By 8:11am Andrew was checking us out of Hotel 1231, and we took in our last glimpses of Torun. This was going to be the first official day of Andrew’s meticulously planned Mennonite Tour!
If we had arrived the proper way, we would have only had to drive through the above larger, much more accommodating arch. (But our way wasn’t necessarily wrong… just more adventurous!)
After one last look at these old castle walls, we hopped in the Opel and drove through the gates one last time.
Upon leaving Torun, we first went to Chelmno, where we saw former cadet barracks which were constructed in 1776, paid for by Mennonites. To keep their non-resistant stance, they paid a very high tax. Those monies, built these military barracks. Which is interesting given Mennonites’ peace position:
Then we walked over to see the Chelmno Town Hall, arriving at 9:14am. “It was in these very rooms that Chelmno councillors and Dutch settlers signed contracts for the lease of villages situated along the Vistula between Chelmno and Grudziadz.”
“At times, Mennonites were heard at the Courtroom of the Town Hall. They also sold their produce in the market square surrounding its historic building. On market days, one could buy delicacies produced in Mennonite households: butter, cheese, and ham.”
(What am I quoting? I do not know! In Andrew’s research, he found this information somewhere online and included it in our tour — it’s on this paper from our journey. He is not here right now to ask where he found this, but once I know the source I will include it!)
And then we had to hit the road. We had a pretty full schedule of places to see before the day was up.
I snapped this picture from my passenger seat, you can see by the droplets at the top right corner that it had been raining but it always stopped raining when we got out of the vehicle! I took the picture because we were driving past all kinds of old cool stuff but I was supposed to be helping Andrew navigate so this was my one picture. Look at the building at the end of the street! And the one on the right, it looks like a turret with an arched gate. I wonder what it is and how old it is! OH WELL NO TIME WE HAVE GO.
Very soon we were out in the Polish countryside. These roads are small but well paved. I took this one picture as we were trying to get to our next destination.
BUT we were delayed because at 9:40am, we came across our first Mennonite cemetery in the wild! In our excitement, Andrew slammed on the brakes so I could jump out and investigate. I raced into the cemetery and began taking pictures frantically and pretty much at random.
This cemetery is surrounded by a wheat field. I am grateful the cemetery has not been tilled under.
This was my first time seeing a Mennonite cemetery “in the wild” (meaning, for me, not cared for by a museum).
He had planned a careful, and very packed schedule of villages to visit and this was not on the itinerary – so it was no small thing that he accommodated my whim.
This was the Kosowo Mennonite Cemetery. At its gate there were two signs. One was filled entirely with text in Polish, and the other had images and text. I’ll just put the one with images here:
If I had more time I would have been able to use a translation app on my phone to read the signs while there, but this was already a bonus cemetery visit, so I just took pictures and ran away. Only now am I reading the signs.
The one with images has a map on the lower left corner, which says “Ivy Trail of the Swiecie Commune. There are 32 Protestant burial places in the city and commune of Swiecie. The oldest of them dates back to the 17th century and the main reason for their creation was the Olender settlement in the Lower Vistula Valley carried out on the initiative of the local nobility. Mennonites, Evangelicals, Old Lutherans, Baptists, and representatives of other branches of Protestantism were buried there. Their end came in 1945 with the outflow of the German-speaking population after Germany’s defeat in World War 2. We can still find gravestones in many of them. Others are only a trace in the cultural landscape or have survived only on old maps.”
This would be a very interesting trail to follow! I think by “commune” they mean community? I think it’s called “ivy” because there are depictions of ivy on some gravestones?
A note on grave markers… I’d already noticed at the Olender Ethnographic Park’s cemetery that many grave markers were very nature-inspired. And here I noticed the images on the right — the oak trunk without branches is especially common. Also there are grave markers shaped into a pile of stones. (I’m sure there is a more elegant way to say that but it escapes me…) And this sign points out a broken flower, and lilies. Also a depiction of shaking hands. I did not have time to see any of these except I think I saw the broken flower. I was in such a hurry though!
And what did the other sign say? I’ll tell you a bit. This is the Kosovo Menoich-Evangelic Cemetery. The oldest written mention of this place is from 1722. The first information about non-Catholics in this parish was recorded in 1584 but not sure if they were Mennonites exactly. The Olenders, including Mennonites, were brought over by noble families. But they didn’t stay. By 1772, only four Mennonite families were recorded living here. By 1776 they were gone entirely. Apparently stonemasons signed their work! But their signatures were difficult to find on these stones. “Plant motifs dominate.” Ivy signifies immortality of the soul; lily is innocence and humility; the broken flower is the fragility of life and premature death; the oak has been associated with durability and majesty but broken branches signify a broken connection with the world of the living. The shaking hands are a symbol of reconciliation with God and trust in Providence.
It also says: “Here lie the ashes of the following families: Bartz, Becker, Feilke, Hass, Heise, Klatt, Klawonn, Korthals, Luedtke, Nitz, Przechomski, Putzmann, Rachau, Wolfram, and other inhabitants usually engaged in agriculture or shipping.”
So, this was very much a random impulsive cemetery stop for me, but I am prone to those and love them, but honestly I had gotten off-task because what we were really trying to do was follow Andrew’s plan which was very specific and carefully thought out. He warned me that there were going to be Mennonite cemeteries all over the place now and we could not be stopping for every single one. We had to stop only at the ones where we knew we had a connection to. This makes sense. (It also makes me want to return!)
Andrew found it challenging to extricate me from this cemetery, but he finally accomplished this task. We were back on the road at about 9:53am, arriving at our next stop at 9:57am.
