Directions, volumes and structure of freight traffic along the Amur at the beginning of the 20th century: analysis of transport statistics

Zyuzin Konstantin Aleksandrovich Postgraduate student, Historical Information Science Department, Faculty of History, Lomonosov Moscow State University 27 Lomonosovsky Prospekt, building 4, Moscow, 119991, Russia zyuzinconstantine@yandex.ru

Introduction

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Russian merchant shipping on the Amur was actively developing: the number of river steamship fleets was rapidly increasing, and the cargo turnover of the largest marinas in the Amur region amounted to more than a million pounds annually ^{[7, steamship movements on the roads of Khabarovsk and Iman during the navigation of 1901]}. Already in the 1890s, domestic shipping companies supported passenger and freight communications throughout the Amur River and along its largest tributaries – Arguni, Shilka, Zee, Sungari, Ussuri – providing the necessary goods to the entire Amur region, part of Primorye and Transbaikalia, as well as supporting trade with Chinese settlements in Manchuria.

The important role of river navigation in the development of trade in the Amur region during this period was repeatedly noted by both domestic historians ^{[5, pp. 148-169] [10, pp. 115-116]} and foreign ^{[12, p. 64],[4, pp. 39-40]}. At the same time, it should be noted that in their assessments, experts are mainly based on the works of their contemporaries, who often use only fragmentary statistical materials on freight traffic along the Amur River. More detailed quantitative data have already been partially introduced into scientific circulation ^[17], but their analysis has not been carried out, and the picture of commodity exchange on the Amur River remains fragmentary in Russian historiography. This article attempts to reveal the information potential of some thematic statistical sources of the early 20th century and to consider on their basis the main trends in the development of river trade in the Amur region in 1901-1913, in the context of the active development of the region by immigrants from European Russia and the changing nature of the local economic situation during the years of construction and operation of the Trans-Siberian Railway.

Research sources

In the second half of the 19th century, statistics on freight traffic on Russia's inland waterways were collected and processed by the Ministry of Railways. The compiled materials were subsequently published as part of departmental statistical collections, which were published annually from 1877 to 1914. Information on the movement of goods along the rivers of Siberia and the Far East – the basins of the Ob, Yenisei and Amur – first appeared in the collection of the Ministry of Transport for 1906 ^[14] (together with data for 1904-1905) and appear in all subsequent issues. These materials reflect the different characteristics of the operation of steam and non-steam vessels on the largest rivers and their tributaries: the directions, volumes and structure of cargo transportation, the average density of goods movement, the poods made by them, etc. Despite the fact that the collections of the Ministry of Internal Affairs turn out to be a good source for formulating general conclusions about the state of navigation in a particular river system in Russia, they are not able to fully meet the needs of studying any more specific, highly specialized topic. Thus, the product range used in them is limited to only a few major categories, which reduces the ability to identify regional features of freight transportation. The lack of data on the direction of movement of goods in the collections of the Ministry of Internal Affairs up to and including 1908 is another serious problem of these materials, which does not allow us to determine which goods and in what quantity were sent up or down the river. The listed features of the source necessitate the use of additional information to analyze the development of river trade in the Amur region over a long period of time.

In this regard, the materials of the Amur Basin Waterways Department, which were used to compile the collections of the Ministry of Railways themselves, seem to be a suitable source. The State Administration of Waterways of the Amur Basin was established in Blagoveshchensk in 1899 in order to study the state of navigation on the Amur River, as well as to identify opportunities for its improvement ^{[6, (for 1901, pp. 28-29)]}. The movement of ships, goods and passengers was initially recorded by department officials at 15 marinas in the Amur Basin, and the data they collected was subsequently compiled into statistical reports, the first of which was published in 1904 (with information for 1901-1904) ^[15]. For each individual pier, statistics were kept on the movement of goods up and down the river through it, and separately for steam and towed vessels, sailing vessels, and rafts. The source uses a more detailed product range than in the collections of the Ministry of Transport, which significantly expands the possibilities for analyzing changes in the structure of freight traffic along the Amur River.

