Fake History by Graeme Donald

Author:Graeme Donald
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Michael O'Mara

THE PEASANT WHO KNEW TOO MUCH: THE DEATH OF RASPUTIN

BORN IN 1869, Grigori Rasputin was a charismatic and Machiavellian machinator popularly believed to have been able to control the Tsarevich’s haemophilia by hypnosis. By 1905, this placed Rasputin in the Russian Tsar’s inner circle, a position he abused by using that same hypnotic power allegedly to seduce the Tsarina, a scandal which led to his death at the hands of Russian nobility. Likewise, the nightmarish account of that assassination has provided the content of many a film in which the dishevelled mystic is poisoned, repeatedly shot and stabbed, and hit with everything but the kitchen sink, yet is still alive when he is rolled up in a carpet and dumped in the freezing Neva river. All such melodrama appears to be lurid invention; indications are that in fact Rasputin was assassinated in 1916 by the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS). But how did such a malodorous peasant insinuate himself into the upper echelons of the grandest royal court of the day?

The Russian royal court of Nicholas II and Alexandra was opulent beyond imagination but much of the country was locked in a sort of medieval culture long abandoned by the rest of Europe, with serfdom not completely abolished until 1892. Many at court were obsessed with the occult and constantly on the search for the next prophet to act as their hotline to God. Nicholas certainly believed that God spoke through the mouths of simpletons and the demented, prompting him to welcome into his court a succession of lunatics – and charlatans acting the part – to be consulted on matters of domestic or foreign policy. In 1903 Eric Weiss, aka Harry Houdini, was invited to perform for the court. Nicholas went into raptures and, ignoring Houdini’s insistence that all was smoke and mirrors, proclaimed him to the court to be the genuine Volshebnik (Wizard or Miracle Man) for whom they had all been waiting. Politely turning down the Tsar’s pleadings for him to remain at court in such a capacity and later explaining his very real fears that the court might hold him captive, like some performing animal, Houdini fled the city just as Rasputin arrived in St Petersburg to find the stage set and the role of Volshebnik open for the taking.

Having heard of Rasputin’s alleged healing powers, Alexandra sent for him to see if he could do anything about her son’s haemophilia. He did seem to have a positive effect on reducing the severity of the distressing bouts of both internal and external bleeding. Some have suggested that he used hypnosis to calm the boy and slow down his heart rate but there is no evidence that Rasputin was skilled in Mesmer’s art. More likely, his intervention kept at bay the court doctors with their leeches, coupled with their use of a new wonder drug called aspirin, now recognized as an extraordinarily efficient anti-clotting agent, so not the best treatment for a haemophiliac. Something about Rasputin’s presence seemed to work for the child so the Tsar and Tsarina were from then on in thrall to him.

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