 The first person to be buried in this cemetery was Johann Gebhard Brethfeld, a merchant in Saint Petersburg.The person who has done the most work in investigating the history of the cemetery is Dr. Benedikt Böhm in Saint Petersburg.As of 2007, Dr. Böhm and published four volumes on the history of the cemetery, each of which contain extensive lists of names of those people who were buried there between 1773 and 1936.