Metadata: Office of the Nikolaev Military Governor; Nikolaev, Kherson Province
Collection
- Country:
- Ukraine
- Holding institution:
- State Archive of the Nikolaev Region
- Holding institution (official language):
- Державний архів Миколаївської області; Государственный архив Николаевской области
- Postal address:
- 54001, Украина, г. Николаев ул. Московская, 1, тел./факс: +380 (512) 37-0065 e-mail: mail@mk.archives.gov.ua http://mk.archives.gov.ua
- Reference number:
- F. 230
- Title:
- Office of the Nikolaev Military Governor; Nikolaev, Kherson Province
- Title (official language):
- Канцелярия Николаевского военного губернатора, г. Николаев Херсонской губ.; Канцелярія Миколаївського військового губернатора, м. Миколаїв Херсонської губ.
- Creator/accumulator:
- Office of the Nikolaev Military Governor; Nikolaev, Kherson Province
- Date(s):
- 1805/1901
- Language:
- Russian
- Extent:
- (11,963 files)
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Scope and content:
-
Documents housed in the fonds (op. 1, 3) contain directives of the central authorities pertaining to “the Jewish question” and reflect various aspects of the life and activities of the Jewish community of the city of Nikolaev and its relations with local authorities, and may conventionally be divided into the following thematic groups:
1) Files on Jews’ residency rights and activities in the Novorossiia territory and the city of Nikolaev, particularly from 1829 through 1866, when they were officially barred from permanent residence in that city. Amongst other things, these files include documents that shed light on the business activities of the Rafaloviches, a family of Nikolaev merchants, and on the complex relationship between the treasury and the well-known contractor and supplier A. I. Peretts; a draft report by Nikolaev and Sevastopol’ Military Governor A. S. Greig to the emperor to the effect that expelling Jewish merchants from Sevastopol’ (per an edict of 1829) would cause municipal commerce to suffer, and that removing Jews from Nikolaev would cause difficulties in the collection of local taxes and the fulfilment of other obligations (1830); the complaint of guild master V. Sorokin against the Jews I. Burt and M. Gafter, who were “engaged in haberdashery work unlawfully, insofar as they were not entitled to residence in the city,” and were “taking clients away from [non-Jewish] haberdashers”; and a memorandum of the police chief to the effect that the Jews indicated were permanent residents of the town of Varvarovka, from which they made visits to the city for work (1850).
Also included are a directive of the military governor stipulating the expulsion of Kh. F. Razumnyi from Nikolaev in connection with the cessation of his duties as Navy rabbi (1857); a petition of the Nikolaev Crafts Administration requesting that “free Jews” living in the city be barred from “engaging in tailoring work,” and the military governor’s order that these Jews be expelled from the city (1859); a report by the Novorossiia and Bessarabia governor-general of 28 October 1860 to the effect that retired lower-ranking Jewish military personnel had “imperial permission” to reside in Nikolaev so long as “permission was granted by local Navy command”; announcements that all Jews who had settled in the Novorossiia territory prior to 1847 were permitted to register as farmers, and a letter of the Nikolaev military governor explaining that the category of persons allowed to reside in Nikolaev did not include Jewish colonists (1861); etc.
2) Statistical data on the size of the Jewish population of Nikolaev, and lists thereof, including a memorandum of the Municipality of Nikolaev to the Nikolaev and Sevastopol’ military governor of 31 December 1829 on the number of Jewish townspeople and merchants of the first and second guilds then residing in the city of Nikolaev; a report of the Municipality of Nikolaev to the administrative committee of the Black Sea Fleet and Port’s main administration containing data received from the local Jewish kahal on the number of Jewish residents of the city who had settled there from different locations and petitioned to be registered as Nikolaev townspeople (1830); a chart showing Christian and Jewish merchants, townspeople, and farmers living in the city of Nikolaev (1830); lists of Jewish merchants, craftsmen, and retired lower-ranking military personnel, and the families thereof, living in the city of Nikolaev (1861-62); lists of Jewish unskilled labourers (1892); etc.
