Stepove () is a village in Mykolaiv Raion, Mykolaiv Oblast in

Southern Ukraine Southern Ukraine (, ) refers, generally, to the territories in the South of Ukraine. The territory usually corresponds with the Soviet economical district, the Southern Economical District of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. The region ...

. Its population was 1869 in the

2001 Ukrainian Census The 2001 Ukrainian census is to date the only census of the population of independent Ukraine. It was conducted by the State Statistics Committee of Ukraine on 5 December 2001, twelve years after the last Soviet Union census in 1989.Stepove rural hromada, one of the

hromada In Ukraine, a hromada () is the main type of municipality and the third level Administrative divisions of Ukraine, local self-government in Ukraine. The current hromadas were established by the Cabinet of ministers of Ukraine, Government of Uk ...

s of Ukraine.

History

The village was founded as Karlsruhe (after

Karlsruhe Karlsruhe ( ; ; ; South Franconian German, South Franconian: ''Kallsruh'') is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, third-largest city of the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, after its capital Stuttgart a ...

, Germany) in 1809 by Catholic Germans. The settlement was part of the Beresan Colonial District of Odessa region,

Kherson Governorate Kherson Governorate, known until 1803 as Nikolayev Governorate, was an administrative-territorial unit ('' guberniya'') of the Russian Empire, with its capital in Kherson. It encompassed in area and had a population of 2,733,612 inhabitants. At t ...

. In 1886, the population of the German colony of Karlsruhe was 2,132 people; at which time it was part of the Landau parish, Odessa district, Kherson Governorate. There were 190

farmsteads A farm (also called an agricultural holding) is an area of land that is devoted primarily to agricultural processes with the primary objective of producing food and other crops; it is the basic facility in food production. The name is used fo ...

, a

Roman Catholic church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

, and a high school. The Roman Catholic Church of St. Peter and Paul was designed by the architect Korfu (Corfu) and was constructed from 1881 to 1885. In 1925–1939, the Karlsruhe colony was part of Karl-Liebknechtovsky's German National District of Mykolaiv region (from

Odessa Oblast Odesa Oblast (), also referred to as Odeshchyna (Одещина), is an oblast (province) of southwestern Ukraine, located along the northern coast of the Black Sea. Its administrative centre is the city of Odesa. Population: The length of coast ...

since 1932). Today, the ruins of the 19th-century neo-gothic style Roman Catholic church still remain. It is somewhat bricked up and its wooden roof and original steeple are gone. Several pictures of the church dated from the 1930s and 40s were published in a German language book called “Die Kirchen und das Religiöse Leben der Russlanddeutsche”. Pictures from 1942 and 1943 show the steeple missing the peak and cross but still with the stone base. The steeple was destroyed by the Soviets as they removed crosses from churches all over Ukraine. It is reported that the steeple was destroyed in 1934. It was rebuilt during the German occupation and destroyed yet again when Soviet forces advanced in mid-1944. Today, the main stone body of the steeple is completely gone. The church could have been battle damaged during the Nazi's advance through the area in 1941 or their retreat a few years later. Battle damage is present on its exterior from small-arms fire and shrapnel from undated events.

References

{{Mykolaiv Oblast Kherson Governorate Former German settlements in Mykolaiv Oblast Villages in Mykolaiv Raion, Mykolaiv Oblast Populated places established in 1811

History

See also

References