Bukovina Germans


The Bukovina Germans are a German ethnic group which settled in Bukovina, a historical region situated at the crossroads of Central and Eastern Europe. Their main demographic presence lasted from the last quarter of the 18th century, when Bukovina was annexed by the Habsburg Empire, until 1940, when nearly all Bukovina Germans were resettled into the Third Reich as a part of Heim ins Reich national socialist population transfer policy.
According to the 1910 Imperial Austrian census, the Bukovina Germans represented an ethnic minority accounting for approximately 21.2% of the multi-ethnic population of the Duchy of Bukovina. Of those 21.2%, a large proportion was represented by German-speaking Jews. By excluding the Jews however, the Germans in Bukovina constituted a minority of circa 73,000 people.
Subsequently, in absolute numbers, 75,533 ethnic Germans were registered in Bukovina when it was still part of the Kingdom of Romania. Historically, some of them developed their own dialect over the course of several hundred years which they called 'Buchenländisch'. To this day, sparse rural and urban communities still reside in southern Bukovina and are politically represented by the Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania.

History

Middle Ages

Ethnic Germans known as Transylvanian Saxons, had sparsely settled in the western mountainous regions of the Principality of Moldavia over the course of the late medieval Ostsiedlung migration.
These settlers encouraged trade and urban development. Additionally, they founded of some notable medieval settlements such as Baia, the first capital of the Principality of Moldavia, or Târgu Neamț. Subsequently, most of them were gradually assimilated in these local cultures.

Under the Habsburgs and within the Austrian Empire

Following the Russo-Turkish War, in 1774–75 the Habsburg Monarchy annexed northwestern Moldavia which was predominantly inhabited by Romanians, with smaller numbers of Ukrainians, Armenians, Poles, and Jews.
Since then, the region has been known as Bukovina. From 1774 to 1786, the settlement of German craftsmen and farmers in existing villages increased. The settlers included Zipser Germans from the Zips region of Upper Hungary, Banat Swabians from Banat, and ethnic Germans from Galicia, but also immigrants from the Rhenish Palatinate, the Baden and Hesse principalities, as well as from impoverished regions of the Bohemian Forest.
Thus, four distinct German linguistic groups were represented as follows:
During the 19th century, the developing German middle class comprised much of the intellectual and political elite of the region; the language of official business and education was predominantly German, particularly among the upper classes. Population growth and a shortage of land led to the establishment of daughter settlements in Galicia, Bessarabia, and Dobruja.
After 1840, a shortage of land caused the decline into poverty of the German rural lower classes; in the late 19th century parts of the German rural population alongside a few Romanians emigrated to the Americas, mainly to the United States but also to Canada.
Between 1849 and 1851, and from 1863 to 1918, the Duchy of Bukovina became an independent crown land within the Austrian Empire. However, in comparison to other Austrian crown lands, Bukovina remained an underdeveloped region on the periphery of the realm, primarily supplying raw materials.
The Franz Josephs Universität in Czernowitz was founded in 1875, then the easternmost German-speaking university. In 1910–1911, the Bukovinan Reconciliation took place between the representatives of the nationalities. During the first round of the 20th century, local German-language literature flourished through the writings of Rose Ausländer, Alfred Kittner, Alfred Margul Sperber, or Paul Celan.

Early 20th century and Kingdom of Romania

From 1918 to 1919, following the end of World War I and the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Bukovina became part of the Kingdom of Romania. At the General Congress of Bukovina held on November 28, 1918, the political representatives of the Bukovina Germans voted and supported the union of Bukovina with the Romanian kingdom, alongside the Romanian and Polish representatives.
From 1933 up until 1940, some German societies and organizations opposed the propaganda of the Third Reich and the National Socialist-aligned so-called 'Reformation Movement'. Beginning in 1938 however, due to the poor economic situation and the powerful national socialist propaganda, a pro Third Reich mentality developed within the Bukovina German community. Because of this, many increased their preparedness for evacuation.

Outbreak of World War II

When Nazi Germany signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact with the Soviet Union in 1939, the fate of the Germans in Bukovina was sealed. In a secret supplementary protocol, it was agreed that the northern part of Bukovina would be annexed by the Soviet Union under a territorial re-organization in Central-Eastern Europe, with the German sub-populations therein undergoing compulsory resettlement to other future Nazi-occupied territories. Under this accord, the Soviet Union occupied northern Romania in 1940.
Consequently, the Third Reich resettled nearly the entire German population of Bukovina to, most notably, Nazi-occupied Poland, where the incoming evacuees were frequently compensated with expropriated farms. From 1941 to 1944, Bukovina was entirely Romanian. Additionally, most of the Jewish population were murdered by the Third Reich in collaboration with fascist Romania under Marshal Ion Antonescu during the Holocaust.

Resettlement in the wake of World War II

In 1944–45, as the Russian front moved closer, the Bukovina Germans settled in Polish areas, fled westward or wherever they could manage. Some remained in East Germany; others went to Austria. In 1945, the 7,500 or so remaining Germans in Bukovina were evacuated to Germany, ending a significant German presence in Bukovina, Romania after 1940. During the postwar era, the Bukovina Germans, as other 'homeland refugees', assimilated into the Federal Republic, Austria, or the German Democratic Republic. Nonetheless, small numbers of ethnic Germans returned to Romania after the resettlement plan failed, most notably the Zipser Germans, but also some Bukovina Germans.

Demographics

The 1930 Romanian census recorded 75,000 ethnic Germans in Bukovina. Thus, the Bukovina Germans made up 12.46% of the total population of the interwar Suceava County at that time. According to the 2011 Romanian census, the German minority in southern Bukovina makes up only 0.11% of the total population.

Organisations

The political representation of the Bukovina Germans is the DFDR/FDGR which has a local branch operating in Suceava County with headquarters in the city of Suceava.
After World War II, the Bukovina Germans who settled in West Germany founded the Landsmannschaft der Buchenlanddeutschen im Bundesrepublik Deutschland.

Notable people