ON THE BANKS OF THE DNIEPER

In 1781, around 1,000 Swedish peasants living on Dagö Island in Estonia were forcibly deported by Empress Catherine the Great to an area near the Crimea in present-day Ukraine. Half of the villagers died during the journey to their new home, especially the elderly and children. A few years after their arrival, only 135 people were still alive.

Despite mass deaths, the village survived. Over the decades, a longing for Sweden grew stronger, but it would take until 1929 before the villagers were finally allowed to move home.

The story of Gammalsvenskby is a tale of a people and a village who, despite trial after trial, manage to maintain an unshakeable hope for a better future - if not in this life, then in the next.