Lyudmila Petrova

Holy Martyr Lyudmila Petrova was born on 26 February 1879 in Rostov, in the family of a prison warder. Her full name was Lyudmila Vladimirovna Petrova. She worked all her life as a teacher of needlework and retired in 1924. She was one of the faithful whom the atheist authorities persecuted for their faith.

On 15 November 1930 she was arrested and accused of belonging to a church-⁠monarchist group, of keeping ties with Metropolitan Joseph (Petrovykh) and Archbishop Eugene, and of secretly collecting money for the group and for their exile. On 30 April 1931 the OGPU college sentenced her to three years of exile in the Northern Territory, and she was sent to Kotlas in the Arkhangelsk region. When her term ended she returned to Rostov.

In 1936 she was arrested again, accused of corresponding with Metropolitan Joseph in exile and of giving him material help. The Special Council of the NKVD sentenced her to three years of exile in Kazakhstan, where she was held in an NKVD corrective labour camp.

In Kazakhstan, in the town of Merkent, she was arrested for a third time, in the group case of Archbishop Alexis (Orlov) and others, accused of belonging to a counter-⁠revolutionary group of churchmen in the South Kazakhstan region. At the investigation she did not admit guilt and said she had not engaged in anti-⁠Soviet activity. On 28 August 1937 the NKVD troika of the region sentenced her to the supreme penalty. On 27 September 1937 she was shot at Lisya Balka (Fox Ravine), near the city of Chimkent.

The saint is commemorated on 28 September, in the new style, as well as on the movable day near 7 February, in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Church, and on 5 June, in the Synaxis of the Saints of Rostov and Yaroslavl.