RESETTLEMEHT OF CHERNIHIV REGION RESIDENTS TO THE NORTHERN CAUCASUS IN THE 30–50TH YEARS OF XIX CENTURY

Due to the reasonably increased interest in ethnic issues and various aspects of interethnic relations, the question of the main stages of the formation of the ethnic territory of Ukrainians, as well as the formation or disappearance of areas of their compact and dispersed settlement outside Ukraine requires increased attention. The purpose of this article is to study the dynamics of resettlement of residents of Chernihiv province in the North Caucasus in the 30–50s of the XIX century, to identify tendencies in growth and decline of migrations of Chernihiv peasants and Cossacks against the background of historical processes in Ukraine and the world. The methodological basis of this study is the principles of historicism, scientificity and objectivity, which contributed to the achievement of impartiality and reliability in clarifying specific facts and showing the logic of changes in the historical process. Research methods are based on the principles of historicism and objectivity; they are represented by general scientific methods of analysis, synthesis and special-historical methods - historical-comparative and historical-genetic. The scientific novelty of the study is that the course of the migration of the population of the Left Bank of Ukraine to the North Caucasus in the second quarter of the XIX century and the consequences of this resettlement were first studied. Based on the processed materials we can draw the following conclusions. Ukrainian settlers, overcoming all difficulties, contributed to population growth and intensive economic development of Caucasus regions, while ensuring the protection of the southern borders of the Russian Empire. During the period from the first mass resettlement of Ukrainians to the 1860s, that is for about 50 years, the population of the North Caucasus increased almost 5 times. Since then, a Ukrainian ethnic group has been formed here, based on former Zaporizhzhya Cossacks and peasants from Ukraine, mainly from Chernihiv, Poltava, Kharkiv and Kyiv regions