Originally, the congregation in Kautz was part of the Reformed parish headquartered in Messer . It later became part of the Lutheran parish headquartered in Dietel where there was a resident pastor.
A wooden church with a metal roof was constructed in Kautz in 1887.
Kautz was founded on 20 May 1767 by Baron de Boffe as a Reformed colony. There were 28 founding families, all of whom came from the Palatinate. The colony was named after its first Vorsteher (mayor), Georg Jakob Kautz. By decree on 26 February 1768, the colony received its official Russian name of Vershinka.
|
Year
|
Households
|
Population
|
||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Total
|
Male
|
Female
|
||
| 1767 |
|
107
|
|
|
| 1769 |
28
|
110
|
61
|
49
|
| 1773 |
30
|
141
|
74
|
67
|
| 1788 |
28
|
179
|
98
|
82
|
| 1798 |
36
|
223
|
119
|
104
|
| 1816 |
53
|
392
|
185
|
207
|
| 1834 |
86
|
672
|
343
|
329
|
| 1850 |
87
|
1,007
|
491
|
516
|
| 1857 |
127
|
1,316
|
647
|
669
|
| 1862 |
101
|
1,360
|
685
|
675
|
| 1886 |
180
|
1,428
|
722
|
706
|
| 1891 |
166
|
1,757
|
863
|
894
|
| 1894 |
180
|
2,089
|
1,011
|
1,078
|
| 1897 |
|
1,583*
|
769
|
814
|
| 1904 |
|
|
|
|
| 1911 |
|
1,559
|
|
|
| 1912 |
|
2,800
|
|
|
| 1920 |
224**
|
1,695
|
|
|
| 1922 |
|
1,511
|
|
|
| 1926*** |
244
|
1,657
|
811
|
846
|
| 1931 |
|
1,790
|
|
|
*Of whom 1,556 were German.
**Of which 221 households were German.
***Of whom 1,655 were German (242 households: 809 male & 846 female).
Censuses for Kautz are available for the following years: 1767, 1798, 1834, & 1857.
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): 350.
Diesendorf, V.F. Die Deutschen Russlands : Siedlungen und Siedlungsgebiete : Lexicon. Moscow, 2006.
Mink, A.N. Historical and Geographical Dictionary of the Saratov Province [in Russian] (Saratov, Russia, 1898): 120-122.
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 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): 319.
Preliminary Results of the Soviet Census of 1926 on the Volga German Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (Pokrovsk, 1927): 28-83.
"Settlements in the 1897 Census." Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia (Win
Kautz (wolgadeutsche.net) - in Russian