Pustaperzha(Puusta in Estonian) 1885.

If someone in the following generation would become interested in knowing from where in Estonia the Kronberg family originates, I have gathered some facts about this. Such an interest usually awakens eventually among the survivors, but unfortunately often too late – when most of the actors have already left the stage and no new facts can be obtained anymore. Most people sooner or later start taking an interest in their ancestry. I have gone ahead of events somewhat and made an attempt to write down the information that has been given to me by those who still know the circumstances, before my time is also up.

In youth one does not have a particularly great interest in knowing anything special about one's ancestors and their deeds; other things are usually prioritized. Those who provided the primary information in this case are for the most part already gone; it is only my brother Karl Kronberg who still today (1998-09-09) knows something about the family's doings and from where in Estonia the Kronberg family originates. Over the years I have on several occasions recorded my brother Karl, my sister Alide (Lida) and mother Emely (Miili) when the latter two were still alive and could tell; it is mainly through their stories that I have been able to sift out the following information:

My grandfather Karl Kronberg lived at Kuremäe farm in Võrumaa, Rõuge parish in southern Estonia, where my father Jaan Kronberg was born in 1868. Karl Kronberg Sr starved to death sometime in 1931 and my father Jaan on September 9, 1944 in Sheltozero, Far Karelia (after having been paralyzed for a couple of months). Mother Emely's parents had also come to Russia at the end of the last century; Emely was born in the vicinity of Pustaperzha in 1884 and died in Tapa, Estonia on 1979-12-13. Karl Kronberg Jr, my brother (born 1912-04-19 in Pustaperzha), said that father Jaan had a brother named Hans, who was some kind of foreman (aidamees – steward) on a German estate, and stayed in Estonia when Jaan and his sister Anne set off to Russia together with their parents.

My brother Karl believes he knows that grandfather Karl took the name "Kroonberg" for his entire Kuremägi household. At the end of the 19th century the peasants did not have family names; the estate owner probably helped to invent the name when the feudal system ended in 1861 and all people were to become independent. Both Karl and Hans were essentially serfs under the German estate until 1882. Despite the fact that Tsar Alexander II had formally freed the peasants from serfdom already in 1861, the estate owners treated their workers as if they were still serfs. On Midsummer's Day the serfs (statarna) could change their lord; the system resembles in many ways the Swedish statare system and is likely an aftermath from the Swedish great power era in the 17th century.

Life in Estonia was quite poor, mother Emely tells, whose parents had moved to Russia at the end of the last century. The Russian government under Tsar Alexander II granted the border areas between the Estonian Grand Duchy and proper Russia for settlement at the end of the last century (the area from Narva southward towards Pskov), and there were many who wanted to move away from their estate owners to a more independent and, hopefully, better life. Peasants with small farms also moved, as well as farmhands, craftsmen, and crofters.

My father Jaan Poltan, mother Emely relates, was a carpenter on the estate; his older brother was married and already had children. The brother Karl supported himself by transporting goods (mostly brännvin) from southern Estonia to Riga. My father Jaan had also had similar work in his youth. He told that he often traveled with two horses on wagonloads of brännvin to Pskow. The journey took about a week; sleep was very scarce and he often thought that it would have been nice to be able to lie down for a while, if only on a table. For food they had ham and bread; brännvin was plentiful. They drilled a small hole in the barrel and could drink through a straw. However, he was not particularly fond of strong drinks and said:

"Even if brännvin ran like a river, I wouldn't drink very much." "I never saw him drunk," mother told.

My father Jaan Kroonberg (as the name was spelled formerly and as it stands on my mother's and siblings Alida's and Karl's gravestone in the cemetery in Tapa, Estonia) I remember as a tall, lean man with blue eyes, black, very soft hair and a white beard. The color change went level with his ears and gave a somewhat peculiar impression. Raised in the true Lutheran spirit, he was certainly a workman of rank, not only in his youth. In temperament very calm and composed, quick to joke and mostly in good spirits. I cannot recall that he was ever really angry; that part of moods was usually mother Emely's domain. Father was good at working, but probably not as good at managing money; that has always been the women's lot in the family. Father neither drank nor smoked except when someone came to visit; then he could take a few nips and roll a "goat's foot" of makhorka (coarse tobacco wrapped in newspaper). He had a certain philosophical view of things and sometimes said when confiscation came up and mother fumed over everything they had lost:

It was still cheap, it only cost money and effort; others have had to pay with their lives.

