SOCIETY MEMBERSHIP

BUKOVINA PEOPLE & EVENTS

Bukovina Brazil in 2001 is progressing. A number of members have plans to travel to Rio Negro/Mafra July 6-8 for their annual celebration. One of the leaders of the Bukovina colony, Ayrton Goncalves Celestino, has been in frequent contact with us and restates his welcome to all. Anyone interested may contact the society to coordinate travel. Al Lang has made his second stop there recently during his international travels. The plans for Friday include international speakers and an evening of arts and music. Saturday will include tours of the Bukovina colony, a grand parade of the Bukovina people and a dinner and dance featuring the crowning of the Bukovina Queen. Sunday will start with Mass followed by a Bukovina lunch and an afternoon of games.

RUTH SCHMAHL CHRISTMAS

PILSNER FAMILY REUNION

ARNOLD SCHMAHL FOUND IN COLLEGE PARK, MARYLAND!
The National Archives EWZ Collection

 by Fay Jordaens and Laurence Krupnak

      When my Schmahl ancestors departed Czernowitz in 1911 for Canada, they left behind all contact with extended family members. Knowledge of the Bukowina Schmahls would have remained unknown to me had it not been for wartime German documents which were gathered by the Western Allies and copies of which are available in the U.S. at the National Archives (NA).

      The German documents which opened the door to additional family history are the documents of the Einwandererzentrastelle (EWZ). The EWZ was the wartime German government organization that coordinated the resettlement of ethnic Germans who were residing outside of Germany during the period 1939-1945.

      In great detail the EWZ records defined the status of my relatives who resided in Bukowina and resettlement camps during the war. Seeing photographs of heretofore unknown relatives was particularly chilling. In some cases, I read hand-written letters which asked that encamped relatives be allowed to leave Germany and return to their "homeland" in Romania.

      By carefully studying descriptions of physical features, as well as relationships to one another, the photographs of relatives put a "face" to some unknown Schmahls.  For example, I never knew that my grandfather Ludwig Schmahl, who died in Canada in 1916, had a brother named Arnold and, that he and his wife and four children were living in Czernowitz. Imagine my surprise to not only discover "Onkel Arnold, " but to find a clear picture of him just as he appeared that sorrowful day on the 14th of February, 1941!  His picture shows a sad looking 63 year-old man, with a full head of hair, deeply furrowed brow, very even features, sporting a handlebar mustache, neatly dressed in shirt, tie, sweater and jacket, holding a placard with his EWZ number depicted across the picture's base.  Arnold, described as a shoemaker, lists the names of five half brothers and sisters, all of whom were unknown to our family!  

     For researchers interested in and understand the codes developed by the Nuremburg Gesetz [laws], Rasse-Kartei (Race Cards) contained in the EWZ files are replete with this information.  I owe a large thank you to Laurence Krupnak, a researcher located in the Washington, DC area.  I hired Laurence to access the EWZ records because the complete EWZ collection is presently only available at a U.S. NA facility located in College Park, Maryland, and the Bundesarchiv in Berlin, Germany.  

     Below is a very brief description of the EWZ collection. The US National Archives' EWZ Collection During the final months of World War II through October 1953, the Western Allies under US Army control consolidated the large caches of Nazi Party and affiliated government organization documents that were found throughout Germany.  These documents were stored and examined in Berlin in a facility that was called the Berlin Document Center (BDC).

     In 1993, an agreement was reached to transfer title and control of the BDC to Germany by July 1, 1994.  One article of the agreement was that all captured German records would be microfilmed and that one complete set would be provided to the US.  These records were given to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) for archiving and making available to the public.

      One wartime German agency whose records were captured was the EWZ. The EWZ, Immigration Control Center, was established in 1939 to coordinate the resettlement and naturalization of qualified ethnic Germans who resided outside of Germany. The EWZ processed more than 2.9 million persons during the period 1939-1945.  Most EWZ records were found intact by Allied Forces - an estimated 70,000-80,000 files were destroyed before capture.  

     Screening (Durchschleusing) the eligible ethic Germans involved interviews and examinations by 6-9 EWZ offices. Families were generally processed together and all persons aged 15 and above were registered separately. Photographs were taken, medical examinations were performed, fluency in German language was tested, family histories and racial examinations based on anthropological evaluations of physical attributes were recorded, etc.

