^{The News}
Dedicated to Austrian-Hungarian Burgenland Family History

Things get a little more difficult when the new member has reason to believe their surnames are from Burgenland but don't know any specific locations. A recent case like this is that of new member Terry Gardner. Terry provided the surname "Streier," no emigrant village (just "Burgenland"), and settlement location, Eden, SD.

Generally, the lack of a village would prompt me to request more information, however, the Eden, SD, settlement location is well known to me as a Burgenlander destination (in fact, some of the siblings of my Burgenlander ancestors passed through or settled there). So, given the press of other business, I ignored the missing village and processed Terry's membership.

This lack of a village, however, did not slip by Member Research staffer, Barbara Raabe. She straightforwardly asked the obvious question:

Terry, do you have a clue which town or region in the Burgenland your Streier ancestor came from?

And that, folks, caused us (the staff) to get it all wrong!

            

Klaus Gerger was the first to step up to bat, saying: "Hi all! The name Streier is not found in Austria today (just in Germany, see http://www.verwandt.de/karten/absolut/streier.html)! Also I have not seen the name in any house lists so far. On the other hand, a very close spelling "Steirer" is a common name in Burgenland.

            

Then I took my swing, saying: If you look at the Eden, SD, census records, you find Ansie Strier listed in 1925. And you find a Cecelia Streier listed in 1920, as well as an Ausulameus Streir. In 1915, it is Anselmus Streier of Hungary; daughter Cecelia is 14. In 1910, you find Cecelia as a daughter to Ansulameus Streuer (from Hungary). 1905 has Anselmus Streir (though my reading of the card is Streirer). The 1900 census has Anselmus Streuer (Cecelia not yet born). The wife was Apolonia in the earlier records but was known as Evelyn and Emeline later. The family emigrated in 1889.

We have Steuer and Steurer as names from Burgenland but not Streuer... but, the way spellings varied, these are quite close. It will take something more precise than census records to get a village though.

            

Terry Gardner then replied: Hello Tom, I have heard from a relative that yes, Asnelmus Streuer is the correct name. When he immigrated to the US his last name was changed to Streier. His wife was Apolinia. I hope to get any information about them and their family history.

            

So, it appeared we had found the right guy in the census records ...but we also had convinced ourselves that the Streuer name did not appear in Burgenland.

Wrong!

For some reason, I wasn't quite ready to give up yet, so I jumped on www.FamilySearch.com and started playing around with variations on the Anselmus Streuer name. What should pop but an IGI record for an Anselm Streuer from, of all places, Wallern ...which is one of my family villages! He was born in the right year and had wife Apolonia (Schneider, also from Wallern) and daughter Cecelia (born in Eden, SD).

If you have family from Wallern, you know that researchers of families from that village are blessed by the existence of Father Graisy's book, "Wallern in der Geschichte seiner Häuser" (Wallern in the History of its Houses). This nearly 300-page book (in 8.5" x 11" format) documents the owners and residents of each of the 250 houses in Wallern. As I have a printed copy of the book (as well as access to the pdf copy on the BB website), I dug it out, consulted the index and noted that the Streuer name had existed in 11 different houses in Wallern. So much for Streuer not being a Burgenland name! 

Digging deeper, I found that Graisy documents the Streuer family tree for 5 generations back from Anselm, showing that the family was in Wallern as far back as the 1767 Urbarial list. Likewise for Anselm's wife, Apolonia: her Schneider family also was present at the time of the 1767 Urbarial list. Graisy documents Anselm and Apolonia as marrying in 1886 and later emigrating to America (the year is not given but the 1889 emigration date from census records is not inconsistent with the 1886 marriage date and the known birthdates and locations of their earlier children -- Oct 1888 in Wallern and Sep 1890 in Eden are the sequential births that surround the emigration date).

I wrote to Terry with most of this information, saying "Terry, you are in luck!" While I thought about the foolishness of my earlier "not a Burgenland name" claim, I didn't ask for forgiveness... after all, I was making up for it by providing all this information.

I also took one more research shot at the Streuer family... and came up with a gem from site http://worldconnect.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=marshallcounty&id=I2818. It was a touching family history, the text of which I present below.

            

"Mr. and Mrs. Anselmus Streier came to St. Paul from Germany with their three older children, Pauline, Katherine and Theresa. In St. Paul, Mr. Streier drove a team of horses on a beer truck, later deciding to come further west and homestead. He came to Redfield but decided that it was too dry there so answered the call of a relative (Math Schlekewy) from near Eden Park and came here. He homesteaded south of what is now Eden but later turned that claim over to Joe Gardner and moved about four miles northeast of Eden and staked out a claim. Here he built a sod house and after getting his family situated he walked to Kisner Ranch in North Dakota to work to earn money for a team of oxen, wagon and other things he would need. While Mr. Streier was away, they had a very bad winter here and had it not been for the kindness of neighbors, Mrs. Streier said they would have perished. She told of the time she was sitting, wondering what she was going to cook for her family next as she had run out of everything even though she had stretched the food as far as she could. As much as she tried to hide her feelings from her children, tears just couldn't be held back. As she sat there looking out, a man walked past the window. It was Mr. Max Sckerl who had come to see how they were getting along. He went to Frank, S.D. and brought food. She said that he saved them from starvation as they were very hungry and weak when he got back with the food.

