In 1766, by the order of Catherine II, a prison for "mad convicts" was opened in the monastery, which closed in 1905 due to revolutionary events. Most of the prisoners were those who violated church canons and were considered sectarians by the Synod.

In 1826, by decree, the prophet Abel was imprisoned in the monastery, who died on November 29, 1841, and was buried behind the altar of the Nikolskaya church of the monastery.

From 1820 to 1832, the leader of the Skoptsy sect, Kondratiy Selivanov, was held in the prison, where he died. In 1829, the Decembrist Fyodor Shakhovskoy died here. From 1869, the leader of the Jumpers sect, Maxim Rudomyotkin, who proclaimed himself the incarnation of the Holy Spirit in 1857, served his sentence in the prison. In the monastery prison, he wrote 14 prophetic books that became part of the sacred scripture of the Jumpers, "The Book of the Sun," and died in 1877. In the 19th century, Old Believer clergy were held in the "Suzdal Fortress." Some, like Alimpii, died in solitary cells without waiting for release, while others, such as Arkadiy, who spent 25 years in solitary confinement, Konon, and Gennadiy, were released in 1881, thanks to Leo Tolstoy. From 1898 to 1904, the Old Believer Fyodor Kovalyov was imprisoned, who buried 25 people alive due to the 1897 census. From 1894 to 1902, the Arkhangelsk benefactor Vasiliy Rakhov was held in the prison. From 1898 to 1901, the Orthodox priest Alexey Zershaninov, who converted to Catholicism, was here. In 1900, the founder of the Churikov movement, Ivan Churikov, spent four months in the monastery prison.