Local customs statistics can also be used as an auxiliary source for the study. In 1902-1903, Russian customs outposts and posts appeared in several settlements on the Amur River, in particular in Blagoveshchensk and Khabarovsk, which kept records of river trade with China even under the conditions of duty–free trade that existed until 1913 within a 50-mile strip along the Russian-Chinese border ^{[1, pp. 110-112]}. In the most complete form, data on the import and export of goods through each Amur customs are contained in the "Reviews of Russia's Foreign Trade along the European and Asian borders", starting with the issue for 1902 ^[8]. Information on the movement of goods was collected by customs officials, probably on the basis of the same documents as representatives of the Amur Basin Waterways Department. Nevertheless, the data from both sources on river trade with China have significant discrepancies, even in its most general estimates (Table 1).

Table 1. Total imports (in pounds) to the Amur and Primorsky regions according to transport and customs statistics in the period 1902-1913.

A source: 1) Customs data – an overview of Russia's foreign trade along the European and Asian borders for ^[1902-1913]. Table XVII. St. Petersburg; Pg., 1904-1914.; 2) Data of marinas on Sungari for 1902-1911. – Statistical report on cargo and passenger traffic and rafting of rafts along the waterways of the Amur basin: for navigation [1901-1904; 1905-1907; 1906-1908; 1909-1911.]. Blagoveshchensk, 1904-1912.; 3) Data of marinas on Sungari for 1912 – Statistical collection of the Ministry of Railways. Issue 133. Transportation by inland waterways in 1912, Part I. Table I. Pg., 1915.; 4) Data of marinas on Sungari for 1913 – Appendix to the most comprehensive report of the Military Governor of the Amur Region for 1912-1913. Table No. 25. Blagoveshchensk, 1915.

The discrepancies between the figures of both types of statistics on the import of goods from Manchuria to the Amur region seem insignificant at first glance. However, it should be borne in mind that this result is achieved solely by accounting for the mass import of grain cargoes, both by customs and marinas. When these data are excluded from comparative statistics, the final discrepancies between the figures of the sources grow to an average of 18% – customs registered larger volumes of imports into the Russian Amur region than the marinas of departure to Sungari.

More significant discrepancies between the data of transport and customs statistics are seen in the data on the total exports of goods from the Amur region to Manchuria (Table 2).

Table 2. Total exports (in pounds) from the Amur and Primorsky regions according to transport and customs statistics in the period 1902-1913.

A source: 1) Customs data – an overview of Russia's foreign trade along the European and Asian borders for ^[1902-1913]. Table XVII. St. Petersburg; Pg., 1904-1914.; 2) Data of marinas on Sungari for 1902-1911. – Statistical report on cargo and passenger traffic and rafting of rafts along the waterways of the Amur basin: for navigation [1901-1904; 1905-1907; 1906-1908; 1909-1911.]. Blagoveshchensk, 1904-1912.; 3) Data of marinas on Sungari for 1912 – Statistical collection of the Ministry of Railways. Issue 133. Transportation by inland waterways in 1912, Part I. Table I. Pg., 1915.

Probably, the discrepancies in the figures of customs and transport statistics on imports and exports are explained by the development of trade in the Russian Amur region not only with marinas on Sungari, but also with other Chinese settlements on Amur or Ussuri. Unfortunately, it will not be possible to directly confirm this assumption using transport statistics: figures on the cargo turnover of marinas on the right (Chinese) bank of the Amur River appear in the materials of the Amur Basin Waterways Department only since 1909 in a stripped-down form. Somewhat more detailed statistics on the movement of goods through individual Chinese marinas (for example, through Aigun – now Heihe in China), although they appear in the collection of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for 1912, however, in the issue for the next year they disappear again.

