Scherbina, Fyodor Andreyevich

Cossack historian, famous local statistician, economist, ethnographer, correspondent member of the Academy of Sciences for History and Political Sciences of the History and Philology Department since December 4, 1904.

Born February 25, 1849, in the settlement of Novoderevyankovskaya, Kuban Region, in a family of a clergyman. Descendant of Cossacks. Was educated in Petrovskaya Agricultural Academy and Novorossiysky University. Before entered the Academy, organized an agricultural workers' association together with his friends in Kuban Region, where he worked as a common worker. In 1878-1882, Scherbina conducted the studies of Kuban Region. In 1884, accepted a position of the Head of the Statistics of Voronezh Provincial Administration, where he had been working for eighteen years. In 1903, was exiled administratively from Voronezh Province (was allowed to return in 1904) and lived for some time in his estate near Gelendjik.

During these years, Scherbina carried out economic and statistical research of Vladikavkaz area at the demand of Vladikavkaz Railroad; the results of this research were published in 1892-1894 under the title of General Review of Economic, Commercial, and Industrial Conditions of Vladikavkaz Railroad Area. Since 1896, Scherbina was a leader of an expedition for the studies of the steppe regions (Akmola, Semipalatinsk, and Turgay Provinces) dispatched by Ministry of Agriculture and State Property. Scherbina dedicated much of his effort to the studies of the agricultural community and workers' associations (artel) and published the articles Solvychegodsk Agricultural Community in Otechestvennyye Zapiski (Motherland Notes) almanac, 1874, Agricultural Community in Dneprovsky County in Russkaya Mysl (Russian Thought) almanac, 1880, and other; he was the first to provide statistical data about Shtundist sectarians (Malorusskaya Shtunda in Nedelya (Week) newspaper, 1878).

Scherbina's works, as those of a local community statistician, are characterized with the introduction into statistic accounting the measurements of the consumption by the people, besides the processes of production, exchange, circulation, and financial processes; his studies of Voronezh Province peasants' budgets served a prototype for all similar works of other Russian statisticians.

In the following years, Scherbina carried out a research on the history of the Cossacks, at the demand of Kuban Cossack Army, which resulted in the release of two volumes of History of Kuban Cossack Army. Besides Scherbina's main works dedicated to statistics, his other works concern ethnographic, historic, and economic issues; some of them are of purely journalistic value. Scherbina's articles, starting 1869, were published in many periodicals, both in the capital and in the province, predominantly in Nedelya (Week), Russkiye Vedomosti (Russian News), Otechestvennyye Zapiski (Motherland Notes), Russkaya Mysl (Russian Thought), Severny Vestnik (Herald of the North), Russkoye Bogatstvo (Russian Riches), Yuridichesky Vestnik (Legal Herald), and Narodnoye Khozyaystvo (National Economy).

In 1907, was elected to Second State Duma from Kuban Province constituency. Joined the Cossack faction and People's Socialists Party. In the Duma Commission for the 1907 Military Contingent, joined the Right and the Cadets to oppose the Left for the authorization of the recruits' contingent for 1907 in the numbers required by the government.

Emigrated after the October Revolution. Was a professor of statistics in Ukraine Technical Institute in Padebrady, then a rector of Ukraine National University. Died in Prague on October 28, 1936.