“A merchant from Saint Petersburg rests here,” it began. This marks the beginning of Volkovo Lutheran Cemetery. It became one of the city’s most esteemed and largest cemeteries.
Welcome to Volkovo Lutheran Cemetery. This is a place of history and stories. This cemetery is not Orthodox. Until the early 20th century, it mainly served the Lutheran Germans in Russia. Over 100,000 people have found their final resting place here since 1773.
Catherine the Great changed burial practices. In 1771-1772, she decreed that burials inside churches were no longer allowed. New cemeteries had to be built outside city limits. Overcrowding and disease outbreaks motivated this. The Black Plague caused a riot in Moscow in 1771.
Volkovo Cemetery was established in 1773. Johann Gebhard Brethfeld was the first person buried here. He was a merchant.
Dr. Benedikt B\u00f6hm has extensively researched the cemetery’s history. He has published four volumes on its history. These volumes include names of those buried between 1773 and 1936. Dr. B\u00f6hm used parish registers and visited the cemetery since 1989. He inventoried the graves with photographs.
His Volume 1 lists 3,700 names of those with standing graves. It also contains 17,000 names of those whose burial plots were sold for eternity, but no longer have headstones. The book includes a map with the location of headstones and burial plots. Volume 2 has 40,000 names of those buried between 1863 and 1919. Volume 3 lists 40,000 names of those buried between 1820 and 1862. Volume 4 partially repeats Volume 3’s information. It indicates which of the 27 non-Orthodox parishes the deceased belonged to in Saint Petersburg.
Genealogists use these publications for family research. Historians research the social histories of the city using them.
Many notable people are interred here. Artur Adamovich Nepokoychitsky was an Imperial Russian military leader. Maria Alexandrovna Ulyanova was Lenin’s mother. Olga Ilyinichna Ulyanova was Lenin’s sister. Aleksandr Ivanovich Kuprin was a famous Russian writer.
Volkovo Lutheran Cemetery is a place of remembrance. It connects us to the past. It shows us the lives and stories of those who came before us. Take a moment to reflect on the history and culture. Remember the people who rest here.