Amur Region

In orographic terms, the region can be divided into 5 parts:

1. a mountainous country through which the rivers that form the upper reaches of the Amur River break through; here you can also include all the areas adjacent to the main ridges of the region;
2. a country of flat hills cut by separate mountain branches;
3. country of plains
4. hilly steppe hills
5. coasts of the southeastern part of the Sea of ​​Okhotsk, the Tatar Strait and the northern part of the Sea of ​​Japan.

According to the general surface structure, the Amur Region is, however, a mountainous country. Although the mountains are not high, their spurs diverge in all directions and fill most of the region.

The main ranges:

1. The Stanovoi, or Yablonova, ridge, in its southern part serving as a watershed of the rivers Selenga, Lena and Amur.
2. Big Khingan, starting from the Sielka ridge, near the peaks of Peh, stretches almost in the meridional direction; it borders Manchuria from the west, passing along the border between the plateau of Mongolia (Gobi) and mountainous Manchuria.
3. Small Khingan also extends in the meridional direction and crosses the Amur River in the middle course of the latter; through a small ridge 500 miles long, bearing the name Dzhugdyr to the northern part, Maly Khingan is connected to the Stanovoi Range.
4. Sikhote-Alin stretches in a continuous ridge along the shores of the Sea of ​​Japan and the Tatar Strait and in the northern part it intersects Amur.

Of the fossil wealth of the region, the most remarkable are gold deposits, which are divided into 7 groups according to their location.

• 1) Upper Amur group, to which 5 areas belong (100 pounds of sand contain from 1/2 to 1 1/2 gold spools); * 2) Zeya group with 4 localities, gold content up to 1 spool 60 shares);
• 3) Selemjinskaya with 5 locations (gold content from 1 1/2 to 2 spools);
• 4) Bureya group (gold content from 89 shares to 38 spools 72 shares - along the Kanaku river, but only nest gold was found in the last locality);
• 5) Amgun group on the Amguni river;
• 6) Lake group on the left bank of the Amur River, below the Small Khingan ridge (gold content from 1 1/2 to 2 spools of 35 shares; * 7) Ussuri group within the entire Ussuri region; gold content and mining are insignificant.

From 1868 to 1875 1615 pounds of gold were mined in all the mines in the Amur basin; in the Amur Region from 1888 to 1892 - 2166 pounds.

Coal deposits in the Amur Region are quite numerous. In the upper reaches of the Amur, they are known on the Ursa River, a tributary of the Onon River, as well as on the Shilke and Arguni rivers. Within the Amur Region, coal was found in many places from the mouth of the Oldoya River to the village of Chernyaeva, further along the Amur River in Chagayan Mountain, between the villages of Korsakova and Kozakevicheva, 20 versts above Blagoveshchensk, 9 versts above the Innokentyevskaya stanitsa, at the entrance of the Amur to Small Khingan and in the lower reaches of the Amur River, 160 miles above Nikolaevsk. Coal is found along the Zee River in the middle course along the parallel to Albazin, as well as against the mouth of the Silimji River and in the White Mountains; a thick layer of coal was also found on Bureya. The most significant coal deposits are located on the island of Sakhalin . Other minerals include iron ore deposits on the eastern slope of Small Khingan, on the right side of the Samara River, near the village of Puzino, 20 versts from the banks of the Amur River; there are traces of native copper and copper ores on the Samara River. In Malyi Khingan, an amethyst was found near the villages of Raddeva and Soyuznaya; crystals of zircon, hornblende, and rock crystal are found in mountain rivers; Topaz, heavyweights, aquamarines, emeralds, beryls, tourmalines and rock crystal are not uncommon on the Urulga River, which flows into Shilka, but the Transbaikal Adunchalon mines are especially rich in precious stones.

The Orokhons lived along the upper reaches of the Amur and the lower reaches of Shilka ; maneuvers - east of the Nevers River and down the Amur River to the Kumara River, are also found in the middle reaches of Zeya , Selemdzhi and their tributaries; Manchus - on the Amur River near the mouth of Zeya ; Tungus - below the mouth of the Bureya , along the middle course of the Horynia, along the Amguni River and along the banks of the Tatar Strait; Golds - along the Amur River from Lesser Khingan to the mouth of Ussuri and along Ussuri. Gilyaks were found in the lower reaches of the Amur, and in the Ussuri Territory there were manza ( Koreans ). Russians lived mainly in cities, towns along the Amur River and Cossack villages along Ussuri.

The beginning of the annexation of the Amur Region to Russian possessions and, at the same time, the beginning of its colonization was laid by Siberian Cossacks. In the years 1643-1646. a party of Cossacks led by Poyarkov along the Zee River entered Amur, on which it descended to the Sea of ​​Okhotsk. In 1649, the peasant Erofei Khabarov, with 70 hunters, went down the Lena River to Olekma; rising along it to the mouth of the Tugir River, in the winter of 1650 crossed the Stanovoy Range and went onto the Amur, on which it descended to the place of the present Albazin. During the years 1651-53. he continued to conquer the region and reached the lower reaches of the Amur. The actions of the Cossack parties under the command of Stepanov (1653–55), Milovanov (1681), Mylnikov (1683) also belong to the same period. In 1685, Albazin was taken by the Manchu army, and the Russians were forced to withdraw from there to Nerchinsk; but in the same year that the Manchus left, the Russians again occupied the city. Under the Nerchinsk Treaty of 1689, Amur was left to China; the border of both states was the Gorbitsa River, which flows into Shilka, the Argun River and the Stanovoi Range. In 1727, under the Burinsky Treaty, the border with China in Transbaikalia was drawn between the Argun River and the Shaban-Dabaga ridge; Cupid remained behind China; Under the same agreement, Russia lost the right to free trade with China. Meanwhile, great difficulties in relations with Kamchatka forced the Russian government to seek the return of the Amur.

In 1854, the Governor-General of Eastern Siberia, Muravyov, without prior permission from the Chinese government, descended the Amur River to the Mariinsky Post with many barges, where a hundred Cossacks were left. In 1854, during the Crimean War, all state property and employees from the port of Peter and Paul were delivered to the mouth of the Amur. Here, our fleet was hiding from the pursuit of the enemy, who did not know about the existence of a free passage for ships to the Amur estuary. In 1855, to reinforce Russian posts at the mouth of the Amur, a second expedition was undertaken down the Amur, which, in addition to the army, included immigrants - peasants of the Trans-Baikal and Irkutsk provinces, who founded three villages. In 1856, military posts Kumarsky, Zeysky and Khingansky were founded on the left bank of the Amur. In the same year, all the places we occupied in the lower reaches of the Amur became part of the Primorsky region .

In 1858, the Aigun Treaty was signed with China, according to which Russia acquired the entire left bank of the Amur River and the right bank from the confluence of the Ussuri River, as well as the entire coast of the Eastern Ocean to the Korean border, and in June of the same year, the Ussuri Territory also passed to Russia along the Tientsin Treaty .

• Nevelskoy G.I. , Feats of Russian naval officers in the extreme East of Russia, 1849-55, Amur and Priussuri Territories, St. Petersburg: Russian Skorupchatnya, 1878
• F.F. Shperk , “Russia of the Far East” (“ Notes of the Imperial Russian Geographical Society on General Geography”, vol. XIV, 1885).

• Primorsky region
• Transbaikal region

• Nikolsky A.M. Amur Region // Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron : 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - SPb. , 1890-1907.