsky, ‘Germans in the Soviet Union: New Facts and Figures’, in American Historical Society of Germans From Russia, Work Paper no. 22 (Winter 1976), pp. 2–3.
The developments detailed below refer to those prior to the liberalization of the Gorbachev period. German sections in a number of the writers’ unions were established and German-language publications were increased over time (although the number remained small compared to other nationalities). Press articles praising Soviet Germans for their efforts during the Revolution as well as against the Nazis in World War II began appearing in 1964 and continued in following years. See Sheehy and Nahaylo, The Crimean Tatars, p. 21. A professional German variety ensemble was founded in 1968, and the first (and possibly only) post-war German drama theater in the USSR opened in 1980. See Yekaterina Kuznetsova, ‘German Theatre in Kazakhstan’, Moscow News (13 September 1981), p. 11. In 1981, Heimatliche Weiten, a bi-annual German-language literary almanac, was started. See ‘Literary Almanac for Soviet Germans’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 205/81 (19 May 1981), annotations.
The USSR Supreme Soviet passed on 24 December 1958 a comprehensive law on educational reform and in 1959 the union- and autonomous republics passed corresponding laws. The laws stated that parents had the right to request instruction for their children in their native language. Pravda (25 December 1958), pp. 1–2; see also Yaroslav Bilinsky, ‘The Soviet Education Laws of 1958–9 and Soviet Nationality Policy’, Soviet Studies 14 (October 1962), pp. 138–57; Pinkus, ‘The Germans in the Soviet Union Since 1945’, pp. 125–6.
Giesinger, From Catherine to Khrushchev, pp. 325–8. German-language study and cultural facilities were virtually inaccessible to Soviet Germans living outside Kazakhstan, Kirghizia, western Siberia and Moscow. See ‘Soviet German Asks for More Teaching of German as Mother Tongue’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 136/82 (23 March 1982), annotations. As late as January 1982, the Landsmannschaft der Deutschen aus Russland [Organization of Germans from Russia] reported that there was still not a single German school in the USSR. See Oschlies, ‘The Status of Germans Living in the Soviet Union’, p. 108. In 1988 it was reported that the question of opening German national schools was being raised, but when this book went to press the issue had still not been resolved. See V. Auman and V. Chernyshev, ‘Sovetskie nemtsi pered voinoi i segodnya’ [Soviet Germans Before the War and Today], Pravda (4 November 1988), p. 8.
See Gerd Stricker, ‘A Visit to German Congregations in Central Asia’, Religion in Communist Lands 17 (1) (Spring 1989), pp. 19–33. According to Oschlies (The Status of Germans Living in the Soviet Union’, p. 111), in the mid-1980s there were 100 registered and 200 unregistered Lutheran congregations with 200–3000 members each; 10–12 Roman Catholic congregations with a total of 500 000 members; and German Baptist groups numbering 50 000–80 000, that were part of Russian congregations. Heitman (The Soviet Germans in the USSR Today, p. 46) estimated that there were 100 000 Mennonites. Pinkus (‘The Germans in the Soviet Union since 1945’, p. 143) noted that 25–30 per cent of Soviet Germans are religious believers.
See the discussion in ‘Our Aliens: The Destinies of Emigrants’, interview with Vyacheslav Kondratyev, interview conducted by Yelena Vesyolaya, Moscow News, no. 44 (5–12 November 1989), p. 15.
For discussions of anti-German sentiment and discrimination, see Oschlies, ‘The Status of Germans Living in the Soviet Union’, p. 114; Juozas Kazlas, ‘A Comparison of Ethnic Group Rights’, unpublished paper presented to the Conference on Problems of Soviet Ethnic Policies: The Status of Jews in the USSR and the Impact of Anti-Semitism, held at Columbia University, New York, 27 May 1980, pp. 75–8; John W. Kiser, ‘Emigration from the Soviet Union: The Case of the Soviet Germans’, Analysis, no. 57 (June 1976), p. 6;
Andrei D. Sakharov, My Country and the World, trans. Guy V. Daniels (London: Collins & Harvill, 1975), p. 58; Pinkus, ‘The Germans in the Soviet Union since 1945’, pp. 144–9; Albert Plutnik, Ispoved pered dalnei dorogoi’ [Confession Before a Long Journey], Izvestia (3 February 1989 ), p. 3.
See ‘“SSSR-nasha rodina”, sozdano obshchestvo sovetskikh nemtsev’ [‘The USSR is Our Motherland’, Society of Soviet Germans Created], Pravda (2 April 1989), p. 1; articles by Aleksandr Nikitin and Kurt Vidmaier under the general headline of ‘Nemetskaya avtonomia: Gde? Kogda? Kak?’ [German Autonomy: Where? When? How?], Literaturnaya gazeta (11 October 1989), p. 11.
Stent, From Embargo to Ostpolitik, p. 64. For information on Soviet-German emigration during 1918–41, see Benjamin Pinkus, ‘The Emigration of National Minorities from the USSR in the Post-Stalin Era’, Soviet Jewish Affairs 13 (February 1983), pp. 5–7.
See ‘The Case of the Germans Resident in Estonia’, A Chronicle of Human Rights in the USSR, no. 10 (July–August 1974), pp. 11–12; ‘More Ethnic Germans Seek to Emigrate from the USSR’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 26/77 (1 February 1977); ‘Ethnic Germans Maintain Pressure to Emigrate’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 121/77 (24 May 1977); ‘Ethnic German Emigration from the USSR’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 101/78 (5 May 1978); Anastasia Gelischanow, ‘Penalties for Soviet Germans Applying to Emigrate’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 309/82 (2 August 1982);
Anastasia Gelischanow, ‘Problems Still Face Soviet Ethnic Germans Wishing to Emigrate to the FRG’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 40/83 (19 January 1983 );
Anastasia Gelischanow, ‘No Concessions in Sight for Would-Be Ethnic German Emigrants from the USSR’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 376/83 (7 October 1983 ).
For examples of Soviet anti-emigration propaganda, see ‘Ethnic Germans Wanting to Settle in the FRG’, Sovetskaya Kirghizia (30 October 1980), in BBC Summary of World Broadcasts (27 November 1980), SU/6586/C/1–2 (A1,B); ‘Plight of Soviet Nationals who Emigrated to FRG’, Moscow Radio in German, 16 August 1978 in BBC Summary of World Broadcasts (24 August 1978), SU/5899/A1/3–4; ‘Disenchanted Emigrants to FRG Returning to USSR’, TASS in English, 23 January 1976, in BBC Summary of World Broadcasts (26 January 1976), SU/5117/A1/6–7; Anastasia Gelischanow, ‘Contrasting Pictures of Ethnic German Emigration from the USSR’, Radio Liberty Research, RL 172/79 ( 6 June 1979 ); Gelischanow, ‘Penalties for Soviet Germans Applying to Emigrate’.
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© 1992 Laurie P. Salitan
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Salitan, L.P. (1992). Soviet Germans: A Brief History and an Introduction to Their Emigration. In: Politics and Nationality in Contemporary Soviet-Jewish Emigration, 1968–89. St Antony’s. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-09756-2_5
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