      Some or all of the following documents were prepared by the EWZ for each ethnic German that was interviewed:

• EWZ-Kartei (or E-Kartei), a general information card;
  

• Gesundheitskartei (or G-Kartei), a health examination card, which included biographical data, a genealogical chart, and a photograph ["Health Cards"];
  

• Volkstumsausweis Certificat, an applicant's ethnic German background, birthplace, and residence, and Umsiedlerausweis, an applicant's resettlement status;  
  

• Rasse-Kartei, cards that summarized the racial examination, including a photograph ["Race Cards"];
  

• Anträge, naturalization application case files, which are generally very thick files containing,  among other items, a Stammblätter, a standard form which was used to summarize personal information, including spouse and children, and family history ["Family Form"]; Einbürgerungsanträge, (abbreviated as Vfg.), the naturalization application form; Umsiedler, which includes a description of property left behind; related correspondence; etc.

      As stated above, the NA has a complete set of the EWZ records. The set of EWZ records is on microfilm and the microfilms are kept at the NA's facility in College Park, Maryland.  This facility is called Archives II and is located near Washington, DC. The NARA microform publication number for the EWZ collection is A3342, "Documents Generated In Connection With Activities Of The EWZ."

      Here are the major series of the A3342 collection that contain genealogically-useful information:

1. EWZ-50:  Anträge (Applications) for naturalization of ethnic Germans from the USSR,

2. EWZ-51:  Anträge for naturalization of ethnic Germans from Romania [includes all of Bukowina and Bessarabia],

3. EWZ-52:  Anträge for naturalization of ethnic Germans from 1939 Poland,

4. EWZ-53:  Anträge for naturalization of ethnic Germans from the Baltic countries,

5. EWZ-541: Anträge for naturalization of ethnic Germans from Yugoslavia,

6. EWZ-542: Anträge for naturalization of ethnic Germans from France,

7. EWZ-543: Anträge for naturalization of ethnic Germans from Bulgaria,

8. EWZ-544: Applicants for Wehrmacht, Organisation Todt, SD, and SS,

9. EWZ-545: Anträge for naturalization of ethnic Germans from Süd-Tirol,

10. EWZ-56:  Rasse-Kartei, and  

11. EWZ-57:  E-Kartei and G-Kartei (E/G Kartei).

      E/G Kartei served as the central registry of the EWZ.  The E/G Kartei collection contains approximately 2.9 million alphabetically-ordered cards.

      NA staff do not perform research.  They will however examine the available indexes to determine which microfilm rolls MIGHT contain records of individuals that you are interested in.  [That is, the indexes only provide a range of names that appear on individual microfilm rolls.]  Copies of NARA's EWZ microfilms can be purchased from NARA.

      If you are unable to visit Archives II or do not want to take a chance of purchasing a roll(s) of microfilm that may not contain the person(s) that you are researching, consider hiring a professional who is very familiar with and can easily access the EWZ collection, such as Laurence Krupnak. Laurence is a member of the APG, the Association of Professional Genealogists, a peer-reviewed organization.  Laurence frequently contributes to the Bukowina Mailing List. Laurence can be contacted by e-mail at Lkrupnak@erols.com, or by post at 1711 Corwin Drive, Silver Spring, Maryland 20910. 

From Czernowitz to Cologne:
The Life of Edith Krammer (nee Baum)

Recounted by Her Daughter, Ingeborg

Edith was born in Czernowitz, Bukovina in 1918,  just after World War I when Bukovina came under Romanian jurisdiction. She was the daughter of the master stove fitter Heinrich Baum and his wife, Karoline Weber.

Picture 1: Karoline Weber, Heinrich Baum (not avail)

Edith was the fourth of six siblings, the first three of whom were born in Czernowitz when it was still under Austrian rule. She recalls a happy childhood amongst her family with a close relationship to her grandmother Josefa Baum (nee Huber), uncles, aunts and cousins,  who also lived in Czernowitz. Her material grandparents had died before Edith's birth.  

Picture 2: Josef  Huber (not avail)

 The siblings grew up in a strict Protestant environment, where Sunday church attendance was mandatory. Her father was a Presbyterian and her mother was very much involved with the women's association of the local parish.  

