The city is first mentioned in 1746, as the settlement Usivka (Ukrainian: Усівка).[4] The official record of the settlement is dated to 1754, when the Saint Elizabeth fortress was built in the region (today Kropyvnytskyi). During the establishment of the Russian colony of New Serbia in 1752–64, the 3rd Company of New Serbia was quartered in Usivka Pandurs. In place of Usivka, the sconce Bechey (after the Serbian city of Bečej) encampment was established.
In 1764, New Serbia was liquidated, and Usykivka became part of the Elizabethan province of Novorossiya Governorate, which existed until 1783, when its territory was included in the Yekaterinoslav Viceroyalty. In 1784, the Russian government gave the settlement a Hellenic name of Aleksandriysk and later Aleksandriya (locally as Oleksandriya). From 1806 to 1922, Oleksandriya was a county (uyezd) seat.
In 1917, branches of the Ukrainian Free Cossacks appeared on the territory of Oleksandriia. In May 1919, the city of Oleksandriia was the center of an anti-Bolshevik uprising led by Otaman Nykyfor Hryhoriv, whose forces were brutally suppressed by the Red Army on 23 May 1919.
On 6 August 1941, (during World War II) the Red Army of the Soviet Union left the city to the Nazi Germany Wehrmacht without a fight. During the Nazi occupation, the city lost almost its entire Jewish population (est. ~2,500).[5] The Nazi administration also executed over 5,500 Soviet prisoners of war as part of the Nazi stance on the issue of the Soviets not signing the 1929 Geneva Convention. The city was recovered by the Soviet armed forces on 6 December 1943.
Until 18 July 2020, Oleksandriia was designated as a city of oblast significance and belonged to Oleksandriia Municipality. It was the administrative center of Oleksandriia Raion even though it did not belong to the raion. As part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced the number of raions of Kirovohrad Oblast to four, Oleksandriia Municipality was merged into Oleksandriia Raion.[6][7]
On 15 April 2022, at 10:26 p.m., two Russian missiles hit the infrastructure of the city's airport.[8]
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