Hieromartyr Alexander Platonovich Ardashev

Hieromartyr Alexander Platonovich Ardashev

Alexander may be spelt Aleksandr.

Background history

The Province of Udmurtia (Udmurt Republic) is situated on the road between Kazan and Perm, which are both west of the Ural Mountains. Yekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk are situated to the southeast of Perm. Udmurtia is historically a land of Finno-Ugric People (the Mari and the Udmurts). Kazan is situated on the Volga River, where the Kazanka River flows into it from the east, through the city.

This province was settled as early as the 5th century, but it was not much under Russian influence and development until the 18th century. Orthodox Christian missionary activity would not have been very active until after this. It seems that in the village of Yakshur-Bodya, the earliest Orthodox Christian presence came in the latter 19th century. It may be kept in mind that the Church of Russia had already a long experience with evangelising the Finno-Ugrik people, as evidenced by the history of the development of the Holy Transfiguration Monastery at Valaam, Lake Ladoga.

In 1860, an Orthodox Christian parish was established.

In 1861, a wooden Temple was built, and it was dedicated to Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker, of Myra. At this time, the village of Yakshur-Bodya received the status of a village.

The first rector of Saint Nicholas Church was the Priest Platon Vasilyevich Ardashev. In 1863, on his initiative, a parish school was opened in the village. There is no further information available about Father Platon and his wife and family. It is known that at the first census of the Russian Empire in 1897, Father Platon is not listed, so his repose was before that date.

By 1904, a two-grade parish school for girls already existed in the village, and in 1913, a first-aid post was opened.

The village was the centre of the Yakshur-Bodinskaya volost, and the volost administration was located there.

Early life of Alexander Platonovich Ardashev

In 1870, Alexander Platonovich Ardashev was born in the Russian Empire, Vyatka Governorate, Saratovsky Uyezd, village of Bolya, in the family of the Priest Platon Vasilievich Ardashev.

Alexander Platonovich was baptised in his home parish, and he was raised and formed as an Orthodox Christian in the bosom of his family and parish.

Since his father, Priest Platon V Ardashev was the first priest to serve in the parish of Saint Nicholas in Yakshur-Bodya, it is likely that Alexander Platonofich received his early education there.

Higher education

Although it is not written in available documents, it is likely (because of its location) that Alexander Platonovich received his higher and seminary education at the Kazan Theological Seminary and Academy.

Kazan Theological Seminary, Kazan

Marriage, ordinations

Alexander Platonovich was married early, and he was ordained to the Holy Diaconate and to the Holy Priesthood soon after.

He and his wife received from the Lord 4 daughters, and 4 sons. Their children addressed their father with the respectful term “papenka” (dear father).

Father Alexander Platonovich Ardashev came from a long line of priests.

Pastoral service

Priest Alexander Ardashev succeeded his father in the 1890s as the parish priest in the Saint Nicholas Temple in Yakshur-Bodya, where he served until 1919.

In 1897, 2 priests served in the Saint Nicholas Church : Father Alexander Ardashev (son of Platon Ardashev), and Father Pavel Appolonovich Lubnin.

The list of the number of schools and students in the parish of the village of Bod’i of the Saint Nicholas Church for 1904 was signed by the Priest Pavel Lubnin.

In 1917, the Bolshevik Revolution occurred in Russia, and soon thereafter the Russian Civil War. With this came the beginning of the persecution of the Church. Thus, in 1919, Father Alexander, with his family, left his native village, when he was transferred.

In the period 1919-1928, Father Alexander Ardashev served as a priest in the city cathedral of the city of Biysk. Biysk is situated very far east from Yakshur-Bodya, to the south of Tomsk and Novosibirsk, near the Altai Mountains, and near the border of Kazakhstan and Mongolia.

In 1928, at the request of his daughter Vera, he received the blessing to move to Moscow, where he served as a priest.

In 1933, he was registered in the small village of Amirovo in the Bronnitsky district. There was a small church, dedicated to the Theophany (Epiphany), where he served.

In 1936, the Saint Nicholas Church in Yakshur-Bodye was closed, and in 1938 it was demolished.

In October, 1936, Father Alexander Ardashev was moved to the village of Baranovskoye, Vinogradovsky district, Moscow region (southeast of Moscow, and north of Kolomna). There, he served as a priest in the Church of the Nativity of Christ. He lived in Baranovsky for a year, the last year of his life.

Father Alexander Ardashev and his family

Arrest

On 3 October, 1937, at the home of the parish council warden, Mr. P. A., Archpriest Alexander Ardashev was arrested at the residence of Voronina, located at #43, Pushkinskaya Street. This arrest was part of the Great Purge in the Soviet Union, during which hundreds of thousands of people were killed.

Father Alexander was charged with refusing to co-operate with the [Joint_State_Political_Directorate OGPU] (the Joint State Political Directorate) in the 1920s, and for having a son-in-law of German descent. Under Article 58-10, this was sufficient for conviction. The priest did not plead guilty.

