page_title: History of Germans in Russia, Ukraine and the Soviet Union
section_title: Notable Russian-Germans
hierarchical_section_title: History of Germans in Russia, Ukraine and the Soviet Union / Notable Russian-Germans
caption_attribution_description: Русский: Губернатор Томской области Виктор Кресс на пресс-конференции в пресс-центре агентства "Интерфакс-Сибирь" в Томске. English: Tomsk governor Victor Kress on press-conference at Interfax-Siberia press-centre in Tomsk.
context_page_description: The German minority in Russia, Ukraine and the Soviet Union was created from several sources and in several waves. The 1914 census put the number of Germans living in the Russian Empire at 2,416,290. In 1989, the ethnic German population of the Soviet Union was roughly 2 million. By 2002, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, many ethnic Germans had left and the population fell by half to roughly one million. 597,212 Germans were enumerated by self-identification in the 2002 Russian census, making Germans the fifth-largest ethnic group in that country. There were 353,441 Germans in Kazakhstan and 21,472 in Kyrgyzstan; while 33,300 Germans lived in Ukraine.
  In the Russian Empire before Catherine the Great, ethnic Germans were strongly represented among royalty and aristocracy, as the European nobility was highly interrelated. In addition, they made up numerous large land owners, military officers, and the upper echelons of the imperial service, engineers, scientists, artists, physicians, and the bourgeoisie in general, because there was strong education among some of the German peoples.
context_section_description: Catherine the Great – Empress of Russia
  Alexandra Feodorovna (Alix of Hesse) – Empress Consort of Russia
  Peter Wittgenstein, field marshal
  Karl Nesselrode – count and diplomat (1780–1862)
  Pavel Pestel, one of Decembrist leaders
  Vyacheslav von Plehve (Vyacheslav Pleve) – Minister of the Interior (1846–1904)
  Vladimir Pachmann – pianist (1848–1933)
  Sergei Yulyevich Witte – Ministry of Ways and Communications + Finance, chairman of the Committee of Ministers (1849–1915)
  Pyotr Schmidt – Russian naval officer and 1905 revolutionary (1867–1906)
  Olga Knipper-Chekhova – actress, wife of Anton Chekhov (1868–1959)
  Vsevolod Meyerhold (Karl Kasimir Theodor Meyerhold) – actor and theatre director (1874–1940)
  Reinhold Glière (Reinhold Ernst Glier) – composer (1875–1956)
  Gustav Klinger – communist politician (1876–1937)
  Max Vasmer – linguist, author of the Etymological dictionary of the Russian language (1886–1962)
  Immanuel Winkler (1886–1932) – Pastor, official representative of Black Seas Germans
  Otto Schmidt – geophysicist and statesman (1891–1956)
  Vasiliy Ulrikh (Vasiliy Ulrich) – Soviet political judge (1889–1951)
  Nikolai Erdmann – dramatist (1900–1970)
  Vilyam Genrikhovich Fischer Rudolf Abel – Soviet intelligence officer (1903–1971)
  Boris Rauschenbach – physicist and engineer (1915–2001)
  Sviatoslav Richter – pianist (1915–1997)
  Patriarch Alexy II (Alexey Ridiger) – primate of the Russian Orthodox Church (1929–2008)
  Alfred Schnittke – composer (1934–1998)
  Anna German (Anna Hörmann) – singer (1936–1982)
  Jeanna Friske / born Jeanna Vladimirovna Kopylova (Жанна Фриске) – singer, model, actress, socialite (1974–2015)
  Alisa Freindlich – actress
  Eduard Rossel – governor of Sverdlovsk Oblast
  Viktor Kress – governor of Tomsk Oblast
  German Gref (Hermann Gräf) – Minister of Economics and Trade
  Alexei Miller – Gazprom CEO
  Edgar Gess – football player
  Peter Neustädter – football player
  Andreas Wolf – football player (born 1982)
  Alexander Merkel – football player (born 1992)
  Georgy Boos – governor of Kaliningrad Oblast
  Angelina Grün – volleyball player
  Wladimir Köppen – meteorologist
  Irina Mikitenko – long-distance runner
  Dennis Siver – mixed martial arts fighter
  Brad Wall – Premier of Saskatchewan
  Dennis Wolf - bodybuilder
  Helene Fischer – singer, moderater
  Ilya Chort (Ilya Leonovich Knabenhof), musician, Pilot band leader, has a Jewish father and German mother
  Zedd – record producer, DJ, musician, multi-instrumentalist and songwriter.
caption: Viktor Kress was the governor (1991–2012) of Tomsk Oblast, Russia
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