"After coming to this country, seven more children were born to this family; Mary (Mrs. John Halbauer, Jr.), George (deceased), John of Eden, Henry of Buffalo, New York, Clara (Mrs. Roy Dennison of Kansas City, Celia (Mrs. Joe Jelinek of Eden) and Rose (Mrs. Adolph Schuster of Eden). Their three other daughters, Pauline (Mrs. Joe Gardner), Katherine (Mrs. Math Strantz) and Theresa (Mrs. Steven Murphy), immigrated here from Austria-Hungary with their parents. Mrs. Murphy is the only of the three still living and she resides in Spokane, Washington.

"Mr. and Mrs. Streier had twenty seven grandchildren and they moved to Eden in 1918. Mr. Streier passed away in 1928 and Mrs. Streier died in 1937. Clara and Rose are the only Streier children still living. (June 25, 1964)"

            

The final kicker....

You may have noticed from above that Anselm's daughter, Mary, married a John J Halbauer, Jr. Well, Halbauer is one of my family names and it turns out John is a 3rd cousin to my mother! (I previously knew that John married a Mary Streier but I knew nothing about her origins... now I do!)
 

1) you first look on the Houselist page [http://www.the-burgenland-bunch.org/HouseList/HouseLists2.htm] to see what villages yet need to be done (they are the ones with the yellow highlight background) and pick your favorite;

2) you send an email to Klaus asking him to put the appropriate file (i.e., a zip of the high-resolution digital pictures) in an accessible location;

3) he does so and sends you an email with an attached Excel spreadsheet template (for recording the transcription) and a link to the zip file;

4) you download the zip using the save option (don't use the open option, as the zip part gets in the way) then unzip it and store it in a directory (put the Excel file in that same directory);

5) using a picture-viewing program, you open each picture in turn, transcribing the names into the Excel template;

6) when all is transcribed, you send the Excel file back to Klaus and he does the rest.

OK, lets talk about excuses why you can't do this...

1) You do not have Excel... well, most any file format (NotePad, Word, etc.) will work to store the transcription (but do check with Klaus first to make sure he can read it!). Klaus will need to do a little more work to extract your data... but he can cope! If you use a "flat file" format, you would merely separate the "columns" of data by commas rather than put them in Excel columns.

However, Excel has the distinct advantage that is automatically proposes completions for an entry when what you type becomes unique... for example, you need to type "Johann" but it's not the first time you have done so for this file... you type "Joh", up pops "Johann", then you either hit the Tab or Enter key to move to the next cell (usually you'll have a lot of "Josef" entries too, so it takes 3 letters for "Johann" to be unique). This saves you a lot of time, especially if there are many repetitious names in a village (and there are, both in surnames and given names!).

2) You don't know how to un-zip files... there's two ways around this... first, you can learn how (most modern computers have the zip and un-zip software built-in, you just need to know how to access it). We can tell you how via email and then you'll have a new skill for other purposes too. Second, using the zip is only a convenience... one file instead of maybe a dozen. Pictures generally do not compress much so using the zip saves less than 5% in total file size. Instead, Klaus can provide each picture file separately... you'll just need to do multiple downloads.

3) You don't have a picture-viewing program... ah, but you probably do. Windows "Paint" program can view these files as well as can the "Windows Picture and Fax Viewer." These are both usually built into a Windows computer. Simply put, if you can view any .jpg files, you can view these also.

4) You can't read German script writing... well, the era of these house lists was right when the transition from old to new style writing was taking place. Most of the surnames and given names use the modern characters. I've yet to see a village (I've transcribed 14 of them) where the surnames were not almost completely in modern characters; the one exception being that the original authors often did not give up a script "s" as the first character of paired s's... but that is easy to recognize. Some of the files, however, use script writing for given names (but you can ask Klaus not to send you files like that).

There are also occasional annotations about property that are almost always in script--but these are quite rare and you can just flag them and let Klaus figure them out. Indicators for the wife's name are also usually in script... "und Maria sein Gattin" (and Mary his wife)... or "mit Maria gebore Schmidt seine Ehegattin" (with Maria née Schmidt his wife). This second version sometimes uses "dessen" instead of "seine" but it means the same thing. I've put two examples here. Note that the words "und" and "gebore" are often abbreviated: "u." and "geb." or "gb."

The first one says "Heinrich Johann u. Antonia gb. Weber seine Ehegattin".

The second one says: "Henrich Michl und Elisabeth gb. Gisch dessen Ehegattin". 

Usually though, I just make a note telling Klaus I am leaving off the "seine Ehegattin" or "dessen Ehegattin" part and I type only the "u. Given-name gb. Surname" part. Klaus rewrites this to English anyway so it is just a waste of time to type it all out.

Royalty will also cause a hiccup or two, but you soon learn. This one is "Albrecht Erzherzog v. Oesterreich K.K. Hoheit" and translates to "Albrecht Archduke of Austria Imperial and Royal Sovereignty" (the K.K. stands for "Kaiserlich-Königlich" and means as noted above). Again, if you struggle with these, Klaus can quickly correct them if you merely point them out.

What you should note from these examples is that the key information—the names—is fairly easy to read. If you don't get hung up on the other stuff, the transcription work is pretty straightforward.

5) You'll make too many mistakes... probably not true... but you will make some. After all, this is handwritten names and even the best handwriting can be difficult to decipher at times. Klaus knows this and comes behind you with his knowledge of Burgenland names and German writing to review and edit your work. I've yet to have a transcription where he did not correct something... but my ego has survived!