Mother Emely was made of somewhat tougher timber and managed both the family's finances and negotiations with authorities and neighbors. With gray-green eyes and her hair pinned up in a bun at the nape of her neck, she was a worthy representative of the Estonian peasant woman, tough and enduring against external influence. She had been the wife of an independent farmer with a relatively large farm in those parts, was proud and held on to her dignity. She did not let herself be shaken by the opinions of those around her; she had her own and acted accordingly. She lacked a few weeks of being able to celebrate her 97th birthday – that is an extraordinarily high age given everything she experienced and endured during her eventful life. There are not many families that have survived four deportations with all family members intact. She had a great many opinions and practical advice to give. As long as she was on her feet she was straight as a pine; she did not give in to old age as too many old people do by not pulling themselves together and straightening their backs. She was also in fairly good shape for her age. When we were in Tallinn and on our way up to Domberget along the stairs from the north side, my sister Alida (who was rather plump) panted. Mother (then in her 90s) completed the long climb without too visible difficulty. When we were out picking berries in the forests of Far Karelia, I remember she used to say:

- Don't sit too long at the same berry bush, stand up, straighten your back and take a few steps to the next! You can always come back to the first one and continue! She also used to encourage me to learn things with the words: - It can always come in handy, so learn as much as you ever can.

By tradition, the peasants were also largely skilled craftsmen; both mother and father were handy. Father always had his carpenter's box with him wherever we were sent; we never had to sleep on the floor if there were any boards nearby. In his carpenter's box he always had a number of bolts to assemble the boards into beds. As soon as an order for a deportation came (one never knew where to), he took the beds apart and saved the bolts for reuse at the next stage of the Soviet order.

Mother's craftsmanship consisted of wool and flax spinning, weaving, knitting, and crocheting. When father had his carpenter's box, mother always had her spinning wheel, and later I wondered how she could manage such a fragile object as a spinning wheel during all the transports. Through Karl I found out that the secret was that father had made the spinning wheel disassemblable. You just had to loosen the various parts and put everything in a sack; upon arrival at the new deportation site, the spinning wheel was reassembled, new pegs were put in, and the work could continue.

Mother Emely had a completely different temperament than father Jaan. There was no naivety or inclination for childishness and playfulness to any great extent. She was quite hot-tempered and was usually the one who administered punishment when I had done something inappropriate. When we lived in Karelia, the reins hung loose and quite often I got a thrashing across the back. It was a couple of sharp blows, but the reins were quite thick and it did not hurt much; the punishment was more symbolic. For some particularly serious offense, father took over the role of punisher, but being rather soft-hearted as he was, the punishment was not harsh; he felt like Olaus Petri before Bishop Hans Brask of Linköping: "To this I am forced and compelled." He was not far from crying himself during the thrashing. One can rightly say that there was to some extent a matriarchy in the family.

During father's childhood, when they still lived in Estonia, where he was born in Rôuge parish, they discussed a lot in the family about a possible move to Russia, mother Emely said. They asked themselves how long it would have to go on like this; they had to work like animals without conditions appearing to improve to any significant degree. A rich farmer in the area where they lived leased land to the crofters and the income was divided equally, but after a while my father (Jaan Poltan – Emely's father) began to think that even that was a dog's work. The heavy work of threshing grain during the winter took a toll on the mood, strength, and hands.

They mainly cultivated grain; as for livestock, it was a bit hit or miss, they had to have a certain number of animals for the manure, mother Emely tells about her father Jaan's activities in Estonia. They leased some hay meadows from the farmer, harvested and shared with the owner. Sometimes they had to buy long straw from other farmers in distant villages to use as bedding for the animals. Before they came to our own land, they had 3 milk cows and 2 heifers, as well as 2-3 calves.

After the abolition of serfdom in Russia in 1861, there became a craving for own land and many farmhands, day laborers and crofters began to move to the borderland between Estonia and Russia. The Russian government promised certain tax exemptions and there were numerous descendants of serfs and small farmers who now began to emigrate from Estonia to the areas east of Lake Peipus. (Lake Peipus) Jaan Kronberg's parents arrived in Russia (probably in 1887), to a Russian village near the river Paartna (in the village of Vesikova?) without any knowledge whatsoever of the Russian language. Father Jaan was then 12 years old. The condition for moving and obtaining land included a requirement: the person in question had to convert to the Greek Orthodox faith.