The German community of Czernowitz kept close contact with its members, which, however, did not preclude friendship with Jewish fellow citizens. Edith's best friend, Hedy Gottlieb, was Jewish. In 1925 Edith enrolled in the "German Protestant School,"  which was affiliated with the Protestant parish of Czernowitz. Although the language of instruction was German, Romanian classes were obligatory. She left this school in 1932 (seven years of formal education were required at this time) and began an apprenticeship as a milliner in the shop of Mr. Weinraub, a Jewish businessman.

At about this same time Edith became a member of the "Deutscher Jugendbund " (German Youth Association) and the "Gustav-Adolf Schar " (Gustav-Adolf Group ) of the parish. With these two organizations she took numerous trips around the Czernowitz area and to the Carpathian Mountains. During holidays she spent some time with relatives in Kimpolung,  in southern Bukovina.

Picture 3: The Preaching Angel (not avail)

The Gustav Adolf Group had a theatrical section and acting became one of Edith's passions. She proudly recalls her role as a preaching angel in a nativity play. In 1939 Edith met her great love, the film technician Franz Josef Krammer, born in Czernowitz, whom she married in 1940 in that city's Protestant  church.  At this time Czernowitz was already occupied by the Russians. She recalls that the material for her wedding dress had to be clandestinely spirited out of the shop by its owner because the Russians had closed  all businesses.

 Picture 4: Edith and Franz Josef in Czernowitz

Later in 1940 Adolf Hitler ordered that all Germans return to Germany. At this time Edith, expecting her first baby and  ill with pneumonia,  could not depart the city with her mother and sisters. Her older brothers, Rudolf and Heinrich Baum, were no longer in Czernowitz, since they  had already been drafted for military service some time earlier. Franz Josef, her husband, had not yet been drafted since his job was deemed "important for the war." The media of film and radio had become significant vehicles of propaganda.

Edith traveled to Upper Silesia via a hospital train. Her husband was not allowed to accompany her en route. It took three months before her husband found her in a resettlement camp in Silesia, where her daughter, Ingeborg, was born. To forestall Franz Josef's being inducted into the SS,  the family also moved to Gratz  (Edith's father had died earlier in 1942). In 1942 her son, Gerhard Franz, was born in Gratz and in 1943 her husband was finally drafted. He was killed in action one year later, leaving Edith a widow at the age of twenty-six with two small children.

In 1945 Edith, her two children, her mother and her three sisters, one with three small children, had to flee Gratz. The circumstances of this escape proved dramatic. They had preciously little to eat and drink. Edith recalls that the bottle for her sister's three-month-old baby had to be warmed over the flame of a candle in the train. 

Their destination was a small village near Neuruppin, north of Berlin. There they found shelter on a farm, where Edith worked in the fields. During the winter she taught religious instruction at the local school. On many occasions the family faced starvation while the farmers were feeding potatoes and milk to their cattle rather than giving the food to the "unwanted" refugees.

 In the meantime the Russians had occupied the area, and the Germans lived in constant fear of the drunken soldiers who almost nightly  were on the prowl for young women. Once, when Edith's sister was taking Edith's daughter to bed and praying with the child, a Russian soldier aimed his rifle through the window. The sister panicked and ran with the child into the kitchen.

 Because Edith spoke Romanian and showed courage, she could defend herself and her children, but it was a time of sorrow and fear. One of Edith's saddest memories was the death of her mother in 1946, on her daughter's fifth birthday.

 In 1949 Edith finally found a flat in the district capital of Neuruppin and a position in the local law office. Because she resisted joining the political party  (the only one allowed), she faced certain pressures. Even though it was nine years before the erection of the Berlin Wall, leaving the Soviet sector was risky business but nonetheless possible. Happily, the family was able to relocate to West Germany.

But as in 1945, she lost everything she possessed. She had nothing and again had to start from scratch. Yet this time is was much easier. Her brother, Heinrich Baum, who  had settled near Cologne after his release from a POW camp in France, proved a great help to her. At that time his wife was still behind the Iron Curtain in Romania. She had been forcibly repatriated in 1945. But with the help of the Red Cross, she was able to join him in Cologne in 1962. In 1956 Heinrich built a house in Cologne where he, Edith and her two children, and another sister with her family, lived together.

Edith is still in this house with her sister . With her two children,  three grandchildren and one great-grandson, she is looking forward to celebrating her eighty-second birthday this August.

