Bobruisk District Historical Economic Summaries
Provided by
The Minsk Historical Genealogy Group
Oleg Perzashkevich, Director
Village of Rechen
Rechen before 1917
History
Before 1793 - Rechen was a village in Novogrudok District of Novogrudok Province of Great Lithuanian Princedom, owned by Radzivill magnate family.
1793-1917 - Rechen was a village in Russian Empire.
Since 1801 - Rechen was a private village in Bobruisk District of Minsk Empire.
1840s - after the Emperor permitted Jews to live in the rural area, Jewish population appeared in Rechen.
Vital Statistics
| Date | Jews | Non-Jews | Comments | % Total Pop. |
| 1840s | Jewish population appeared | |||
| 1897 | 98 | 801 | Both sexes | 10.9% |
| 1909 | 1141 | Total population | No info | |
Jewish Life
In 1840s, after they had obtained permission to live in rural area, some Jewish families moved their business to Rechen. Since there was no Jewish community or considerable resident Jewish population in Rechen, there were no special Jewish objects there.
Economic Review
Traditional activities of local population were agriculture, chopping of wood. Since early time small local rivers were main trade ways and roads for local inhabitants.
During Russian principality the authorities did a lot to develop the region because of military and fiscal reasons mostly. First of all, old communications were reconstructed there:
 | road Luban - Starobin; |
| road Urechye - Rechen. |
After abolishing of Serfdom (the law prescribing personal dependence of peasants from their landlords) in 1861 local peasants became more active in non-agricultural sphere, and local Jews (had obtained permission to live in rural area in the early 1830s-40s) moved their businesses (mainly taverns and trinket stores), mostly from the shtetles of Luban and Urechye, to big villages or to the regions of maximal peasant market activity. Rechen, Zakalno and Zabolotye formed such a region.
In XIX, because of development of the All-Russian Market, new types of communications appeared in the area in 1873. The Libava - Romny railroad appeared.
Construction of the railroad provoked new increase in development of local settlements. Since the closest to Rechen rail station was in Urechye (21 km afar) and there was a good road from Rechen to Urechye, the village had been growing up rapidly since 1890s.
In 1884 there were 52 wooden houses in Rechen.
In 1909 there were 176 wooden houses in Rechen.
Unfortunately, we do not know any big business and trade enterprises in Rechen before 1917.
General cultural information
At the end XX - beg. XX century in Rechen there was nothing special.
Closest church was in Zabolotye ( km), closest post office was in Luban (12 km) and
closest doctor was in Slutsk (50 km).
Copyright 1997-1998 Oleg Perzashkevich
Reproduced for the web with permission. All rights reserved. Any use of this material is
prohibited without permission from:
Minsk Historical Genealogy Group
Republic of Belarus
Minsk - 07, Zhukovskogo 9-2-190
Phone: 375-17-2240560
e-mail: minskhist@yahoo.com
