Maladzyechna
Encyclopedia
Maladzyechna is a city in the Minsk Voblast of Belarus
Belarus
Belarus , officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered clockwise by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel ,...

, an administrative centre of the Maladzyechna district (and formerly of the Maladzyechna Voblast
Maladzyechna Voblast
Maladzyechna Voblast or Molodechno Oblast was a Voblast of the Byelorussian SSR. Initially the Voblast was formed on December 4, 1939 following the annexation of West Belarus into the BSSR from the Second Polish Republic as the Vileyka Voblast...

). It has 98,514 inhabitants (2006 estimate) and is located 72 km northwest of Minsk
Minsk
- Ecological situation :The ecological situation is monitored by Republican Center of Radioactive and Environmental Control .During 2003–2008 the overall weight of contaminants increased from 186,000 to 247,400 tons. The change of gas as industrial fuel to mazut for financial reasons has worsened...

. Located on the Usha River, it has been a settlement since 1388 when it was part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania
Grand Duchy of Lithuania
The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a European state from the 12th /13th century until 1569 and then as a constituent part of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth until 1791 when Constitution of May 3, 1791 abolished it in favor of unitary state. It was founded by the Lithuanians, one of the polytheistic...

. It was also home to the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...

 facility Maladzyechna air base
Maladzyechna (air base)
Maladzyechna was an air base in Belarus located 8 km south of Maladzyechna. It was a 1960s-era attack or interceptor base. Towards the end of the Cold War it was plowed under for farmland...

.

History

The fortification
Fortification
Fortifications are military constructions and buildings designed for defence in warfare and military bases. Humans have constructed defensive works for many thousands of years, in a variety of increasingly complex designs...

 on the right bank of the Usha was first mentioned in 1388, although it is probable it was erected even before that date. Rectangular earthworks with stone walls 3,5 metres high and 11 metres wide formed the basis of the future castles and military camps formed on that location. The town itself was first mentioned the following year in a document issued by Kaributas, Prince of Severian Novgorod, who on December 16 assured his tributary fidelity to his cousin, King Jogaila
Jogaila
Jogaila, later 'He is known under a number of names: ; ; . See also: Jogaila : names and titles. was Grand Duke of Lithuania , king consort of Kingdom of Poland , and sole King of Poland . He ruled in Lithuania from 1377, at first with his uncle Kęstutis...

 and Jadwiga of Poland
Jadwiga of Poland
Jadwiga was monarch of Poland from 1384 to her death. Her official title was 'king' rather than 'queen', reflecting that she was a sovereign in her own right and not merely a royal consort. She was a member of the Capetian House of Anjou, the daughter of King Louis I of Hungary and Elizabeth of...

.

In 1501 the place was donated by King Sigismund I the Old
Sigismund I the Old
Sigismund I of Poland , of the Jagiellon dynasty, reigned as King of Poland and also as the Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1506 until 1548...

 to certain Michael of Mstislav
Mstislav
Mstislav may refer to:* Mstislav , a Slavic origin given name* an alternate spelling of Mstsislaw, a town in Mahilyow Voblast, eastern Belarus...

, on the condition that the latter provided a safe river passage for the nobles and hunters dwelling in the area. The privilege was further confirmed on July 12, 1511

After Michael's heirless death, the locality passed through different hands until finally in 1567 it was acquired by Prince Nastasi Zbaraski, the voivod of Trakai. In 1568, that is the following year, a battle took place in the vicinity of the castle, in which the 40,000 men strong army of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth was a dualistic state of Poland and Lithuania ruled by a common monarch. It was the largest and one of the most populous countries of 16th- and 17th‑century Europe with some and a multi-ethnic population of 11 million at its peak in the early 17th century...

 defeated the forces of Muscovy. In 1617 it was bought by Lew Sapieha
Lew Sapieha
Lew Sapieha . He was born in Astrouna , near Vitsebsk, Belarus. He became Great Secretary of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1580, Great Clerk of the Grand Duchy in 1581, Court Chancellor of the GDL in 1585, Grand Chancellor of the GDL from 1589 until 1623, Voivode of Vilnius in 1621, Great...

, the Grand Chancellor of Lithuania. Around that time the village had 1000 inhabitants. On August 20, 1631 Sapieha sold it to Stanisław Siemiott, the chamberlain of Samogitia
Samogitia
Samogitia is one of the five ethnographic regions of Lithuania. It is located in northwestern Lithuania. Its largest city is Šiauliai/Šiaulē. The region has a long and distinct cultural history, reflected in the existence of the Samogitian dialect...

