John Letnikov

Holy Confessor John Letnikov, a layman, in the world Ivan Leontievich Letnikov, was born in 1860 in the village of Protopopovo in the Kolomna district of the Moscow province. For a long time he helped his father-⁠in-⁠law, a merchant, in matters of trade and of the church. In time he became himself a timber industrialist and the owner of a sawmill. After the Bolshevik revolution he gave his plant to the state. For a quarter of a century he was the warden of the church of the Holy Trinity in the village.

In 1929, after the disturbances around the burial of Olga Makeeva, at the church council meetings of 1 and 2 October it was decided to ask for the release of their arrested pastor, Father John Kalabukhov. After the meeting some members of the council were arrested, among them the warden Ivan Leontievich. Interrogated, he did not admit guilt. In 1929 he was sent for three years of exile in the Northern Region and fell asleep in exile, in the city of Arkhangelsk, on 25 October 1930.

The Church commemorates him on 25 October, the day of his repose, in the new style, on 1 November in the Synaxis of the Saints of Arkhangelsk, and on the movable days of the synaxis of the new martyrs and of the Saints of Moscow.