Peter Krestov

Holy Hieromartyr Peter Krestov was a priest of the Russian Church. He was born on 8 January 1890 in the village of Gorodets, Pirochinskaya volost, Ryazan province, and died on 19 December 1941 in the infirmary of camp point no. 1 of Vyatlag, in the Kirov region. He was canonized on 26 January 2002 in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Church.

He was born into the family of the psalmist Ivan Ivanovich Krestov and his wife, Lyubov Alekseevna. His father died early, leaving in the care of his wife, who worked as a prosphora baker at the church, five children. In 1911 Peter Krestov graduated from the Ryazan seminary. During his studies he met Antonina Nikolaevna Dobrodeeva, the daughter of the psalmist Nikolai Dobrodeev, who studied at the Ryazan diocesan school. In 1914 Peter and Antonina were married. In the same year they began to work as teachers at the school in the village of Panino, Spassk district, where Antonina's parents lived.

In 1914 Peter was called up into the active army, where he served as a private soldier. In 1915 he was taken prisoner at Lovech, in Bulgaria, and sent to a German prisoner-⁠of-⁠war camp, Strelkow. There he stayed about five months, then was moved from camp to camp (Sprottau in Lower Silesia, Limburg, Soltau in Lower Saxony). There the end of the war found him, in 1918. In July 1918 he was freed from captivity and passed over to his homeland near Pskov.

From July 1918 he worked as a village school teacher and, at the same time, as an inspector of the education department. In 1922 he was ordained priest. He served at the Pyatnitskaya church in the village of Panino, Spassk district, Ryazan region: from 1922 to 1924 as second priest, then as rector, and from 1934 to 1938 there, with the rank of archpriest. In the summer of 1931 he was arrested and sent into exile, then arrested again at Mezen. In February 1932 he was sentenced to three years in a camp. After his release, in January 1934, he returned to the village of Panino and was dean.

In February 1938 he was arrested again, and in September sentenced to five years in a camp. Until 1940 he was held in the Ryazan prison, then, until December 1941, in Vyatlag. He died in captivity. He was rehabilitated in 1958.