In assessing the volume of river trade with China, customs data can really complement transport statistics and help create a more detailed picture of the development of trade across the Amur River at the beginning of the 20th century. At the same time, however, they by no means replace the latter, at least from the point of view that they do not reflect the movement of goods between the marinas. For this reason, reports from the Amur Basin Waterways Department and statistical collections from the Ministry of Railways are still seen as more solid sources for research. Of course, these materials also have drawbacks: their compilers recognized that the statistics collected for various reasons do not take into account the entire volume of cargo transportation along rivers, for example, due to the lack of registration of their movement through shallow marinas. Nevertheless, it contains data on the movement of most goods ^{[14, (for 1910, table I. The number of ships and rafts and all goods sent and arrived by inland waterways in 1910, pp. 3-6)]}, and therefore these sources are able to display a relatively complete picture of the development of trade along the Amur River in the beginning of the XX century.

General dynamics and directions of freight traffic on Amur

Based on the collected figures from statistical collections of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and reports of the Amur Basin Waterways Department, we compiled the general dynamics of goods transportation downstream and upstream of the Amur and Shilka rivers – from Sretensk in the Trans-Baikal Region to Nikolaevsk-on–Amur in Primorye - for 1901-1913. (Fig. 1). The volume of shipments downstream was calculated by the number of cargoes arriving at the wharves of the designated area from above along the river; the volume of shipments upstream was calculated by their arrival from below along the river. The use of this approach was due to the desire to take into account the movement of goods entering the Amur River from its tributaries, which is impossible when using figures for shipments from the marinas of these tributaries themselves until 1910 (until that year, statistics did not record where goods were sent from the mouth of the tributary – up or down the Amur River). On the other hand, part of the data on shipments from the Amur to the tributaries is lost in this way. This amount, however, does not seem to be very significant, since often the goods first landed at the Amur pier near the mouth of a tributary, and only then were re-shipped to the end point of the route. For example, settlements up the Zee were mainly supplied by shipments of goods from Blagoveshchensk.

We should also add that, in accordance with the task of estimating the total volume of freight traffic up and down the Amur River, the dynamics below includes the re-shipment of the same goods from different marinas. For example, it takes into account fish shipped from Khabarovsk, which originally arrived there from Nikolaevsk-on-Amur. The "net" number of shipments was calculated for a particular product per year in the next section.

1. The dynamics of freight traffic up and down the Amur River in 1901-1913.

A source: 1) for 1901-1908 – Statistical report on cargo and passenger traffic and rafting of rafts along the waterways of the Amur basin: for navigation [1901-1904; 1905-1907; 1906-1908; 1909-1911]. Blagoveshchensk, 1904-1912.; 2) for 1909-1913 - Statistical Collection of the Ministry of Railways. Issue 133, 139. Transportation by inland waterways in 1912, 1913, 1915-1916.

As can be seen from the diagram, the most active growth in freight traffic occurred in the period after the end of the Russian-Japanese War. The increase in their number in these years was mainly due to two factors. Firstly, in just 14 years, the population of the Amur region has more than doubled due to the massive influx of migrants from European Russia. Thus, the population of the Amur Region in 1913 was estimated at 348,540 people versus 129,348 in 1900 ^{[6, (for 1900, 1912-1913)]}, and the population of the Primorsky Region was 619,185 people versus 273,789, respectively ^{[7, (for 1900, 1913)]}. For this reason, during the For decades, transportation of both food and industrial products has been noticeably intensified, which supplied the entire Amur Region, as well as parts of Transbaikalia and Primorye, along the river. Secondly, in 1907-1916, the Amur Railway was under construction in the Amur Region, the materials for the construction of which were transported by riverboats. Given the large volumes and heavy weight of construction timber, stones, metal structures, etc. transported, it is not surprising that the sharp increase in the number of cargoes transported along the river since 1907 is reflected in official statistics.

