Baltiysk

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city
Baltiysk
Балтийск
coat of arms
coat of arms
Federal district Northwest Russia
Oblast Kaliningrad
Rajon Baltiysk
mayor Maxim Leonidowitsch Brychuk
First mention 1430
Earlier names Pillau (until 1946)
City since 1725
surface 49  km²
population 32,697 inhabitants
(as of Oct. 14, 2010)
Population density 667 inhabitants / km²
Height of the center 10  m
Time zone UTC + 2
Telephone code (+7) 40145
Post Code 238520-238528
License Plate 39, 91
OKATO 27 405
Website балтийск39.рф
Geographical location
Coordinates 54 ° 39 ′  N , 19 ° 55 ′  E Coordinates: 54 ° 39 ′ 0 ″  N , 19 ° 55 ′ 0 ″  E
Baltiysk (European Russia)
Red pog.svg
Location in the western part of Russia
Baltiysk (Kaliningrad Oblast)
Red pog.svg
Location in Kaliningrad Oblast
List of cities in Russia
Baltiysk today, aerial view

Baltijsk ( Russian Балтийск , German Pillau , Lithuanian Piliava ) is a city on the eastern Baltic Sea. It is the outer port of Kaliningrad , the former Königsberg (Prussia) , in the Kaliningrad Oblast . The city has 32,697 inhabitants (October 14, 2010) and is the administrative center of the Rajons Baltijsk .

The city belonged to East Prussia until 1945 and was in the Fischhausen district until 1939 , after which it became part of the Samland district .

location

Baltijsk is located on the north side of the Pillauer low , which separates the Fresh Spit from the Samland . It is also the southernmost place on the Amber Coast . Kaliningrad is about 60 kilometers away by land . The city is the westernmost Russian-populated city.

history

The recorded chronicle of Pillau goes back to the year 1370, when the battle of Rudau took place. Before the conflict, the Teutonic Order is said to have gathered its army in front of Pillau.

A settlement called Pilen ( Alt Pillau ) was first mentioned in documents in 1430 . The historical name Pillau goes back to the Prussian "pile, pille, pils" (fortress, castle). The place gained crucial importance when heavy storms in 1479 and 1510 broke through the Fresh Spit and created a navigable channel called "Das Gatt". This enabled Pillau to develop into a strategically important port city later.

Pillau fortress

Pillau fortress

During the Thirty Years' War , the Swedish King Gustav Adolf landed on July 6, 1626 with a fleet of 37 ships in Pillau, which was then occupied by the Swedes for ten years. They expanded the existing entrenchments and built the Pillau fortress . During the Swedish times, the place expanded and the first wooden church was built. When the Swedes had withdrawn in 1635, the Great Elector built Pillau into a naval base in Brandenburg . As a result, the population grew again, and pilots, traders and former officers settled in the fortress catchment area. In 1660 the wooden church was replaced by a stone structure and received an organ.

King Friedrich Wilhelm I granted Pillau town charter on January 18, 1725. During the Seven Years' War , the city and fortress were under Russian occupation from 1758 to 1762. From 1791 to 1805 the fortress was restored under the direction of Paul von Gonzenbach . The renovation cost 645,000 thalers.

During the Fourth Coalition War, French troops besieged Pillau in vain in 1807, so that the fortress was preserved for Prussia through the Peace of Tilsiter . As a result of the Franco-Prussian alliance against Russia, the fortress had to accommodate a French occupation contingent of 1200 men under Colonel Castella de Berlens in the summer of 1812 . When East Prussia rose against Napoleon in early 1813 and Russian troops appeared in front of Pillau, the commander of the Prussian contingent managed to persuade the French to withdraw without a fight on February 8, 1813 in order to prevent the Russians from taking the fortress. In 1905 the garrison consisted of a 43rd infantry battalion and a 2nd foot artillery battalion .

District fortress Pillau (1885–1903)

On July 2, 1885 , the new administrative district "Fortress Pillau" was formed from the manor district of Pillau, fortress, which previously belonged to the district of Alt Pillau . It consisted only of this one Gutsbezirk and belonged to the district Fischhausen in the administrative district of Konigsberg the Prussian province of East Prussia . Since the manorial district of Pillau, fortress, was incorporated into the municipality of Pillau on March 30, 1903, the administrative district "fortress Pillau" no longer existed.

industrialization

Port of Pillau (1927)

From the middle of the 19th century, industrialization brought the city a new boom. The shipowners based in Pillau had eight trading ships in 1848. A railway line connected the city with Königsberg from 1865, and the port was expanded considerably. The naval site was further enhanced by the construction of a large barracks . At the beginning of the 20th century, the Königsberger Seekanal through the lagoon was completed near Pillau , which could also be kept open in winter. As a result, the ports of Königsberg, Elbing and Braunsberg remained in operation all year round. After the incorporation of Alt-Pillaus and the fortress of Pillau into the city in 1902, the population grew to over 7,000. At the beginning of the 20th century, Pillau had three Protestant churches, a secondary school, a navigation school and a district court. In 1937, more communities were added, so that Pillau had 12,000 inhabitants at the beginning of the Second World War .

