Basil Sokolov

Holy Hieromartyr Basil Sokolov, a priest, by his full name Basil Alexandrovich Sokolov, was born on 5 May 1880 in the village of Cherny Ruchey, Vyshny Volochyok district, Tver province (now the Udomlya district), in the family of a psalm-⁠reader. He finished the theological school and from 1909 was a psalm-⁠reader in Moscow province. In 1925 he was ordained priest. In 1930 he was arrested on a charge of "anti-⁠Soviet agitation" and "counter-⁠revolutionary activity", and was sentenced, according to one source to three years in a camp, according to another to eight years of exile in the Northern Region, which he spent in the village of Romanovskaya, Shenkursk district. In 1931-1932 he was arrested in exile and sentenced to three years in a camp, and in 1935 once more, for non-⁠payment of taxes, to two years. Returning from detention, he served at the Transfiguration church in the village of Spas-⁠Ulstim, Udomlya district, helped to open the empty parish school and took part in secret services in homes.

On 20 November 1937 he was arrested on a charge of "hostile attitude to Soviet power... anti-⁠Soviet agitation aimed at disrupting work on the collective farm". He did not admit guilt. On 27 November the NKVD troika of Kalinin region sentenced him to death, and on 29 November 1937 he was shot and buried in an unknown common grave. He was rehabilitated in 1989, and in August 2000 the Jubilee Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church glorified him.

He is commemorated on 29 November, on 7 February (a movable date) in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Church, and on 18 July (a movable date) in the Synaxis of the Saints of Tver, all in the new style.