A momentous date in 1861: the Tsarist government frees the serfs!
In the reign of Tsar Alexander II, a bill which liberated peasants from serfdom was issued, on 19 February 1861. On 5 March 1861 this bill was published.
The author reviews the effect of emancipation:
All of the peasants, our grandfathers and great-grandfathers received personal freedom.
From that time, landowners could not purchase, sell, gift, or exchange peasants. Now they did not have the right to treat a person like their personal possession. Peasants could now get married without the permission of the landowner. They received the right to enter into their own agreements and transactions. They now had the right to engage in crafts and trade. They received the right to move into a different class (burghers, merchants). Peasants were now able to hold positions in public office and in educational institutions. They also received the right to acquire movable and immovable property [real estate], treat it as they pleased, and transfer it by succession in accordance to the customs and laws.
The liberation of the individual peasant – this is the most important achievement of the people in their age-old aspiration and struggle against serfdom. The government was forced to free the peasants from the land.
The landowners did their best to retain the best lands:
However, even here, the landowners made use of their former position. The division of land was conducted according to the interests of the landowners. They took the best lands for themselves, and for the peasants they gave a little sand, in other words, infertile land. The forests transferred to the property of the landlords, much of the grassland and other lands.
A government paper documents the results in Divin, which then --in 1861-- was composed of something more than 200 families:
Only then were our ancestors endowed with plots of land in Divin. As can be seen from the endowed plots and other lands, in that time more than two hundred families lived in Divin. In accordance with historical data, which was preserved in the city of Grodno in the Central State Historical Archive, plots of land were made in the following order, and in accordance with the laws of those, imperial times.
The allocation of plots of land for peasants in Divin was conducted as follows:
a) Lands were allotted based on streets
b) Each allottment had access to a diverse land, equal to all of the plots of the street. For example: arable land, hay, pasture for livestock, land for pasture and unsuitable lands were allotted.
{
30} Each owner of the obtained plot of land had the right to use the arable land and grassland, at their own, sole discretion. And the pastures, grazing land and unsuitable lands went to the general use among the participants of the plots belonging to the same street.
Not all Diviners received allotted parcels of equal size, as well as of equal quality; there was a difference in the sizes of the lands received.
• Povitskoy Street
88 plots of land, 28 dessiatines each and 3 plots of 40 dessiatines, 2 parcels for the gentry, 4 vegetable garden plots of one dessiatine each.
• Ratnenskoy Street
33 plots of 44 dessiatines each, which comprised 7 pustoks , 2 gardens of one dessiatine each, 2 farm labor-lands of 3 dessiatines each, 2 plots for the gentry, as well as 11 sites for Klebantsevs from 35 – 40 acres each. Klebantsev, or more correctly Plebantsy. This name comes from the word Priest’s House, the residence of the priest, a minister of the Catholic religion. The peasants-klebantsevs did not work as serfs for the landlord, but instead only worked for the priest, from which their popular name, plebantsy, comes from. The allotments were not equal for everyone. Some had allotments of 35 dessiatines, while others – 40 dessiatines. Although the Plebantsy lived on the Ratninskoy street (near the Priest’s house), but their plots were scattered among all four streets.
• Brest Street created were:
8 plots of 32 dessiatines each and 3 garden sites of less than a dessiatine each.
• Kobryn Street created were:
28 plots of 28 dessiatines each. One of three was a farm-hand plot of one dessiatine and 4 garden sites of part of a dessiatine each.
Besides lands given to peasants, a separate set of allocations served the religous community:
Outside of the peasant plots in Divin there were the following plots:
1. The plot for the Piatnitskoy Church – 320 dessiatines.
2. The plot for the Prechistinskaya Church – over 100 dessiatines.
3. The plot for the former churchyard – more than 200 dessiatines.
The compositions of these plots include various lands: arable, hay, and different woodlands.
Outside of the settled town land, the resources were at least partly shared:
There were a lot of plots of a specific forest, in which a lot of good timber grew. The forest in these areas belonged to the landowner. Farmers had only the right to graze cattle; mowing the hay was not allowed to anyone there.
Farmhands, gentry and Jews brought their livestock out to the peasant pastures. For this, they were required to pay the general fee to the street to which these lands belonged to. Prices for the passage of cows, sheep, and horses {
31} were set by communal street gatherings.
The lake belonged to the landowner. The peasants were entitled only to its coastal areas, i.e. along the entire coast. They could bring their animals to drink at any time of the year, they could also catch fish in the lake. This was only allowed to be done without the use of boats, from the shore or by walking into the water. Any means of fishing was allowed.
Almost every allotted plot in our Divin received its own nickname, besides the last name of the owner. For example, my great-grandfather was named Ilya, but among the people his name was simply Lyasch. Since then, all of our descendants are referred to by the nickname Lyasches. From one side, a neighbor of our great-grandfather had the name of Nazar. Through the present, all of his descendants are called Nazaruks. On the other side, there was a neighbor named Panas. His descendants are still called Panasyuki.
Some plots are called by the name of their original owners. But there are also those names, whose origin has not been known since ancient times.
Following a nine-year period, peasants could finally sell their land – in theory. In practice, heavy debt kept many from attaining :
During first nine years after the publication of the reforms, the peasant had no right to give up a land parcel. Therefore, he could not leave rural society. But even after the conclusion of this period, the release from this society was difficult for many reasons. A "free" peasant was burdened by the need to continually serve in cash and kind. By order of the rural society, those peasants, which did not repay their debts, could be given to other odd jobs, falling into someone’s custody, etc. In addition, faultless payers were required to pay fees for the deficient.
All the peasants who have concluded trade deals and had become land owners had in fact remained in an unequal state. They had to carry conscriptions, to pay tributes and were subject to corporal punishment. Excluded from all this were members of the privileged class: nobles, merchants and clergy.
For a period of two years after emancipation, corporal punishment was still allowed:
It was only in 1863 that a decree abolishing corporal punishment was issued.
Under further decrees, the cold reality: peasants were required to pay the former landlords for their allotments, under impossible terms:
The land reform of 1861 and the decrees of 1863 extended to 50 provinces of the European part of Russia, beginning with Arkhangelsk and ending at Bessarabia. The peasants’ installed plots of land did not provide the minimum subsistence required by a peasant family. This was the case for the whole expanse of European Russia.
Peasants were not immediately in possession of the cash required to purchase the land from the landowner. This purchase was spread out over 49 years. It was called a "redeemable loan," which the peasants had to pay on an annual basis. Redemption payments were levied by the government in the form of public fees. Redemption payments were set at a 6% redemption loan. The peasants became owners of the redeemed plots of land from the moment of the state’s authorization of redemption transactions. The peasants expected {
32} a freedom different from the one provided to them by the declared state laws. They believed that the imperial officials and their nobles cruelly deceived them.
Therefore, in as early as 1861, the peasants’ uprisings began; this spread throughout all of the provinces of the European part of Russia."
This peasant uprising happened even in our Kobryn and its surroundings. In the fall of 1863, a man named Romunald Traugutt announced himself. He declared himself a dictator and began to insist on introducing agrarian reform. In April of 1864, Traugutt was arrested by the tsarist authorities and hanged. After this, some rebel forces continued the struggle for a short time. But gradually they were eliminated.
