The parish of Grimm was founded in 1767. A new church building was built of wood in 1848 in the Kontor style. There was a balcony around three sides, and a "swallows nest" pulpit above the altar. The Lutherans and Reformed parishners used the same building.
The Grimm parish included the congregations in neighboring Bauer, Franzosen, and Dönhof. The pastor lived in Grimm but preached once each month in the other colonies of the parish.
Grimm was founded as a Reformed colony on 1 July 1767 by the Russian Crown. Gottfried Heinrich Ulrich Grimm, a surgeon from The Netherlands, served as the first Vorsteher (mayor) of the colony. His wife was Anna Elisabeth née Gompers, a midwife.
|
Year
|
Households
|
Population
|
||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Total
|
Male
|
Female
|
||
| 1767 |
89
|
179
|
|
|
| 1769 |
177
|
687
|
345
|
342
|
| 1773 |
171
|
769
|
402
|
367
|
| 1788 |
162
|
962
|
493
|
469
|
| 1798 |
167
|
1,214
|
566
|
559
|
| 1816 |
209
|
1,701
|
872
|
829
|
| 1834 |
331
|
3,130
|
1,655
|
1,475
|
| 1850 |
350
|
4,452
|
2,323
|
2,129
|
| 1857 |
360
|
4,497
|
2,366
|
2,131
|
| 1859 |
351
|
5,074
|
2,640
|
2,434
|
| 1886 |
620
|
5,746
|
2,926
|
2,820
|
| 1891 |
587
|
8,133
|
4,198
|
4,035
|
| 1894 |
619
|
9,257
|
4,743
|
4,514
|
| 1897 |
|
5,389*
|
2,781
|
2,608
|
| 1905 |
|
10,374
|
|
|
| 1911 |
|
11,788
|
|
|
| 1912 |
|
11,859
|
|
|
| 1920 |
1,040**
|
7,007
|
|
|
| 1922 |
|
5,339
|
|
|
| 1926*** |
1,001
|
5,645
|
2,746
|
2,899
|
| 1931 |
|
5,472****
|
|
|
| 1939 |
|
5,110
|
|
|
*Of whom 5,363 were German.
**Of which 1,030 households were German.
***Of whom 5,608 were German (985 households: 2,724 male & 2,884 female).
****Of whom 5,460 were German.
Lutheran and Reformed
Beratz, Gottieb. The German colonies on the Lower Volga, their origin and early development: a memorial for the 150th anniversary of the arrival of the first German settlers on the Volga, 29 June 1764 . Translated by Adam Giesinger (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1991): 349.
Diesendorf, V.F. Die Deutschen Russlands : Siedlungen und Siedlungsgebiete : Lexicon. Moscow, 2006.
List of Settlements in the Russian Empire in 1859, vol. 38: Saratov Province (St. Petersburg, 1862): 59.
Mink, A.N. Historical and Geographical Dictionary of the Saratov Province [in Russian] (Saratov, Russia, 1898): 593-597.
Orlov, Gregorii. Report of Conditions of Settlements on the Volga to Catherine II , 14 February 1769.
Pallas, P.S. Reise durch verschiedene Provinzen des Russischen Reichs. Theil 3,2, Reise aus Sibirien zurueck an die Wolga im 1773sten Jahr (St. Petersburg: Kaiserl. Academie der Wissenschaften, 1776): 622.
Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 2 (Göttingen: Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 2001): 73-85.
Pleve, Igor R. The German Colonies on the Volga: The Second Half of the Eighteenth Century, translated by Richard Rye (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2001): 318.
Preliminary Results of the Soviet Census of 1926 on the Volga German Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (Pokrovsk, 1927): 28-83.
Schnurr, Joseph. Die Kirchen und das Religiöse Leben Russlanddeutschen , Evangelischer Teil.
"Settlements in the 1897 Census." Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia (Winter, 1990): 18.
- Grimm (wolgadeutsche.net) - in Russian