Christian Gustave KRAUSE

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Ereignisse

Ehepartner und Kinder

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A BIOGRAPHY OF CHRISTIAN GUSTAVE KRAUSE

by

GUSTAVE C. KRAUSE

I am putting down some of the things in my father's life that I remember, and his earlier life that he told us about. My brother, Reinhold, wrote a short history in 1973, which is part of Hilda's Golden Heritage published on the town's 50th anniversary. Since there was not much mention of Dad's younger life before he emigrated and the rest of it was of necessity quiteshort, I will add some of what I remeber. I've told my children most of this at different times but it might be interesting to read through, and some of Dad's great grandchildren might also find someinteresting reading.

Christian Gustave Krause was born on October 5, 1887 in the village of Brienne in Bessarabia in South Russia. He was baptized in the name of the Triune God at the village church on October 15, 1887. He was confirmed in the faith of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of sourth Russia on April 7, 1902

His father was Christian Krause and his grandfather wasGeorge Krause (I think). My dad used to say that his grandfather had a wind-powered flour mill and one of his (Dad's) favorite places to visit was to the old mill to hear his grandfather's stories.My impression was that the wind power was not too dependable and after the old gentleman retired, the mill wasn't in operation anymore.

My Dad (according to mother who was very close to hisown age) was not an honor student but he must have had a good head for mathematics, and was quite good in the Russian language, a required subject since that was the country they lived in. By RoyalRussian permission they had religious freedom and the right to use the German language in church and school. Russian therefore, was not considered very important, although it had to be taught. Thisarea in Russia was colonized and developed by German immigrants who came there under an agreement made with Csarina Katherine the Great. This colonization happened early in the ninetennth century, Ithink

The earliest part of it may have occurred in the latter decades of the eighteenth century.

My Dad remembered and told us about the coronation of Csar Nikolaus 11, who was executed by the communists in 1917. Dad said they had a school holiday on coronation day and he mentioned soldiers and cannon ( I would imagine the army had a parade and fired salutes ).

Grandfather and Grandmother Christian and Christina ( nee Mathias) had a family of ten children: four boys ( Henry, Christian, August, and George.) and six girls ( Johanne, Mary, Emma, Martha, Lydia and Bertha.)

In Bessarabia, most farm owners' sons learned a trade since most of their equipment and clothing was manufactured right in the village. Dad was apprenticed to a tailor. since hismeister was also a landowner, the apprentice found that he was actually doing more farm work than learning to be a tailor. I think these contracts were for three years, but I am not sure if Dad completed his course. He did, I think, make a coat or two during his first years in Canada, but I don't think he considered his trade as interesting work" and during his life in Canada he was totally committed to farming.

Some time after he was apprenticed to a tailor, Dad was drafted into the Russian army. The years he spent in the army were two but precisely at what age he was drated Idon't know, although I think it was at 21.

Every able-bodied young man had to serve in the army at that time. I understand they drew lots to see which draft each had to go with, possibly so that the village was not depleted of all its young workers.

Dad was blond and of slim build so he was drafted for the Csar's elite guard, an infantry unit. Army life was pretty grim(primitive). Dad said that when he first got there a whole group sat at the table at mealtime. The cook or flunky put a big pot of Borscht in the middle of the table and everyone dug in, if he was lucky enough to have a wooden spoon. One thing I remember very well is that Dad never wasted much time over meals. When farm work was busiest he used to say, " You guys should have been in the Russian army. You would have learned to eat fast or starve." Later, during his time of service, they had an outbreak of some disease, which may have been the mumps as Dad said that everyone that got sickhad a real swollen throat. After this the army doctors decreed that everyone was to have his own pivate bowl and spoon. the food, however, was still far from plentiful and the competition was keen.

