A History of the Mennonite Brethren Church, Ja Toews

s instruction introduced into the schools. " Sl This freedom was short-lived, however. With the retreat of the German armies in 1943, some thirty-five thousand Mennonites were evacuated. The retreat turned into a disorganized flight under the constant attack of Russian guerrilla bands and armed forces. Hundreds of refugees died on this long trek from the steppes of the Ukraine to the Vistula area of occupied Poland (Wartegauj. Scores of families were separated. In the closing days of the war and its aftermath, thousands were forcibly repatriated into Russia, and only some twelve thousand escaped into the Western zones of Germany. Most of them subsequently migrated to Canada and South America. In God's inscrutable but gracious providence, however, a new day was to dawn even for the people who had remained under the shadow of death for several decades longer. The survival and renewal of the Mennonite Brethren Church in ihe Soviet Union will constitute a brief epilogue to their history in Kussia. Chapter 9 The Powers of Death Have Not Prevailed Although the Soviet Union had formed an alliance with the Western Powers against the Axis Powers (Germany, Italy, and Japan) during World War II, the so-called "Iron Curtain" descended shortly after the end of the war, separating the East from the West and causing an almost complete blackout of information on the life of the church in the U.S.S.R. The "cold war" continued without abatement until the death of Stalin in 1953, when a gradual relaxation of restrictions found expression in amnesties to inmates of labor camps, to which many Mennonites had been sentenced. The first direct contact in the post-war period with the Mennonite and Mennonite Brethren Churches in Russia was established in October, 1956, by a delegation from North America consisting of H. S. Bender and D. B. Wiens. 1 Although they were not permitted to visit Mennonite settlements, these brethren were able to meet a number of Mennonite leaders in Alma Ata and in Moscow. From these contacts Bender and Wiens learned that all Mennonite colonies in the Ukraine, Crimea, Alt-Samara, and Caucasus had been completely eliminated, and their population resettled mostly in the republics of Central Asia and in southwest Siberia. Subsequent delegations in 1958, 1966, and in 1970 have confirmed this information. 2 In response to the Bender-Wiens report, the MCC established an East-West office in Frankfurt, West Germany, in 1957, to facilitate the "tracing service" (Suchdienst) for missing persons, and to gather as much information on the Mennonites of the Soviet Union as possible. Peter J. Dyck, prominent leader in the rescue and resettlement of Mennonites in the post-war period, was appointed director of this office. In October, 1959, Dyck reported that the East-West card-index at Frankfurt embraced twelve thousand alphabetically-listed names of the one hundred thousand Mennonites estimated to be in