There were only a few relatively large marinas along the entire length of the designated Amur and Shilka sections (about 3,000 versts), with cargo turnover exceeding one million poods per year. Towards the mouth of the Amur River, the first such pier was in Sretensk, located on the Shilka River. In 1898, one of the branches of the Trans-Baikal Railway was connected to the city, and it became the terminus of the Trans-Siberian Railway in Transbaikalia until 1913. Being located at the junction of railway and river routes, Sretensk was one of the most important transshipment points in the entire Transbaikalia and Amur Region, and since the same year, 1898, freight traffic from Russian railways stations to the Amur and Primorsky regions operated through the city ^{[13, 1898, No. 974, Tariff No. 6425]}. The goods were transported to Sretensk, loaded onto river vessels and followed to their destination – separate marinas in the Amur and Primorsky regions and stations of the Ussuriysk railway; the same transportation was carried out in the opposite direction. In 1901-1913, the cargo turnover of the Sretensk pier fluctuated almost annually between 2-3 million pounds, while a change in its nature is clearly visible from Tables 3-4: if before 1907 goods were imported to Sretensk in larger quantities from below along the river, then in the subsequent period they were shipped from the city to the pier downriver. This process was primarily due to an increase in the volume of shipments of railway structures from Transbaikalia since 1907.

The next major Amur marina downriver was located in Blagoveshchensk. Being the largest city in the Amur region and the Amur region as a whole, it concentrated a significant part of regional commodity flows: every year the city not only consumed and shipped a substantial amount of local goods, but also distributed to other Russian and Chinese settlements on Amur and the Zee those of them that were imported into the region from the Primorye and Trans-Baikal regions, as well as from Manchuria. During the period under study, the cargo turnover of Amur marina alone increased from 8.4 million poods in 1901 to 32 million poods in 1913. The most intensive growth in cargo turnover in Blagoveshchensk occurred after 1907, when the city saw a significant increase in shipments from below and above along the river – various kinds of building materials and timber, respectively (Tables 3-4).

The second largest Russian marina in the region was located further down the Amur River in Khabarovsk. In 1897, the Ussuriysk railway was brought to the city, which connected it with Vladivostok. In a short time, Khabarovsk became one of the most important transit points in the region, through which the Primorsky Region was connected to the Amur marinas. Goods arriving by train from Vladivostok were sent to Amur through the city, and in the opposite direction – mainly agricultural products from the Amur region and Manchuria, distributed at stations of the Ussuriysk railway up to Iman (now Dalnerechensk). In 1901-1908, the cargo turnover of the Amur pier in Khabarovsk fluctuated almost annually between 4 and 5.5 million poods, since 1909 it began to increase sharply and reached 18 and 23 million poods in 1912-1913, respectively. This growth was mainly due to an increase in the number of shipments of construction materials through the Khabarovsk Pier – some of them were exported from the city up the Amur River, some arrived both from below and from above along the river (Tables 3-4).

The last major Russian river pier in Nikolaevsk-on-Amur operated at the mouth of the Amur River. Just like Khabarovsk, Nikolaevsk played an important transit role in the Amur region's trade: here, goods arriving on river vessels directly from the sea were shipped up the Amur River and then could be distributed along the marinas along the entire length of the river up to Sretensk (such as salt, tea or fish). Transit in the opposite direction was not so developed, and goods arriving in Nikolaevsk from above along the river mainly settled in the city itself. It was only in 1913 that the first successful experiment was carried out to export soybeans from Manchuria to foreign markets through Nikolaevsk – 888 thousand pounds of cargo ^{[8, (for 1913, p. 467)]}. In 1901-1913, the cargo turnover of the Nikolaevsk river pier increased from 2.3 to 8.5 million poods, and its most intensive growth occurred in the period from 1910, mainly due to an increase in shipments of construction materials upriver (Tables 3-4).

Table 3. Shipment of goods from the largest Russian marinas up and down the Amur River in 1901-1913. (thousand pounds).

A source: 1) for 1901-1911 – Statistical report on cargo and passenger traffic and rafting of rafts along the waterways of the Amur basin: for navigation [1901-1904; 1905-1907; 1906-1908; 1909-1911]. Blagoveshchensk, 1904-1912.; 2) for 1912-1913 - Statistical Collection of the Ministry of Railways. Issue 133, 139. Transportation by inland waterways in 1912, 1913, 1915-1916.