Many had already moved to Russia before us and before my husband's parents, mother Emely tells, and my parents felt that something should be done, but what? There was no abundance to bring along; they got one cow, a barrel of pork, and when that ran out, after arriving in Russia and settling down, it was milk food for long periods. I don't really know how badly off they actually were in the beginning, mother Emely recounted. My husband Jaan said that when he was going to Russia he didn't have a single kopek, but they moved voluntarily; staying behind would have been even worse. An acquaintance of the family had met them on the road and had given him 20 kopeks with the urging:

- Have a drink, then you'll dare more!

Near the place they moved to, there had been an established Estonian miller for a few years, and he had to serve as interpreter until Jaan had learned enough Russian to manage on his own. The grandfather never learned Russian completely, my brother Karl tells; he worked occasionally as a farmhand for the miller and got along well with his son Jaan, neither of them was particularly quarrelsome. Gradually, when they had acquired their own land and become relatively well-off, everything they had accomplished in Pustaperzha was registered in his name. Jaan was always a very calm and sensible person; he and grandfather Karl never quarreled as far as I remember, said mother Emely.

Near us lived an Estonian family, and after a while my husband and his parents moved there. I don't remember how long they lived there before they started building on the spot where you, Albert, were born. The distance there was probably 2 kilometers, it couldn't have been much more. At first they built a sauna on the bank of a small stream and lived there for a short time. However, the stream dried up during dry summers, and then they had 1.5 km to the nearest watercourse near a school. When I asked why they didn't try to dig a well, Karl replied that the ground was very clayey and water was difficult. The lack of water caused a lot of trouble. After the regular workday, the horse could not be unharnessed before water was fetched in a barrel a good distance from the farm. After a while, the water situation became unsustainable and too labor-intensive. The sauna was built, but they began to look for a place with better water conditions, and when a suitable spot appeared, building began anew.

At the new place a well was dug, and the water was so close that it came through a channel directly into the kitchen. Grandfather Karl is said to have remarked that now there was nothing more to do, that's how well the water supply worked. At the previous place the ground was so clayey that you could dig a pit and store the water in the pit, but it couldn't hold much water, and what roads to transport water on! Oh, oh, how much trouble and difficulty we had to endure before we had everything ready, sighed mother Emely.

The new place turned out to be good, and we lived there for about 20 years. We got married in 1911, and the confiscation came in 1930. By that time we had gotten the farm going really well; the fields were cleared of stones and stumps. We had borrowed 300 rubles from an acquaintance and hired some nearby Russians to clear the fields. There were enormous stumps, as big as houses, and they lasted as fuel for a 4-5-year period. We also burned stumps in the drying barn. Now the land was cleared, 23 hectares of arable land so clean that we could use a mowing machine to cut hay and grain; moreover, in 1927 we had bought an additional 15 hectares, but we could only enjoy it for a couple of years. Everything fell into the hands of those beggars and bandits – and was destroyed.

One of our acquaintances, Karl Sack, had a small place with rather poor conditions; he got an opportunity to take over a considerably better place. He took his house apart and moved it to the new place, but did not get to enjoy the fruits of his labor for any longer time before the confiscation came.

In the district where my sister Elvy lived, mother Emely tells, there were not so many Estonians; most of the surrounding people were Russians, but in Pustaperzha there was, on the other hand, a very large number of Estonian and Latvian farms. The new settlements constituted a Lutheran diaspora in a compact Greek Orthodox surroundings. The Russian villages had a better location because they had been formed long before the Estonian and Latvian settlements. When the Estonians and Latvians came, they had to take what was left. They lived like bears and wolves; upon their arrival they usually had to start by living in hastily cobbled-together leaf huts or earth holes, but they managed well; they were capable, hardworking farmers and eventually became very prosperous.

The Russians' villages were of traditional construction, a conglomerate of clustered houses along some highway; no land consolidation had taken place, and their small fields could lie several kilometers from the dwelling houses. It took time to drive to the strips to work or haul manure, and their harvests were not at all comparable to those that we in later times got from our fields.

