Farmers in Search of Land, Renewal, and religious Freedom

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During the 1700s, Mennonite farmers sought land to own, cultivate, and pass on to their children, as they also sought renewal of faith for themselves and their communities. They hoped to be tolerated for their distinctive and radical beliefs, and many migrated to new places that offered them religious freedom.  

Mennonites seemed to love the land. On the third day of creation, God created dry land called Earth, bringing forth all kinds of plants, crops, and trees. They liked Psalm 24:1, “The earth is the LORD’s and everything in it, the world and all who live in it.” (NIV) 

In this lecture, we will review the migration of Mennonites from the Netherlands east to Poland, Prussia, and Russia in search of land and religious toleration. Second, we will analyze why Mennonites fled Switzerland to the French Alsace and German Palatinate. Third, we will trace the westward migration of European Amish and Mennonite families who sailed across the Atlantic Ocean to a new world in Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Ontario.

Dutch migration to Poland, Prussia, and Russia

A new homeland for Dutch Mennonites emerged when hundreds migrated east to Poland and Prussia. As early as the 1540s, persecution pushed Mennonites out of the Netherlands. Emperor Charles V unleashed fierce persecution against Flemish Mennonites in Flanders in the 1530s and 1540s, compelling them to relocate. Many of those put to death in the Martyrs Mirror come from these difficult years of persecution. The violent disaster at Munster had tarred the reputation of Mennonites in the Netherlands. While some Dutch Mennonites grew wealthy, not all did so. Difficulties in making a living, wars, and rapid urbanization pushed many Dutch Mennonites to move east.

At the same time, nobles and ruling officials in the Polish province of West Prussia welcomed religious minorities. Rural Dutch Mennonite farm families felt pulled to the Vistula Delta of Polish Prussia. In Poland, they found religious tolerance offered by noblemen who sought skilled farmers to cultivate grain and raise milk cows, as well as to reclaim marginal land in the river delta. The nobility needed more farmers, so the Mennonites from the Netherlands and North Germany moved east to seek better opportunities for themselves and their children.

The Vistula River in Poland seemed to beckon the Mennonites to move. In the 1540s, among the earliest to migrate, a dozen Flemish Mennonite families from Flanders fled persecution. They moved to Przechowko  (pronounced Chee-hōf-ka)along the Vistula River, about sixty-five miles south of Danzig (today Gdansk), along the Baltic Sea. By 1661, the Old Flemish Mennonites had established a thriving church in Poland, and other farm families from the Netherlands joined them. A trickle of migration turned into a steady stream of Mennonites who fled the Netherlands and northern Germany, such that by 1780, there were approximately 13,000 Mennonites in West Prussia. In the Netherlands, however, during the 1700s, the Mennonite population decreased by 83%, and 100 Dutch Mennonite congregations disappeared.