Hieromartyrs And Martyrs Of Ufa And Orenburg 1 of 3

Entire Story in one File  | Page   2   3   In the ancient town of Zilair in Bashkiria, shortly after the revolution, the priest Raphael and the deacon Terence were serving the Divine Liturgy. A detachment of Bolsheviks broke into the church wanting to take

hold of the church-servers, but the people prevented them, and the priest

prevailed upon them to allow him to complete the service. The deacon was terrified and ran away, while the priest remained to complete the Liturgy. But the Bolsheviks could not wait for the end. They took hold of the priest, tied his legs to the tail of a horse, and, with one of them sitting on the horse, they dragged the priest out of the town. They dragged him over the

stumps and bushes to the edge of a pit, and then threw him into it.

The next day the priest appeared in a dream to the deacon in shining

white vestments with a golden crown on his head and said:

"Brother! So you were afraid of your crown! It's waiting for you, inthe morning go and get it."

In the morning the deacon got up, recounted his vision and... went to the Bolsheviks. They took hold of him and led him out to the place where they had cast the remains of the priest. Several pious laymen were also led out with the deacon. They killed them and threw them into the pit, which was filled with rubbish and animal excrement.

In time a light began to appear over the place of the burial. And then a spring appeared, which gushed out bubbles in abundance. The water breathed, as it were; it gushed out air bubbles under great pressure, forming a little pool about 450 square metres in area, and breathing as it were in one place. It was very pleasant to the taste. And it remained at a constant cold temperature, never freezing during the most severe frosts.

Believers visit this source in summer and winter.

The names of the holy hieromartyrs are: Priest Raphael and Deacon Terence. There were about nine laymen martyred with them. But we do not know their names.

(Source: Reader Gregory Ivanovich Mukhortov, Pravoslavnaya Zhizn', No.2, February, 1995)

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In 1918, Leonid Nitsa, a member of the Moscow Council of 1918-1918, was killed in Ufa.

(Source: Protopresbyter Michael Polsky, Noviye Mucheniki Rossijskiye, Jordanville, 1949-57, part 1, p. 203)

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In 1918 Protopriest Nicholas Rusanov was shot in Kustanai, Orenburg province. He was one of six brothers, all protopriests, who were shot: Fathers Nicholas and Antonin in Kustanai, the rest in Chelyabinsk uyezd. In all, 80 clergy were killed in the northern uyezds of Orenburg province and diocese - the Chelyabinsk, Troitsk and Turgay regions that form part of that diocese.

Protopriests Alexander Zemlyanitsyn, John Evstratyev, Peter Kholmogortsev, Michael Penkovsky and others were taken out of Chelyabinskand disappeared without trace in 1918.

In 1918, in Orenburg diocese, Priest Fyodorov was killed in the following way. They tied a soapy waxed thread round his skull and began to twist with a nail until the upper part of his head jumped out.

Clergyman Simeon Ionin served in the city of Troitsk, Orenburg diocese. He was shot in Kustanai in 1918.

Protopriest Michael Gromoglasov was the superior of the cathedral in

Verkhne-Uralsk, Orenburg province. He was arrested before Pascha in 1920,

having been denounced by the second priest of the cathedral, Telegin. In prison an escort stabbed him with a bayonet. Soon he was released, he recovered and was arrested again. Fr. Michael was taken out of the city and ordered to dig his own grave. He asked permission to pray and fell on his

knees. Having prayed, he got up and said: "I'm ready." And was shot. A Kirgizian shepherd told the story.

In 1922, in connection with the confiscation of church valuables, 28

clergy and monastics of various ranks were killed by the Bolsheviks in Ufa province.

In the spring of 1929 the church on the hill Mayak in Orenburg, where the priest Fr. Basil Moiseyevich Kurdyukov served, was closed and turned into an electricity station. Then Fr. Basil and the priest Fr. Ivan Nikolayevich Mironov began to conduct services in Fr. Basil's flat. The NKVD considered this to be a crime and ascribed to Fr. Basil a whole antisoviet organization consisting of four groups: Orenburg, Belozersk, Putyatin and Nizhne-Arkhangelsk. 29 people were arrested in connected with this affair. In Putyatin they were: G.E. Sviridov, M.E. Nikulichkin, A.M. Lernikov; in Nizhne-Arkhangelsk they were: P.F. Igonin, F.P. Tuchin, A.Y.Teplyakov, K.A. Nasekin. In Belozersk there suffered: T.A. Safronov, I.A. Mishnev, N.M. Lomakin and others.

