I grew up in central Kansas. Eventually I moved to Arizona, then retired here. My father's branch of the Family Tree has narrowed down to two grand-nieces, and I feel compelled to provide them some history before it is too late. Find-A-Grave & WikiTree have been great free sources of information. I also have a lot of related paperwork from all of my grandparents.

My goal with Find-A-Grave is to provide information that will lead to corrections, missing links, and proper links. Managers of individual profiles have been greatly helpful.

All of my grandparents were descendants of Volga Germans who settled in Frank, Moor, Liebental, Herzog and Mariental Colonies in Russia.

The Volga Germans were not Russian citizens, nor were they allowed to own land. They were Germans, and they were parents -- parents who were willing to uproot their lives, and start from scratch in an unsettled (and dangerous) land, in order to provide their children with better future. In return for building civilized colonies and establishing an agricultural infrastructure on the neighboring acres surrounding the Volga River near Saratov, the German colonists were promised low taxes, exemption from military service, supplies and building materials, freedom to practice their religions and maintain their German culture and customs, and eventually some level of military protection from raiding bandits from neighboring Kazakhstan. They arrived by the thousands, weary from generations of war after war, where their sons were little more than "cannon fodder" to the German monarchs.

The formal Manifesto issued in 1763 by Catherine the Great of Russia (herself a descendant of Germans) drew over 30,000 colonists to the Russian steppes. For over 100 years the colonists were free to farm and live their lives without the threat of war. Several generations of monarchs continued the agreement -- until they didn't.

Alexander II abolished serfdom on private estates across Russia in 1861. Prior to 1861 conscription into the military was compulsorily enforced only for the peasantry. Conscription had been 25 years for serfs who were drafted by their landowners, which was widely considered to be a life sentence. On the first day of 1874, Universal Conscription was introduced for all social classes.

Further, Russian politics was swiftly changing. Alexander II was assassinated by revolutionaries in 1874. Under Alexander III, relations with Germany grew frosty.

The Germans had a decision to make. Leave everything behind (sell what they could), trek back to Germany or possibly somewhere else, and start all over again? Or take a chance and hope that things would be okay in Russia. Several generations of hard work had paid off for many of the colonists. The land was in good condition and crops were profitable. How could events unfolding in far-away Moscow affect them?

Many of the colonies sent delegations to Germany to seek alternatives. The U.S. was actively seeking immigrants to settle in the Midwest, from Texas north to the Dakotas, and on west. Citizenship was available to those who wanted it, and land ownership just sweetened the pot. While no one was exempt from military conscription, the U.S. was in a relatively peaceful period following the Civil War. Train tracks westward were being laid, enabling interested parties to view the fertile lands.

The delegations returned to their colonies in Russia, and shared their impressions of the American frontier. Immigrants would need to repeat what their ancestors had done in the 1760s and 1770s, leave their established farmlands, homes and businesses, sail to another country where English was spoken, make their way west where they would need to built temporary shelters in the ground, giving all their efforts to establishing crops in unbladed land.

In the meantime, military-age sons were notified of their conscription duties in Russia. Political upheaval was in the wind. Freed serfs were beginning to plunder farmlands for food all across Russia. Yet, many colonists chose to stay in Russia, choosing what they considered the easy path. The tens of thousands who remained did not have to wait long to realize their mistake. Their lands were plundered, their homes were burned, and they were taken by train to Siberia, where most remained until after the World Wars. The few colonies that remained became Russian agricultural collectives, with churches converted to bureaucratic purposes. Letters from colonists who stayed behind to their family and friends now in the U.S. were replete with pleas for money and clothing.

The parents of my grandparents settled in central and western Kansas, especially Ellis, Rush, Barton and Ness counties. A branch of Rothes struck out to Endicott, Washington. Further branches made their way to Colorado, Arizona and Canada. Their German cultures and spoken tongue fell away during and after World Wars I and II, and many of the soldiers never returned to the farms of their fathers.

Agribusiness, dust storms, and higher-wage industries emptied the small farm towns of western Kansas. Volga German descendants blended in the "melting pot" of North America. Yet some have sought to keep the story alive and shared. Our hard-working ancestors who were willing to take the more difficult path, to uproot their lives and livelihoods for nothing but the promise of a better life for their children and grandchildren. The ability to recognize your current path has reached a dead end is only useful when paired with the gumption to start over, elsewhere, to regain opportunities for yourself and your family. It is easier to stay behind, with storage lockers and basements loaded with the dead-weight of acquisitions unseen for decades. It is easier, until it isn't.

The four sets of linked names include:

- Rothe(Rode) / Scheuerman;

- Gallowa (changed to Galloway by a few of their kids) / Schäfer;

- Storm / Windholz / Kuhn / Hepp / Hermann;

- Linenberger / Hergert / Legleiter / Kreutzer / Rohr.

Most of the above names settled in Rush County, Kansas (or nearby).

While most of my time is spent on WikiTree, I have gradually worked to move link my parents with their parents (and their parents, along with all of their siblings). I'll keep at it until I bring them together.

Scott Rothe