3) Documents pertaining to the election of Jewish community officials and regulating the activities thereof. Among these are instructions of the Novorossiia and Bessarabia governor-general on procedures for appointing community rabbis and rabbis subordinate to them from among graduates of the Zhitomir and Vil’no Rabbinical Seminaries, and lists thereof (1860-66); a directive of the Nikolaev military governor to the Nikolaev municipal police to the effect that Jews’ complaints against rabbis could be submitted only by agents of the Jewish community (1860); a directive of the Novorossiia and Bessarabia governor-general requiring rabbis to read sermons in honour of the Russian emperor, with the texts thereof presented to be approved by the police beforehand (1864), and the same official’s circular (10 July 1872) on procedures for performing public prayers and services.
Also included are correspondence of the Nikolaev military governor with the Nikolaev mayor on the approval of persons elected to various offices in Jewish houses of worship (1873); with the Nikolaev municipal police on an assembly of congregants to elect agents to purchase a building for a house of worship (1885); with the Nikolaev Municipal Administration on the approval of instructions for a commission on distributing aid to indigent and disabled Jews (an agreement on supplementing these instructions with permission to collect contributions to acquire clothing and food for children and indigent parents, and to provide these persons with crafts training); correspondence on closing the second Jewish burial society, and on the approval of rules for the management of the Jewish cemetery (1892-94); instructions for Jewish butchers (1895); instructions of the Nikolaev mayor to the military governor on the election of rabbis and their assistants; files on the approval of the results of elections of members of boards of synagogues and Jewish houses of worship, the trustees of the Nikolaev Jewish hospital, the board of trustees of the Nikolaev Talmud-Torah, honorary trustees of a Jewish state school, etc.
4) Documents on the collection of the korobka [kosher meat tax] from Jews, and on the distribution thereof; on leasing the korobka (in 1884-95 and 1896-1900), including a memorandum of Jewish residents of Nikolaev on the need to enlist officials elected from the Jewish community to draw up a korobka budget (1884); a report of the mayor and correspondence of the Nikolaev military governor with the Ministry of Internal Affairs on auctioning korobka leases and concluding agreements with the Nikolaev merchants I. B. Gokhberg, P. Rashkovskii, and M. Rafalovich (1884, 1896); budgets for korobka disbursements in the city of Nikolaev for 1885-88, 1888-91, and 1896-1900, and explanatory notes and conditions pertaining to same; correspondence on the disbursement of aid to indigent Jews from korobka funds, including the Nikolaev mayor’s (rejected) petition to the military governor requesting that 1,400 rubles be distributed to the needy from remaining korobka funds “in connection with the poor harvest and downturn in the bread trade” (1891); on using korobka funds to construct a new building for the two-grade Jewish state school in Nikolaev (1895-1900); etc.
5) Materials on the opening, closing, and operations of Jewish communal and charitable institutions and schools, including a ruling of members of the Nikolaev Jewish community that it was necessary to construct a Jewish bathhouse, an “almshouse including a hospital,” and a new cemetery (1861); correspondence of the military governor with the Nikolaev Municipal Duma on allocating funds to maintain the city synagogue and Jewish houses of worship and charitable institutions (1869); with the Nikolaev city police on permitting Kh. Varshaver to open a private women’s school in Nikolaev (1880), on collecting information on melameds engaged in the education of Jewish children (including a list of melameds and the cheders thereof, 1882), and on approving the charter of the Auxiliary Bank of Jewish Craftsmen of the City of Nikolaev (1886); with the trustee of the Odessa Educational District on closing the Nikolaev Talmud-Torah and establishing a two-grade Jewish school (to include a vocational department) (1888-90), on persons “secretly instructing Jewish children in Jewish law, reading, and writing,” and on the implementation, per a Senate edict, of special rules for Jewish teachers who ran private schools, and the adoption of strict punishments for violations of same (1892).
Other materials contain correspondence with the Nikolaev mayor on procedures for managing Jewish bathhouses (1890); with the Ministry of Internal Affairs on approving the charter of a Jewish almshouse, and permitting the donation of real estate to establish this institution (1899); a letter of I. N. Durnovo, minister of internal affairs, on implementing restrictions (the “percentage norm” or quota) on Jews enrolled in state educational institutions, and in particular for admissions to programs training physicians’ assistants and pharmacists; and a memorandum of the chief of medicine of the Nikolaev naval hospital to the effect that the prescribed five-percent quota for Jewish pharmacology students could not be implemented for three years, when the current student body would have completed its course of study (1893); petitions by groups of Jews, members of burial societies, and communities for permission to open houses of worship (1888-89); files on the approval of the charter of the Nikolaev Jewish hospital (with information on the history of its foundation), on the construction of a “barrack for prayer services during Jewish holidays” in the hospital courtyard, and on permitting the heirs of the merchant Kh. L. Meshures (a former trustee of the hospital) to construct and donate the hospital’s outpatient wing (1890-95); etc.