On April 19, 1930, in Orenburg, an OGPU troika for the Middle Volga region sentenced Fr. Basil and Fr. Ivan to be shot; four people received ten years in the camps; and the remaind twenty-three - various terms of punishment. Fr. Basil refused to accept any guilt, he said that he had formed no antisoviet organization, and that the community of 150 people which hehad formed pursued purely religious ends.

Monk Emelian Porfiryevich Efremov was born in 1888, being from the village of Stary Nekhratov in Kazan province. From 1913 he lived in monasteries in Jerusalem, Athos and Kiev. Before his arrest he was livingin the khutor of Malga, Petrovsky district, Middle Volga region. He was arrested by the GPU on January 21, 1931 and charged in accordance with article 58-11 as a participant in a counter-revolutionary organisation. On March 26, 1931 he was condemned to be shot. The sentence was carried out on April 5, 1931 in Orenburg.

Nun Praskovya Potapovna Ivanova was born in 1875, being from the village of Makovka, Buzuluk uyezd, Samara area. She was illiterate. Before her arrest she was living in the village of Pronkino, Sorochinsky district, Middle Volga region. She was arrested by the OGPU on February 11, 1930, and on April 27, 1930, on the basis of article 58-11, was sentenced to five years' deprivation of liberty. Nothing more is known about her.

Nun Darya Prokofyevna Kurdyukova was born in 1880, a native of the city of Bogorodsk. She lived in Orenburg, ul. Yansona, 15. She was the wife ofa priest, and had a son Ivan (b. 1912), a daughter Nina (b. 1919) and a daughter Lyubov (b. 1924). She was arrested by the OGPU on January 3, 1931 and sentenced on March 26, 1931 to be shot in accordance with articles 58-11 (counter-revolutionary organizational activity) and 59-7 (agitation of a revolutionary nature). The sentence was carried out on April 5, 1931.

Hieromonk Niphon Ivanovich Slavgorodsky was born in 1882, being a native of the village of Proskurino, Buzuluk region, Orenburg province. Before his arrest he served in the Klyuchegorsky women's monastery in the village of

Tally, Grachevsky region. He was arrested on September 21, 1928 for "conducting agitation and propaganda aimed at the undermining and weakening of Soviet power by using religious convictions of those in his surroundings" (article 58-10). On february 8, 1929 he was condemned to deprivation of liberty for three years. On October 28, 1931 his case was reviewed and after serving his term he was exiled to the Urals for another three years.

Nun Stepanida Matveyevna Samartseva was born in 1883, a native of the village of Vetlyanki, Sol-Iletsk region, Orenburg province. Before her arrest she lived alone in her birthplace. On January 27, 1930 she was arrested on charges of belonging to an antisoviet group and systematically conducting

anti-soviet agitation together with other nuns (articles 58-10, 58-11, 58-12). On April 24, 1930 she was condemned to deprivation of liberty for

three years.

Nun Eudocia Romanovna Samsonova was born in 1892, being a native of the village of Logachevki, Totsk region, Orenburg province. She was alone and

illiterate. Before her arrest she lived in her birthplace. She never worked. On January 24, 1930 she was arrestee on a charge of conducting antisoviet

agitation and calling on believers to resist the enterprises of Soviet power. On May 1, 1930 she was sentenced to five years deprivation of liberty.

The priest Fr. Alexis Petrovich Yasenev was born in 1877 in the village of Yelkhovka, Buguruslan district, Orenburg region. Until his arrest he lived in the village of Pavlushkino in the same district with his wife Maria, two sons and two daughter. He was arrested on January 20, 1930 in connection with article 58-10 and the next day was sentenced to be shot. Nothing more is known about him.

The priest Fr. Basil Andreyevich Shumov was born in 1890 in the village of N-Ozernovo, Pokrovsky district, Middle Volga retgion. He served in the

local church. In 1931 he was arrested on the basis of articvle 58-10, andon September 16, 1931 he was sentenced to three years deprivation of liberty. He had a wife Tatyana, six sons and one daughter.