Note. 1: the above statistics do not include cargo transportation by junks and boats before 1908, because the sources do not allow us to determine their direction relative to the river flow. However, given the small volume of this kind of transportation (about 100 thousand pounds annually), these figures can be ignored.

Note. 2: Italics indicate the total number of goods shipped on rafts and in rafts (almost exclusively timber).

Table 4. Arrival of goods at the largest Russian marinas from above and below along the Amur River in 1901-1913. (thousand pounds).

A source: 1) for 1901-1911 – Statistical report on cargo and passenger traffic and rafting of rafts along the waterways of the Amur basin: for navigation [1901-1904; 1905-1907; 1906-1908; 1909-1911]. Blagoveshchensk, 1904-1912. 2) for 1912-1913 - Statistical Collection of the Ministry of Railways. Issue 133, 139. Transportation by inland waterways in 1912, 1913, 1915-1916.

Note. 1: the above statistics do not include cargo transportation by junks and boats before 1908, because the sources do not allow us to determine their direction relative to the river flow. However, given the small volume of this kind of transportation (about 100 thousand pounds annually), these figures can be ignored.

Note. 2: Italics indicate the total number of goods that arrived on rafts and in rafts (almost exclusively timber).

The general structure of freight traffic on the Amur River

During the entire period under study, especially in the post–war years, significantly more goods were shipped down the Amur River than up the river. This type of river transportation is understandable if we consider them from the point of view of their structure (Fig. 2, Fig. 3).

2. The structure of cargo transportation down the Amur River in 1909-1913.

Table 5. Structure and volume of shipments of goods down the Amur River in 1901-1913. (thousand pounds).

A source: 1) for 1901-1911 – Statistical report on cargo and passenger traffic and rafting of rafts along the waterways of the Amur basin: for navigation [1901-1904; 1905-1907; 1906-1908; 1909-1911]. Blagoveshchensk, 1904-1912.; 2) for 1909-1913 - 1) Statistical Collection of the Ministry of Railways. Issue 133, 139. Transportation by inland waterways in 1912, 1913, 1915-1916; 2) Review of the Primorsky region in 1912, 1913. Appendix 26. Bulletin on the movement of goods in the Primorsky region. Vladivostok, 1914-1915.

Note: These statistics take into account the transshipment of the same cargo from different marinas.

3. The structure of cargo transportation up the Amur River in 1909-1913.

Table 6. The structure and volume of shipments of goods up the Amur River in 1901-1913. (thousand pounds).

A source: 1) for 1901-1911 – Statistical report on cargo and passenger traffic and rafting of rafts along the waterways of the Amur basin: for navigation [1901-1904; 1905-1907; 1906-1908; 1909-1911]. Blagoveshchensk, 1904-1912.; 2) for 1909-1913 – 1)Statistical collection of the Ministry of Railways. Issue 133, 139. Transportation by inland waterways in 1912, 1913, 1915-1916; 2) Review of the Primorsky region in 1912, 1913. Appendix 26. Bulletin on the movement of goods in the Primorsky region. Vladivostok, 1914-1915.

Note: These statistics take into account the transshipment of the same cargoes from different marinas.

During the entire period under study, from 40 to 77% of all shipments down the Amur River accounted for only one forest, which was massively floated from the upper reaches of the Amur River and its tributaries – from Shilka, Arguni, Zeya and Ussuri – and in the largest numbers arrived in Blagoveshchensk, Khabarovsk and Nikolaevsk-on-Amur. Until 1906, timber was transported along the Amur River in the range of 2-3 million pounds per year. A significant increase in these volumes occurred after 1907, when construction of the central and eastern parts of the Amur Railway began. Under these conditions, shipments of forests along the Amur River increased by more than 4 times, and in the period from 1907 to 1913 annually amounted to about 13 million pounds of construction timber and firewood.

