Rasputin (Galway Observer)

His Life & Death

The Matrimonial Circle

It was his strange fascination, his mysterious influence over women, generally to their detriment; his queer, piercing, hypnotic eyes and amazing will power that caused him soon to become notorious.

Russian Mystery Man

Who Ruled the Czar
Murdered by a Noble
His Life Story

Gregory the Rake

Gregory Rasputin literally means “Gregory the Rake” and as may be surmised, this was not the mysterious man’s real name.  Born forty-eight years ago, he was christened Gregory Novykh, but at an early age he became a horse thief, and a debauchee of the worst type, so that his fellow villagers nicknamed him Gregory the Rake- a name to which for some unknown reason he himself clung.

Then suddenly following an extra long debauch, which placed him in the bad books of the peasants he contrived to retrieve his position by the development of a religious mania.  He found that his new cult paid, and wandered through Northern Russia preaching an extraordinary doctrine, the substance of which was to “to live is to love; that every evil deed is immediately punished in this world; that unless a man sins he cannot be pardoned; and that sin is therefore the path to grace.”

His creed in itself would never have won for him the fame he gained.  It was his strange fascination, his mysterious influence over women, generally to their detriment; his queer, piercing, hypnotic eyes and amazing will power that caused him soon to become notorious.

Aided by Women

Each step of Rasputin’s progress was taken with the aid of women devotees.  He had a quite well modulated, warm voice, and used at all times the archaic “thee” and “thou” phraseology of the Bible.  He started first as a Scripture reader in the houses of provisional merchants and people of the better off present classes who had prospered in a worldly way…

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Traces of blood in the snow in the Palace garden

Gregory Rasputin, the mysterious monk, who has been described as “ The man behind the Tsar” has been assassinated.

An illiterate Siberian peasant who was hardly able to write his own name, who had read no book except the Bible, and only appreciated portions of it which suited his own ends; whose personal habits were the subject of a world famous scandal; whose strange hypnotic influence over women saved him from death on several occasions – he has at length paid the last penalty.  Strange to say, it was no common assassin who brought about his death, nor any ruined or revengeful woman.  He was slain, it is alleged, by the young Prince Youssoupoff, who was married in 1914 to Her Highness Irene Alexandrovno, daughter of the Grand Duke Alexander Michaelovitch.  It is stated that the body of Rasputin was recovered by divers from the bottom of an ice hole in the Neva near Petrovsky Bridge, which crossed one of the lesser arms of the river north of the city.  It was early on Saturday morning that a mysterious motor car is reported to have been seen on Petrovsky Island. The police there upon examined the river near Petrovsky Bridge and discovered a newly-cut ice hole, whence stretched human footprints in various directions in the snow.  Near the bank was found a man’s golosh, stained with suspicious marks.  Divers were requisitioned to examine the bottom of the river, with the result that the body of Rasputin was discovered.

According to accounts, the police found traces of blood in the snow in the Palace garden.  On demanding an explanation from the servants the police were informed that a mad dog had just been shot.  In corroboration of this statement, the dead body of a dog was produced.  The animal’s body and a lump of blood stained snow were removed for examination.

Galway Observer, 1 February 1917

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