Second World War

Refugees in the Port (January 1945)

During the Second World War, the Pillau naval base gained great importance. As early as 1933, Pillau had become the home port of a minesweeping flotilla, in 1939 a sea air base was added and a year later a submarine training division was stationed. New docks were created as berths for cruisers. When the war was drawing to a close, the first refugee transports for the Hannibal company were carried out through the city . On February 5, 1945, the first Soviet air raid caused great damage. Between the end of January 1945 and April 18, a total of more than 450,000 refugees left the port of Pillau by ship. With house-to-house fighting in the city on April 24th, the port facilities were blown up. The dead from the Second World War are buried in the German war cemetery in Baltijsk .

Monument to the Great Elector

Monument to the Great Elector in front of the lighthouse

In 1913 the monument to Friedrich Wilhelm was inaugurated.

post war period

On April 25, 1945, the Red Army captured Pillau as the last East Prussian city and, like all of northern East Prussia, placed it under the administration of the Soviet Union . The Potsdam Agreement confirmed this in August 1945. Pillau was renamed Baltijsk on November 27, 1946 (meaning about Baltic city or Baltic Sea city ) and became the main base of the Baltic fleet . The population of the city was reduced to almost zero from 1944 to 1947 due to the flight and expulsion of the German population and rose only slowly again due to the influx of new citizens from Central Russia, the area of ​​what is now the Volga Federal District and Belarus. Until the collapse of the Soviet Union, Baltiysk was a specially sealed off military area within the Kaliningrad area.

This only gradually loosened after the opening of the oblast. During this time, a Russian Orthodox church was opened in Baltijsk and a striking monument to Tsar Peter I , known as "the Great", and Tsarina Elisabeth were erected. Even today, the urban area of ​​Baltiysk is not yet fully accessible.

Population development

year Residents Remarks
1768 01,123
1782 approx. 1,300 in 114 households
1810 0 2,315
1816 02,521 without suburbs and castle freedom (62 inhabitants) and without the fortress (146 people)
1828 03,674 with the fortress
1831 03,929
1875 03,196
1880 03,225
1890 03,303 including 53 Catholics and twelve Jews
1905 07,374 including 233 Catholics
1933 07,577
1939 10,980
1959 17,378
1970 20,300
1979 23,568
1989 27,070
2002 33,252
2010 32,697

Note: census data

Churches

Former Reformed Church , today the Russian Orthodox St. George's Cathedral

History until 1945

There is no information about a possible chapel or church in the 15th and 16th centuries. The founding of a Protestant church in Alt-Pillau has been handed down from 1598 . In Pillau (Pillau I) there was also a small wooden church built by the Swedes. This was rebuilt in 1660 and 1717/1720 as a garrison church under Brandenburg-Prussian rule. In 1866 the Reformed congregation in Pillau received its own church , and in 1910 the Catholic congregation too. There was also a Baptist chapel. All church buildings except the Catholic church had no steeple, so as not to disturb the orientation of the sea to the lighthouse .

Structures

Before 1945 there were two Protestant parishes in Pillau: that of the Church of Alt Pillau (Pillau II) and that of the garrison and town church of Pillau (Pillau I). Both belonged to the Fischhausen parish in the church province of East Prussia of the Church of the Old Prussian Union . The Reformed Church was part of the Königsberg inspection.

There were the following churches

  • Church Alt Pillau 1598 first construction, 1674/1776 new half-timbered building, which was considerably damaged in 1945 and then demolished
  • Garrison and town church in Pillau I. In 1660, Elector Friedrich Wilhelm built a church, which was replaced from 1717 to 1720 by a towerless, cross-shaped complex in Gothic style. It was renewed in 1768. The church stood on the grounds of the fortress. It was damaged in World War II and its foundations were still standing in the 1960s when they were demolished.
  • Reformed Church . A Reformed community had existed in Pillau since 1685. It had to use the garrison and town church for its services. It was not until 1866 that it received its own brick building without a tower between the fortress and the parade square. The church was damaged during the war, but it was repaired and used as a military shop or cinema. It was transferred to the Russian Orthodox Church in 1992.
  • Catholic Church Maria Meeresstern. In 1910 a separate church was built for the Catholic community in Pillau. The architect Friedrich Heitmann from Königsberg created the designs . The church was the only one in the city to have a tower, as it was a little off the beaten track near Alt-Pillau and so could not endanger the navigation of the sea. It was damaged in 1945 and then removed.