For the same reason, from 1908-1909, various kinds of building materials began to be transported en masse along the river – railway structures, cement, stone, lime, etc. – the total annual shipments of which exceeded 5 million pounds. In 1912-1913, metal structures arrived on the Amur from the Trans-Baikal Railway through Sretensk, from the Ussuriyskaya Railway (mainly from Vladivostok) through Khabarovsk, as well as directly from the sea through Nikolaevsk. The cement used in the construction was exclusively locally produced and arrived at the Khabarovsk pier from the cement plant operating in Primorye since 1907 at the Evgenyevka station of the Ussuriyskaya Railway. At the same time, stone was imported in large quantities from Manchuria and from the Chinese coast of the Amur River on ships for the construction of a railway bridge in the Khabarovsk region ^{[3, pp. 261-262]}. The previously presented dynamics of transportation of all these cargoes down and up the river was reflected by a sharp increase in the share of shipments of not only "building materials" (cement, lime, stone, railway cargo), but also "other goods" – in the available statistics, building materials for the railway were obviously mixed with incoming This group includes categories such as "cast iron" or "iron, copper, steel and tinplate".

During the period under study, there was also a noticeable increase in the volume of grain shipments – grain and flour – which increased from 1.6–3 million poods in 1901-1903 to 11-13 million poods in 1910-1913. The increase in grain shipments was naturally associated with the rapid growth of the Amur Region's population, both due to migrants and workers who participated in the construction of the Amur Railway (about 100 thousand people were imported from European Russia alone ^{[5, p. 155-156]}). On average, over 13 years, the share of grain shipments down the Amur River was 27%, and up - 32%. At the same time, if more flour than grain was sent downriver almost every year, then the opposite situation was observed for transportation upriver. This fact is explained by the fact that Blagoveshchensk was the largest center of grain trade on the Amur, where grain was imported en masse from below along the river, and flour produced from it was sent en masse down the river. In 1907-1913, grain was imported to Blagoveshchensk in volumes of 2 – 4.5 million poods, of which more than 95% (except in 1913) came from below along the river, mainly from the mouth of the Sungari. The milling business in Blagoveshchensk was particularly well established ^{[11, p. 89]} and the city was able to provide flour not only to the Amur region, but also to Transbaikalia and Primorye. In the post-war period, from 1.5 to 3 million pounds of flour were shipped from Blagoveshchensk annually, of which from 65% to 87% went downriver, mainly to the wharves of the Primorsky region along the Amur and Ussuri. It should be noted that grain from Manchuria was also sent in large quantities to Khabarovsk, where it was processed at local mills, which, however, rather worked for the demand of the Ussuri region.

In general, at the beginning of the 20th century, the Amur region depended on food supplies from outside, and the importance of such imports from Manchuria, including for the development of the milling business in the Russian Far East, was fully realized by the administration. For this reason, a preferential import procedure was maintained for Chinese grain even after the abolition of duty-free trade within the 50-mile strip along the Russian-Chinese border in 1913. The fate of flour imports turned out differently, which, although produced at the mills of Russian concessionaires in the vicinity of Harbin, was nevertheless subject to import duties in order to support domestic flour mills in the Amur region proper. As a result, flour imports to the Amur Region, which averaged 446,000 poods in 1908-1912, decreased to 4.6 thousand poods in 1913, and 709 thousand to 8.8 thousand in Primorye. [calculated from: 8, Table XVII (for 1908-1913)].

The movement of all other goods was mainly carried out up the Amur River. The possibility of establishing transit from the sea to the Amur region through the Primorsky Region has led to a much greater diversity in the structure of shipments upriver than shipments in the opposite direction. Back in the last quarter of the 19th century, the Amur and Trans-Baikal regions were provided with necessary goods through their shipment from Nikolaevsk-on-Amur ^{[2, pp. 39-42]}. The commissioning of the Ussuriysk Railway in 1897 made it possible to intensify such transit also in the direction through Khabarovsk, where goods were delivered directly from the port of Vladivostok. Salt, sugar, kerosene, metals and metal products, machinery and implements (including agricultural ones), and manufacture were shipped in large quantities from Primorye up the Amur River. In total, the volume of shipments of these categories through both of these points in Primorye could range from 1 to 3 million pounds per year, which significantly exceeded the figures for their export from another major transit point in Transbaikalia – Sretensk [calculated from: 15 (for 1901-1911), 7 (for 1912-1913)].