6) You don't have the time... my estimate is that most villages take 2-4 hours to transcribe, so you probably should do this in more than one sitting, but, if you spread the effort out over a few days or even weeks, you'll hardly notice it. Klaus does not care how long you take; he simply appreciates that you are doing it! Even if you take a month, that almost infinitely beats having the data sit untranscribed!

So, where is the need? Of the seven Burgenland districts, Jennersdorf, Güssing, Oberwart and Neusiedl are either done or nearly done and Eisenburg is about one-third complete. The big need is for transcribers of Oberpullendorf and Mattersburg villages. For Oberpullendorf, only 4 of the 63 villages are done. Mattersburg sits at 5 of 22 complete. (These numbers were current at the time of writing this... a few more have been completed since then.)

From what I've seen, transcribers tend to be individuals with an interest in a particular village or district... they are looking to see if their ancestors are in the lists. Personally, my people come from Neusiedl and, no surprise, that is the district I put my effort into.

So folks, give it a try. The worst you can do is discover it just does not work for you (Klaus will accept it if you tell him you tried but are giving it up). At the other end, you may find out you are good at transcribing and enjoy both the process and the fact that you are making a contribution to other BB members and to posterity. Given that you are doing genealogy, it seems clear that leaving something behind is meaningful for you... this is one more opportunity to do so!

To give credit where credit is due, let me acknowledge those who have worked as transcribers:

Güssing: Klaus Gerger, his wife Heidi and cousin Sibylle Malits -- they started with transcriptions directly from the originals in the archive and then switched to paper copies.

Jennersdorf: Same as Güssing, with the start of digital imaging in October 2001; Jürgen Brandtweiner joined in.

Oberwart: Tamás & David Vértesi, Rudy Wolf, Jürgen Brandtweiner, Carol Sorensen and Herbert Rehling.

Neusiedl: Rick Tischler, Dale Knebel, Kathy Middendorf, Bob Tobin, Jim Weinzatl, Charlie Deutsch, Rudi Wolf, Pat Dolan, and Tom Steichen.

Eisenstadt: Rudi Wolf, Magda Zakanyi, Bruce Klemens, and Klaus Gerger.

Mattersburg: Alexander Pehm, Ewald Pingitzer, Mary Rushing and Tom Steichen.

Oberpullendorf: Tamás Vértesi and Joe Domnanovich.

As you can see from the above, this project is more than ten years old... with your help, it could be completed this year. Now wouldn't that be nice? Klaus' email address, should you choose to join the effort, is in the link here (just click it) and is available also on the Houselist page.
 

Hi Tom, Some BB members might discover their Burgenland ancestor lived in an Eisenberg not mentioned in this month's BB Newsletter discussion of the "Eisenberg-Eisenburg Confusion." For the sake of completeness, and to avoid confusing an unsuspecting researcher, please let me add the Eisenberg in southern Burgenland to your list. In the Sankt Martin an der Raab church records, "Vashegy" (Eisenberg in German) is listed in about 3% of the entries. My mother, who left Burgenland in 1935, tells me the place name Eisenberg was then very much in use by people who lived in southern Burgenland.

The municipality of Sankt Martin (Marktgemeinde Sankt Martin an der Raab) today includes Eisenberg along with the villages of Doiber, Gritsch, Welten, Oberdrossen, Neumarkt an der Raab and Sankt Martin an der Raab. The Eisenberg name is still very much in use there. For example there is a volunteer firefighter group "Freiwillige Ortsfeuerwehr Eisenberg an der Raab." Also, Wikipedia has an entry for Eisenberg an der Raab, probably because the Virgin Mary is said to have appeared there in 1955.

I've attached a page [Ed: not shown here] from the Sankt Martin birth records of January 1877 (LDS tape 700719), with entry five showing Vashegy house number 133 as the birthplace of Aloisia Poglitsch. (I have a copy of that page because entry number six records the birth of my grandfather, Josef Potetz.) My mother's recollection is that there were much fewer than 133 homes in Eisenberg - about 15. I suspect Vashegy house 133 in the Sankt Martin church records is the same house that would be found in the BB village lists as house 133 in Neumarkt an der Raab.

The Google Maps website (http://maps.google.com/maps) places Eisenberg an der Raab just where my 92-year-old Mom remembered it to be, south of Neumarkt an der Raab and north of Oberdrossen.

Thank you again for your great work helping all of us with Burgenland connections. I have learned so much from the Burgenland Bunch.

            

Richard is, indeed, correct... there is yet another Burgenland Eisenberg to consider! As shown in the Google map above, it is designated Eisenberg an der Raab and is in the Jennersdorf district.

In my prior article, I had included some map excerpts from the 1910 3rd Military Mapping Survey of Austria-Hungary that showed the other candidate Eisenberg / Eisenburgs. Here is the corresponding excerpt for this Eisenberg (you should find it pretty much centered in the bottom half of the excerpt). The advantage of these military maps is that they show the terrain relief and put little filled rectangles to mark housing. Thus we see that Eisenberg (an der Raab) is at the upper end of a small valley (perhaps a mile deep) that drains into the Raab. And, as Richard's mother notes, it consists of very few houses. (As an aside, you can also note that the valley, in 1910, lacked a formal road; instead, there are just unimproved walking and cart paths in the area.)

Our purpose, though, of the prior article was to caution researchers about the need for additional information when the place of interest is Eisenberg or Eisenburg. This follow-up only makes that need even greater! I thank Richard for bringing this to our attention.