After 1990

In 1991 the Russian Orthodox Church received the only remaining building of the Reformed community for use. Nothing was preserved from the original equipment before 1945. In 2001 relics of the canonized admiral Fyodor Ushakov were brought to the church. Today it is the St. George's Cathedral of the Baltic Fleet in the diocese of Kaliningrad and Baltiysk .

Evangelical church members living here now belong to the parish in Swetly (Zimmerbude) , a branch parish of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Resurrection in Kaliningrad (Königsberg) in the Kaliningrad provost of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of European Russia .

There is a Catholic center in a historic brick building.

traffic

Satellite image (2000)
Pillau

Street

Baltijsk can be reached via the Russian trunk road A 193 (former German Reichsstrasse 131 ) from Kaliningrad (Koenigsberg) via Wsmorje (Großheidekrug , until 1939 Groß Heydekrug) and Primorsk (Fischhausen) . There will soon also be a connection to Primorskoye Kolzo (coastal motorway ring) via Primorsk .

railroad

In addition to the road connection, there is also a railway connection to the hinterland on a section of the former East Prussian Southern Railway with Kaliningrad; After the Svetlogorsk - Primorsk section was closed in 2006, travel via Svetlogorsk is no longer possible.

ship

Between the two world wars, the shipping line Sea Service East Prussia connected the Pomeranian Swinoujscie with Pillau as an alternative to bypassing the Polish Corridor .

Between June 2007 and December 2009 there was a direct connection with the German ferry port Sassnitz for rail traffic .

A ferry terminal , important for the Kaliningrad Oblast, was built near Baltijsk , from which a very important (because visa-free ) connection with the Russian heartland should exist for the exclave . The car ferries to Ust-Luga near Saint Petersburg are ice-proof and need 48 hours for one direction. The use of high-speed ferries, which will only need 15 hours, is planned.

At the beginning of 2020, the container ship SVS Vega was set up as part of the New Silk Road as part of the cargo ferry service between Baltiysk and Mukran Port under the name Baltic Sea Bridge .

sons and daughters of the town

Baltiysk City Municipality

Pillauer low

coat of arms

Blazon : "In red, a silver sturgeon floating on blue water, crowned with a golden royal crown."

King Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia elevated the place to a city in 1725 and gave it the above coat of arms. The oldest known seal shows the picture in the field with the inscription SIEGEL DER KOENIGL. PR. CITY OF PILLAV 1725 . In the 19th century the name was changed to the royal seaside town of Pillau.

General

The city of Baltiysk is also part and the administrative seat of the Baltijskoje gorodskoje posselenije (Валтийское городское поселение), a municipal municipality. It is located in the south of the Baltijsk Rajons and covers an area of ​​49.1 km² in the southwestern tip of the Samland . In the north it borders on the rural community Diwnoje (Neuendorf) and the city of Primorsk (Fischhausen) , in the east on the Fischhausener Wiek (Primorskaja Buchta) and the Fresh Lagoon (Kaliningradskaja Saliw), in the south on the Fresh Spit (Baltijskaja Kossa) on the to Poland is part of the city Krynica Morska (Kahlenberg) in the Pomeranian Province , on the west by the Baltic Sea . In 2010 there were 33,303 residents here.

structure

The municipality, which has existed since 2008, includes the city of Baltiysk and two settlements:

Russian name German name
City :
Baltiysk Pillau
Settlements :
Beregovoye Tenkitten
Lunino Dargen

traffic

In terms of transport, the city of Baltiysk is connected to the region by road and rail only to the north via the A 193 trunk road (former German Reichsstrasse 131 ) and the Baltiysk – Kaliningrad railway line . There is no border crossing to Poland in the south.

literature

(in order of appearance)

