Constantine Zverev

Holy Hieromartyr Constantine Zverev, a deacon, was born in 1881. His full name was Constantine Ivanovich Zverev. He graduated from the classical gymnasium in Vernyi and the teachers' seminary in Tashkent, was ordained deacon and served at the church of Saint Nicholas in the village of Talgar, Vernyi district. He is commemorated together with the holy hieromartyrs John Granitov and Leontius Klimenko.

John (Ivan Mikhailovich Granitov) was born in 1875, was ordained priest, in time raised to the rank of archpriest and appointed rector of the church of Saint Nicholas in the Cossack settlement of Talgar in the Semirechye region. On 11 February 1920, in the time of the persecution begun against the Church, the archpriest John was arrested by the Bolsheviks on a charge of "counter-⁠revolutionary acts against Soviet power and hiding grain reserves". At the arrest his tormentors tore out his beard, and before the shooting they gouged out his eyes and sawed at his neck with the chain of his pectoral cross. In his torment the priest cried out to the faithful: "Do not renounce God".

Seeing how cruelly the shepherd was tormented, the deacon Constantine intervened for him and was at once cut down with sabres. The remains of the holy martyr were put in a sack by the executioners and thrown into a ravine near the cemetery, where the executions were carried out. The archpriest John Granitov was shot in the night of 11 to 12 February 1920.

Leontius Klimenko was born in 1887 and served in the village of Evgenievka in the Vernyi district. In the time of the persecution he was accused by unbelievers of counter-⁠revolutionary acts, of mocking the Communist party, of keeping ammunition and of refusing to grind grain for the Communists. He was shot in the night of 11 to 12 February 1920, together with the archpriest John Granitov. The bodies of the holy hieromartyrs were buried in an unknown grave near the Cossack settlement of Talgar.

Saint Constantine is commemorated on 11 February and on 7 February, with the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia, in the new style.