Karlsberg, Bukovina
from: Das Ansiedlungswesen in der Bukowina

by Raimund Friedrich Kaindl
translated by Irmgard Hein Ellingson

(Innsbruck: Verlag der Wagner’schen Universitäts-Buchhandlung)

pages 353-359

This is the report of the Karlsberg parish chronicle in regard to the beginnings of the village.^[i] Karlsberg was named for the Archduke Karl and was founded in 1797 by the Radautz Economic Director Pauli and the Jewish man Reichenberg. In that year, in the middle of the forest near Putna, these two men established a glass making enterprise called Putner Hütte or the Putna Works. A number of wooden houses were also built. The glass works in Lubaczow in Kreis (county) Zólkiew, Galicia, were being abandoned at the time so Pauli and Reichenberg sent for the German Bohemian workers there to come to Karlsberg. The workers came and lived in the forest. For the most part, as their duties at the glass works permitted, they tended gardens and meadows to which they received proprietary rights. The leader was Löffelmann, a hard-working, just-minded, and experienced man under whose direction the colony flourished. When officials saw this, the colony was passed to the administration of the Radautz Economic Directorship.

The Radautz domain, which included Karlsberg, belonged to the imperial Religious Foundation which administered lands confiscated from the Orthodox church. This land was rented to the military for its stud farm so that General Cavallar, the farm’s commander, had a certain influence upon the glass works. The first official administrator of the glass works was named Beller. He was removed by Cavallar and replaced by Rybicki, who directed the works until 1819. Rybicki’s successor Franz Kuppetz managed the business so poorly that the glass works had to be abandoned on 14 July 1829, thereby reducing the workers to the most severe misery.

The following excerpts from the village chronicle required elaboration from some sources, and correction from others.

It was previously noted that the entire Suczawa [Suceava] valley once belonged to the Putna monastery of the Orthodox faith, and this area became part of the Religious Foundation domain when the Austrian government confiscated the monastery estates. The military rented it for their stud farm, as already indicated, but they had no use for the forested lands. The military stud farm commander, as the superior imperial authority, had permitted others to pursue their objectives and in the same manner, allowed the entrepreneur and businessman Reichenberg to build a glass works by Putna. The intention was not only to increase revenue but also to provide a place for people in the neighboring villages to work and earn money. The Economic Office director Pauli had a leading role in these negotiations and is therefore not omitted in the parish chronicle.

The chronicles accurately report that the first workers, virtually all Bohemian Germans, came from the glass works at Lubaszow, Galicia. The Putna works commenced operation in 1797 and in 1801 passed to the possession of the stud farm. On 20 October 1801, General Cavallar negotiated a contract with the workers, who promised to work for at least one seven-year term of service in return for a certain wage, the endowment of a house and garden as well as 1 ½ Joch^[ii] of pasture land, and an old-age pension. The chronicle’s accuracy in regard to the enterprise’s early success is demonstrated by the fact that the construction of a second glass works was being considered by 1802. It is also noted that the Galician Landesguberium [provincial government] negotiated with the Radautz cavalry commander about the immigration of twelve glass-worker families from Bergreichenstein, Bohemia, according to a document dated 18 March1803. Since the glass works expansion did not take place, it seems that these families did not go to Bukovina but a number of other Bohemian woodcutter families arrived in that year. In return for providing 50 Klafter^[iii] of wood per year, each family would receive about six Joch of land, the necessary wood for construction, and according to need, advances for the purchases of livestock and implements. The settlers repaid the advances made to them in four years and then they requested a contract. But the Economic Office demanded 60 Klafter of wood from each family, which caused various deep-rooted and persistent quarrels to surface. Even though the county office interceded on behalf of the settlers, a number of families moved away and were replaced by others. It was not until 21 September 1815 that a contract was concluded with the Karlsberg woodcutters, although a similar agreement had been reached with the glass workers fourteen years earlier. After this, each family was again required to provide only 50 Klafter of wood per year.

There was a dispute about the intended allocation of land as well. Since only a limited amount of arable land was available, the woodcutters were also assigned land in the Putna community. Such incursions by the land managers had been forbidden by terms of a 1787 decree issued by Emperor Joseph II. Forested lands brought into cultivation belonged to the person who cleared it, and to his heirs.^[iv] After that, on 7 November 1815, the county office decided in favor of the Putna community and those who resided there. Land had to be found for the Karlsberg church, school, and similar structures but only very limited amounts of arable land were provided.^[v] Each family was given its own house, a vegetable garden, only about 1 ½ Joch of pasture, and pasturage rights in a community meadow in 1816. Twenty years later, the village contained only about 42 Joch of tillable land.