  • Johann Friedrich Goldbeck : Complete topography of the Kingdom of Prussia. Part I: Topography of East Prussia. Marienwerder 1785, p. 9 ( full text ).
  • Pillau in 1812/13. Prussische Provinzial-Blätter, Vol. 10, Königsberg 1833, pp. 650–658.
  • Leopold Krug : The Prussian Monarchy; presented topographically, statistically and economically. According to official sources. Part I: Province of Prussia. Berlin 1833, pp. 109-121.
  • August Eduard Preuss : Prussian country and folklore or description of Prussia. A manual for primary school teachers in the province of Prussia, as well as for all friends of the fatherland. Bornträger Brothers, Königsberg 1835, pp. 501–503.
  • Pillau (encyclopedia entry). In: Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon. 6th edition, Volume 15, Leipzig and Vienna 1908, pp. 876/877.
  • Konrad Haberland, Wilhelm Lomber, Alexander Arendt: Pillau then and now. 1725-1925. Festschrift. Pillau 1925.
  • On the events of 1812/13: Ludwig Häusser: German history from the death of Frederick the Great to the establishment of the German Confederation. Fourth volume. Meersburg, Naunhof, Leipzig 1933, pp. 35/36.
  • Helmut Blocksdorf: Pillau - Chronicle of a downfall. The escape from East Prussia. Hamburg 2000, ISBN 3-8132-0722-6 .
  • Гостюхин, Александр Федорович (ed.): Пиллау - Балтийск. Прошлое и настоящее. Калиниград [2000].

Web links

Commons : Baltiysk  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. a b Itogi Vserossijskoj perepisi naselenija 2010 goda. Kaliningradskaya oblastʹ. (Results of the 2010 all-Russian census. Kaliningrad Oblast.) Volume 1 , Table 4 (Download from the website of the Kaliningrad Oblast Territorial Organ of the Federal Service for State Statistics of the Russian Federation)
  2. Faber: The strangest of the chronicle of the city and fortress Pillau . Contributions to the Prussian customer, Volume 6, Königsberg 1824, No. 1, pp. 42-70 , and No. 2, pp. 130-150 .
  3. ^ Gerullis, Georg: Die old Prussian place names, Berlin, Leipzig 1922, p. 122
  4. ^ Walter Gonzenbach: Fortress Pillau and its reconstruction from 1791 to 1805. Thurgauer Jahrbuch, Vol. 44, 1969, p. 83, accessed on March 24, 2020 .
  5. a b c Meyer's Large Conversation Lexicon . 6th edition, Volume 15, Leipzig and Vienna 1908, [1] pp. 876/877.
  6. ^ Rolf Jehke: District fortress Pillau
  7. ^ E. Wendt & Co. (Ed.): Overview of the Prussian Merchant Navy . Stettin January 1848, p. 16 ( online [accessed June 4, 2015]).
  8. Through the Указ Президиума Верховного Совета РСФСР от 27 ноября 1946 г. «О переименовании г. Пиллау Приморского района Калининградской области »(Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR of November 27, 1946: On the renaming of the city of Pillau in Primorsk district in Kaliningrad Oblast)
  9. a b c Leopold Krug : The Prussian Monarchy; presented topographically, statistically and economically. According to official sources . Part I: Province of Prussia . Berlin 1833, [2] p. 109 ff.
  10. ^ Johann Friedrich Goldbeck : Complete topography of the Kingdom of Prussia . Part I: Topography of East Prussia . Marienwerder 1785, [3] p. 9.
  11. Alexander August Mützell and Leopold Krug : New topographical-statistical-geographical dictionary of the Prussian state . Volume 4: P – S , Halle 1823, [4] p. 41, paragraphs 1460–1461.
  12. Geographical Institute: New General Geographical and Statistical Ephemeris . Volume 30, Weimar 1830, [5] p. 24.
  13. ^ A b c d e Michael Rademacher: German administrative history from the unification of the empire in 1871 to the reunification in 1990. East Prussia - Fischhausen district. (Online material for the dissertation, Osnabrück 2006).
  14. Walther Hubatsch : History of the Protestant Church in East Prussia. Volumes I to III, Göttingen 1968
  15. ^ Building in Pillau. ostpreussen.net, accessed on January 31, 2020 .
  16. Historical photos of the Catholic Church and other buildings in Alt-Pillau Picture Archive East Prussia
  17. ^ Evangelical Lutheran Provosty of Kaliningrad ( Memento of August 29, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  18. Benjamin Klare: "Baltic Sea Bridge" at Mukran Port · Port sets up liner service between Sassnitz and Baltijsk as part of the New Silk Road . In: Daily port report of March 26, 2020, p. 4
  19. ^ German town book - Handbook of urban history by Prof. Dr. Erich Keyser , published by W. Kohlhammer Verlag, Stuttgart 1939, Volume I Northeast Germany, page 94/95
  20. ^ German local coats of arms by Prof. Otto Hupp , published in 1925 by Kaffee-Handels-Aktiengesellschaft Bremen
  21. http: //www.russian-west.narod,ru/index.htm (link not available)