, who then divided the villages surrounding Maladzyechna among his sons. Following a testament conflict between the descendantd of Siemiott and Aleksander Gosiewski, the Voivod of Smolensk
Smolensk
Smolensk is a city and the administrative center of Smolensk Oblast, Russia, located on the Dnieper River. Situated west-southwest of Moscow, this walled city was destroyed several times throughout its long history since it was on the invasion routes of both Napoleon and Hitler. Today, Smolensk...

, the town remained a property of the Gosiewski family. During their ownership of Maladzyechna the fortifications were extended and strengthened significantly by addition of several bastion
Bastion
A bastion, or a bulwark, is a structure projecting outward from the main enclosure of a fortification, situated in both corners of a straight wall , facilitating active defence against assaulting troops...

s. Around that time Maladzyechna started to be referred to as a town, even though it was officially a village and was not granted with a city charter. Nevertheless, it served as a centre of trade and commerce for the surrounding villages and also gained significant profits from transit between Lithuania and Poland. In 1708 the castle was one of the headquarters of the Swedish Army
Swedish Army
The Swedish Army is one of the oldest standing armies in the world and a branch of the Swedish Armed Forces; it is in charge of land operations. General Sverker Göranson is the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Army.- Organization :...

 of King Charles XII of Sweden
Charles XII of Sweden
Charles XII also Carl of Sweden, , Latinized to Carolus Rex, Turkish: Demirbaş Şarl, also known as Charles the Habitué was the King of the Swedish Empire from 1697 to 1718...

, which led to its partial devastation in the effect of a battle between the Swedes and the Russian forces.
On September 18, 1711 Bishop Bogusław Gosiewski, sold the town to the mighty Ogiński family. Among the owners of the area were Kazimierz Ogiński and Tadeusz Ogiński, the Castellan of Trakai
Trakai
Trakai is a historic city and lake resort in Lithuania. It lies 28 km west of Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. Because of its proximity to Vilnius, Trakai is a popular tourist destination. Trakai is the administrative centre of Trakai district municipality. The town covers 11.52 km2 of...

 (Lithuania). The Ogiński family became the main benefactors of the area, as they made it one of the main centres of their domain. They erected a new, classicist palace with notable frescoes, as well as a late renaissance church. It was also them to ask the king Sigismund II Augustus
Sigismund II Augustus
Sigismund II Augustus I was King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania, the only son of Sigismund I the Old, whom Sigismund II succeeded in 1548...

 to grant the town with a city charter. Although it was not granted, in 1730 the monarch granted the town with the privilege of organization of two fairs a year and 2 markets every week. In mid-18th century the Ogiński's also founded a monastery of the Trinitaries there.

Following the Partitions of Poland
Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...

, the area was annexed by Imperial Russia and the palace was abandoned soon afterwards. The castle was also neglected. During the final stages of Napoleon's invasion of Russia it was there that the Grande Armée made its last stand in former Grand Duchy of Lithuania
Grand Duchy of Lithuania
The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a European state from the 12th /13th century until 1569 and then as a constituent part of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth until 1791 when Constitution of May 3, 1791 abolished it in favor of unitary state. It was founded by the Lithuanians, one of the polytheistic...

. In early November 1812 Napoleon Bonaparte gave his last orders to his marshals there, after which he left for Vilnius
Vilnius
Vilnius is the capital of Lithuania, and its largest city, with a population of 560,190 as of 2010. It is the seat of the Vilnius city municipality and of the Vilnius district municipality. It is also the capital of Vilnius County...

. On November 21 of that year the Polish-born Russian general Yefim Chaplits
Yefim Chaplits
Eufemiusz Czaplic was a general of the Russian Empire.Eufemiusz Czaplic was born into an old Polish noble family Czaplic and began military service in the Polish army, but entered the Russian service with a rank of second major of on October 26, 1783...

 arrived at the French camp there and defeated the already-routed French forces led by Marshal Victor
Claude Victor-Perrin, duc de Belluno
Claude Victor-Perrin, First Duc de Belluno was a French soldier and military commander during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars...

. In the effect of the fights the town was completely demolished, as were the monastery and the castle. Because of that, in mid-19th century the town had not more than 500 inhabitants.

