Kalnivka

Kalnivka, later known as Troitske, began as a settlement of migrants from Urazova in the middle decades of the eighteenth century. Its name was associated with an early settler called Kalyna. The newcomers occupied land claimed by the Golitsyn family and were drawn into the estate's system of serf obligations as settlement expanded.

In the early nineteenth century a proposed purchase of freedom replaced personal dependence with heavy financial commitments. Payments to a state bank burdened the inhabitants over many years, illustrating the difficulty of escaping the estate economy through redemption. A church dedicated to the Trinity subsequently gave the settlement its Novotroitske name. Kalnivka's history thus connects migration into the Sloboda countryside with landownership, serfdom and the costly terms under which freedom was negotiated.