Anna of Rybinsk

Saint Anna of Rybinsk, venerable martyr (in the world Maria Alexeevna Blagoveshchenskaya), was a nun of the Russian Church and was shot at Yaroslavl on 11 March 1937. She was glorified among the saints as a venerable martyr in the year 2000. She is commemorated on 11 March.

She was born in the village of Borisoglebsk, Poshekhonye district, Yaroslavl governorate, the eldest daughter of the priest Alexei Apollosovich Blagoveshchensky. In 1916 she finished the girls' gymnasium of Poshekhonye. She worked as a teacher in several schools of the Beloselsk volost. In 1922, with the blessing of Archimandrite Nikon (Chulkov), abbot of the Pavlo-⁠Obnorsky monastery, she joined a women's agricultural commune founded in 1921, under the guise of which a Christian community of women existed, living by monastic rules. Until 1931 the commune worked successfully, showing good economic results and serving as a model of successful collective farming. But in the spring of 1931 the NKVD began an investigation, and the commune was liquidated in 1932. The nun Anna was arrested on 29 April 1931, on 23 April 1932 the investigation was ended, and Anna was sent to a labour camp-⁠sovkhoz. In 1934 she was released and served as psalm-⁠reader at the church of the village of Nikolo-⁠Koloksha, Rybinsk district.

She was arrested again, on suspicion of active participation in a counter-⁠revolutionary underground group of churchmen. The source places this arrest on 22 September 1937, but the sentence on 7 March 1937, so the dates do not fit together. On 7 March 1937 the NKVD troika sentenced her to death by shooting, and on 11 March 1937 she was shot at Yaroslavl. She was rehabilitated on 25 May 1989 and glorified among the saints in 2000.