Bohodukhiv

Bohodukhiv is a city in Kharkiv Oblast in eastern Ukraine and the administrative centre of Bohodukhiv Raion and of the Bohodukhiv urban hromada. It stands on the river Merlo, a tributary of the Vorskla, on the Central Upland. A defensive fortification against the Tatars existed here in the 16th century, and the settlement was founded in 1662 as a small sloboda and ostrog by Ukrainian Cossacks under the otaman Tymofiy Krysa; it has been a town since 1681. From 1780 it was the centre of a uyezd of Kharkov Governorate, and German forces occupied it twice during World War II. The 2001 census counted 18,045 inhabitants and the 2022 estimate is 14,624. Its railway station on the Southern railway has operated since 1878, and the food industry was historically the main branch of its economy.