The first group of German 34 colonist families arrived in Kratzke on 7 August 1767. They came from the Pfalz, Prussia, Hanover, and Sweden and had been recruited by Baron de Boffe. The colony is named after Adam Kratzke, the first mayor (Vorsteher) of the colony, who later moved to Katharinenstadt.
In August 1774, rebel leader Pugachev raided the colony. Gottlieb Beratz, Volga German historian, reports the following:
Soon after his arrival in the colony, Pugachev erected gallows and strung up four strangers thereon. “Thereupon these monsters,” reported the witness Dewald, “ransacked the few houses of our then still very small village, took what pleased them, struck old men and women, as well as children, with their whips and rods, but without killing anyone, and then camped near the village. Before dawn was visible on the horizon, a few houses in the village here and there began to burn. At the same time the whole pack of brigands with their leaders got up and left our village. As there was no wind that morning, the fire did not spread and even in the farmyards where it had broken out, much could still be saved. All the grain, hay, and straw on the threshing floors, however, fell prey to the flames. Also, everything that the robbers came across in the fields was completely destroyed. The livestock that they could catch also was partly butchered on the spot, partly driven away with them.”
Along the northern edge of the colony, there was a mill on the banks of the Karamysh River.
In 1855, families from Kratzke, along with several from the neighboring colonies of Dietel, Kautz, and Merkel founded the daughter colony of Ährenfeld.
Today, what remains of the former colony of Kratzke is known as Podchinnoye.
Kratzke was founded as a Lutheran colony. There was a resident pastor in the neighboring colony of Dietel, and Kratzke belonged to the parish headquartered there.
In 1826, a wooden church building was dedicated in Kratzke. In 1899, a new building was constructed, also of wood.
During the Soviet years, the steeple was removed and the building was converted into a community center where movies were shown.
As of 2017, the building was still standing and being used as a barn.
The Dietel parish which included the colony of Kratzke was served by the following pastors:
1768-1770 Sigismund Israel Bergen
1772-1774 Gottlieb May
1780-1782 Laurentius Ahlbaum
1793-1798 Johann Heinrich Buck
1801-1815 Karl Jakob Früauf
1819-1835 Andreas Anton Haag
1835-1862 Gotthard Alexis Marpurg
1864-1880 Ernst Gottfried Carrolien
1887-1892 August Julius Tiedemann
1893-1927 Johann Friedrich Möllmann
| Year |
Households
|
Population
|
||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Total
|
Male
|
Female
|
||
| 1767 |
|
129
|
|
|
| 1769 |
34
|
127
|
67
|
60
|
| 1773 |
34
|
137
|
76
|
61
|
| 1788 |
22
|
166
|
88
|
78
|
| 1798 |
30
|
213
|
117
|
96
|
| 1816 |
53
|
339
|
181
|
158
|
| 1834 |
79
|
663
|
341
|
322
|
| 1850 |
82
|
1,012
|
535
|
477
|
| 1857 |
119
|
1,214
|
637
|
577
|
| 1859 |
81
|
1,223
|
639
|
584
|
| 1886* |
138
|
1,213
|
673
|
576
|
| 1891 |
133
|
1,907
|
980
|
927
|
| 1894 |
131
|
1,928
|
1,020
|
908
|
| 1897 |
|
1,181**
|
588
|
593
|
| 1904 |
|
2,233
|
|
|
| 1910 |
|
2,458
|
|
|
| 1912 |
|
2,497
|
|
|
| 1920 |
224***
|
1,577
|
|
|
| 1922 |
|
1,322
|
|
|
| 1926 |
235
|
1,456
|
712
|
744
|
| 1931 |
|
2,171****
|
|
|
| 1939 |
|
2,188
|
|
|
*Not including 84 families (345 men and 326 women) who are absent – having immigrated to the United States.
**Of whom 1,175 were German.
***Of which 223 households were German.
****Of whom 2,149 were German.
- Kratzke (wolgadeutsche.net) in Russian
- Kratzke (Enzyklopädie der Russlanddeutschen)
- Podtschinny (Wikipedia)
- Beratz, Gottieb. The German colonies on the Lower Volga, their origin and early development: a memorial for the 150th anniversary of the arrival of the first German settlers on the Volga, 29 June 1764. Translated by Adam Giesinger (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1991): 351.
- Diesendorf, V.F. Die Deutschen Russlands : Siedlungen und Siedlungsgebiete : Lexicon. Moscow, 2006.
- Giesinger, Adam. From Catherine to Khrushchev: The Story of Russia's Germans. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1981.
- Mai, Brent Alan, ed. A Description of the Saratov Colony of Pochinnaya [Kratzke] 1798. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1995.
- Orlov, Gregorii. Report of Conditions of Settlements on the Volga to Catherine II, 14 February 1769.
- Pallas, P.S. Reise durch verschiedene Provinzen des Russischen Reichs. Theil 3,2, Reise aus Sibirien zurueck an die Wolga im 1773sten Jahr (St. Petersburg: Kaiserl. Academie der Wissenschaften, 1776): 622.
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 2 (Göttingen: Der Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 2001): 449-461.
- Preliminary Results of the Soviet Census of 1926 on the Volga German Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (Pokrovsk, 1927): 28-83.
- Rye, Richard, trans. Description of the Saratov Colony of Katharinenstadt also known as Baronsk. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1995.
- "Settlements in the 1897 Census." Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia (Winter, 1990): 19.
- Williams, Hattie Plum. The Czar’s Germans: With Particular Reference to the Volga Germans. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1975.
1767 Census
1798 Census
1834 Census
1857 Census
1897 Census
50.877, 45.227333
Migrated From
Immigration Locations
Map showing Kratzke (1857).
Source: Volgograd Archives (F.302:O.4:D.428).
Map showing all the lands allocated to Kratzke (1857). The colony itself is in the center along the upper border.
Source: Volgograd Archives (F.302:O.4:D.428).
Map showing Kratzke (1935).
Map of Kratzke as of 1939, created from memory in 1959 by Fritz Knaus, Friedrich Stuckert, and Maria Maier.
Source: Wolgadeutsche.net Forum
Panorama of Kratzke (2009).
Source: Georgi Spach.
Kratzke Lutheran Church (1996).
Source: Rodney Fink.
Lutheran Church in Kratzke (2009).
[opposite side]
Source: Georgi Spach.
Interior of the Lutheran Church in Kratzke (2009).
[taken through a projector slot; floor removed; foundation exposed]
Source: Georgi Spach.
Fabric factory in Kratzke, built in 1904.
Source: Zhirnovsk Archives via Tanja Schell.
Fabric factory in Kratzke, built in 1904.
Source: Zhirnovsk Archives via Tanja Schell.
Fabric factory in Kratzke, built in 1904.
Source: Zhirnovsk Archives via Tanja Schell.
Fabric factory in Kratzke, built in 1904.
Source: Zhirnovsk Archives via Tanja Schell.
Home of the factory owner, later used as a school.
Source: Tanja Schell.