The quarrels, the management errors, and damage to the enterprise caused by the competition from other glass works ultimately caused the Karlsberg works to fail. A number of the workers were laid off in 1825 and two years later, it was shut down. Unfortunately we are not well-informed about the operation. It was reported that the Radautz (Fratautz) estate relinquished the entire production of the Putna works to one contractor at the price of 1 fl. 40 kr. ^[vi] for one Schock^[vii] of glass panes and 1 fl. 20 kr. per Schock of shaped glass items.^[viii]

The unemployed workers, who lived in an area with very little arable land, experienced the most severe misery after the glass works closed. Only a few found jobs in other glass works. Fortunately this was about the time that the settlement plans were again set into motion.

On 22 October 1833, the Radautz Economic Office proposed to the cavalry general that twenty-one unemployed families be offered the opportunity to settle upon abandoned properties in the Radautz estate. These people were to be sold their houses in Karlsberg at a cheap price. Each family was to relinquish their six Joch of land to compensate for outstanding debt upon their contracted endowment. They would have only 42 Joch 1034 square Klafter^[ix] that they could use until their relocation. Since 126 Joch were necessary for the 21 households, an area of 83 Joch 566 square Klafter would be taken from the estate and the community meadow of the Putna community. The rest of the land would then be obtained from the forested lands. The county office interceded on behalf of these settlers, referring to their plight which they neither deserved nor merited, the poor quality of their land as contrasted to the vast estate forests totaling 40,000 Joch, and the colony’s impoverished condition in the surrounding wild area. It was the imperial councilor’s duty to supervise the contract’s conclusion after the imperial chancellery granted the settlement on 8 January 1838 and the regional Gubernium approved it on 2 February 1838, which referred it to the county office. The same contract went from the Lemberg Revenue Administration (15 March 1838) to the District Administration to the Solka Economic Office. Thereby the former glass makers and woodcutters were each endowed with about 6 ½ Joch of land. The county office reported on 15 October 1838 that the Radautz Economic Direction had resolved various matters which differed from those on the Solka and Illischestie estates, with settlement officials. Settlement plans proceeded and a contract was concluded on 6 October 1839.

A later report, which was dated from Radautz on 20 October 1853, noted that in 1841, each of the twenty-one unemployed families received 6 Joch 400 square Klafter of land excluding ground for a house. The total land allocation amounted to 131 Joch 400 square Klafter, of which 56 Joch 1416 Klafter were arable land and 74 Joch 584 Klafter were forested land. Each family was also allowed to use a community pasture of 400 Joch.^[x] They were promised ten tax-free years after which each family was required to provide twelve days of manual labor, a measure of spun yarn that was 1 Klafter long and consisted of 30 skeins with 30 threads per skein, one wagon-load of wood, one chicken, and finally 30 kr. C.-M. in accordance with the forest laws. This contract was concluded by the local officials but not ratified. In November 1841, the imperial Hofkammer and the imperial councilor both noted that Karlsberg received different consideration than other settlements and ordered that a new contract with the common and prevalent norms be concluded.

But matters did not unfold as in other colonies. This contract had not yet been concluded in 1848, when Unterthanswesen, a form of vassalage or servitude, ended. Previously the settlers had only been obligated to pay the fees as stipulated by the forest laws. After 1848, it was difficult to conclude such a contract because it had been based upon a form of servitude which no longer existed. The Karlsberg settlers were freed from this fundamental condition of their existence, as were other imperial subjects. It was also determined that Karlsberg, as well as Neu-Solonetz, already owned all its properties and therefore paid its own taxes to the principality.^[xi] In regard to their rights for a  wood supply and the terms of servitude, the Karlsberg people reached a settlement with the Radautz estate for proprietary rights to 125 Joch of land, as dated 11 January 1868 and ratified by the regional commission on 10 July 1868.

In 1848, 667 Catholics lived in Karlsberg and in 1890, the settlement numbered about 880 German Catholics among the 942 residents.

Endnotes

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Visitors since July 5, 2002               Last Revised: 01/01/07 07:45:41 PM