Dr David Zersen wrote this Foreward to Trudla Malinkowa’s masterpiece. We hope that it will inspire you to read her blog and get a copy of her book for your bookshelves and your family’s edification. Copies can be gotten through the Texas Wendish heritage Society, 1011 CR 212, Giddings, TX 78942 by contacting the Executive Director, wendish@bluebon.net.
Foreword
In the middle of the living room in our Wisconsin vacation home sits a wicker basket about the size of a clothes hamper. It may seem oddly positioned to visitors, but it assumes for us a focal point around which everything else takes meaning. It was my great-grandfather’s luggage containing everything he owned when he journeyed from Pomerania to Wisconsin in 1867. It reminds us that our ancestors often began with practically nothing and that our subsequent accumulation is more ephemeral than it may seem.
Shores of Hope is a remarkable study in emigration literature documenting the departure of people who often had less than my great-grandfather to four continents: Australia, the United States and Canada, South America, and Africa (South Africa). The details are well researched, and the supporting source material is filled with human pathos. It is a very good read, and at times one is filled with emotion to note that many of our ancestors probably underwent similar surrender and loss as well as hope and occasional exultation as they journeyed to unknown climes. In our current settings on these four continents we are all immigrants, even the so-called indigenous peoples, and we stand in awe of the artifacts and research that tell our stories.
Although native peoples lived in various places in all the areas to which the emigrants in this study traveled, these settlers carved out homelands in relatively isolated circumstances. They built huts, dug wells, crafted fences, cooked on open fires, planted crops, and dreamed of better days. In many cases, their humble homesteads were more primitive than those of the native peoples who preceded them.
The Wends in this specific study have a unique history. On the one hand, they are a microcosm of the great emigrations that left Europe in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. On the other hand, they are a Slavonic minority group in an area between Berlin and Dresden, Germany, which has a 1,500-year history and which was assigned territory within Germany’s artificially drawn borders. The economic and religious conditions became so difficult for these Wends and many others in central Europe, and the advertising for emigration was so convincing, that with other desperate people they took ships to lands which promised better opportunity.
In all the countries to which these emigrants came there are today descendants who look back on this history with wonder and admiration. Were it not for these brave men and women, Wends or others, we would not be where we are today.
Concordia University Press is happy to publish the first English translation of this work for a number of reasons.
First of all, it is an excellent and gripping chapter in emigration history that charts an exodus from Europe to four continents. Secondly, for the first time in one volume it provides the details for this broad multi-continental emigration to English-speaking populations in the countries to which the Wends emigrated. Thirdly, it is an important chapter in Lutheran history that has never been told in this comprehensive a fashion. Fourthly,
it is a story unknown to most living descendants of the Wendish emigrants. And finally, it provides background for the founding of Concordia University Texas, the university of which Concordia University Press is a part.
That final reason requires a brief explanation. Between 1854and 1926, the initial Wendish colony in Serbin, Texas,spawned about 20 Lutheran daughter congregations that carried on the theology and heritage of the Wendish pioneers. In 1923, thirteen of these congregations met to plan the founding of Concordia Lutheran College of Texas, which became a reality in 1926. Eighty-three years later, Concordia University Texas can lay claim to being the only university in the world founded largely by the descendants of Wends. And the bell which the pioneers brought with them in 1854 still welcomes all who enter the campus.
A few important linguistic details are necessary in this Foreword. There is an ongoing discussion debate in the scholarly community as to whether the emigrants described in this work are Sorbs or Wends. The discussion is too complicated to address in detail. Following WWII it became appropriate, especially among philologists and historians in the European setting, to call this Slavonic ethnic group “Sorbs,” a form of their native Serbja or Serby.
However, when the emigrants left Europe in the mid nineteenth century, they knew themselves as Wends, and so they are typically known today in the countries where they settled and where readers will typically have access to this book. For this reason, to avoid confusion with the use of two different terms, upon the advice of numerous scholars, we are using “Wend” and “Wendish” throughout this work except where the word may be the title of a book, a newspaper/journal, or an organization.
