Journal of European Baptist Studies, Volume 7, No. 3, 2007

ptist Studies Whatever the number of Mennonite Brethren baptisms of Ukrainians, and there may have been others, none of them resulted in the establishment of a Ukrainian Baptist movement until the baptism in Alt- Danzig in June, 1869. This was the area where the Pritzkaus were conducting stundist meetings with Ukrainians present. Several months before June, a letter from the area recorded crowded prayer services in which people cried out for God’s mercy. It also noted, ‘Even Russian hired men and servant girls attend the meetings’ and that ‘...also in all the adjacent country there is a great awakening among both Germans and Russians’. 27 It is not surprising that in such a revival atmosphere Ukrainian believers would be eager for baptism. The opportunity for such a baptism occurred on 11 June 1869 (o.s.) when Johann Unger, the Mennonite leader from Chortitsa, had come to Alt-Danzig to baptize a large group of German believers. After careful examination of the candidates, which took some days, the baptism was finally ready to proceed. A group of both Germans and Ukrainians observed Unger who read from the Gospel, joined in song with those present, and then, with prayer, immersed each candidate one by one. But one of those baptized was a Ukrainian, Efim Tsimbal, who, unexamined, slipped in line and, according to Johann Pritzkau, who knew Tsimbal well, was supposedly inadvertently baptized by Unger. In his report of the baptism in 1869 Pritzkau claimed eighty-nine were baptized but with no mention of Tsimbal. In a letter from him in 1870 in which he stated fifty were baptized, he finally mentioned Tsimbal’s baptism. 28 But was Tsimbal’s baptism inadvertent?—a question which Michael Klimenko raised almost fifty years ago in his dissertation. According to the Russian report, the village magistrate himself was suspect and found himself in trouble for failing to stop Tsimbal. Why did Unger baptize an outsider rather than Johann Pritzkau, a native of the area who knew all the candidates and had only recently been ordained for mission service by Oncken? In fact, Pritzkau was baptizing a short time later. Was it expedient to have an outsider, who could claim he did not know the candidates Mennonite Brethren Historical Society of the Midwest, 1973), pp. 142-51; and Lawrence Klippenstein, (ed.), ‘Johann Wieler (1839-1889) Among Russian Evangelicals: A New Source of Mennonites and Evangelicalism in Imperial Russia’, Journal of Mennonite Studies, 5 (1987), p. 48. 11 Baptist Missionary Magazine, September 1869, pp. 360-61. 28 For the Russian report of Tsimbal’s baptism, in which it was claimed thirty were baptized, see Materialy dlya istorii religioznago dvizheniya na yuge Rossii vo vtoroipolovine xix veka, in Pravoslavnyisobesednik, September 1908, no. 58, pp. 71-72. For Johann Pritzkau’s reports, see Quarterly Reporter, October 1869, pp. 394-95, and July, 1870, p. 837, and Pritzkau, Geschichte, pp. 13- 14. 2