Evgraf Pletnev

Holy Hieromartyr Evgraf Pletnev, a priest, was born on 6 December 1868 in the family of a priest and received the crown of martyrdom by shooting on 23 December 1918, at Perm, together with his son, the Holy Martyr Michael. The Russian Church honours him among the New Martyrs and Confessors of the twentieth century.

In 1890 Evgraf Ivanovich graduated from the Perm seminary and in September of the same year was ordained priest. Until August 1891 he served in the Krasnoufimsk district of the Perm province, being at the same time teacher of the Law at two schools. Then he was moved to the Vladimir Mother of God church of the Kungur Saint John the Forerunner convent, where he served until 23 May 1900, being at the same time teacher of the Law at the Kungur schools.

For diligent service he received in 1894 the epigonation and in 1899 the skufia. He was married to Lyubov Nikolaevna, daughter of a priest, and they had four children: Nicholas (born 1891), Olga (1894), Michael (1897) and Boris (1900).

In May 1900, already an archpriest and dean, he began to serve at the Transfiguration church in the town of Cherdyn, Perm province; in that time he was also a deputy in judicial matters, secretary of the diocesan school council and teacher of the Law at the Cherdyn parish school and the lower trade school. In 1918 Archpriest Evgraf was arrested together with his son Michael.

According to eyewitnesses of the arrest, the military leader of the Cherdyn district, Fritz Appoga, dipped him into an ice-⁠hole in the river Kolva. In December 1918 the priest was condemned by the Perm provincial Cheka for counter-⁠revolutionary agitation and sentenced to death. On 23 December 1918 Saint Evgraf Pletnev was shot at Perm, together with his son.

He is commemorated on 23 December, on 14 February in the Synaxis of the Saints of the Perm Metropolis, and on 7 February in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Church (new style).