A photo essay from the excursion we took in the summer of 2015 to one of the oldest estates in the Kharkiv region—the abandoned Shidlovsky estate in the village of Staryi Merchyk, Bohodukhiv Raion.
A cave in the forest:
The Church of All Saints was built on the site of an old church as part of a manor complex in the late 1770s. The manor itself was still a wooden structure at that time. According to one account, the church was designed by V. I. Yaroslavsky. The bell tower was completed in the 19th century. During the Soviet era of neglect, and later during another renovation in the 1990s, the church underwent further alterations.
The estate itself, built in the Neolassical style, was constructed approximately between the 1780s and 1790s. The architect’s identity has not yet been confirmed by documentary evidence, although one theory suggests that it was designed by Pyotr Yaroslavsky. From the 1920s until 1997, the estate housed educational institutions; the last of these, the Veterinary Technical School, moved out in 1997, and the estate has stood abandoned ever since. Unfortunately, the estate burned down in the spring of 2018.
In the early 2000s, an attempt was made to preserve the estate—some of the windows were bricked up.
The estate’s basement:
Some of the stucco moldings in the interior were still intact in 2015. The 2018 fire destroyed them along with the roof and floor joists.
During the Soviet era, the ballroom was divided into two floors by a ceiling. This is the second floor.
An elegant stucco rosette, with a light fixture mounted in the center.
Several service buildings have been preserved around the estate. The outbuildings, which stand separate from the main house, formerly housed the kitchens and served as living quarters for the servants, the butler, and guests; separate structures housed the stables and barns.
The tombstone from Grigory Shidlovsky’s grave, next to which the estate was built.
The grave itself has not survived; it was looted during the Soviet era.
A mighty oak tree, about 25 meters tall, stands in a once-magnificent landscape park—of which only the name remains—as it has been completely overgrown.
Video of the estate’s interiors:
Historical photos of the estate from 1914, taken from Lukomsky’s book *Ancient Estates of the Kharkiv Governorate*. In 1872, engineer Yevgeny Dukhovsky purchased the estate.