"We, Adam de Battyany, Eternal Count of Güssing, Knight of the Holy Roman Empire, Lord High Steward of Hungary and Oberster [Commander in Chief] of that section of Hungary situated on this side of the Danube and the border area of Canisa [a fortress at Nagykanizsa on the Serbian/Hungarian border southwest of Lake Balaton], Kammerrat [imperial and royal councilor of the Treasury] of his Holy Majesty, King Matthias. We make it known herewith to all those to whom it may concern, that we have abandoned the Meierhof [agricultural estate] called Polyanizi situated in the territory belonging to our Castle of Schlaining. All those who desire to do so are allowed to settle and build houses, for there shall be villages in this place in the future, as there have been in the past. So far, the following have settled and begun to build there: Michael Zlatarics, Lucas Czvek, Ivan Balaskovics, Ivan and Verhas Jrue. In addition to the aforementioned, the following persons have promised to take up residence there: Glav,...Ive, Stefan Horvat, Juri Konczer, Matthias Horvat, Vida Verhas, Nicholas Horvat, Silbernagl Moritz, Kru_, Martin Bencsicz, Johan Balok, and Bark...icz. We grant them liberty for three years and will grant the same exemptions to all those who settle there at a later date until they have built their houses. But we will not allow these liberties to those that already own a house on our domain and abandon their homestead. With the condition that they endeavor to build their houses within three years, and that they start to do their services or Robot [obligatory work] and pay taxes, they are after this time obliged to serve and pay taxes in the way the other Walachs had to serve and pay taxes. For greater endorsement, we strengthen this Letter with our Seal and our handwriting. Written in our Castle of Rechnitz on Saturday before the celebration of Saint George the Martyr, in the year of the Incarnation of the Lord, one thousand six hundred and fifty. Adam Battyany"

This document shows that areas of Oberwart had lost villages sometime in the recent past ("for there shall be villages in this place in the future, as there have been in the past") and that the benefit of moving there was a period of up to three years in which taxes and Robot service were exempted (plus some unstated amount of land). It is notable that Castle Schlaining lies only a dozen miles west of Köszeg along the valley route west into Styria (Castle Rechnitz also lies along the same valley but even closer to Köszeg). Whether the destruction of the aforementioned past villages occurred during the 1532 retreat through Styria is unknown, however, the BB Village History for Bad Tatzmannsdorf (a village which is only a few miles west of Stadtschlaining) indicates that it was devastated by the Turks in 1532. This suggests that the Stadtschlaining area likely suffered similar devastation at that time.

In addition, Frank Paukowits noted in his recent Croatian Roots article in Newsletter 204 that Croats emigrated to Burgenland in the fifteen- and sixteen-hundreds. His related Croatian Linguistics article in Newsletter 206 provides a map (a reduced version is to the right) showing numerous villages in the Rechnitz area, between Stadtschlaining and Köszeg, that were populated by Vlahi dialect Croatians (the compact circular region of red triangles). The map also shows additional bands of Croatian settlement that look, notably, like stripes where an army might have marched through or may have plundered while encamped: one to the south across the Güssing district; another starting around Köszeg then running north across the western half of the Oberpullendorf district; still another through the small villages surrounding Eisenstadt; and a last band in the northern reaches of the Neusiedl district. One could speculate that this last, most northern band of depopulation resulted from the siege march of 1529 and the Eisenstadt one from related foraging efforts. The more southern regions of Croatian settlement in depopulated areas would more likely be a result of the 1532 campaign.

            

An article in Newsletter 42 by Fritz Königshofer provides some documentation that supports the theories put forth above. Fritz cites a booklet titled "Beitrage zur Geschichte der Grossgemeinde Rechnitz," in which Karl Klein of Rechnitz speaks about two waves of Croat immigration into the Rechnitz area. Klein said the first wave occurred in the 1530s, early in the reign of Franz Batthyány and "after the devastating campaign and raids by the Turks which ended in 1532." This confirms that major destruction in Burgenland resulted from the 1532 campaign. These colonists came from the area of Kopreinitz (the German name for current-day Koprivnica, Croatia, a town 80 miles south and 20 miles east of Rechnitz near Croatia's northeast border).

Klein also notes that the second Croat immigration wave happened under Adam Batthyány before or around 1650, claiming the purpose was to fortify the border area. Fritz says that "these soldier-like Croat settlers of the 17th century were also called Vlahi (Wallachen, Walachians)" but he says he was puzzled by this term since he thought it describes people from Romania. Frank Paukowits' Linguistics article makes it likely, however, that the reference was to a particular Croatian dialect. If so, these settlers were from an area about 70 miles south of Kopreinitz, just over the border into present-day Bosnia-Herzegovina. Klein's information on the second wave is consistent with the Proclamation cited above, which notes "Walachs" by name and implies some earlier settlers were of this heritage.

            

Let us now move forward toward the siege of Vienna in 1683. Interestingly, it was preceded by 20 years of peace (the Peace of Vasvár) between the Ottoman and Habsburg Empires. However, the Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold I, continued to attempt to crush Protestantism in the Habsburg-occupied portions of Hungary, which led to widespread unrest and, ultimately, to open rebellion by 1681.