On 19 October, 1937, his sentence was handed down by a “troika” (a three-person extrajudicial panel) under the NKVD (People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs) Directorate for the Moscow Region.

Repose

On 31 October, 1937, Father Alexander P Ardashev was executed by firing squad at the Butovo NKVD shooting range at Butovo, near Moscow. At the same time, 17 more priests and church servants were shot.

All of them, as well as thousands of the same innocent victims, were shot for their faith, for not renouncing their faith, at the notorious NKVD Butovo Shooting Range. One estimate of the deaths is about 20,000.

Rehabilitation

Father Alexander was rehabilitated on 17 July, 1989, due to the absence of any “corpus delicti” (proof of a crime).

His relatives located the house – in what was then the village of Usadishche, in the Vinogradovsky County (southeast of Moscow) – where Father Alexander spent the final years of his life. At that time, there was no brick church in the village ; the wooden church was situated elsewhere.

The materials of the investigative case of Priest Alexander Ardashev have been submitted to the Synodal Commission on Canonisation.

Father Alexander’s descendants kept a deep interest in his spiritual journey. His great-great-grandson, Yuri Gabrov, and his great-granddaughter, Elena Suslova – some of whom travelled from abroad – visited the Voskresensky District. Their great-grandfather had vanished in the 1930s ; it was only decades later, when access to NKVD archives was finally granted, that they discovered his case file.

The grim secret that had haunted the priest’s family for all those years was revealed : Alexander Ardashev had been executed at the Butovo firing range. This discovery served as a catalyst for further research and the gathering of information. This information was submitted to the Canonisation Commission of the Church of Russia.

It was his relatives relatives who located the house, in what was then the village of Usadishche, in the Vinogradovsky County (southeast of Moscow), which was his last residence in this life.

Glorification

The Hieromartyr Alexander Ardashev was glorified amongst the New Martyrs.

In 2000, the All-Russian Council glorified Tsar Nicholas II and his family, as well as many other New Martyrs and Confessors. On this date, there were added 1,765 glorified saints known by name and others unknown by name but "known to God".

Date of commemoration

The date of commemoratin the Hieromartyr Alexander Ardashev is 31 October.

The artist N. I. Bashmakov painted an icon of this New Martyr.

About Saint Nicholas Church in Yakshur-Bodye

In 1995, construction began on the new Saint Nicholas Church. It was sanctified in 1997, and the first service was held in the new Temple.

The new, re-constructed Temple of Saint Nicholas, Yakshur-Bodye

In 2006, the memorial to the participants of the Great Patriotic War was reconstructed. In 2009, a park dedicated to the participants of local wars of the 20th century was opened in Yakshur-Bodye. In memory of f these events, an infantry fighting vehicle was installed in the park.

Reflections

Although the Hieromartyr Alexander Ardashev was not involved in the history of the Orthodox Church within Canada, his details are included amongst the other articles, because one of his great-great-grandchildren is the wife of a priest in the Archdiocese of Canada.

The names of other members of the family of the Hieromartyr Saint Alexander Ardashev were not available at the time of this writing.

 Archival file : Volume I, p. 40 ; held at the State Archive of the Russian Federation (GA RF)
 
 Ardashev, Alexander Platonovich (1870)
 Date of birth : 1870
 Place of birth : Vyatka Governorate, Saratovsky Uyezd, village of Bolya
 Gender : Male
 Nationality : Russian
 Social origin : From a clerical family (family of a member of the clergy)
 Education : Secondary
 Profession / Place of employment : Priest at the church in the village of Baranovskoye, Vinogradovsky District, Moscow Region
 Place of residence : Moscow Region, Vinogradovsky District, village of Baranovskoye
 Party affiliation : Non-partisan
 Date of execution by firing-squad : 31 October, 1937
 Place of death : Moscow Region, settlement of Butovo, “Butovo Shooting Range” (Butovo Polygon)
 Arrested in (location) and by whom : Moscow Region, Vinogradovsky District, village of Baranovskoye
 Date of arrest : 3 October, 1937
 Charge : “Anti-Soviet agitation”
 Date of conviction : 19 October, 1937
 Convicting body : A “Troika” under the Directorate of the People’s 
 Commissariat for Internal Affairs (UNKVD) of the USSR for the Moscow Region
 Sentence : Supreme measure of punishment : execution by firing squad
 Date of rehabilitation : July, 1989
 Data sources : Moscow, execution lists - Butovo shooting range ; Database “New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Orthodox Church of the 20th Century”

References

Open list of victims of political repression in the USSR

Kosmodamian-ru biography

Additional information :

Sakharov Centre maryrolog

The Ardashev Priests

Wikipedia article about the Great Purge 1936-1939

Wikipedia article about the Yakshur-Bodynsky District

Wikipedia article about Yaksur-Bodya

Wikipedia article about Udmurtia

Wikipedia article about the Ural Mountains

Encyclopaedia Britannica article about Finno-Ugric Peoples

Wikipedia article about the Butovo firing range