Antonina Pavlovna Azarova, who was born in 1910, recounts that from the age of 16 she used to chant in the choir of the church in the village of Petrovskoye. There the priest Fr. Victor worked hard and brought the church into a flourishing condition. The deacon was Fr. Paul (perhaps Zhernikov,

born 1890, repressed in 1932), and the choir master was Philip Arsenyevich. It was a terrible time, there was shooting day and night. Philip Arsenyevich was forced to leave. Red army men surrounded the church, they shot over the heads of the terrified congregation. "Whoever comes near the church," they said, "will get a bullet in the head!" They mocked and bound Fr. Victor and Fr. Paul and dragged them off somewhere and were never seen again. Fr. Victor's matushka Natalya and here two children (one son had just died) lived for a time with the church warden. Then someone took them away.

Fr. Basil served in the church of the village of Chernij Otrog. During the famine of 1921 he organized a kitchen at the church and fed many starving people. He fed them with maize, which came from America as humanitarian aid. His daughter, Olga Vasilyevna, taught in the parish school. Fr. Basil was

probably a dean because priests would come from all the region around andhe would read them lectures and books, and talk with them for a long time. These seminars lasted for up to seven days.

Once the hierarch arrived, and a large crowd gathered in the square.The bishop thanked Fr. Basil and called on the people to not to give in and not to give up their church. However, when Fr. Basil was dekulakized they took away everything. The people wept, Fr. Basil's matushka died on the spot. He was arrested and taken, not to Orenburg, but to Kardeyevo (now Izyak-Nikitino), to the hospital. They soon let him out, but he did not recover.

After these events they sent another priest. He was very old, about 70. He served for two years and was then taken; no more was seen of him. He may have been Fr. Theodore Vecherko, who was born in 1865 and was repressed in 1932.

Monk Theodore Andreyevich Shapovalov was born on February 17, 1855 in the village of Ulanovo, Glukhov uyezd, Chernigov province. From 1896 he lived in monasteries of Chernigov province, from 1905 to 1929 in a monastery in

Buzuluk. Before his arrest he lived alone without fixed occupation in Buzuluk. On July 26, 1937 he was accused of belonging to a counter-revolutionary, church-sectarian revolutionary organization and on

August 27 was sentenced to be shot. The sentence was carried out on August 30, 1937.

Nun Maria Petrovna Filatova was born on July 17, 1871 in Krasnokholmskaya stanitsa, Orenburg district, where she lived without a fixed occupation. On September 18, 1937 she was arrested and charged with belonging to a counter-revolutionary, church-monarchist organization and calling people to fight Soviet power. On October 8 she was sentenced to ten years' deprivation of liberty. Nothing more is known about her.

(Source: Priest N.E. Stremsky, Mucheniki i Ispovedniki Orenburgskoj Eparkhii XX Veka, Saraktash, 1998, pp. 143-149, 183-5, 187, 190-194; Protopresbyter Michael Polsky, Noviye Mucheniki Rossijskiye, Jordanville, 1949-57, part 1, pp. 211, 213, part 2, pp. 309, 230; The New Martyrs of Russia, Montreal: Monastery Press, 1972, p. 102; Vladimir Rusak, Pir Satany, London, Canada: "Zarya", 1991, p. 24)

In the short period of his relative freedom, Archbishop Andrew of Ufa took care to leave a deputy in his place, and on November 29 / December 12, 1922 consecrated (together with some other bishop) Protopriest Victor Payarkov as Bishop John of Divlekanovsk. After Vladyka Andrew's arrest, Bishop John was appointed by Patriarch Tikhon as temporary administrator of the Ufa diocese.

Times were difficult, the renovationists were on the ascendant and had taken into their hands almost the whole diocese. The clergy were silent out of fear, the people had no leaders, and were in the full sense "sheep without a shepherd".

At this moment Bishop John issued his first epistle exposing the lies and treachery of the renovationists. The epistle was distributed round the parishes by volunteer laypeople, among whom there were some secretly ordained priests. Great in the eyes of the Church was the feat of these messengers; they were called in church circles "apologists" of Orthodoxy. It was they who pushed into action the sluggish clergy and led the movement of the people. They were the first to use the term "Soviet church", and defined their confession as "old church". There were many of them, and their fates were varied, but some of them received the title "ascetics" already during their lifetime. Such, for example, was the student at the pedagogical technical college Valentina Ch.