Imre Thököly, recognized by the Ottomans as King of Upper Hungary (present-day eastern Slovakia and parts of northeastern Hungary), led Protestant and other anti-Habsburg forces, which were reinforced with a significant force from the Ottomans, into repeated clashes with the Habsburg military in 1681 and 1682. When Habsburg forces responded by marching into central Hungary in January, it prompted immediate mobilization of the Ottoman army and a formal declaration of war in August of 1682. However, August was too late in the year to launch a full-scale invasion. This situation allowed ample time for the Habsburgs to prepare defenses and set up alliances with other Central European rulers, including a decisive mutual-assistance treaty between the Habsburgs and Poland in which Leopold would support King John III Sobieski, if the Turks attacked Kraków, and the Polish army would come to the relief of Vienna, if it were attacked.

It would be July of 1683 before the Ottoman army of 40,000, supported by 50,000 allied troops, arrived to the south and east of Vienna, again passing through the Heideboden of the Neusiedl district. After initial fights, Leopold retreated to Linz with 80,000 citizens of Vienna, leaving 18,000 Austrian troops to defend the city. Unlike the 1529 siege, this one was well planned, lasted much longer and involved more troops on both sides. In preparation, the Ottomans had repaired roads and bridges leading into Austria and had established logistical centers containing ammunition, cannon and other resources needed to support the army.

Rather than attempt to overwhelm the defenders in an all-out assault (a very costly approach when measured in casualties to the attackers—but also one quite likely to succeed given the difference in numbers), the Ottomans chose to lay siege in order to take the city intact for its riches (an assault gave troops the right of plunder; a surrender did not). This proved to be a critical mistake because, by early September, a Holy League relief force of 66,000, led by 37,000 Poles, had arrived. The Ottomans attacked the relief force very early in the morning of the 12th, hoping to catch them unorganized. They also threw an all-out assault at the city, believing that the defenders were so sufficiently weakened that they could be quickly subdued and then the city walls could be used for defense.

The battle raged all day on both fronts, with little gain by either side... until, that is, Sobieski, at the head of 3,000 Polish heavy lancers, led a late-afternoon charge of 20,000 rested cavalry, breaking the tired Ottoman lines and driving on into the Ottoman camps, capturing their food, supplies and heavy cannon. The tired and dispirited Ottoman troops retreated, then fled, south and east. Within three hours of the cavalry charge, the Christian forces had won the battle and saved Vienna.

The Turks lost at least 15,000 men dead and wounded in the fighting plus had at least 5,000 men captured, compared to approximately 4,500 dead and wounded for the Habsburg-Polish forces. However, though routed and in full retreat, the Turkish troops found time to slaughter all their Austrian prisoners, with the exception of those few nobility worth ransoming.

The battle marked the historic end of expansion into Europe by the Ottoman Empire. Within three years of the siege, the Habsburg allies had pushed the Turks out of Hungary and, in ensuing years, reclaimed Transylvania and drove deep into the Balkans, annexing these ravished and depopulated lands. Nonetheless, the Ottomans fought on for 16 years after the second siege of Vienna before finally giving up and signing the Treaty of Karlowitz in 1697.

            

This, then, sets the stage for the resettlement of Hungary during the 1700s... and for all the questions I posed above. However, first some speculation about effects in Burgenland.

As noted above, it is documented that the retreat of the Ottoman allied army was to the south and east. This means that major units of the 70,000 survivors retreated through the Eisenstadt and Neusiedl districts and, perhaps, through other Burgenland districts further south. Given that the Holy League forces had captured the Ottoman food, supplies and animals, these Ottoman units likely plundered the regions they passed through for needed supplies and any opportunistic riches.

Barbara Raabe provided references indicating that Wallern was also damaged in 1683, either by Ottoman foragers or retreating army units: Father Graisy (in Wallern in der Geschichte seiner Häuser), notes that Wallern was "probably completely destroyed by Turks"; Albert Schuh likewise says that the village was "again (partly?) destroyed by Turks" during the second siege of Vienna. However, comparison of documented property holders before and after the second siege indicates that over half of the surnames present before the siege were also present after the siege. Given that the few available lists precede or postdate the siege by many years, yet the name lists are still so similar, this seems reasonable evidence that Wallern was rebuilt by the same families rather than being wholesale resettled.

Johann Neuberger, in Das War Zanegg, the Heimatbuch of Zanegg in Moson County (Weisselberg) in Western Hungary, also speaks of a second Ottoman rampage through the Heideboden as their armies advanced on Vienna, again burning down houses, destroying crops and massacring those foolish enough not to flee. He reports, though, that Zanegg, unlike other villages in the area, was only slightly damaged.

In support of (but also in slight conflict with) Neuberger's report is the book, Die Österreichische Monarchie in Wort und Bild." It says "The inhabitants of these villages (Zanegg, St. Johann, St. Peter, Andau), as well as of St. Andrä are said to have settled here after the last Turkish war; they are said to have come from Salzburg, and they are mostly called "Heidebauern" (meadow farmers)." Clearly, if Zanegg was "only slightly damaged," one would think it did not need wholesale resettling, though perhaps the 150 years of being near the front lines had kept it underpopulated (Neuberger does imply this) and this influx was more in-fill than complete resettlement.

Near-by St. Andrä, on the other hand, was said to have been deserted for more than 200 years before being completely resettled about 1696 (see Article 3b, Newsletter 204). That article reports that residents of St. Andrä had been granted a tax-free status for 6 years due to a law passed in 1689, which shows that they were "foreigners" (citizens of Austria-Hungary would usually get only a 3-year tax free status). The exact status of other Heideboden villages and their surviving populations is unknown, though Article 3b suggests that a fair number were in competition for additional land to support more residents in the late 1600s immediately after the Turks were driven out.

