Nowydwór

Nowydwór [German name Neuhof]: estate of the Chelmno bishops, Starogard powiat, postal, telegraph and railway stations, district civil registrar's office. Located 4 km. from Pelplin, it is served by the Catholic parish in Klonówka and the Protestant congregation in Rudno; it has a Catholic school. With the manorial farmstead of Debina (German name Eichwald) it has 13 homesteads, 48 hearths, 234 Catholic inhabitants (as of 1879), 516.1 hectares of arable land and gardens, 139.3 of meadows, 1.7 of pastureland, 12.2 unusable hectares, 8.9 of water, for a total of 678.2 hectares, with a net income of 9,796 marks from the land; it is about 12 km. from the powiat capital [Starogard Gdanski].

It appears that Nowydwór is one of the older settlements. In 1884 urns were discovered there, but only scraps were extracted. Long ago this estate was the property of the Pelplin Cistercians. The local manorial farmstead may already have been founded in the 15th century on the old territory of Pelplin (cmp. Rev. Kujot's Opactwo Pelplinskie, p. 386). There used to be two smaller farmsteads there, which circa 1618 were called Kamieniec and Starydwór [Old Manor]. In 1545 it and Ropuchy came into the possession of the monastic attorney Jerzy Pomierski. In 1548 King Zygmunt August confirmed Pomierski's lifelong tenancy, along with the monastery's charters. In 1594 farm-owners from Rudno leased the local manorial farmstead for 12 years at 700 zl. (2,659 marks) annually. The original of this agreement, designated for the monks' use, has been preserved to this day in the Pelplin records. In regard to form and signatures it is one of the most interesting relics of the Cistercian era. It was drawn up in Polish: "We, Oswald Kiclier (Lachtliwy) and Stanislaw Raikowski, soltyses, and all neighbors of the village of His Royal Majesty Rudno, leaseholders for this period of His Excellency Stanislaw Przyjemski, Royal Marshal, Konin starosta, etc." At the bottom and on the left side of this document all the lease-holders signed, but in German. Stanislaw Raikowski signs it with his own hand as "Stenzel Reke," his two brothers Pawel and Jan/ Hans do likewise. Alongside them stand Lukasz Mulintz (Milecz, from Milecz near Matawy), Jan Frost, Pawel Bielawski (Bilaw), Jan Hildebrandt (Hilbrandt). Several of the names are written very illegibly; there are 17 of them in all. Both the soltyses put their seals over their names. The shields are just as in their arms, but in place of the usual arms of Rajkowski there is a high cross to which a line is attached at a right angle from the left. The other soltys's seal has three stars on the shield. This document was drawn up in Rudno. The names show that adoption of German forms happened among the peasants of Pomerania as well as the nobles; from the days of the Teutonic Knights the inhabitants had become so used to these forms that they signed their names that way, even though they considered themselves Poles.

In 1661 with abbot Czarlinski's permission the monastery leased Nowydwór for three years to the renowned lord Jan Kenig. The lease-holder was to occupy: Grawensee, Szaszek, Rorteich, Dwaslupy, a pond in the woods, Starydwór by Wangiermucy, a small pond by the manor, and a second in front of the courtyard. The monastery kept for itself three ponds, Grabówko, Chójka "by the dike" and Lenartek. Five people and an innkeeper were left behind. Kenig had wood for free, but was not to touch the oak grove and small birch forest beyond the manor. The livestock consisted of 8 oxen and 3 cows (this was in the days after the Swedish war). The lease was for 500 zl. the first year, 900 the second, and 1,000 the third. The monastery allowed brewing beer for the house's use, but stipulated that Kenig was to leave a complete sowing on the farmstead of 1½ lasts of rye, half a last of barley, a last of oats, a quarter bushel of peas, and several bushels of wheat.

On 14 April 1683 a great fire broke out in Nowydwór and destroyed all the farm buildings and livestock.

Currently Nowydwór has 85 Chelmno-measure wlókas. After the transfer of the Chelmno diocese's capital from Chelmza to Pelplin in 1821, Nowydwór remained the property of the bishop. The Cistercians built the local chapel for their steward, who resided there.

[Editor's note: there are dozens of places named Nowy Dwór in Poland, and many were called Neuhof by the Germans because both names mean "new manor." So even if this name sounds familiar, don't jump to the conclusion this is the right one unless the one you want was located within a few kilometers of Pelplin, in what is now Gdansk province.] 

Source: Slownik Geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego - Warsaw [1886, vol. 7, p. 298, 13th entry under Nowydwór]