Russian democracy of gold miners: the law is taiga, the bear is the master

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

In the 19th century, a lot of gold was found in the border regions of China and Russia. De jure, this territory was Chinese, but there was no power there - taiga. And pretty soon a real republican state appeared there.

Gold mines

Since the 17th century, after the conclusion of the Nerchinsk Treaty on the Border on the Border Territories, the Russians and the Chinese actively and freely cooperated and contacted as neighbors. Russian Cossacks crossed the border in search of resources, then it was gold, diamonds and furs, the Chinese also entered the territory of Russia to steal gold, diamonds, furs.

And in 1883, gold was discovered on the Zheltuga River, a tributary of the Amur. Formally, it was the territory of China at a distance of only five kilometers from the border, and there were no border guards then, crossing the border was completely free, and the place was very deaf. True, the population began to increase rapidly, if at first there were a thousand colonists, then three years later it was already closer to 15,000.

Criminal element

Naturally, the criminal element Zheltuga attracted like a magnet. From all over the world, first of all, of course, from Russia and the United States, fugitive criminals, alcoholics and others came here. Casinos were built, fortunately there was that to lose. Drunkenness and sodomy reigned in the mines, since the union of artel workers immediately decided not to let women in, because where there is a woman, there is vice. So, the absence of women did not help.

The criminals in every possible way established their own rules and showed who there was power and authority. In 1884, for example, a local cook was killed and dismembered for not feeding some lesson for free.

State creation

In order to self-organize, to avoid unnecessary bloodshed and the domination of criminals, the gold diggers created a republic with all the attributes of power. There was the president, ministers, head-deputies, troops, the tax system, the Constitution. The California Republic was the ideal for miners. Representatives of artels of gold miners - states - elected by deputy. The Russian language became the state language, since the majority of Russian Cossacks and convicts were there.

A German named Karl Karlovich became the first president. Its exact origin is unknown: whether he was from Trieste, or from Bohemia, or a Germanized Rusyn from Slovakia. The second was the Molokan Eremey Sakharov. By the way, it was Russian Protestants and Old Believers who made up half of the power, and the other half were two Chinese from a completely Chinese state and immigrants from the western outskirts.

The republic was presidential, but the elders of the states had great powers - they decided small criminal cases. There were no prisons in Zheltuga, and the punishment was corporal. The meetings of the elders constituted the court, and the president himself was the second instance of the court. The entire republic was going to a gathering to pass a verdict on the murder case.

First steps

Interestingly, one of the first decrees of President Karl Karlovich was permission to come to the republic for women. For sodomy they gave 500 lashes - a person either died or became a cripple. Any offender was expelled.

A hospital appeared in the republic in the very first month of its existence, where the patient was kept free of charge. Another state institution was the circus, founded as an alternative to gambling houses.

As for taxes, merchants contributed 10% of the goods, vodka merchants - 25%, innkeepers - 20%, casino owners - 80%. Personal income of gold miners was not taxed.

Destruction of the republic

The republic existed for three and a half years. In the winter of 1885-1886, the Qing empire sent there a large army of equestrian Evenk manegirs - the most evil warriors at that time, who simply destroyed all people in their path. Many fled, the rest did not resist for long, some of the Chinese were executed on grave charges of illegal mining, and some fled to Russia.

It is interesting that when the Russians crossed into their territory together with the Chinese, who wanted to hide from retaliation, the Russian authorities wanted to destroy the Chinese this time, but the Cossacks, colleagues in the gold mining, did not give them, and they themselves transferred them to Chinese territory in a safe place. The descendants of these gold miners live in China up to the present day in the national Shiwei-Russian volost.