Fritz Königshofer also notes some destruction in Burgenland but argues against wholesale resettlement, saying...

"During the advance of the Turks to Vienna in 1683, and during their retreat, there was a lot of destruction and killing of civilians. However, survivors likely returned to their towns and re-built them. Burgenland is not an area identified with the vast resettlement efforts in the regions of Hungary and Slavonia further east and south. Nevertheless, West Hungary/Burgenland received some fresh blood as some of the settlers left their Danube vessels early, perhaps sometimes influenced by agents of the West Hungarian magnates, and settled earlier than planned in West Hungary.

Maybe a few Burgenland towns had to be newly constructed after the siege of Vienna. I know that fellow BB staffer Emmerich Koller wrote in his book that his hometown Pernau [Pornóapáti, Hungary] was rebuilt after the Turkish devastation of the abbey which had there been before. My hunch is that there are not many other examples, though. In fact, some inhabitants of the region now called Burgenland may have joined the emigration to the east and south. For instance, BB member Ernest Chrisbacher has concluded that his Griesbacher line of the Bakony Forest had come from Burgenland during the 18th century.

Klaus Gerger also provided some insight, citing two books by Franz Theuer [Brennendes Land - Kuruzzenkriege. Ein historischer Bericht (Burning Land - Kuruzzen War. A Historical Account), 1984; and Verrat an der Raab - als Türken, Tataren und Kuruzzen 1683 gegen Wien zogen (Betrayal of the Raab - as Turks, Tatars and Kuruc 1683 Moved to Vienna), 1976]. He says that the books indicate that "Burgenland was not (much) affected during the getaway of the Turkish troops after the relief of Vienna. Burgenland is so close to Vienna and the troops (at that time you could not call them troops anymore, just fleeing hordes) tried to get as many miles, as fast as possible, between them and the victorious army."

However, Klaus also points out that during the preparation for the second siege, "The Turkish (and Hungarian) troops tried first to get hold of all the fortified places on the front line. Doing so, they attacked Burgenland villages on a regular basis. Some villages put themselves under protection of the Turks (for a high price in wine, livestock and food); others tried to resist—they paid with their lives and the burning down of their villages in many cases." This would explain the occasional destroyed small village and the damage in larger, fortified Burgenland towns... it also explains why many villages avoided significant damage.

This, then, largely covers what the Staff reported concerning Burgenland-specific resettlement after 1683. It seems it was much more a rebuilding by prior residents, where needed, with later fill-ins for those residents enslaved or killed in the turmoil of war. One could reasonably presume that that the bulk of the recovery and rebuilding took place in the years prior to 1700, with fill-ins occurring later as settlers were recruited for more eastern lands. Given that, we will now turn our attention to the resettlements in the 1700s.

            

The first question I posed above was "What were the facts on Hungarian population size changes around 1700?"

Fritz Königshofer provided some data on this, saying: "When the Turks were pushed back in the Turkish Wars following the siege of Vienna (1683), many parts of Hungary were nearly empty of people and the land lay fallow. I am reading that, at the time of liberation from the Turks, there were only about 100 farms in Somogy county, when 150 years earlier there had been 11,000. The large region between Danube, Drava and Balaton had only 3,200 people living there. The population of County Arad was only 5,000. In contrast, the areas under Austrian rule/occupation (West Hungary, Upper Hungary and Transylvania) did much better. For example, 85,000 people lived in county Sopron and 110,000 in county Vas."

It should be apparent that there was a large difference in surviving population depending on which side of the 150-year military front a county was on (the map below shows in red the counties Fritz named). As noted in the map, the longstanding Habsburg vs. Ottoman front line started in the southwest along the Hungarian border, crossed into the Hungarian counties near the Drava River, then arched north through Zala and Veszprém counties before running near the eastern edge of Györ. Lands to the southeast of the front were systematically pillaged and depopulated over the years; those to the northwest suffered only from the occasional short-term military incursions toward Vienna, with the Heideboden area bearing the brunt of those activities in what is now Burgenland.



Below, we will note the large resettlements that took place in the Bakony Forest, the Banat and along the Backa lowlands between the Danube and Tisza (Theiß) rivers. Since we are at a map, we will locate these regions. The Bakony Forest was the area just north of Lake Balaton in Zala and Veszprém counties. The Banat was the region north of the Danube, east of the Tisza and below Csanád and Arad counties, consisting of Torontál, Temes and Krassó-Szörény counties. The Backa lowlands between the Danube and Tisza should be reasonably self-evident as Bács-Bodrog county.

We now address the question, "When did the recruitment start?"

The first wave of resettlement came almost immediately after the Ottoman Turks were defeated at Vienna in 1683 and then pushed back beyond Budapest by 1686. By 1689, a Habsburg decree called for the resettlement of the depopulated Hungarian Kingdom. This wave of settlement was encouraged by nobility, whose lands had been devastated by the warfare, and by military officers including Prince Eugene of Savoy and Count Claudius of Mercy. These colonists mainly settled in the Bakony Forest and Vértes mountains north and west of Lake Balaton, around the town of Budapest, and in Swabian Turkey (Schwäbische Türkei), which was the area of heaviest early colonization. Swabian Turkey is the triangular region between the Danube River, Lake Balaton and the Drava River that Fritz mentioned above. Much of this early settlement occurred in the late 1600s, even before the Ottomans formally capitulated in 1697.

