History of the Great Grandfather of Hertha Arndt

(From Carol Arndt’s Baby Book)

"During a Catholic revolution, great grandfather’s name was changed from Friedrich Vesilofski to Friedrich Frohlich. The name was changed so that the name would not appear to be Polish. The family had changed to Lutherans and would have been murdered for it. Friedrich Vesilofski was of the Royal family from Russia and Poland at that time. The family had Bibles printed in gold before the revolution." (Edited by Bill Remus)

Hertha Hoffman Arndt also told of the family dining with gold plates.

Commentary: The Poles revolted frequently against the Russians (however, none of the revolutions were particularly religiously motivated). Never the less, the Vesilofski’s may have feared death and changed their name. And they may have left Poland for the same reason.

The Volhynia church records (Kirchenbuch) initially use the name Froelich (Frohlich) and later freely use Wessalowski (Vesilofski) for Frederika, Wilhelm, and other members of the Friedrich Wessalowski family (Frederika was our very own Ludwig Hoffmann's grandmother). Perhaps the people of Volhynia were more accepting of Lutheran-Catholic marriages than Poles. Wilhelm Wessalowski (Frederika’s brother) often appears in the church books as he baptized the newly born (this kind of person was called a "teacher"); later the baptism was "affirmed" during the occasional visit of the regional Lutheran pastor to an outlying village like Wilhelm’s Tarnowole village. Thus, Wilhelm was widely known and accepted at least in his village.

Friedrika’s sister Anna Carolina was born in 1835 in Massanhalsjactoz Poland. So the family of Friedrich Wessalowski departed Poland after 1835 and arrived in Volhynia no later than 1852. Thus, the name change occurred prior to 1852.

Either the 1833 failed Polish revolution or 1848 failed Polish revolution may have caused their flight and temporary name change to Frohlich. I say temporary name change since Frohlich and Wessalowski are used interchangeably in the church records of Volhynia. This is a very logical name change since Froehlich means happy person in German and Wessalowski means happy person in Polish.

Here is my theory: I think it likely that the Wessalowski family lived in southern Poland prior to the 1848 revolution. This area was called Galacia and was under Austrian control. In 1848 the Polish peasants rose up against the Polish nobility in Galacia. The Austrians tacitly encouraged the Polish peasants to destroy of over 2000 manor houses in Galacia that belonged to the Polish nobility; the Austrians seemed to think this was a good way to show the local Polish nobility who was boss. I think they lived in Galacia since no where else in Poland were the Polish nobles so directly targeted and Volhynia is just across the western border of Galacia.

Norman Davies in A History of Poland (Volume II, pages 147-148) describes the scene as follows: "Faced with small groups of armed noblemen, Johan Breindl enlisted the help of the local peasants. In particular he sought the assistance of Jakub Szela (1787-1866) an irascible peasant from Smarzowy… Szela set to work to organize bands of serfs, who were promised an end to their feudal obligations if they would turn on their masters. In the ensuing melee, the estates of the noble conspirators were invaded. Noblemen, landlords, bailiffs, and protesting official were butchered in cold blood. The innocent suffered with the guilty. Before long, the peasant bands were offering the severed heads of their noble victims to the authorities as proof of their zeal. ….. In some districts nine out of ten manors were razed to the ground. …. It was nearly three weeks before the Austrian army could arrive to restore order. By that time more than two thousand Polish noblemen had been killed. …. Szela was arrested but was then rewarded with a large estate in the distant province of Bukovina."

October 6, 1999