D. N. Brazol was the name of the owner of a large estate from whom the Mennonites purchased 5,324 dessiatines (about 14,000 acres) of land in the district of Alexandrovsk province of Ekaterinoslav, Russia (now Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine) on 20 July 1868. This land was located north of the Molotschna settlement and became the nucleus of the Schönfeld Mennonite settlement, composed of villages and smaller and larger estates. Schönfeld was the center and volost of the growing and prosperous settlement. Blumenfeld, which had been started in this district in 1848, was added to the Schönfeld volost in 1876. Between 1855 and 1875 a number of estates in this area were settled by Mennonites centering around Rosenhof, and after 1875 Blumenheim was established.

At the time of World War I some 2,000 Mennonites lived in this area on 202 farms consisting of some 150,000 acres of land. The settlement had three places of worship, Schönfeld, Blumenfeld, and Rosenhof.

For a more detailed description see Schönfeld Mennonite settlement

Bibliography

Adapted by permission of Herald Press, Harrisonburg, Virginia, and Waterloo, Ontario, from Mennonite Encyclopedia, Vol. 1, pp. 410-411. All rights reserved. For information on ordering the encyclopedia visit the Herald Press website.

©1996-2013 by the Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. All rights reserved.