In addition, the Catholic Church and their monasteries (Heiligenkreuz, St. Gotthárd, etc.) held significant land that had been depopulated. Klaus Gerger notes that the Church was quick to recruit Catholic settlers from areas where their Orders had connections.

The era of government-organized and supported colonization took place well after 1700 and in three phases named after their Habsburg sponsors: 1. the "Karolinische Ansiedlung," or Caroline colonization, which occurred from 1718 to 1737 under emperor Karl IV (Fritz Königshofer reports 1723-26 as the primary years for this wave); 2. the "Maria Theresianische Ansiedlung," or Maria Theresian colonization, which occurred from 1744-1772 under Maria Theresia (most active years were 1763-1773); and 3. the "Josephinische Ansiedlung," or Josephine colonization, which took place under Joseph II from 1782 to 1787. Fritz notes that "the first wave was only Roman Catholics, while in the second wave there were a few Protestants. Since the third wave followed the Tolerance Edict, one would assume that Protestants were free to join."

These three waves primarily targeted the Banat, which was annexed from the Ottomans by the Habsburgs in the 1718 Treaty of Passarowitz, and the Backa lowlands. The first wave immediately followed the Treaty, however another Austrian-Turkish war occurred in 1737–1739, destroying many of the early settlements. The second wave of colonization, to rebuild what was lost, started after the suspension of hostilities but was slow to draw interest. The third wave, being open to Protestants and under a tolerant King, drew from a new class of settlers.

Questions 3 and 4 will be answered together, as these are part and parcel of the decision to resettle: "How was the actual recruitment done?" and "What were the incentives that were offered?"

Staff member Matt Boisen, speaking of the resettlements in the late 1600s, says "It was easy to find Germans, they were hiding in great numbers in the Alpine valleys to the west, waiting for the dust to settle, and basically got there after the Croats and before the Magyars, to take up the offers of free land, home sites, construction materials, livestock and exemption from taxes. The Germans flooded the area." This seems a fair assessment of the situation... nobility and military leaders were looking for colonists and the Austrian and Swabian Germans were pleased to comply.

The programmed resettlements in the 1700s were accomplished through joint state and private initiatives. Bishop Count Leopold Kollonitsch (later Archbishop of Esztergom and Primate of Hungary), advised Karl VI to give preference to the German Catholics in order that the country might, in time, become German and Catholic. Thus they would offer Catholics of the southwest German states inducements such as free agricultural land, home sites, construction materials, livestock, exemption from all public taxation for a period of 6 years and the right to retain their language. The King was requested to issue appropriate decrees in the entire Roman Empire and neighboring countries, stating that the colonization was to be carried out in a peaceful manner and with the consent of the landowners. As a result, Count Claudius of Mercy sent agents to the Habsburg territories in the region which is now western Germany (Baden, Württemberg, Alsace, Lorraine, the Rhineland, Westphalia, Bavaria and Swabia).

John Lavendoski states that his understanding of the Banat settlements "points to a high degree of sophistication beyond just proclamations.... various 'recruiters' were hired to travel to German villages and to promote the concept of a move to the Banat. Corporations were even formed by these recruiters, who were paid on a "per person recruited" basis with a bonus for recruiting skilled specialists such as gunsmiths, locksmiths, tailors, etc., so that villages could be completely self sufficient once established."

Consistent with John's understanding, other sources record, for example, that miners, foundry workers, charcoal burners and forest workers were specifically recruited to reactivate the abandoned copper, silver and iron mines in the Banat mining districts.

Settlers were also allowed to bring their own ministers and teachers so the education of their children and their church-centered social customs could continue under familiar conditions.

As to incentives, the 1782 Ansiedlungspatent (Settlement Patent), for the third wave under Joseph II, guaranteed the following:
1. Freedom of mind and religion for all citizens.
2. A house and garden for every family.
3. For farmers: fields and meadows, farm animals, and field and house tools.
4. For skilled tradesmen: 50 gulden for the purchase of tools.
5. For the family: their oldest son would not be required to serve in the military.
6. For each family; free transportation from Vienna to its settlement plus food until settled and able to provide for itself.
7. For people that became ill during the trip: hospitals and free medical services, with free service continuing until complete recovery.
8. A ten-year exemption from all taxes.

Temporary housing was provided until a home was built, which was then "stocked" with a mattress, a carpet, a shovel, a pitchfork, a spinning wheel, a flour sieve, 6 sacks, a baking trough, an axe, a hoe, a bread board, a water bucket, a flour bucket and a butter bucket plus a cow (or 18 gulden). Farmers received, in addition, 4 horses, a wagon, a bridle, a plow and tools such as a sickle and a saw.

The farm land, itself, remained government property but was allocated under a never-ending lease contract for as long as a farmer and his family would work the land that was assigned to them. A farmer had the right to all of the crops he could raise and was taxed (after the exemption period) with a percentage of the amount he harvested from the land. And, as more plow animals or manpower became available to the farmer, his land allocation could be increased. The land had to be passed on undivided to the heir, usually the oldest son. These contracts stayed in force until 1848, when lease-holders were given possession of the land and the right to own, buy and sell land.