6) Documents on registering the Jewish population: correspondence with the Nikolaev mayor on the preparation of Jewish vital records (1880-81); a memorandum of the military governor addressed to board members of synagogues and houses of worship notifying them as to the necessity of keeping vital records in accordance with the law, and to the Nikolaev crown rabbi with a “stern reprimand” for delays in vital record entries (1875); petitions by various individuals requesting that rabbis register their children in vital records, and complaints regarding the incorrect keeping thereof; a petition by Crown Rabbi A. Rozenberg requesting permission to enter previously-omitted records for Jews born in 1878 separately (and a resolution of the military governor initiating a special investigation on this subject, 1888); etc.
There are also memoranda of the Nikolaev military governor to the head of the Tavriia province confirming the townsperson P. Fel’dman’s entitlement to receive a medal for the defence of Sevastopol’ (1863); of the Novorossiia and Bessarabia governor-general on assisting A. Tsederbaum, editor of the Odessa Jewish newspaper Ha-Melits, in his efforts to familiarise himself with everyday Jewish life in the city of Nikolaev, and the Nikolaev military governor’s order to the municipal police to render assistance to A. Tsederbaum “if need be and in such cases as his demands are just” (1868); a memorandum of former Nikolaev Rabbi M. Kogon on his being appointed an official to perform special tasks pertaining to Jewish affairs (1879); letters of representatives of the St. Petersburg group The Brotherhood of Zion calling upon Jews to emigrate from Russia (1882), and of the Odessa city prefect on the discovery (9 February 1889) of a secret society engaged in collecting donations for Jewish farmers and craftsmen in Syria and Palestine [the Society to Aid Jewish Farmers and Craftsmen in Syria and Palestine, also called the Odessa (or Palestine) Committee]; this society had a network of agents in other cities, including in Nikolaev (the letter includes a list of persons suspected of involvement in this society’s activities); correspondence on permitting the board of a tailors’ house of worship to produce Torah scrolls in honour of the deceased Emperor Alexander III (1894); a petition by wives of Jewish doctors and merchants (co-signed by the city rabbi) requesting permission to collect donations to aid needy Jews “in connection with crop failures and the threat of famine” (1900); etc.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- This was established in 1805 as the Office of the Nikolaev and Sevastopol’ Military Governor, an executive-administrative entity headed by the Nikolaev and Sevastopol’ military governor. The office held jurisdiction over the cities of Nikolaev and Sevastopol’, and over the admiralty settlements assigned to the military governorate (until 1877). In late 1856 the civilian administration in the city of Sevastopol’ was removed from its purview, at which point it was called the Office of the Nikolaev Military Governor. It was dissolved by decree (22 May 1900) of the State Council in connection with the liquidation of the Nikolaev Military Governorate; its authority was transferred to the newly-established Office of the Nikolaev City Prefect.
- Access points: locations:
- Kherson province
- Nikolaev
- Odessa
- Russia
- Sevastopol’
- Syria
- Ukraine
- Subject terms:
- Agriculture
- Aid and relief
- Cemeteries
- Correspondence
- Crown rabbis
- Education
- Education--Cheders
- Education--Melamdim
- Education--Schools and universities
- Education--Talmud Torah
- Expulsion
- Financial matters
- Health and medical matters
- Health and medical matters--Hospitals
- Hevrah kadisha
- Jewish Question
- Jewish quota
- Jewish soldiers
- Kahal
- Law enforcement
- Law enforcement--Police
- Maps
- Mikveh
- Military
- Professions
- Professions--Crafts
- Rabbis
- Residency issues of Jews
- Ritual slaughter
- Ritual slaughter--Butchers
- Seafaring
- Statistics
- Taxation
- Taxation--Korobka
- Torah (scroll)
- Trade and commerce
- Vital records
- System of arrangement:
- The fonds includes three inventories systematised according to the structural-chronological principle.
- Finding aids:
- Inventories are available.
- Yerusha Network member:
- Jewish Theological Seminary