the holy new martyrs of eastern russia - Coptic Orthodox teaching

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began to serve in the church of the Holy Archangel Michael on Pirogov street,
becoming a subdeacon and cell-attendant of Bishop Augustine. When
Vladyka was exiled to Central Asia, he followed him, helping the bishop
during services and working in the fruit gardens in Pedzhikent. When the
bishop moved to Syzran, Boris went too. Apart from helping in services, he
carried out various assignments, including taking letters from Vladyka to
Metropolitan Sergius. In December, 1930 Bishop Augustine ordained him to
the diaconate. On being arrested, Fr. Boris was cast into Syzran Domzak. At
the trial he witnessed: “In my conviction, Soviet power is at the present time
restricting the servants of the religious cult… The clergy are being loaded
with insupportable taxes which they cannot pay… Collectivization is
acceptable for an Orthodox Christian only if it does not damage his religious
convictions, that is, if collectivization does not pursue the aim of the
persecution of religion.” Fr. Boris was sent to a camp near Lodeinoye Polye,
Svirlag, Leningrad province. He was parted from the archbishop, who was
sent to another camp also near Lodeinoye Polye. There he died at the
beginning of the 1930s.
Nun Luceria Yefimovna Mankova. She was born in 1888. She was arrested
in September, 1931 and convicted, in accordance with articles 58-10 and 59-11,
of belonging to “the church-monarchist counter-revolutionary organization,
‘The Trues [True Orthodox Christians?]”. Nothing more is known about her.
Nun Stepanida (Sergeyevna Kshnyaseva). She was born on November 11,
1878 in the village of Nizhnee Nikolskoye, Pokrovsky region, Orenburg
district. She was illiterate. She entered the Pokrovsky women’s monastery in
Plokrovsky region, Orenburg province in 1905, leaving it in 1928. On
November 20, 1930 she was arrested in her native village and cast into the
Orenburg domzak. On March 26, 1931 she was convicted of “participation in
the counter-revolutionary church organization, ‘The Trues’”, and sentenced to
five years in the camps in accordance with articles 58-10, 58-11 and 59-7.
Nothing more is known about her.
Alexander Antonovich Medem. He was born in 1877 (or 1870) in the city of
Mitava, now Elgava in Latvia. His father was Count Otto (Anton)
Ludwigovich Medem, a Lutheran, a senator, a member of the State Council,
who had many important government posts, in particular the governorship of
Novgorod. He went to the Novgorod gymnasium, and then to the juridical
faculty of St. Petersburg university, from which he graduated in 1897.
However, he was not much interested in the law, and occupied himself rather
on his estate in Khvalynsky uyezd, Saratov province. He sold several pieces of
land that he had received from his father to his peasants at very low prices. In
1901 he married Maria Fyodorovna Cherkova, from whom he had a son and
three daughters. (After the revolution his son emigrated to Germany, while
one of his daughters was shot in 1938.) Until 1918 he administered the estate of
his father, and after the confiscation of the estate he rented as much of it as he
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