Similar, but less generous, patents were issued for the earlier waves, however, earlier waves accepted only Catholics and some local nobility reneged on promised tax and military exemptions after the settlers had invested in establishing a home and a working farm or trade.

We now come to the question of "Why German settlers (rather than other ethnicities, in particularly Hungarian)?"

One argument was put forth above. The Habsburgs were German, Roman Catholic and strong supporters of the Counter-Reformation. Since Hungary was a predominantly Protestant (Lutheran, Calvinist and Unitarian) country, it made sense to recruit German Catholics in order to champion the Roman Catholic religion in Eastern Europe.

Clearly, a second goal was to redevelop farms and other resources... and Germans were considered excellent for that purpose. Fritz Königshofer recalls reading that "the Hungarian nobles preferred German settlers because they did such a good job in improving the land and thus making it valuable for the landlords." Staff Member Barbara Raabe commented that "Germans were forced to find land outside their own country because of primogenitor, where the eldest son inherited the farm. The other sons went into the trades or moved to new land." She comments further that, for this reason, "many Germans settled in lands to the east, including Poland, Russia, Romania and Austria-Hungary." Thus, when the Habsburgs wanted to resettle their lands after the Turks, the Germans had a history of being willing, available and competent. In fact, some writers state that, in the Hungarian countryside, German peasants proved to be the better farmers and, in the villages, the master craftsmen among millers, tailors, shoemakers, masons and other artisans were largely German also.

A third major goal was to fortify the land against insurrection or invasion. Clearly, the loyalty of the recruited Swabians went to the Habsburgs, who were credited with freeing the land from the Ottoman Empire and organizing the resettlement programs. These colonists were quite willing to serve on Austria's Military Frontier (Militärgrenze) against the Ottomans. However, Hungarian (Magyar) settlers were expected to have a different view: a view that the Habsburgs were largely just another oppressor and loyalty should be to Hungary first. From the Austrian viewpoint, the Magyars were considered a rebellious people and were recent enemies who had taken up arms against the Habsburgs prior to and during the second siege of Vienna and again in 1703–1711 with Rákóczi's War for Independence from Habsburg rule. Andrew Burghardt, in "Borderland, A Historical and Geographical Study of Burgenland, Austria" (UW Press, 1962), speaks to this issue, saying "the empty areas were extensively resettled, but generally not with Magyars. The Viennese, who had had their fill of Hungarian rebellions, understandably preferred to introduce other ethnic groups. Germans were given preference, but many other linguistic groups were also invited in to occupy the land."

Despite all this, the Austrian settlement program is still considered less a policy of Germanization than it was adherence to the principles of practicality, trade and national interests. These called for the recruitment of colonists, merchants, artisans and skilled laborers from the German and Austrian territories. Nevertheless, people of other nationalities also settled in the reclaimed Hungarian territories, among them were Serbs, Croatians, Bulgarians and Romanians, and to a lesser extent, Slovaks, Ruthenians, Czechs and a few French, Belgians and Italians.


The Arrival of German Colonists in Banat, a 17' x 5' triptych by Stefan Jäger, painted 1910.

Across the three waves resettlements, some 150,000 German immigrants settled in Hungary from various German and Austrian areas. The settlement policies led to the creation of over 1000 villages, substantial increases in agricultural, commercial and industrial production, and growth of national prosperity. Roads and canals were constructed, mines and forestry reestablished, swamps and marshes drained, and farms and land developed. Because of the considerable contributions of the 18th century settlers and their descendants, their regions eventually became known as the "breadbasket of the Danube Monarchy."

We then asked the question, "How did the post-1700 influx differ from the earlier Croatian migrations that Frank Paukowits had recently written about?"

This, of course, was a misguided question, as the Croatian migrations in the 15 and 1600s that Frank wrote about truly concerned resettling parts of Burgenland; whereas, the evidence indicates that the post-1700 resettlements at best only peripherally affected Burgenland. Much of Burgenland's population was largely unscathed by the events leading up to 1683, so the necessary rebuilding was likely done early on and mostly by the same families who lived there before the armies rolled through. The evidence suggests that only opportunistic infilling occurred in Burgenland during the three settlement waves in the 1700s; the pockets of needed resettlement (mainly Heideboden villages) being completed in the late 1600s.

The final question was: "What historical documents exist concerning the recruitment and its effects?"

Again, as pertaining to Burgenland, this question was somewhat misguided. The earliest major recruitments were mostly into Swabian Turkey, the Bakony Forest and the Budapest area, with only pockets of resettlement in Burgenland, and these recruitments preceded by many years the three major resettlement programs that were motivated by the annexation of the Banat in 1717. However, as noted, one possible effect on Burgenland of these early, less-formal recruitments was to create an outflow of Burgenlanders who opportunistically claimed land in these nearby areas.

The 18th Century programs of "recruitment" apply mainly to the Banat, the Backa lowlands, and the Donauschwaben who settled them. Much can be found in their histories. Therefore, we will only cite a few sources of information about these areas and people. The more Burgenland-related sources were cited in the text above.

First, I present three websites, each of which provides information about the recruitments and their effects:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danube_Swabians

http://www.donauschwaben-usa.org

http://www.dvhh.org

Second, I present a book that appears to be a primary source for much that is on the websites:

The Last Generation Forgotten and Left to Die: the Postwar Memoirs of a Child: the History of the Danube Swabians in Word and Pictures. Hans Kopp. Cleveland, OH: H. Kopp, 2003.