When bullets and poison were no match for Rasputin

Grigori Yefimovich or Rasputin, as he preferred to call himself, was no stranger to controversies. He was a healer for Alexei, Tsar Nicholas ll and Alexandra's only son, and over time, became very close to the royal family. Well, close enough to irk many, as his popularity was only rivaled by the notoriety and his mysterious aura. The series of events to be discussed here, started way back in 1903-04, with his entry into St. Petersburg, which eventually triggered the events leading to his death in 1916.

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A bigger part of his mystery stems from the circumstances which eventually led to his death. It so happened that amongst Rasputin's haters were the nobles Prince Felix Yusupov, Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich and the right-wing politician Vladimir Purishkevich. These three planned to kill him. But what happened during the time that made Rasputin a bit more mysterious? When Yusupov lured Rasputin to his home, Moika Palace, after midnight, he was kind enough to serve him tea and cakes. That sounds tasty, except that they were laced with cyanide. But he was in for a surprise, as Rasputin ate those like a boss, without choking on the poison. The next up the deadly menu was wine, and three glasses of the drinks and added poison (now that's too predictable) were finished by Rasputin in no time!

After the failed poisoning attempt, at 2:30, Rasputin was shot from Dmitry's revolver by Yusupov. While that seemed like easy murder, after driving to Rasputin's apartment with Sukhotin wearing the former's coat and hat to avoid any untoward suspicion, and the return to Moika palace was a nightmare for the scheming trio. Rasputin, who was left for dead, attacked Yusupov, who fled for his dear life! It was only after he was shot down in the palace courtyard by Purishkevich, did Rasputin actually stop.

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Eventually, Rasputin's body was dropped in the Malaya Nevka River. While these incidents were recounted in Yusupov's memoir, the postmortem reports are quite different. We will never know what happened on that fateful night, but Rasputin did manage to shake things up quite a bit for his murderers! Now, this is one way to die, and yet not die.


Post Written by - Lopamudra