When the village of Brienne was founded and as it developed, each of the founders received a lot ( Hof) to build his house and outbuildings. The village was located in a valley by a stream with steep hills ranging alongside. The farm land was on the steppe ( or bench or mesa ). This must have been a vast prairie. The farmers all lived in the village and went out each morning to work the land ( in season). The grain was hauled home in wagons and threshed on the threshing floor in the Hof, by driving the horses over it to trample the grain from the straw. The straw was forkedoff the grain by hand and the chaff was then separated in a hand-operated fanning mill. The clean grain was bagged and stored in the house loft. It was carried there piggy-back by the young men. Thestraw and chaff were stacked and used for feeding the livestock. The hillsides were used to grow grapes and wine-making was a major industry. Apples, cherries, apricots, peaches and watermelo werealso grown. Each Hof had a share of steppe land anad also of the lilsides, which were also used to grow vergetable as well as fruits and grapes. The women and girls found their occupation here as well as working in the house. I think they were all very busy and worked very hard, but they had a lot of good times too when they got together in the evenings. There were always plenty of other young people about and one of the major social events in the fall and winter were corn husking bees.

As the population increased, land and building sites got scarcer. Each founding member's Hof was subdivided among his family and things became quaite crowded both at home and on the steppe where the fields were quite small.

When Dad came back from the army, he was at home withhis parents. In November of 1912 he married my mother, Mathilda Hannemann, who was of the same village.

My mother's sister, Mary Brauer, and her husband ( Christian ) and family had immigrated to Kulm, North Dakota in 1904. In 1913, Uncle Christian came back for a visit and, what with the scarcity of land at home, my parents decided to sell out and try their fortune in America.

My sister, Irene, was born October 16, 1913 and January, 1914 my parents bid farewell to their home and parents and all their friends and relatives to go to America. They knew that very likelythis was good-bye and not just a short-term parting. ( My parents never saw their home again, although they visited some of their relatives in Germany in 1954). All Germans were moved out of Bessarabia to Poland in 1940 when Stalin and Hitler made a deal. Later, in 1945, these people fled from Poland into Germany where they lived as 'displaced persons". The younger peole integrated, but some of them emigrated. Among those were my Uncle George Krause with his wife ( Emma) and children, Anna and Emil, and Emil's fiancee, Friedl Junge, who came to Canada in October, 1951.

When Dad, Mother and baby Irene came to Kulm, homesteading land was very scarce, except for some very rough land. Dad looked around as far west as Malta, Montana but nothing that appealed to him ws found.So they decided to come to Hilda, Alberta in Canada where a nephew of my mother's was located. He was about the same age as my parents and had located here with his family some years earlier. They came by train to Irvine, Alberta which was then the closest point on the railway. From here the nephew, Mr. Baumgardt, took them to his home 40 miles north. of Irvine ( eight miles west and one mile north of HIlda: NW 1/4, Sect. 3, Twp. 18, Rg. 2, West of the 4th meridian). This was their base while they looked for a homestead of their own.

Dad homesteaded the NW 1/4, Sect. 24-18-3-4and took preemption on the adjjoining SW 1/4 Sect. 24-18-3-4 in April of 1914. A sod house was built shortly after.Their homestead land established a credit rating for them so they managed to get established with much scrimping and long hours of hard work. A wagon and horses were among thefirst requirements and some fo the cancelled mortgage notes and bills of sale were still in my Dad's effectsat his death. Also the receipts received when he paid ten dollars per quarter section to file on his two quarters.

There was so little rainfall in the year 1914, that there was no greengrass and no breaking of the prairie sod was possible. My parents were very discouraged and were contemplating writing home for money so they could go back. Dad said at one time they were saving their last dime to buy a stamp so they could send a letter home, when they received a letter from home saying that war had broken out in Europe in August, 1914 and that Dad had received a call to rejoinhis regiment. This put a new face on the situation and from then on in they started to think "stay". The first winter they spent on the homestead they were very poor but Dad said they something to eat every day. One day it was "knoephla" and the next day it was "strudla". The crate that the kitchen range came in was used to build a table. One thing my mother was still lamenting when I was oldenough to remember was the fact that they had left most of the bedding and such things behind. Someone had advised them it was better to buy new things when they got to America.

