What was the capital of Izmail from 1959 to 1960?
Izmail Izmail ( , translit . Izmayil ; , translit . Izmail , formerly Тучков ( Tuchkov ) ; or Smil ; , ) is a historic city on the Danube river in Odessa Oblast in south-western Ukraine . Administratively , Izmail is incorporated as a city of oblast significance . It also serves as the administrative center of Izmail Raion , one of seven districts of Odessa Oblast , though it is not a part of the district . In Russian historiography Izmail is associated with the 18th century sacking of Ottoman fortress of Izmail by Russian general Alexander Suvorov . It is the largest Ukrainian port in the Danube Delta , on its Chilia branch . As such , Izmail is a center of the food processing industry and a popular regional tourist destination . It is also a base of the Ukrainian Navy and the Ukrainian Sea Guard units operating on the river . The World Wildlife Funds Isles of Izmail Regional Landscape Park is located nearby . Population : History . The fortress of Izmail was built by Genoese merchants in the 12th century . It belonged for a short period of time to Wallachia ( 14th century ) – as the territory north of the Danube was one of the possessions of the Basarabs ( later the land being named after them , Bessarabia ) . The town was first mentioned with the name Ismailiye , derived from the name of the Ottoman Grand Vizier Izmail . From the end of the 14th century , Izmail was under the rule of Moldavia . In 1484 , the Ottoman state conquered the territory , which became from that moment an Ottoman protectorate ( under direct rule from 1538 ) . Since the early 16th century it was the main Ottoman fortress in the Budjak region . In 1569 Sultan Selim II settled Izmail with his Nogai subjects , originally from the North Caucasus . After Russian general Nicholas Repnin took the fortress of Izmail in 1770 , it was heavily refortified by the Turks , so as never to be captured again . The Sultan boasted that the fortress was impregnable , but during the Russo-Turkish War of 1787–1792 the Russian Army commander Alexander Suvorov successfully stormed it on 22 December 1790 . Ottoman forces inside the fortress had the orders to stand their ground to the end , haughtily declining the Russian ultimatum . The defeat was seen as a catastrophe in the Ottoman Empire , while in Russia it was glorified in the countrys first national anthem , Let the thunder of victory sound! . Suvorov announced the capture of Ismail in 1791 to the Empress Catherine in a doggerel couplet , after the assault had been pressed from house to house , room to room , most of the garrison and support forces in the city had been killed in three days , a few hundred taken into captivity . For all his bluffness , Suvorov later told an English traveler that when all was over he went back to his tent and wept . At the end of the war , Izmail was returned to the Ottoman Empire , but Russian forces took it for the third time on 14 September 1809 . After it was ceded to Russia with the rest of Bessarabia by the 1812 Treaty of Bucharest , the town was rebuilt thoroughly . The Intercession Cathedral ( 1822–36 ) , the churches of Nativity ( 1823 ) , St . Nicholas ( 1833 ) and several others date back to that time . Izmails oldest building is the small Turkish mosque , erected either in the 15th or 16th centuries , converted into a church in 1810 and currently housing a museum dedicated to the 1790 storm of Izmail . After Russia lost the Crimean War , the town returned to the Principality of Moldavia , which would soon become part of the Romanian Principalities . Russia gained control of Izmail again after the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878 . With the breakup of the Russian Empire in 1917 and in the aftermath of World War I , the city was occupied by the Romanian Army on 22 January 1918 , after a skirmish with troops of the Danube flotilla . Later that year , the Sfatul Țării of Chișinău , which claimed to be the representative of the whole of Bessarabia , voted to formally unite the region with Romania . This union was recognized by the United Kingdom , France and Italy in the Treaty of Paris , but not by the Soviet Union which had territorial claims over Bessarabia . In 1940 , and again during World War II , it was occupied by the Soviet Red Army and included ( August 1940 ) in the Ukrainian SSR ; the region was occupied in 1941–1944 by the Romanian Army participating in Operation Barbarossa . During the Soviet period following World War II , many Russians and Ukrainians migrated to the town , gradually changing its ethnic composition . Izmail Oblast was formed in 1940 and the town remained its administrative center until the oblast was merged to Odessa Oblast in 1954 . Since 24 August 1991 , Izmail has been part of independent Ukraine . Geography . Climate . Under the Köppen classification , Izmail has a humid continental climate ( Dfa ) with four distinct seasons and generous precipitation year-round , typical for the inland South . Summers are hot and humid , with temperatures somewhat moderated by the citys elevation . Winters are cool but variable , with an average of 48 freezing days per year . Demographics . Before 1920 , the population of Izmail was estimated at 37,000 . During that time , approximately 11,000 of the population were Jewish , 8,000 Romanians and 6,000 Germans . Additional members of the population were Russians , Bulgarians , Turks and Cossacks . - 2008 — 77,076 people ; - 2011 — 75,581 people . The national composition ( 2001 ) : Russians - 43.7% ( 33,600 ) , Ukrainians - 38.0% ( 29,200 ) , Bulgarians - 10.0% ( 7,700 ) and Romanians - 4.3% ( 3,300 ) . In 2010 , the population was 75,300 . The population also consists of many other nationalities : Gagauz , Greeks , Jews , Armenians , etc . - 75 nationalities . Notable residences . - Alexandru Averescu , Romanian Marshal , Army Commander during World War I ; Prime Minister ( in fact , born near Izmail , in the village of Ozerne ) - Ioan Chirilă , Romanian writer and sports journalist - Galina Chistyakova , Ukrainian athlete , winner of the long jump bronze medal at the 1988 Summer Olympics - Leonid Dimov , Romanian poet ( 1926 , Ismail – 1987 , Bucharest ) - Olena Hovorova , Ukrainian athlete , winner of the triple jump bronze medal at the 2000 Summer Olympics - Wiktor Kemula , Polish chemist , electrochemist , and polarographist , he developed a hanging mercury drop electrode ( HMDE ) - Vitali Konstantinov , Russian wrestler - Ruslan Maynov , Bulgarian actor and musician - Gavril Musicescu , Romanian composer - Sergiu Sarchizov , Romanian composer and conductor - Sholom Schwartzbard , Jewish anarchist , assassin of Symon Petliura - Ivan Shishman , Bulgarian artist - – Russian philosopher , publicist , author of television films , Member of the Union of writers of Russia - Artur Văitoianu , Romanian general , Army commander during World War I ; Prime Ministe