[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] Reasons for migration; Was Re: the lost guard

[Jerry Frank]

I am glad that you clearly understand that, unlike Russia and the Catherine 
the Great invitations, the presence of Germans in Russian Poland (and 
Volhynia) occurred under different circumstances.

As you stated, in many parts of Russian Poland, Germans were already living 
there at the time of occupation because the territory (South Prussia and 
parts of East Prussia) had previously been under Prussian rule.  In many 
cases, the Germans were invited to these areas by invitation, not of 
royalty, but rather the landowning nobility.  Although there was often 
conflict between Germans and Poles at the peasant level, the Polish 
landlords were inviting Germans to settle on their lands to help them 
develop and farm it.  Depending on time and location, this was done under a 
variety of contract forms including rentals, lease, and purchase.

Watch in the next SGGEE Journal for an article about the migration from 
Russian Poland to Volhynia to see how much of this migration was 
economically motivated.




At 01:51 PM 07/01/2003 -0800, JUSTIN L DINGMAN wrote:

>In regard to the text, I vaguely remember hearing that Germans were
>invited in to farm Polish territory after Napoleon was defeated
>(particularly in the area that had been under Prussian control, a process
>referred to as the 'Germanization of Poland'), when Russia assumed
>control of what was called "The Kingdom of Poland."  I am not sure why
>Germans would have come, however, as they were not friendly to Russia at
>that time.  The Poles rebelled on several occasions, but any successes
>against the Russians were temporary.  I had never heard that Germans were
>invited into Russia itself,
>but I suppose anything is possible.  I am not sure what the motivation
>was, but in Poland it was something to the effect that bringing in German
>farmers would make the Poles less nationalistic.  However, the section in
>which grandfather's family was living had been part of the Prussian
>territory before Napoleon and probably had a great many Germans living
>there already.

Jerry Frank - Calgary, Alberta
jkfrank at shaw.ca