Biography of Father Johannes Lang

Description:
Born in 1882 in Simferopol. Graduated from Saratov seminary and was ordained May 24, 1905, for the Diocese of Tiraspol. He served as vicar – then as pastor – of the parish in Novocherkassk, serving also the parish in Liebenthal outside Lugansk. September 18, 1941 – Father Johannes, as part of a large group of Germans, was deported from Rostov-on-Don to Shipunovo, Altay kray, and in February 1942 he was sent to the settlement in Zerkaly, Shipunovsk region. The local residents had a very negative attitude toward the deportees; Father Johannes had to earn his living and he did so by walking through the area with a soldering tool and repairing buckets and pots. Residents paid him with milk, which his sister then made into cottage cheese and sold. In June 1944, having drunk some milk along the road, he felt sick and barely made it to an outpatient clinic where he died, June 26, 1944. The doctor – a deported German woman – believed that his death was brought on by poisoning, resulting from lack of caution in handling the materials that he welded. His parishioners remembered him as a good and very sincere person. Sources: Letters of Father Jarosƚaw Wiśniewski containing evidence about the death of Father Lang and the memories of those who knew him; Dzwonkowski, p. 321; Schnurr, p. 363
Variant Names:
Lang, Iogann; Lang, Johannes
Dates:
1882-1944
Locations:
Simferopolʹ (Ukraine); Saratov (Russia); Tiraspol (Moldova); Novocherkassk (Russia); Shipunovo (Altai Krai); Zerkaly (Russia)
Subjects:
male; clergy and religious; survived