Porechy

Porechye, later called Demidov, stands where the Gobza joins the Kasplya north of Smolensk. The Kasplya flows to the Western Dvina and offered a route toward Riga and the Baltic. First mentioned in 1499, the settlement developed as a river landing and a centre for the surrounding forests and fields.

After the Truce of Andrusovo in 1667, the Porechye district was granted to the diplomat Afanasy Ordin-Nashchokin. Peter I established a trading landing here in the early eighteenth century. Boats carried timber, grain, hemp and other goods down the Kasplya and Western Dvina to Riga. Catherine II made Porechye a district town in 1776; three years later records counted dozens of river vessels departing for Riga, evidence of the importance of its waterborne trade.