Andrew Shershnev

Holy Hieromartyr Andrew Shershnev, a priest, was born in 1869 in the village of Nizhnee Maslovo, in the Zaraysk district of the Ryazan province, in the family of the peasant Vladimir Shershnev. He was shot on 8 December 1937 at Butovo, near Moscow. The Russian Church honours him among the New Martyrs of Moscow.

In 1882 he went to Petersburg, where he worked as a waiter in a tavern; in the capital he followed the teachers' seminary by correspondence and applied himself diligently to self-⁠education. In 1890 he went to the Kiev province and was taken on as a teacher at a literacy school; in eight years he worked in four schools. From 1898 to 1921 he was a teacher in three schools of the Zaraysk district. In the early 1920s he fell ill and lived supported by his son. He attended the church of the Nativity of Christ in the village of Pronyukhlovo, where, as a lover of church singing, he for a time served as psalm-⁠reader.

In 1931 he was ordained priest for the Annunciation church in the village of Stepanovskoe, in the Ramenskoe district, in 1932 he was moved to the Trinity church at Troitskie-⁠Ozerki, in the Kolomna district, in 1933 to the church of the Presentation in the village of Chanki in the same district, and in 1935 again to Troitskie-⁠Ozerki. In the summer of 1937 statements from two peasants reached the NKVD accusing him of anti-⁠Soviet activity during his rounds of believers' homes, where he served molebens. At the NKVD's request the village council drew up a certificate stating that "Shershnev will get in the way in the village and we consider that he must be eliminated as a class". Five false witnesses were heard.

On 27 November 1937 Priest Andrew Shershnev was arrested and imprisoned at Kolomna, then moved to Taganka in Moscow. At the interrogation the investigator read him the testimony of the false witnesses, demanding that he confirm it; to all the threats the priest answered that he did not confirm it and did not admit guilt of anything. On 1 December 1937 the NKVD troika sentenced him to death. Priest Andrew Shershnev was shot on 8 December 1937 at the Butovo firing range and buried in an unknown common grave. He is commemorated on 8 December, in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs of Butovo and the Synaxis of the Moscow Saints.