Father Jaan used to sometimes talk about the Russian farmers' poor efficiency. In his opinion, the Russians' form of settlement was the main reason for their poorer economic conditions. A self-owning farmer who lives on his own land is always much more efficient and can in a shorter time achieve better results than those who live clustered together in one place and have far to their fields. Father related that he always had an axe tucked in his belt wherever he went on his land, and could repair fences or anything else in need of mending as soon as he spotted it. He didn't have to make a separate errand of it. It was, so to speak, close to the work, and the tasks that a farm required were done immediately.

The Russians' living in villages naturally suited the Slavic temperament better; they are more sociable and need many people around them, unlike Estonians, who are more individualistic and not as much in need of company. This, however, led to significantly poorer performance regarding the management of agriculture. In the mornings, everyone gathered with their horses and carts; the departure was made together, and if someone was late, they waited for him. On the way out to the fields, they were not in a hurry either. During the journey, stories were told, and if there was any home-brewed liquor left, they sometimes took a vodka shot. Home distilling was allowed, and the vodka flowed. Once at the fields, they had to agree on lunch and the return trip. Upon returning home, they gathered in the middle of the village, where there was always a lot of people and great social life; all this took time away from work, and the results were not long in coming. The Estonian and Latvian farmers had achieved good results, and the Russians were naturally very envious of them; the Estonians and Latvians had founded their farms much later, but despite this had still achieved much better prosperity.

In themselves, neither Estonians nor Latvians are any great teetotalers either, but drinking occurred under more orderly circumstances, mainly in connection with festivities or on holidays. The common saying among Estonians and Latvians is said (according to father Jaan) to have been:

- Sure, one can take a drink on Saturday, possibly a hair of the dog on Sunday, but on Monday the body should start at attention and work. No drinking on weekdays.

When Stalin in the 1930s began with collectivization, the "poor peasants" took the opportunity to get rid of the more well-off, appropriated some of their belongings, and thought that justice was thus served. Those who were deported and whose property was confiscated (in the Novoselje area) were almost 100% of foreign origin; it was only a few Russians from the Pustaperzha area who ended up in the deportation for the same reason. None of the Russians in the vicinity had any large estates; there was not much to confiscate. These "poor peasants" had no luck with them, however. Easy come, easy go. Some enterprising Russians had, however, already during our time begun to move out to individual farms. There where you, Albert, herded the collective's sheep, pigs, and cows in the summer of 1939 and your aunt looked after you, the inhabitants were predominantly Estonians. Most had emigrated from the motherland already at the end of the last century and had managed to establish good farms. Jaan's father said:

- If we hadn't moved, we would have remained farmhands for others; they were masters and we would have remained their servants as long as we lived.

Because some Estonians had already moved to the border regions at a fairly early stage, there was a certain knowledge base to pass on to those who were still in Estonia but were considering moving to Russia. Those who had already moved and established themselves to some extent wrote to their acquaintances in Estonia and described the conditions: a few tax-free years in Russia to begin with. When your grandfather arrived, he had only a single cow and hardly anything else to support himself with. Moreover, grandfather was disabled; one of his hands was shorter and when plowing he had to use a kind of harness to handle the plow. The conditions for the tax exemption also included a requirement to convert to Greek Orthodox faith, but that apparently was not taken very seriously since most had returned to Lutheranism by the end of the 1920s. The Russian state interfered with Lutheran services and church construction. It was only with the introduction of the Soviet state that difficulties and persecution of believers arose. No one was allowed to own even a Bible, much less use it or engage in religious propaganda.

When I think of all that was accomplished and built there by Jaan and his father (I myself lived there only 19 years) over those 40 years, it is no small thing, says mother Emely. It is true that only 23 hectares of arable land were cleared by us, and the first house burned down, but they built as fast as they could and gradually it became quite a lot. Just before the confiscation, an additional 15 hectares of land were purchased from a farmer who moved to Siberia. Now the farm had grown to over 40 hectares and provided a good livelihood for its owners. This naturally aroused some envy, and in the name of revolution and equality, the "poverty committee" took over all of this, but the result was not what was expected – many of those poor farmers paid a very high price for the experiment – not least the members of the "poor man's committee".

Someone has said that "The revolution devours its children." The Russian revolution has not only devoured the children but to a large extent also the grandchildren.