Nicholas Ushakov

Holy Hieromartyr Nicholas Ushakov was a priest in the village of Semyonovskoye, in the Yaroslavl province, and was shot on 4 November 1937, on the feast of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God.

He was born on 5 February 1876 at Yaroslavl, in the family of a deacon. He finished the Yaroslavl seminary, in the second category, then for ten years was teacher and teacher of religion at the zemstvo primary school at Okunevo, Yaroslavl district. On 27 April 1909 he was ordained priest and, from then until the last arrest, for twenty-⁠eight years, he served at the church of Saint Michael in Semyonovskoye, Mologa district (today the Breytovo district). He was teacher of religion at the primary schools of Semyonovskoye and of Bazyki. He had a large family: four sons and a daughter.

On 8 February 1930 he was arrested on a false charge of counter-⁠revolutionary activity and anti-⁠Soviet agitation and spent three months in prison. Returned, he went on serving in his church, founded a youth choir at it, sought to draw all to common prayer and often served services of supplication in the villages. On 8 May 1937 he was arrested again and taken to the prison in Rybinsk. They charged him with "counter-⁠revolutionary agitation among the faithful, drawing young people into the choir and working on them in an anti-⁠Soviet direction". He did not accept the slander. On 2 November the death sentence was given, and on 4 November, the feast of the Kazan Icon, Father Nicholas received the crown of martyrdom. He was glorified by the Council of Bishops in the year 2000.

He is remembered on 4 November, on 5 June in the Synaxis of the Saints of Rostov and Yaroslavl, and on 7 February (a movable day) in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors, in the new style.