Demetrius Ostroumov

Holy Hieromartyr Demetrius Ostroumov, an archpriest (1869-1937), was born on 5 February 1869 in the village of Kuzminka, in the Serpukhov district of the Moscow province, in the family of the priest John Ostroumov. He received the crown of martyrdom by shooting on 30 August 1937 and was buried at Butovo, near Moscow. He is commemorated on 30 August, on 29 May, in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs of Butovo, and on 5 September, in the Synaxis of the Saints of Moscow.

In 1899 he finished the seminary in Moscow and was sent as a teacher to the Transfiguration two-⁠class church school in Moscow. In 1906 he was ordained priest at the church of the Holy Trinity in the village of Mineevo, in the Dmitrov district, and in 1909 was appointed rector of the church of the Annunciation in the village of Fedosino, in the Moscow district, where he served until his arrest, in 1937. For long and blameless service he was raised to the rank of archpriest. He was known among his flock as a zealous and pious priest. His wife, Olimpiada Vasilievna, helped him in everything; knowing well the treatment with herbs, the peasants from all the region came to her with various ailments. Later the priest was accused of having himself engaged in treatments, although he only helped his wife.

The persecution

The first time he was arrested was by the Cheka in 1919, accused of desertion, because he had not appeared for labour service. He was soon released, for he had an exemption because of illness. In 1930 he was arrested on a charge of keeping currency and weapons, but the OGPU could not prove this false accusation and he was freed. In the same year he was convicted for failing a fixed quota, but the quota had been fulfilled, though not on time, and the sentence was cancelled. In 1932 he was called to account, accused of anti-⁠Soviet agitation, and, after a month and a half in detention, released. In 1936 the head of the Kuntsevo NKVD section, Kuznetsov, began to gather through informers information about the priest in Fedosino. An informer with the nickname Stove-⁠maker said that the priest, to avoid taxes, had put the whole farm in his daughter's name; another, nicknamed Special, said that a kulak had come to the priest to consult on what to do about the taxes, and the priest had advised him to pay nothing to Soviet power and not to join the collective farm. Another informer said that the priest was often visited by an old acquaintance, a teacher of foreign languages at the school in the Kremlin; another, on a train, had heard him speak of the killing of Kirov; another added that in the priest an anti-⁠Soviet mood could be felt. An NKVD official recast the phrase that he was not proletarian and not collective-⁠farm-⁠minded to say that he was counter-⁠revolutionary. A collective denunciation was even sent to a newspaper, accusing him of hiding income from baking prosphora and from treatment by homeopathy.

Arrest and death

In the night of 8 August 1937 Father Demetrius was arrested and imprisoned at Taganka. The investigator asked him whether he knew Madame Kirchhoff and whether he kept in touch with her. He answered that he knew her, that she had been a teacher of German, that she had come five times to see them and that she now lived in Georgievsk, in the North Caucasus, and that they had never spoken about politics. About treating the sick he said that he had for his personal use a home handbook of remedies and homeopathic medicines and that, if someone asked, he gave the medicine for money, that is, was paid the price of the medicine. He denied all the charges of a hostile attitude toward Soviet power. The chairman of the collective farm in Fedosino said, as a witness, that in the summer of 1936 the priest had organised illegal prayer services in homes and had urged people not to work on the feast of Saint Elijah. Other witnesses signed, without reading, what the investigator put before them. On 28 August the NKVD troika sentenced him to death. Archpriest Demetrius Ostroumov was shot on 30 August 1937 and buried at Butovo.