As it happened, in this year that is now drawing to a close, we visited quite a few beautiful places in Sloboda Ukraine. However, there was one estate we never got around to visiting, even though we had the chance. Its name is familiar to many—Sharivka.
Perhaps no other architectural site in our region is as popular as this historic estate. Sometimes it even seems as though, aside from Sharivka, there’s nothing else worth seeing in the region. In my opinion, this beautiful estate has already broken two Sloboda Ukrainea records:
1) In terms of the number of pilgrims.
2) In terms of the number of myths about it and its owners.
Just think of all the tales about the legendary barons or Counts of Koenig, the “sugar kings,” and so on.
If you collected all these legends, you could one day publish a fascinating book titled “101 Tall Tales About the Sharivka Estate.” Let me say right away—I have no animosity whatsoever toward the estate itself or its owners. It’s just extremely unfortunate that all these fabrications overshadow the wonderful names and real achievements of its former owners. After all, Leopold Koenig and his sons were not just “sugar kings.” For this reason, today I’d like to share—even if only briefly—some of the real facts and events from their lives.
As early as 1870, at the All-Russian Manufactory Exhibition, Leopold Koenig, a St. Petersburg merchant of the First Guild, was awarded the right to display the state coat of arms on his products as the highest honor for his excellent refined sugar produced on a massive scale, for the excellent design of his factory, and for his well-established and consistently maintained reputation, was awarded the right to display the state coat of arms on his products as the highest honor. His varnishes for sugar molds also deserved special attention.
In 1882, Leopold Koenig participated in the All-Russian Art and Industry Exhibition in Moscow. The display case from his St. Petersburg paper mill showcased cotton and yarn to visitors. The products were of such high quality that the exhibition organizers awarded Koenig a gold medal.
And as we all remember, from September 23 to October 12, 1887, our beloved city hosted the All-Russian Agricultural Exhibition, which went down in history as the first event of its kind to be held in the provinces. At that time, 51 pavilions were erected on an area of more than 20 hectares in the University Garden and on the adjacent vacant lot of the Veterinary Institute (now Shevchenko Garden and Freedom Square). Over the course of the exhibition, more than 100,000 people visited. Leopold Koenig was not only among those who donated money to organize the exhibition (500 rubles), but also took an active part in it.
The success of his stud farm (founded in 1879) at the Trostyanets’ estate was held up as a model by all the organizers. Koenig set the goal of breeding a strong draft horse breed specifically for heavy field work. To this end, a stallion and two mares of the Ardennes breed were imported from Belgium. A draft mare named Desdemona was awarded a bronze medal.
In Koenig’s separate pavilion at the exhibition itself, visitors could purchase a highly interesting book providing a detailed description of the state of the farm on his estate.
Also on display from the Trostyanets’ estate were lard, fat, fresh butter, and sweet-and-salty butter. Koenig also brought butter from his Huty estate to the exhibition, for which the committee awarded a small silver medal.
For a complete collection of superior seeds, including grain, grass, and beet seeds, as well as beet and potato tubers grown to very large sizes, achieved through the rational use of selected seed beets, Koenig received a gold medal.
Moreover, it was Leopold Koenig who was perhaps the most active advocate for the cultivation of forests of all tree species in Sloboda Ukraine. On the Trostyanets’ estate, for example, 8,803 desyatinas of the 17,697 desyatinas of land were forested. Deciduous trees that had been cut down were artificially replaced with conifers. Koenig provided forestry exhibits from both estates for the exhibition and arranged them both inside his pavilion and around it.
There was just about everything there. Seedlings and saplings of coniferous species used for reforestation of cleared deciduous forest areas; tools and equipment used in silvicultural work and logging; logs of various types of wood from our own forests, tastefully arranged on a clearing among a group of coniferous seedlings and saplings; oak and ash planks that amazed exhibition visitors with their width; soil samples… After the exhibition ended, this collection of specimens was transferred to the museum of the Kharkiv University Garden. The seedlings and saplings themselves were planted in the University Garden, while the oak and ash planks were sent to the Imperial Agricultural Museum in St. Petersburg. After reviewing all the exhibits presented by Koenig, the expert commission recognized him as worthy of a gold medal “for exemplary forest management and the successful cultivation of various forest species on a large scale.”
Koenig’s refined sugar was of such high quality that it also received the highest award. The granulated sugar was awarded a large silver medal. Pigs from the estates were awarded a bronze medal and a certificate of commendation. Koenig was awarded a large silver medal for the grain-and-potato alcohol produced at the Trostyanets’ Distillery.