The homestead was not as isolated as the foregoing might seem to indicate. By 1914 the whole area around Hilda was pretty well taken up by homesteading people. There were two more dwellings, one a bachelor's, on my Dad's Sect. 13, two families on Sect. 12, two families on Sect. 23, and to the east as well, neighbors were very close. Everyone was primarily from a German-Russian background and of the Evangelical Lutheran faith, so they soon had a church and formed new friendships and social life. I remember though that, during my childhood when we had company or visited, the subject 'da Heim' was always predominant. The Zion Evangelical Lutheran congregation was organized in 1912. Melita's ( my wife's) Dad was a charter member. This congregation, by God's grace, continued until 1969. At thetime it was disbanded, one son, tow grandson and one granddaughter of Dad's were members of the congregation. Of the group, some joined Bethlehem Lutheran at hilda and, others, St. Paul's in MedicineHat.

I as born on November 16, 1915. This was a good crop year although Dad had only a few acres under cultivation. He had built a little granary of clay and straw mortar and prairie stones for the wheat but the barley had to be stored in the kitchen part of the sod house. Apparently, my bed was on the barley heap. I;m sure I never knew as I must had had plenty of bedding. The year 1916 was another good crop year. There was a little more land under cultivation and the grain prices were also pretty good, so this helped them to get established so slowly. My parents often said, although they were poor and everything was slow, hard work, they were content and happy with good friends and neighbors, all of whom were living in the same circumstances.

My Dad had to haul his grain to Medicine Hat or Irvine. Estuary, Saskatchewan was an alternate point but he preferred Medicine Hat because it was a better place to get supplies and the mills were better to sellgrain to. A round trip took three days. If he got an early morning start ( around 4 a.m.) he could sometimes still get his load off the same day. I think the mill elevators must hve stayed open past 5 p.m. Next day he rested his horsese and did his business and the third day he drove home.

In May, 1918 my brother Reinhold was born. A sister, Martha, was born in 1920 but died in infancy. My parents built a new home in 1921 and we moved in that fall, so the soddy served them for seven years. I can remember when it was pulled down in 1924. My sister Frieda was born in 1922.

The post-war years brought slumping grain prices and crops were mostly very light, although 1923 was a good one. 1924 was almost a complete failure, 1925 and 1926 were very little betterand, during these years, many homesteaders were looking north to the parklands of central Alberta. In 1924 and 1926 there was quite an exodus. My Dad went on a trip to Innisfail and was tempted to relocate but, as he later said, he had 125 acres of sommerfallow that made him decide to stay. 1927 was the best crop year this area ever grew, excepting maybe 1966, and 1928 was also good and this settled Dad in HIlda for good.

He retired to Medicine Hat in the fall of 1941, and became a member of St. Paul's Lutheran church at Medicine Hat. He continued very active by coming out often to see what was going onat the farm and giving us a helping hand. Melita says if she happened to be making butter he wouldn't leave until he had a big glass of cold buttermilk.

During his retirement years, Dad also served on the building committee of St. Paul's. The church building was first remodeled and, in 1956, replaced with a new building.

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Datenbank

Titel	Wilhelm, Petereit Family Tree
Beschreibung	Wilhelm Family Name is from Marzhausen, Neu-Eichenberg, Werra- Meissner-Kreis, Hessen, Deutschland and the most recent births for my 3rd grandparents in Linden, Hannover, Germany Petereit Family name is from Prussia and ending with my great grandfather in Tauroggen, Lithuania Krompholz Family name if from Salzburg, Österreich and then moved to Lithuania. Wenger, Pfieffenberger, Amaisserin, Neufang Family names are from Bad Hofgastein, Salzburg, Austria and Undberg, Salzburg, Austria and also Dorff, Salzburg, Austria
Hochgeladen	2020-10-24 18:11:37.0
Einsender	Susan Knight Wilhelm
E-Mail	susanwilhelm113@hotmail.com
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