The case of the “counterrevolutionary group of churchmen of the town of Yegoryevsk” in 1935 as an example of the persecution by the NKVD of the “non-commemorators” movement in the Russian Orthodox Church (based on the materials of the GA of the Russian Federation, the GA of SO and the Central State Administration of Moscow)

Abstract

The article deals with the case of the “counter-revolutionary group of churchmen, consisting of the monks, nuns and former people of the town of Yegoryevsk”, that began in April 1935. Among the defendants in the case were the monastics, the representatives of the white clergy from the temples in the town of Yegoryevsk and the surrounding area, as well as the laypeople who took an active church position. The formal charges brought against the members of the “counterrevolutionary group” were reduced to anti-Soviet agitation aimed at disrupting the events organized by the Soviet government, directed to spreading false rumors about its imminent downfall and to organizing a secret church. However, the archival documents indicate that the main purpose of the initiated case was an attack on the believers who did not accept the 1927 Declaration of Metropolitan Sergius of Nizhny Novgorod (Stragorodsky), the Deputy Patriarchal Locum Tenens, and who formed the groups of the True Orthodox Church and the non-commemorators. In the mid-1930s. those groups were mostly filled by the priests and clergymen returning from exile who were forced to settle outside the 100-kilometer zone from Moscow, in the towns such as Yegoryevsk, Pokrov, Alexandrov, etc. The material is based on the documents from the collections of the State Archives of the Russian Federation, the State Archives of the Smolensk Region and the Central State Archives of the Moscow Region.