Ch 8-1Trakehner Horses and Farm Life

Upon meeting my father, my mother’s first question was whether he was a farmer. This was important as she vowed to get off the farm and never return, so much did she hate the never-ending work. His family owned a farm with a tavern and used non-family, paid workers. In that day and place their farm was considered a large operation. 

An early suitor of hers, Herbert Rosenberg, lived on that farm in Ramutten which we found by accident, just down the road at the border with Lithuania. His family had a sizeable farm and he had an eye for the young Edith Waltraut Redetzki. But every time he came to call on her all she could smell was the stink of horses on him!  His hands were very big and he wore clumpy mittens that smelled. They made his hands seem huge! Oh there is no way she could bear to even be anywhere near him; this was not the life she envisioned for herself.

At the local dances the rule was if a young woman refused a dance she had to leave. They wanted everyone dancing, couldn’t save yourself for a favorite. At one dance she was so afraid that a young man she didn’t like, maybe Herbert, was going to ask her to dance that she kept going to the bathroom every time he made a move toward her. She spent most of the evening in the bathroom.

East Prussia was the largest horse breeding area for all of Germany. In 1922 the province had nearly 500,000 horses, down from a high of 510,000 in 1912; lost a lot to the first world war.  Opa raised horses, the Trakehner breed. One market day both Mama and Papa went into town. The girls were instructed to take care of farm work and feed the horses. Edith, of course, was terrified of the horses – and horses sense that. There was one horse in particular that seemed to have an eye out for her. When she came round he’d flatten his ears a sign to my mother he was just waiting to get her. One horse already got her a couple years before, right across the nose, a scar visible to this day. She considered the risk of getting kicked by the surly horses and weighed it against the trouble she would get from Mama. No matter, she decided not to feed them that day and got her revenge, at least for that one day.

It wasn’t that way with all the farmers. Some of the near neighbors had only one daughter or their children were too young to work. Having only girls may have made it harder for the Redetzki’s, but had there been a boy child, it would not have noticeably lessened the work load for the girls. School was six days a week and the terror inflicted by the school teacher was only a slight improvement over home and the drudgery of work. Summer vacation didn’t exist. If you weren’t in school there were farm tasks specific to the season that you had to do – haying, planting, harvest. This was an agricultural economy and life revolved around the seasons.

Herta enjoyed her life on the farm. Her difficulty was if she had to get off the farm. She was supposed to learn to be a cook so that she could get a job in someone’s home, but she didn’t want to leave home and work elsewhere. Not an ambitious person she was content to do her work and take things one day at a time. She enjoyed her life as it was. The farm suited her and she got along with the animals. 

My father's family had a different set up and was much better situated. His village was located on the far eastern border of East Prussia, In Kreis Stallupönen, directly on the border with Lithuania. This area was more densely populated than the region around Heydekrug. There was also more abundance due to a stable economy and politics. Memelland was a protectorate and region continually in dispute. Klemms had a better environment in which to sell goods. And Klemms also ran a tavern. Well respected in the community the Meihöfer side was descended from the Protestand Salzburger settlers evicted from Austria in 1740.

There is a picture passed down through the family of the Klemm tavern in Groß Sodehnen circa 1916. It’s likely they got the photo at one of the gatherings of the East Prussia group that meets regularly in West Germany. A war memorial was erected right in front of the tavern.  All sorts of dignitaries in uniforms with spiked helmets and top hats standing there looking very pleased; the ladies are dressed in their finest. It looks to be a special event, perhaps dedication of the war memorial. 1916 seems an odd date for a memorial as the war was still under way. The first big Russian invasion was in 1917. Could they have put it up after that? But the people don’t look like war vanquished, they look victorious. Maybe this is connected with one of the other countless wars fought in Europe. 

Other than being told it is the tavern in Groß Sodehnen, we don’t know anything about the photo. I look carefully trying to see if anyone resembles my father. Could any of these be his parents?  Or perhaps his grandparents? I wonder as to the identity of the dashing fellow decked out in uniform wearing an old fashioned spiked German military helmet.  But really, it could be any memorial in any German town. I don’t have any information about Klemm ancestors in the military.

After the Russian invasion and ensuing destruction it was popular to print postcards of the devastated East Prussian cities; they show up on eBay. In what connection did people send these postcards?  I know they didn’t have vacationers in these areas. Were they sent to remind others of the hardships you faced? Did people enjoy these scenes like we enjoy a beach sunset? Of course, while updating loved ones, you’d want to show them the most recent local atrocities done by the enemy. Lest anyone forget…but forget everyone did.

Meihöfer - Groß Warningken 1910?

We have no photos of my father’s family prior to 1938 – none of his own father who died in 1931 in a farm accident, and only one of his mother and her family in Groß Warningken that dates to about 1910.  At least we think we can identify his mother in this family photo. There is the matriarch Karoline Urbschat (who looks so much older than her age), the joyfully grinning patriarch Friedrich Karl Meihofer, the 6 Meihoefer girls, a son Hans and his wife, and two blonde granddaughters in front of their house in Groß Warningken. They are all dressed in black, high collars for the women. Very stern looks on all their faces, with the exception of Friedrich. If this photo is 1910 seems the war memorial photo might be earlier by at least one decade.

Germany in the 30’s was a class society and differences between farm and city were great. It was a society of bureaucratic officials, the ‘von’ Prussian nobles with their large estates known as a “Gut”, shopkeepers vs. farmers, educated vs. illiterate, high or Platt dialect defining your origins, Germans versus Lithuanians and Poles at the bottom of the pecking order. The Klemm family had the tavern and a prosperous farm ensuring them a good position in the community. But come hunting season their two sons (my father and brother Alfred) were used by the nobility as beaters to rouse the game birds out of the bush. It all sounds a bit Victorian-like, but this was Germany in the late 1920’s prior to Hitler coming to power. Onkle Alfred, Dad’s older brother, ended up with a bit of buckshot in the ass from a slightly out of aim, or likely drunk, hunter. They were country boys; they were not allowed to hunt. Hunting was a privilege reserved solely for the aristocracy. It hasn’t changed all that much in present day Germany. Instead of aristocracy it’s wealthy industrialists, politicians and foreign dignitaries. They no longer use peasants for beaters; they use the game warden to drive the deer to their nice stands. The game warden also has to check in case they get too drunk and fall out of their stand.