Another linguistic problem is created with the use of the words Protestant, Evangelical, and Lutheran. Both Protestant and Evangelical can have different meanings in the European and in the American settings. Protestant
can be a generic term in the English speaking world for all denominations which are neither Roman Catholic nor Eastern Orthodox. In Europe, however, it can be used as a synonym for either Lutheran or Reformed or the union
churches which are a combination of both. Within the Lutheran community, “Evangelical” has a historical use, either as an adjective modifying Lutheran or, in European settings, as an alternative word for Lutheran. The word also is used in the English-speaking world to describe a 20th-century conservative movement that sees itself as more progressive than Fundamentalist. Although it will be difficult to choose the right word in all contexts, we have tried to allow the translation to respect the context and use the most appropriate term.
Finally, there is a sensitive difference between the use of emigrant (one leaving a country) and immigrant (one traveling to a country). Depending on their use in the setting in Europe or in the four continents to which the Wends journeyed, choosing the right term can be tricky. We hope that we have used the terms judiciously.
Among those to be thanked for helping to bring this translation to publication are Raymond and Sandra (Miertschin) Matthijetz, the Texas Wendish Heritage Society, and Concordia University Press, who provided financial support. We are also grateful to the original publisher, the Domowina-Verlag, and the author, Trudla Malinkowa, for making this work available to us. Likewise we are grateful to Thomas Fiebiger of the Satzstudio Kontrapunkt in Bautzen for making the original photographs as well as the immigration lists available to us in digital format. We are also thankful to the Board of Concordia University Press for recognizing the importance of this work and giving it priority in our queue of publications.
There are many individuals who need to be thanked, first of whom are the translators themselves. The Texas portion of this work was first given to us for consideration by the Texas Wendish Heritage Society in a rough draft that had been provided by Luise Green and further edited by Jack Wiederhold. Believing that the whole work should be published, not just the Texas section, the Concordia University Press staff solicited the help of two translators: the Rev. Konstantin Hahn, a Germanspeaking native of the Ukraine who served until his retirement as Assistant to the President of the Ontario District of the Lutheran Church-Canada, and the Rev. Carl Roemer, Th.D., a second-generation German speaker who did theological work at Erlangen in Germany.
We are grateful to many readers who reviewed the manuscript and made comments and corrections, including Mrs. Georgie Boyce (former President, Texas Wendish Heritage Society), Dr. Ceretha Cartwright (CUP Board Member), Mr. Charles Dube (President, Texas Wendish Heritage Society), Mr. Carl Kupfer (CUP Board Member), Mrs. Jan Slack (Managing Director, Texas Wendish Heritage Society), and Dr. David Z. Chroust (Texas A&M University).
Scholarly advice at different points was provided by Dr. Gerald Stone (Oxford, UK), Dr. Charles Wukasch (Austin, Texas), Dr. Roland Marti (Saarbrücken, Germany), Dr. Gunther Schaarschmidt (Victoria, British Columbia), and Dr. Walter Kamphoefner (College Station, Texas).
Special thanks are given to the author, Trudla Malinkowa, who read the translation and gave not only a very thorough critique, but also provided updates, including a new section on the Iowa Wends, as well as some new pictures. Mrs. Malinkowa, a dentist by background, works with the Sorbian Institute in Bautzen, and her areas of specialization include emigration and monument restoration. She is the editor of the Wendish Lutheran magazine Pomhaj Boh and the author of numerous books and articles on Wendish history and culture. Her support throughout the translation and publication process provided a level of quality that we could not have achieved alone.
Finally, thanks are given to Dr. George Nielsen for his willingness to allow us to use his Name List, and to Cathryn C. Petersen for a new addition to this list along with new pictures involving the Wends of lowa; to Kevin Zwar, Honorary Researcher for the Wendish Heritage Society of Australia, and Lyall Kupke, Archivist, Lutheran Archives, Lutheran Church Australia, for their advice; and to Eric Mellenbruch, the typographic designer for Concordia University Press, whose congenial and wise partnership gave confidence over the lengthy process that is involved in publishing a book.
To my wife, who accepted with patience the many months given to editing, translating and negotiating the details on this project, and to my son, Rolf, who helped with computer solutions to tricky problems, I extend my thanks and appreciation.
DAVID ZERSEN, Managing Editor Concordia University Press Austin, 2009
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