Parafia św. Eliasza w Dojlidach do 1939 roku

ENDojlidy is the oldest settlement within the borders of the city of Białystok. The first mention about the Orthodox parish in Dojlidy comes from 1571. It was founded by Hrehory Chodkiewicz, Voivode of Vilna, the Great Lithuanian Hetman. The parish of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary in Dojlidy always had the status of an independent Orthodox parish church in the Białystok decanate. In 1828–50 the office of the parish priest in the Dojlidy parish was held by Onufry Gogolewski, who succeded in making the Uniates in Dojlidy return to the Orthodox Church in 1839. In 1856 Dojlidy was purchased by Baron Alexander Krusenstern, a senator in the Russian Empire. The new owner built a palace in the close vicinity of the church and founded a park around it. Before World War I, up until the evacuation in 1915, the position of the parish priest in Dojlidy was held by Father Aleksander Kaliszewicz. When the war ended, the Orthodox faithful began to return from the "exile"; however, in 1919 the Orthodox Church of the nativity of the Virgin Mary was not given back to the Orthodox community. The church, the belfry, the parish house and the land that belonged to the Orthodox parish in Dojlidy were unlawfully given by the authorities to the Roman Catholic parish.