As a successful and wealthy man, Leopold Koenig also had his hobbies. Living sometimes in Bonn and sometimes in St. Petersburg in a mansion on Vasilyevsky Island, he was passionate about breeding purebred dogs. The pair of pointers he purchased in England for a fortune—”Devonshire Nero” and “Lady”—aroused enormous public interest and became the ancestors of many modern dogs of this breed. The offspring of this pair also earned Koenig prizes at dog shows.
Of course, a man like that couldn’t help but be involved in charity work. In our beloved city, Leopold Koenig and his sons were members of the “German Relief Society” and actively donated money to support the national community. The income from raising cows, pigs, and horses made this possible.
Undoubtedly, sugar production generated considerable revenue. However, it was by no means the primary or key source of income in the Koenigs’ vast financial empire. Speaking of the term “sugar king,” which is so commonly used here today: in 1884, a book by Vladimir Osipovich Mikhnevich titled *Our Acquaintances* was published in St. Petersburg. It was a humorous dictionary containing 1,000 profiles of government and public figures of the time: scientists, writers, artists, merchants, and industrialists. And on page 101, we read:
Koenig is a sugar manufacturer who enjoys a very “sweet” reputation in St. Petersburg, but whether Mr. Koenig himself is as “sweet” as his sugar is unknown, and is rather doubtful, judging by his active involvement in the latest sugar speculation, which has embittered the lives of many thrifty Russians. Under the Koenig brand, there is a huge sugar refinery in the capital—arguably the largest in Russia in terms of production—and every St. Petersburg housewife, when asking for sugar in the shops, will invariably say: “Please, give me some Koenig’s!”—which means it’s of such high quality and so sweet.
The 1931 book *Lutheranism and Its Political Role* already mentions Leopold Koenig’s son. “The Lutheran Church’s intensified efforts in 1905 required increased funding. This, of course, was secured. The ‘Sugar King,’ St. Petersburg industrialist Leopold Koenig, donated 50,000 rubles to the consistory.”
References to the “sugar king” can also be found in other St. Petersburg publications from various periods. This is not surprising, since the Koenig refined sugar factory in St. Petersburg, along with the paper mill, was the family’s main enterprise in that region. For this reason, it can be assumed that the term “sugar king” came to our lands from the city on the Neva.
On December 16, 1903, at the age of 82, Leopold Yegorovich Koenig died. His entire financial empire was in excellent condition. His four sons—Yuli, Karl, Alexander, and Friedrich proved to be worthy successors to the business their father had started. As general partners, they established the empire’s largest trading house, the “L. E. Koenig – Heirs,” which included beet sugar, refined sugar, distilleries, brick, and timber processing plants, as well as mills and a stud farm.
One of the most significant achievements of Leopold Koenig’s heirs took place in 1908. At that time, at the International Construction and Art Exhibition in St. Petersburg, the parquet flooring produced at the Trostyanets’ factory “L. E. Koenig – Heirs” in Trostyanets was awarded the sole highest honor—the Grand Gold Medal from the Ministry of Trade and Industry.
In our city, the representative of the Trostyanets’ Parquet Factory was Nakhim Moiseevich Kompaniets, who lived in his own house at No. 34 at Kontorska Street. The factory’s office was located at Voskresenskaya Square, 11.
In 1913, Professor Mikhail Mikhailovich Orlov published a book titled *Forestry on the Kharkiv Estates of “L. E. Koenig—Heirs.”* Its 185 pages provided a detailed account of everything Leopold Koenig had created and what his sons had expanded upon. The book also contained 3 detailed maps, 53 illustrations (including photographs of the estates and samples of parquet flooring), and 6 drawings.
That same year, two more publications were released, dedicated to Koenig’s Trostyanets’ and Huty estates, both featuring beautiful illustrations. Speaking of the Huty estate, as early as 1897, at the Kyiv Agricultural and Industrial Exhibition, Leopold Koenig presented the first detailed description of his estate, totaling 500 pages. Among the individual components of this estate were the Nikitivska and Sharivska estates. In Gut itself, there was a sugar factory, while the Sharivka distillery produced alcohol. At the same time, pig farming was actively practiced throughout the Huty Estate, with the primary focus on breeding large Yorkshire pigs.
How can we not recall the story—so beloved by many tour guides—about how one summer Leopold Koenig ordered his workers to bring several metric tons of sugar “from the factory” overnight and build a “snow” slide out of it, so that the next morning his beloved wife could go sledding down it in the summer. Now, I realize this doesn’t sound very romantic, but the only thing that could possibly have been created in a single night in Sharivka using “locally available materials” was a pool filled with alcohol. Well, or whatever pigs have in abundance. Although, of course, you won’t attract tourists with a story like that…
For technical reasons, it is not possible to list all of Leopold Koenig’s and his sons’ awards and achievements in this article. However, in my opinion, to refer to this family solely as the “sugar kings” is, at the very least, disrespectful to them and to what they have done for our region…
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