The village of Knyazevka in the Tarsk district was founded in the late 19th century by settlers from the Vologda province, who arrived in Tarsk land to engage in trades. Initially, the village was called Chigaly, and in 1896 it was renamed Knyazevka in honor of the Tobolsk governor L.M. Knyazev. The governor visited the Tarsk Priirtyshye to inspect the taiga lands and select suitable places for settlement.

In 1898, newcomers from the Vyatka province settled in Knyazevka, and that same year a rural society was formed. From 1901, the settlement became part of the newly established Atirsk volost. Later, settlers from Vitebsk, Mogilev, Minsk, and other regions of Russia also settled here.

The first mentions of the church in Knyazevka date back to 1909. It was built with funds from the Alexander III Foundation and the efforts of parishioners. In Ivan Goloshubin's "Reference Book of the Tarsk Diocese" (1914), the church is described as a wooden building on a stone foundation with a bell tower. The church was not accepted by the commission due to poor workmanship. There was one altar, in the name of St. Catherine the Great Martyr. Utensils and books were absent, and the nearest church was located in the village of Atirsk, 38 versts away. The parish had no subsidiary churches, chapels, or prayer houses, and there was no information about church land. The parsonage was also not accepted by the commission.

The craftsmen who built the church without a single nail are no longer remembered, but the old-timers recounted that they selected each log by passing it through a metal ring.

In the insurance report of churches dated December 10, 1911, the church is described as wooden, on a stone foundation, covered with iron. The length of the church, including the bell tower, was 11 fathoms, and the width was 6 fathoms and 1 arshin. The church had one large and one small dome, 12 large windows, two Venetian windows, eight small ones in the dome, three external double doors, and two internal ones. The bell tower was one tier, with a total height to the upper cornice of 6 fathoms. The nearest peasant house was located 20 fathoms to the northeast. The church and bell tower were valued at 10,000 rubles.

The church was built in the traditions of Russian wooden architecture with elements of eclecticism and featured a harmonious composition. Before its destruction, it represented a three-part parish church, an octagon on a square base. The cubic volume of the church part with two side porches was joined by a lowered apse with a three-sided eastern projection and a narrower refectory, to which the bell tower was attached. The octagon was topped with a tent and decorated with kokoshniks in the form of four barrel-shaped elements. Each face of the octagon had a rectangular window. To the north and south of the church part and bell tower, side porches, rectangular in plan, were added under a gable roof. An open porch, a narthex, adjoined the western wall of the bell tower. The southern and northern facades had the same composition. On the facades of the church, bell tower, apse, and tambour of the bell tower, there was one window opening, while on the refectory facade, there were two. The volumes adjoining the church part had double-leaf entrance doors and one window in the western part. Their facades were topped with triangular gables. All window openings were elongated vertically, framed with simple wooden moldings with a cornice in the shape of a "crown." Inside the church, all rooms were connected by wide rectangular openings. In 1910, a wooden watchman's lodge was added to the church.

The church was served by a priest with a salary from the treasury of 600 rubles and a psalmist with a salary of 200 rubles per year. The priest at the Catherine Church was Yegor (Grigory) Mikhailovich Podorov, who came from the Usty-Sysolsky district of the Vologda province. He lived in a monastery from the age of 12 and, at 35, went to search for his mother after learning that she had remarried and moved to Siberia. Thus, he ended up in the taiga village. After the church was destroyed, he baptized residents at home for a while, but then fell ill and died. Yegor Mikhailovich served as the priest of the Knyazev parish until the 1920s, after which Father Elisei (Ishchenko Elisei Lukich) became the priest. After the church was closed, he, along with the psalmist (Pasyankov Alexander Stepanovich, born 1890), was sent to a special settlement in Kulai.

In the early 1930s, services in the church ceased, crosses were removed, the iconostasis was taken down, and the church lost its dome and cupolas. The church building was not destroyed but converted into a club. Later, a cuckoo was often heard flying by, which was considered a bad omen, so the building was quickly repurposed into a grain storage facility. After the construction of a new grain storage facility, the church remained empty for a long time and began to decay and fall apart.

The Catherine Church in Knyazevka is included in the list of cultural heritage sites (historical and cultural monuments). This decision was made by the Omsk Regional Executive Committee on May 23, 1989, and the monument was assigned the code 5500483000.

In 2000, the church building collapsed, the roof leaked, and one corner completely rotted. The church fell on the night before the Holy Trinity holiday. Restoration is impossible.

Today, the village of Knyazevka has disappeared from the map of the Tarsk district: by 2000 it had become deserted, and in 2014 the last resident passed away.