By the late nineteenth century population growth in the Staraya Derevnya area, formerly on the outskirts of the city, was putting pressure on the existing cemeteries.

[1] Funds were solicited in early 1905 for the construction of the cemetery church, with the Holy Synod advancing a loan of fifty thousand rubles, repayable over 10 years.

[1] After the war the cemetery became one of the main burial locations for the city, and expanded significantly, eventually covering fifty nine hectares, and today is mostly full, with most interments being in existing family plots.

[2] It opened that same year on 2 August, the Day of the Airborne Forces, opposite the Afghan War memorial, itself inaugurated in 1996, sponsored by the veterans' association Afganvet.

[3][4] Nataliya Danilova, of the University of Aberdeen, writes that "The unique character of the Cemetery is its ability to function as a place for both public commemoration and private grief.

[1][2][5] The Piskaryovskoye Memorial Cemetery is the usual place for the main commemorations of the siege, with the Seraphimovskoe Cemetery often commemorating other military events, including Victory Day on 9 May, the anniversary of the withdrawal from Afghanistan (15 February), the deaths of troops from the 76th Guards Air Assault Division in the Battle for Height 776 during the Second Chechen War (1 March), the Day of the Airborne Forces (2 August) and the foundation of the OMON (4 October).

[6] Those buried at the Serafimovskoe Cemetery include naval officers Giorgi Abashvili, Vladimir Alafuzov, Ivan Yumashev, and Mikhail Zakharov.

Other military figures interred in the cemetery include Soviet Air Force Lieutenant General Dmitry Alexandrovich Medvedev, two flying aces of the Korean War, Anatoly Karelin and Mikhail Mikhin, and Major General Sergei Ivanovich Tiulpanov, who commanded the Propaganda Administration of the Soviet Military Administration in Germany.

From the world of arts, painters Dmitry Belyaev, Pavel Filonov, Boris Lavrenko, Joseph Serebriany, and Nina Veselova, actors Glikeriya Bogdanova-Chesnokova, Aleksandr Demyanenko, Igor Dmitriev, Irina Gubanova, Pavel Kadochnikov, Nikolai Kryukov, Lev Lemke, Sergey Mikaelyan, Gennadiy Michurin, Antonina Shuranova, and Mikhail Svetin; dancers Boris Fenster, Alla Sizova, Yuri Soloviev and Sergei Vikharev; musicians Vitaly Bujanovsky, Boris Gutnikov and Yuri Morozov; and architect Iosif Langbard were all buried here.