Mykolaivka, Donetsk Oblast

Mykolaivka is located near the Seversky Donets River, 20 km east of Sloviansk and 12 km from the Kozhushko railway station Sloviansk - Lyman line. The physical distance to Kyiv is 528 km. A railway line from Sloviansk serves the city, serving and supplying the Sloviansk Thermal Power Plant. The Elektricheskaya railway station, a non-passenger railway station, operates.

The settlement was founded in the first half of the 18th century in 1730. It was the property of Danila Bystritsky, the Izyum wagon regiment. In 1732, Bystritsky's estate included 18 households, 34 huts, and 83 souls. According to church records and legend, the river, located approximately 15-16 km from Slavyansk, flowed into the Seversky Donets River, which was very turbulent and, flowing out of ravines and hillocks composed of red clay, eroded the turf banks. This gave the river and the settlement their name, Krasny Byk.

The settlement of Krasny Byk grew into a sloboda, a village, and by the end of the 18th century, it had 397 households and approximately two thousand people of both sexes. According to legend, one of the settlers found an icon depicting St. Nicholas. A chapel was built in the village, and the icon of St. Nicholas was placed there. After some time, the settlement of Krasny Byk was renamed Nikolaevka, after the chapel of St. Nicholas. The chapel with the icon of St. Nicholas, according to legend, was moved to the church newly built in 1748. It was subsequently rebuilt several times, consecrated by clergy, and the village became a full-fledged settlement and parish.

In 1903, Pyotr Petrovich Semenov-Tyan-Shansky wrote about Nikolaevka: "All the clay from the Nikolaevka deposit is of high quality and is used by potters not only in the nearby village, but also in many villages 10 miles away." In 1900, the Slavic manufacturer Essen built a porcelain factory on the colored clay deposits between Nikolaevka and Rai-Aleksandrovka, employing many Nikolaev residents. In 1910, a pottery school was established in Nikolaevka, with four masters teaching about 70 students.

After the overthrow of the Provisional Government of Russia, a zemstvo was organized in Nikolaevka. After the October Revolution, a volost revolutionary committee was elected in Nikolaevka. Nikolaevka partisans who died during the civil War are buried in a mass grave in Raihorodok. In 1931 a farm was established in Nikolaevka. By 1932 the farm had 30 cows, 150 sheep, and 30 pigs. Two collective farms were organized in the village. The top of the farm was united into the Chubar collective farm, and the lower streets of the village were united into the 15th Party Congress collective farm.

From October 1941 to June 1942 the front ran along the Donets River. On the night of September 2, 1943 all residents were evacuated along the roads in the direction of the Dnieper River. The Germans used this to cover their retreat, as a German convoy of horses and vehicles was moving alongside the civilians. Almost the entire village was burned by the Germans during their retreat. Of the 940 houses in Nikolaevka, only 72 remained. On September 12, 1943, the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army liberated the village of Varvarovka in the Kramatorsk Raion, where residents of Nikolaevka were located.

After the war, part of the collective farm lands was allocated for the construction of the Slavyansk Thermal Power Plant. Construction workers arrived here in late 1951. On September 26, 1954, the first unit of the power plant, with a capacity of 100 MW, began operation. By decision of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union, construction of the main unit, the first in Europe, with a capacity of 800 MW, began in late 1963. Some time later, construction of another unit of the same capacity began. It was commissioned in 1969.

Mykolaivka received city status in 2003, and since 2016 has been the center of the community of the same name.

Russia-Ukraine War

On 4 July 2014, Ukrainian forces secured the city from pro-Russian separatists.^[4][5][6] The hospital began renovations in 2015, having been damaged in the fighting, with pro-Russian militants positioned around the building and on its roof.^[7] In 2016, the Verkhovna Rada appropriated the status of the city of district significance, withdrew it from the composition of the Sloviansk municipality and included it in the Sloviansk Raion.^[8][9]

On 28 September 2022, the city was shelled by Russia. One person is known to be killed.^[10]