Germans

Categories / Population/Ethnic Groups
GERMANS, an ethnic community forming a part of the St. Petersburg population. German language is related to the Germanic group of Indo-European languages. Their religion is Lutheran (amongst the St. Petersburg population up to 90%) and Catholic. Germans are the majority of the foreigners living in St. Petersburg. The German community was conceived at the same time as the city. Tsar Peter the Great invited German specialists to Russia, among many others. They consisted of artisans (from among these in the 19th century the most famous were the bakers), soldiers, civil servants, scholars, and doctors. The German community in St. Petersburg grew on account of the Germans in the Baltic states, as well as from immigrants from Germany, from the second half of the 18th century. From the second half of the 18th century there arose in St. Petersburg Province a German agricultural colony (on the territory of present day St. Petersburg - Grazhdanka, Vesely Poselok among others). In 1869 there were 45,600 Germans living in St. Petersburg. In 1910 - 47,400 settled mainly on Vasilievsky Ostrov and Admiralteiskaya (in the 18th century) and in the Kazanskaya suburbs. In 1710 the first German Lutheran Society of St. Peter was founded, in 1730 its church was consecrated (see Lutheran Church of St. Peter). Burials were mainly conducted at Smolenskoe and Volkovskoe Lutheran cemeteries. From the 18th century in St. Petersburg there was a German school (the oldest being - Peterschuhle, founded in 1710), in the 19th century - there were cultural and professional unions (for example, the Society of Artisans Palme). In 1728-1916 the German newspaper St. Petersburger Zeitung was produced (re-established in 1991), in the 19th and first third of the 20th centuries, there were other periodical publications. From the start of World War I (1914-18) in St. Petersburg German pogroms occurred. In the 1920s-30s, in Leningrad the German Cultural-Educational Society operated (1 Eighth Line, Vasilievsky Ostrov), as well as the German Museum Society (3 Мalaya Konyushennaya Street), the German House of Education (4 Yakubovicha Street), the German Pedagogical Technical School (74-76 Moika River Embankment), the German Department attached to the Leningrad Order of the Red Star State Pedagogical Institute in honour of А.I. Herzen, and other national organizations, liquidated in 1937-38. In March 1942 Leningrad Germans together with Finns were deported to Siberia (see ethnic deportations). In 1989 there were 3570 Germans living in St. Petersburg. In 1989 the German Society of St. Petersburg was established, in 1991 - St. Petersburg Society of German Culture, in 1993 -the German Cultural Society, involved in the preservation of traditions and German language. In the 1990s some Germans emigrated.

References: Немцы в России: Петерб. немцы: Сб. ст. СПб., 1999; 300 лет вместе: С.-Петербург и немцы в течение трех столетий / Сост. Г. Кнаппе, Е. Петровская. СПб., 2002.

A. Y. Chistyakov. Herzen Alexander Ivanovich
Peter I, Emperor
18th Line of Vasilievsky Island/Saint Petersburg, city, house 1
Malaya Konyushennaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 3
Moika River Embankment/Saint Petersburg, city, house 76
Moika River Embankment/Saint Petersburg, city, house 74
Yakubovicha St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 4
Веселый Поселок
Гражданка
Немцы в России: Петерб. немцы: Сб. ст. СПб., 1999 Handicraft (overview)
Military Personnel
Civil Servants
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church
St. Petrischule
Pedagogical University
Finns
Deportations, ethnic