Andrew Cook - To Kill Rasputin

What then is the evidence that differentiates this case from the groundless rumours of the past?

It should be stated at once that the story is officially denied. The denial, however, is half-hearted, and given with conflicting details. The official answer was at first that nothing had happened. It now seems to have been modified to the extent of admitting that something has happened, that Rasputin has been wounded, but that he is going on well.

I am informed that an inquiry at his flat in the English Prospekt brought the answer that on Friday evening, the 29th December, he left in a motor with an unknown officer and has not since been seen. In the meanwhile, interested people seem to be purposely spreading fantastic and impossible rumours with the object of discrediting the whole story. The fact that no one has seen Rasputin’s body goes to support all these official denials and contradictions.

The following facts, however, seem to afford overwhelming proof for the fact of Rasputin’s death.

In the first place, the whole of Russia regards it as established beyond doubt. The news published in the Bourse Gazette has already been circulated through the provinces. The mysterious telegrams that are already appearing in the Petrograd press show how widespread is the conviction of the truth of the announcement.

Secondly, Rasputin’s entourage is in a state of deep depression and great anxiety. His flat is filled with commotion and lamentation. His principal supporter at Court, Madame Vyrubova, has refused to leave her rooms and the guard of secret police outside them has been trebled.

Far more conclusive, however, than this hearsay evidence is the attitude of the Petrograd press. The Bourse Gazette would never have risked its existence for a rumour. Even had it done so, a mere rumour would not account for the meeting that was held on the evening of the 30th December of representative of all the Petrograd press, at which they discussed the question as to what policy they should adopt with reference to the publication of the news. The matter was decided for them, for during the conference they received a notice from the censorship, forbidding any publication of the event. None the less, both on the 31st December and 1st January there have appeared numerous indirect and mysterious references to the murder in most of the Petrograd papers. For instance, in the Novoe Vremya in a remote corner and in small print there is the following paragraph:

On December 30th, at the Zeloti Concert, as a result of a unanimous request, in view of events that are taking place, the National Anthem was sung amidst tumultuous applause.

Still more marked in the Ruskaya Volya there are no less than four more remarkable references to the event. It should be remembered that the Ruskaya Volya is a new daily paper that has just appeared, and that it is supposed to have particularly close connections with the Government. In addition to a poem, the motif of which are the words ‘rasputin’ and ‘novikh’ (Rasputin’s names, and also the word for ‘rake’ and the genitive plural of the work ‘new’), there are two leading articles in which the clearest reference is made to the news. In the first of them, Alexander Amphiteatrov, the editor, ends with the following words:

‘I wrote so far, and then there came the news of the Bourse Gazette ! In its big type was announced the sensational news that there had passed from the scene of life the strangest and the most notorious embodiment of the present reactionary might.’

The second article, entitled ‘Short Chronicle,’ deals in detail with the great excitement in Petrograd and states that never had the city passed through so nervous a day; never had the telegraph worked so incessantly as on Saturday, December 30th.

‘Yesterday was the great day. About it no one can say more.’

Again, on page 6, there is a paragraph of twenty lines, headed:

Yesterday about six o’clock near the house of Prince Yusupov, Count Sumarokov-Elston, Moika 94, several revolver shots in succession were heard in the neighbourhood of a motor car that was standing close by.

The shooting was heard by a constable of the 3rd Kazan District and other constables who were standing on the opposite side of the Moika in the direction of the Admiralty District police station. The Kazan police station constable hurried to the spot and as he approached, the motor car went off at great speed.

It is supposed that a number of young men, after a good supper, had shot into the air.

On January 1st these references became more explicit. The Rech , for instance, published in its ‘Latest News’ the following paragraphs:

At three o’clock on the night of December 30th, a constable standing at the point opposite the Kazan section of the Ofitsersky Street, heard cries and a noise issuing from the garden of No. 21. At the same time, constables standing on their points upon the Moika Quay, not far from the Prachashnaya Bridge, also heard the noise from the same garden, that looks out upon the Moika. The garden at 21, Ofitsersky Street, stretches almost to the bank of the Moika and is enclosed on the side of the quay by a two-storied house, No. 92, belonging to Prince Yusupov. The next house to No. 92 also belongs to the same owner.

The constable in the Ofitsersky Street, some time after hearing the cries, saw several men coming out of the garden gate of No. 21. He tried to find out what had happened, but did not succeed.

A short time after this a motor car was noticed to arrive at the garden and seen afterwards to leave it.

According to the statements of passers by, another motor car arrived at the same garden from the Moika side about 3 o’clock. An examination shows that there were bloodstains upon the snow in the garden. The manager of the house declared that this was the blood of a dog that went mad during the night and was shot. Samples of the snow with the blood have been taken for examination.

In the course of December 30th, the news arrived that a mysterious motor car had been seen at the Petrovsky Island during the night. On December 31st the river was examined in the neighbourhood of the Petrovsky Bridge. A freshly made hole in the ice was discovered and footsteps passing backwards and forwards to it in different directions. Divers were given the duty of examining the bed of the rivers.

Some men’s galoshes were found in the snow on the bank with suspicious dark stains.

The Bourse Gazette of January 1st, in a remote corner of it pages and in very small print, publishes the same story under the heading of ‘Mysterious Discovery.’ The only additional detail that it gives is that the divers found nothing.

The Novoe Vremya has another small paragraph entitled ‘Mysterious Crime.’ Much the same details are given in it with the addition that the secret police are guarding the river, and that photographs have been taken.

The feeling in Petrograd is most remarkable. All classes speak and act as if some great weight had been taken from their shoulders. Servants, isvostchiks , working men, all freely discuss the event. Many say that it is better than the greatest Russian victory in the field.

What effect it will have in Government circles, it is difficult to say. My present view is that it will lead to immediate dismissal of Protopopov and of various directors of the Secret Police, whilst in the course of the next few weeks the most notorious of Rasputin’s clientele will gradually retire into private life. I would suggest, for instance, that careful attention should be paid to any changes that take place in the Department of the Interior and the Holy Synod, where Rasputin’s influence was always strongest.