Cyril-Chelmogorsky Monastery is a closed monastery. It is located
southeast of the village of Morshchinskaya, Kargopolsky district,
Arkhangelsk region, between Lekshmozero and Monastyrskoye lakes. Now
only ruins have survived from the monastery.
In 1316, Saint
Cyril of Chelmogorsk, a monk of the Novgorod Anthony Monastery,
permanently resided on Mount Chelma, which belongs to the Chud
lands. He spent the first winter in a cave, later he built a wooden
cell and a chapel. By the end of the life of Saint Cyril, the entire
local population was baptized. For the converts, the monk built a
church in honor of the Epiphany. Saint Cyril died in December 1368.
10 years after his death, in 1378, Hieromonk Arseny founded the
Cyril-Chelmogorsk monastery.
In the 15th century, a new
Epiphany Church with a side-altar was erected in the name of the
Great Martyr Catherine. Ivan IV the Terrible presented the
Kirillo-Chelmogorsk monastery with arable land, fields for mowing,
forests, lakes and small rivers and ordered to transfer part of the
Kargopol income to the monastery. There are versions that one of the
wives of Ivan the Terrible was sent to this monastery. In 1599, the
wife of Dmitry Kurlyatev-Obolensky and his 2 daughters were forcibly
tonsured here. In 1612-1615 the monastery was ravaged by Lithuanians
more than once. In 1633, Metropolitan Cyprian of Novgorod and
Velikolutsk gives the Cyril-Chelmogorsk monastery a letter with a
blessing for the construction of two churches: the Epiphany and the
Mother of God. In 1637, the monastery received another letter with a
blessing for the construction of the III church over the Holy Gates
in the name of the Great Martyr Catherine. The church of St.
Catherine is not mentioned in the chronicles after 1656, it probably
burned down. In 1674, the Annunciation Church perished in a fire,
and the Assumption Church was erected in its place. In addition, the
monastery had its own courtyard in the city of Kargopol.
In
1727 the impoverished Cyril-Chelmogorsky monastery was attributed to
the Spaso-Kargopol monastery. In 1732 the monastery became
independent, but in 1751 it was again assigned to the Spaso-Kargopol
monastery. In 1764, by order of Catherine II, the
Kirillo-Chelmogorsk monastery was liquidated. Two monastic churches
became parish churches. In 1844-1845, merchant Mikhail Nikolayevich
Lytkin built a new Epiphany Cathedral with a side-altar in the name
of St. Cyril of Chelmogorsky on the site of the old Epiphany Church.
In 1845, the buildings of the former monastery were given to the
Alexander-Oshevensky monastery.
In the 1880s, the Chelmogorsk
Monastery gained relative (but not officially confirmed)
independence. In 1880 and 1887, it experienced fires. The Epiphany
Church was rebuilt again in 1897-1899. In 1904, the Holy Synod
granted independence to the monastery. In 1917, Metropolitan
Benjamin of Petrograd blessed the construction of the
Kirillo-Chelmogorsk Epiphany Hermitage in Petrograd. In June 1918, a
chapel dedicated to the Holy Martyr Hermogen was consecrated here.
In 1932, after the arrest of the monks and clergy, the
Kirillo-Chelmogorsky monastery was abolished forever, the wooden
monastery buildings were dismantled, including the Assumption
Church. At present, only ruins remain of the former monastery. In
2005, Bishop Tikhon of Arkhangelsk and Kholmogorsk consecrated a
veneration cross in memory of St. Cyril of Chelmogorsk near the
place where the monastery stood.