Tea was one of the most popular categories sent upriver from the lower reaches of the Amur River. Back in the 1880s, Russian merchants managed to arrange tea supplies directly from Chinese ports to Russia via the Amur River: tea was transported by ship from Shanghai to Nikolaevsk-on-Amur, where it was loaded onto river vessels and delivered to Transbaikalia, Primorye and the Amur Region in volumes of over one hundred thousand pounds per year ^{[16, p. 192-193]}. After the commissioning of the Trans-Baikal Railway, tea began to arrive by train from Sretenskaya Pier also to Siberia and European Russia, which made this direction comparable in importance to the sea route through the ports of the Baltic and Black Seas. So, in 1901-1902, the volume of tea imports through Sretensk exceeded 1.4 million pounds per year. After connecting the Russian ports of the Pacific Ocean with European Russia and Siberia via the Trans-Siberian Railway, tea transit through Amur decreased, but it was still carried out in significant volumes – about 500 thousand pounds of Chinese tea annually, excluding its shipments from Khabarovsk and Blagoveshchensk [calculated from: 15 (for 1901-1911), 14 (for 1912-1913 years)].

Another category that went upriver en masse was fish. Fishing began to develop actively in the lower reaches of the Amur River in the 1880s, when local fish began to be exported to foreign markets from Nikolaevsk-on-Amur, primarily to Japan ^{[9, p. 5]}. Prior to the commissioning of the Trans-Siberian Railway, its river traffic was limited only to the Amur basin and did not exceed 350 thousand pounds per year (excluding transshipment) [calculated from: 15 (for 1901-1904)]. The opening of a continuous railway line from the Far East to Siberia and European Russia allowed local merchants to establish active export in a short time. fish for the domestic market: fish were caught in the Amur Estuary and shipped upriver in various forms – salted, frozen and canned to Khabarovsk or Sretensk, where they were loaded onto trains and sent to their destination stations along the Trans-Siberian Railway. Another major area of its sale was Manchuria, where it was also supplied from the lower reaches of the Amur River by rail through Khabarovsk, or by riverboats through the mouth of the Sungari. The most active export of fish up the Amur River occurred in the last five years of the period under study, when its figures increased rapidly: from 600 thousand pounds in 1909 to 2.5 million pounds in 1913, excluding its transshipment from different marinas [calculated from: 15 (for 1909-1911); 14 (for 1912-1913)].

Conclusions

The experience of using materials from pre-revolutionary Russian transport statistics shows their rich information potential for historians. An analysis of data from the Amur Basin Waterways Department and statistical collections of the Ministry of Railways for 13 years showed that by 1913, the movement of goods along the Amur River had noticeably intensified relative to the level of the beginning of the century, due to the rapid pace of settlement of the Amur Region by immigrants from European Russia and the construction of the Amur Railway. The supply of Russian settlements on Amur was mainly carried out from below along the river – through the port of Nikolaevsk-on-Amur, as well as through Khabarovsk, where goods arrived by rail from Vladivostok. In the same direction, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Russian merchants began mass transportation of Chinese tea and fish caught in the lower reaches of the river to Siberia and European Russia. Of the local cargoes within the Amur region, only three categories were transported en masse – timber rafted from the upper Amur River and its tributaries, Manchurian grain, and flour from the Amur region.

The commissioning of the Trans-Siberian Railway through Manchuria hardly contributed to a reduction in the total volume of trade on the Amur. Even without taking into account the mass transportation of building materials, timber and all categories of iron in 1913, the volume of movement of goods downriver was about 475% of the level of 1901, and upriver – about 348% of the level of 1901. Thus, it seems that the railway has rather changed the nature of the transportation of goods along the river, namely their directions and structure.