Presbyter
Hieromonk Leonid Viktorov was born in 1891 in Ryazan in the family of a deacon. Becoming an orphan at an early age, he was accepted for free education at the Ryazan Theological Seminary. After graduating, he served as a psalmist in the church of the village of Boloshnevo, where his grandfather, Protopresbyter Ioann Viktorov, was the rector. In 1912, Leonid was ordained as a deacon, and later as a priest at the Nativity of the Mother of God Church in the village of Kurbatovo, becoming its rector and head of the church school.
In the 1930s, the church in the village of Kurbatovo was closed, and the priest's family with five young children was evicted from their own home. Father Leonid sought a new place of service, initially serving in the village of Pavlishchevo, but that church was soon closed as well. During this time, his uncle, Father Mikhail Viktorov, a priest from the village of Boloshnevo, was arrested, and Father Leonid began to serve in his place. Here, he was deprived of voting rights, and his children were not accepted into educational institutions.
In early 1936, Archbishop Juvenal of Ryazan was arrested, and Father Leonid faced the threat of arrest. At night, when arrests typically occurred, he began to spend the night in neighboring villages, while the children were hidden in the bell tower. On February 20, 1936, Father Leonid was arrested and taken to the church watchman's house, where they demanded the church treasury. Not finding any money or valuables, the Chekists took him to prison, seizing his personal diary and correspondence. Father Leonid's last words to his eldest daughter Anna were: “Do not leave the children and mother, I will definitely return. May the Lord keep you!”
On the collective “case of Ryazan clergymen and laypeople,” Father Leonid was sentenced to 5 years in camps. The priest spent two years in Siblag in the city of Mariinsk, where he passed away in early 1938.
