Sholokhov was born in Russia, in the "land of the Cossacks" – the Kruzhilin hamlet, part of stanitsa Vyoshenskaya, in the former Administrative Region of the Don Cossack Host. His father, Aleksander Mikhailovich Sholokhov (1865–1925), was a member of the lower middle class, at different times a farmer, a cattle trader, and a miller. Sholokhov's mother, Anastasia Danilovna Chernikova (1871–1942), the widow of a Cossack, came from Ukrainian peasant stock (her father was a peasant in the Chernihiv oblast). She did not become literate until a point in her life when she wanted to correspond with her son. His family were not Don Cossacks, but "inogorodnye" ("outlanders"), the rather disparaging term used by the Don Cossacks for outsiders who settled in the territory of the Don Cossack Host by the banks of the river Don. The "inogorodyne" tended to be much more poorer than the Don Cossacks and were excluded from voting for officials in the Host government (the Don Cossack Host were allowed to elect almost of its leaders except for the "ataman" who headed the Host who was always appointed by the Emperor).