The Ukrainian administration was located in Sievierodonetsk from 2014 to 2022 during the war in Donbas, due to Ukraine not being in control of Luhansk.

The city traces its history to 1797 when the British industrialist Charles Gascoigne, commissioned by the Imperial Russian government in 1795, founded an ammunition and cannon factory for the Black Sea Fleet.

[2] Gascoigne had emigrated to Saint Petersburg years earlier, and founded factories and mines across the Russian Empire during his time there.

[3] The factory was built in the Donets Basin (or Donbas) at the confluence of the Luhan and Vilkhivka [uk] rivers.

According to folk etymology, the name is also derived to the word "Luh" (Ukrainian: Луг), which means "meadow", referring to the floodplains around the river.

By 1880, the factory was a large industrial node, linked by rail to other major cities and to the Azov Sea.

[2] In summer 1896, German industrialist Gustav Hartmann [de] founded a locomotive-building company in Luhansk, which is now Luhanskteplovoz.

[2] After the end of the war, the victorious Bolsheviks created the Soviet Union on the territory of the former Russian Empire, and began restoring the city.

The proportion of Ukrainians grew from 19.1% to 58.7% between 1897 and 1939, many of whom were refugees fleeing the Holodomor, a manmade famine across Soviet Ukraine.

[7] In March 1942, a grand concert featuring the work of Taras Shevchenko was held in the city to inspire Ukrainians to fight off the invading Nazis.

[6] Demographic shifts continued during the late Soviet period; by 1989, Ukrainians made up 41.8% of the population and Russians had a majority of 52.4%.

[2] On 4 May 1990, a decree of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR gave the city back its original name.

[13][14][15] On 17 August, Ukrainian soldiers entered the rebel-controlled Luhansk and for a time had control over a police station.

[citation needed] On 21 November 2017, armed men in unmarked uniforms took up positions in the center of Luhansk in what appeared to be a power struggle between the head of the republic Igor Plotnitsky and the (sacked by Plotnitsky) LPR appointed interior minister Igor Kornet.

"[22] The website stated that security minister Leonid Pasechnik had been named acting leader "until the next elections.

On 7 September 2006, archaeologists in Ukraine announced that an ancient structure had been discovered near Luhansk, which the press reported as a pyramid antedating those in Egypt by at least 300 years.