German abbrevation

[cesky67]

Hi

Could anyone tell me what the word "Swch." is an abbrevation of in relation to a village. It may be a german or Russian word I don't know which.The example is Swch.Natschalo" in Russia. It just seems to be a few houses. Although I have seen "Swch.(Gemüse)" and "Swch. (Heilkräuter)" also.
thanks

[Lionel H.]

Are you sure ?? "Schw." would sound more german.... Schw. Hall or Schw. Gmünd...... generally means "Schwäbisch". If you mean I am completely wrong, excuse my Attempt ! L.

[Akira Takiguchi]

May be "Südwestlich", or more simply, misread "Südlich"?

[Gerdan]

Is it the context with the name of the village or a location in a certain direktion of the village Natschalo, so as a grave site or a battle situated "Swch.".

Than I would agree with Akira that it could be "südlich" (south)
or "südwestlich" (south-west) of...

Gerdan

[cesky67]

Thanks for all the replies guys, much appreciated

I actually stumbled across it in the last hour, after looking all week,when I discovered a Russian map on google which had been translated from the russian into German. Swch stands for Sowchos (German ?) or apparently Sovkhoz in Russian. It is a defined in various places as a state run farm and according to sources it could have a land area of 15,000 acres or 6,000 hectares. It was the equivalent of a VEG in the former DDR. So perhaps they were highlighted on maps because they may have been a good possible source of food for the advancing troops. That was why some had Swch (Gemüse) and another had Swch (Heilkräuter) one was Vegetables and the other medicinal herbs. Another one I've seen in the last few minutes was Swch (Vieh) which is cattle.

[Akira Takiguchi]

Ach so, Sovkhoz! Thank you for saving us from future headache!