It was not until the later part of the century that the town started to gradually recover. In 1864 a Russian-language school was opened there and in 1871 an Orthodox church of Intercession of Our Most Holy Lady was built at the main town square. In 1873 it was linked to the world by the Minsk
Minsk
- Ecological situation :The ecological situation is monitored by Republican Center of Radioactive and Environmental Control .During 2003–2008 the overall weight of contaminants increased from 186,000 to 247,400 tons. The change of gas as industrial fuel to mazut for financial reasons has worsened...

–Vilna railway, which sparked a period of economic recovery of the entire region. In early 20th century an additional rail line was opened, linking Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...

 and Polotsk with Lida
Lida
Lida is a city in western Belarus in Hrodna Voblast, situated 160 km west of Minsk. It is the fourteenth largest city in Belarus.- Etymology :...

 and Siedlce
Siedlce
Siedlce ) is a city in eastern Poland with 77,392 inhabitants . Situated in the Masovian Voivodeship , previously the city was the capital of a separate Siedlce Voivodeship ....

. This made the town a major railway junction and attracted many new settlers, in large part Jewish. By the outbreak of World War I the town had already over 2,000 inhabitants.

During the war, the town was the headquarters of the Russian 10th Army of the Western Front. Between February and December 1918 it was under German occupation, but was then seized by the Bolshevik
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....

 forces during the Russian Civil War
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed to the Soviets, under the domination of the Bolshevik party. Soviet forces first assumed power in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a...

. On July 4, 1919 the town was captured by the Polish Army units led by Gen. Stanisław Szeptycki, during their advance towards Minsk. However, the town was again briefly held by the Russian forces in the course of the Polish-Bolshevik War. Following the Riga Peace Treaty it was transferred to Poland, but the border between Poland and the Soviet Union was only 30 kilometres to the east, which cut Mołodeczno, as the town was known in Polish, from much of its economical background. To counter the threat of economic decline, on April 26, 1929 the town was granted with city rights and became a capital of a separate powiat
Powiat
A powiat is the second-level unit of local government and administration in Poland, equivalent to a county, district or prefecture in other countries. The term powiat is most often translated into English as "county", although other terms are also sometimes used...

 within the Wilno Voivodship.

In the effect of the Polish Defensive War
Invasion of Poland (1939)
The Invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign or 1939 Defensive War in Poland and the Poland Campaign in Germany, was an invasion of Poland by Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small Slovak contingent that marked the start of World War II in Europe...

 and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, named after the Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and the German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, was an agreement officially titled the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Soviet Union and signed in Moscow in the late hours of 23 August 1939...

, the town was occupied by the Red Army
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...

 and annexed to the Byelorussian SSR
Byelorussian SSR
The Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic was one of fifteen constituent republics of the Soviet Union. It was one of the four original founding members of the Soviet Union in 1922, together with the Ukrainian SSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR and the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic...

, where it became part of the Vileyka Voblast
Vileyka Voblast
Vileyka Voblast was a territorial unit in the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic created out of the eastern powiats of the Wilno Voivodeship after the annexation of West Belarus into the BSSR in November 1939. The administrative centre of the province was the city of Vileyka. The Voblast...

 on December 4, 1939. The NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....

 expropriated the local school for teachers and set up one of its concentration camps there. After the German invasion of USSR
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...

 the camp was set free, but at the same time the new German authorities sent most of the local Jewish inhabitants to the German concentration camps throughout the occupied Europe. In addition, the German Wehrmacht has set up the infamous Stalag 342 for the Soviet prisoners of war there, in which at least 30,000 people were killed. On July 5, 1944 the advancing Red Army
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...

 occupied once more the town, and annexed again to the USSR. The heavy damage that Vileyka suffered during the war, made it unsuitable to perform the role of the administrative centre, thus the Maladzyechna, which was located only 20 kilometres away from Vileyka, became the new administrative centre when the civilian control was restored in the BSSR on 20 September 1944. The Maladzyecna Voblast also survived the 1954 reform which halved the amount of Voblasts in the BSSR, but on 20 January 1960, the Voblast was disestablished, and the town of Maladzyechna became part of the modern Minsk Voblast, in which it remains today as part of the Republic of Belarus.

Sights

Near Maładečna there is a VLF-transmitter for transmitting time signals
Beta (time signal)
Beta is a time signal service in the VLF range in Russia, operated by the Russian navy. There are 6 transmitter stations, which take turns transmitting time signals and other communications....

.

External links

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