Valentina was a character of rare integrity, purity and energy. Many, even in the True Church, called her a fanatic; but she was not hindered by, or ashamed by, this title; and it was then that many understood that every Christian is obliged to be such a "fanatic". Valentina worked mainly among the women, and she did impossible things. Thus when she came to a parish, the situation was reversed with lightning-like speed, the renovationist clergy were driven out, the women created dvadtsatky (groups empowered to accept the church from the Soviet authorities) and removed the keys from the "livers" (as the renovationists of the "Living Church" were called) and simply compelled the representatives of the authorities to sign agreements with them concerning the existence of the "Tikhonite" Church. Often the dvadtsatky were joined by wives and sisters of leading party members - so great was the influence of Valentina, so powerful her word, so great the scope of her activity.

Literally the whole police force, the communists and the komsomol pursued Valentina. On the roads into the villages seized by the renovationists they placed pickets composed of people who had seen Valentina, but she was led along local paths and used to appear unexpectedly. An "old women's psychosis" would erupt, as the local papers called it, a parish would become "old church", and Valentina would disappear without a trace, so as to appear again where she was least of all expected.

Of course, in the end Valentina was arrested. But her work was already done. Renovationism was finished.

Valentina was taken out from a small quay on the Belaya river under a powerful convoy. Walking along the long gang-planks on the deck of the steamer, Valentina looked back and saw a silent crowd of women on the river bank. They had come out to escort her into exile. Then she waved her hand and shouted:

"We're best rid of them, sisters!"

At that moment her convoy behind her struck her in the back and she stumbled and fell from the gang-planks into the river. Both the convoy and the people rushed to save her, but it was too later: perhaps half an hour later she was pulled dead out of the water. The river's swift current had pulled Valentina under the steamer, where her dress had caught on some iron object and she was unable to surface. The authorities did not hand her body over for burial, but the people found her grave and secretly transferred her body to a village cemetery.

(Sources: M.E. Gubonin, Akty Svyateishago Patriarkha Tikhona, St. Tikhon's Theological Institute, 1994, p. 975; Protopresbyter Michael Polsky, Noviye Mucheniki Rossijskiye, Jordanville, 1957, part 2, pp. 253-254)

The priest Fr. Macarius Fyodorovich Kvitkin was born in 1882 in the town of Orsk, Orenburg province, in the family of the pious parents Theodore and Eudocia Kvitkin. From an early age he loved Christ and the Church. He often went to church, reading and chanting in the choir. He graduated from a teacher training college and became a schoolteacher. In 1904, Macarius married a pious girl from a well-to-do family, Euphrosyne Kondratyevna Beznosova. A year later their first child, Sergius, was born.

Having worked for some years as a teacher, Macarius went to a theological seminary, and after graduation was ordained to the priesthood.

Fr. Macarius began his pastoral service in the town of Novo-Troitsk, Orenburg province. Before the revolution he served in the village of Verkhnyaya Pavlovka, 25 kilometres from Orenburg, where his second son, Vladimir, was born in 1918. In 1920, Batyushka and his family settled in the village of Alexandrovka, Orenburg region. At first Fr. Macarius served in a prayer house, but then, in 1924, he constructed a small wooden church. In 1925, however, this church was closed, and they moved to Orenburg.

At that time the ruling bishop of the Orenburg diocese was Bishop James. In the autumn of 1925, Vladyka James appointed Fr. Macarius as the second priest in a large, three-altared church whose main part was dedicated to St. Seraphim of Sarov and which was situated in Forstadt, a suburb of Orenburg.

In 1925-26, the diocese was temporarily administered by Vladyka Dionysius. Fr. Macarius' son Vladimir was the bishop's staff-bearer and often travelled with Vladyka Dionysius when he served in the other, still open churches of Orenburg and in the women's monastery.

On July 16/29, 1927, Metropolitan Sergius issued his notorious declaration, which formally opened the way for the antichristian authorities into the Church. Over 90% of parishes in the Urals rejected Sergius' declaration.

The rector of the St. Seraphim church where Fr. Macarius was serving as the second priest at that time was Fr. Alexis S. During the first years of their serving together, he and Fr. Macarius had had peaceful, friendly relations. But after the declaration of Metropolitan Sergius, frictions between them developed. Fr. Macarius categorically refused to commemorate the puppet of Soviet power, Metropolitan Sergius, as the patriarchal locum tenens, but commemorated Metropolitan Peter of Krutitsa, who was at that time in prison. This difference in understanding of church truth and the true pastoral way led to the division of the parish into two groups, one supporting Fr. Alexis and the other - Fr. Macarius. Finally, the parishioners came to the decision that the priest who had the majority of votes would remain in the parish. Since the parish was a large one (more than 1000 people), a general meeting was arranged in the church.

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