Memories of the Russian Court

by Anna Aleksandrovna Vyrubova

IN preceding chapters I have mentioned the name of Rasputine, that strange and ill-starred being about whom almost nothing is known to the multitude but against whom such horrible accusations have been made that he is universally classed with such monsters of iniquity as Cain, Nero, and Judas Iscariot. Even H. G. Wells, in whose “Outline of History” Joan of Arc and Abraham Lincoln are disposed of in a line, sacrifices valuable space to state as an established fact that in 1917 the Russian Court was “dominated by a religious impostor, Rasputin, whose cult was one of unspeakable foulness, a reeking scandal in the face of the world.” I have no desire in this book to attempt an exoneration of Rasputine, for I am not so ambitious as to believe that I can change the collective mind of the world on any point. In the interests of historical truth, however, I believe it to be my simple duty to record the plain tale of how and why Rasputine came to be a factor in the lives of Nicholas II and of Alexandra Feodorovna, his wife, and exactly to what extent he did, or rather, did not, dominate the Russian Court. Those who expect from me secret and sensational disclosures will, I fear, be disappointed, for Rasputine’s every movement for years was known to the Russian police, and the most sensational fact of his whole career, his assassination, has been described by practically every writer of the events of the Russian Revolution.

I will first explain the exact status of the man, for this does not appear to be generally understood. He has been called a priest, more often still a monk, but the truth is he was not in holy orders at all. He belonged to a curious species of roving religious peasant which in Russia were called Stranniki, the nearest English translation of the word being pilgrims. These wandering peasants, common sights in the old Russia, were accustomed to travel from one end of the Empire to the other, often walking with heavy chains on their bodies to make their progress more painful and difficult. They went from church to church, shrine to shrine, monastery to monastery, praying, fasting, mortifying the flesh, and their prayers were, by a very considerable population, eagerly sought and devoutly believed in. Once in a while a Strannik appeared who, by virtue of his extreme piety, gift of speech, or strong personality, acquired more than local reputation. Churchmen of high rank, estate owners, and even members of the nobility invited these men to their houses, listened with interest to their discourses, and asked for their prayers. Such a Strannik was Gregory Rasputine, who from the humblest beginnings in a remote Siberian village became known all over the Empire as a man of almost superhuman endowment.

Of the type of Russians to whom the Stranniki made a genuine appeal the Emperor and Empress undoubtedly belonged. The Emperor, like several of his near ancestors, was a born mystic, and the soul of Alexandra Feodorovna, either from natural inclination or from close association with him whom she so dearly loved, leaned also towards mysticism. By this I do not mean that the Emperor and the Empress were at all interested in spiritualism, table-tipping, or alleged materializations from the world beyond. Far from it. In the earliest days of my acquaintance with the Empress, as far back as 1905, she gave me a special warning against these things, telling me that if I wished for her friendship never to have anything to do with so-called spiritism. Both the Emperor and the Empress were profoundly interested in the religious life and expressions of the whole human race. They read with sympathy and understanding the religious literature not only of Christendom but of India, Persia, and the countries of the Far East. I remember in connection with the Empress’s first warning against spiritism that she gave me a book, an obscure fourteenth-century missal called “Les Amis des Dieu” which, in spite of her warm recommendation, I found great difficulty in reading. This interest in religion and the life of the spirit was actually what constituted what Mr. Wells calls the “crazy pietism” of Nicholas II. It was simple Christianity lived and not merely subscribed to as a theory. They believed that prophecy, in the Biblical sense of the word, still existed in certain highly gifted and spiritually minded persons. They believed that it was possible outside the church and without the aid of regularly ordained bishops and priests to hold communion with God and with His Spirit. Before I came to Court there was a Frenchman, Dr. Philippe, in whom they reposed the greatest confidence, believing him to be one in whom the gift of prophecy existed. I never knew Dr. Philippe, hence I can speak of him only as a sort of a forerunner of Rasputine, because, as the Empress told me, his coming was foretold by Dr. Philippe. Very shortly before his death the French mystic told them that they would have another friend authorized to speak to them from God, and when Rasputine appeared he was accepted as that friend.

Rasputine, although very poor and humble and almost entirely illiterate, had acquired a great reputation as a preacher, and had especially attracted the attention of Bishop Theofan, a churchman of renown in Petrograd. Bishop Theofan introduced the Strannik to the wife of Grand Duke Nicholas, who immediately conceived a warm admiration for him, and began to speak to her friends of his marvelous piety and spiritual insight. At that time the Emperor was on very friendly terms with the Grand Duke Nicholas, or rather with his wife and her sister, two princesses of Montenegro who had married, not quite in conformity with the rules of the Orthodox Church, the brothers, Grand Dukes Nicholas and Peter. One of these sisters, Princess Melitza, Grand Duchess Peter, had something of a reputation as a mystic, and it was at her house that the Emperor and Empress met first Dr. Philippe and later Rasputine. In one of my first conversations with the Empress she told me this, and told me also how deeply the conversation of the Siberian peasant had interested both her husband and herself. In fact Rasputine, at that period, interested and impressed almost everyone with whom he came in contact. When the house of Stolypine was blown up by terrorist bombs and, among others, his beloved daughter was grievously wounded, it was Rasputine whom the famous statesman summoned to her bedside for prayer and supplication. I am aware that the public generally believes that it was I who introduced Rasputine into the Russian Court, but truth compels me to declare that he was well known to the Sovereigns and to most of the Court long before I ever saw him.

It was about a month before my marriage in 1907 that the Empress asked Grand Duchess Peter to make me acquainted with Rasputine. I had heard that the Grand Duchess was very clever and well read, and I was glad of the opportunity of meeting her in her palace on the English Quay in Petrograd. Interesting as I found her, I was nevertheless thrilled with excitement when a servant announced the arrival of Rasputine. Before his entrance the Grand Duchess said to me: “Do not be astonished if I greet him peasant fashion,” that is, with three kisses on the cheek. She did so greet him and then she presented us to each other. I saw an elderly peasant, thin, with a pale face, long hair, an uncared-for beard, and the most extraordinary eyes, large, light, brilliant, and apparently capable of seeing into the very mind and soul of the person with whom he held converse. He wore a long peasant coat, black and rather shabby from hard wear and much travel. We talked and the Grand Duchess, speaking in French, bade me ask him to pray for some special desire of mine. Timidly I begged him to pray that God would permit me to spend my whole life serving their Majesties. To this he replied: “Your whole life will be thus spent.” We parted then, but shortly afterwards, just before my wedding day, when my heart was in a tumult of doubt and anxiety, I wrote to the Grand Duchess Peter and asked her to seek Rasputine’s counsel in my behalf. His word to me was that I would marry as I had planned but that I should not find happiness in my marriage. It will be seen how little I regarded him as a prophet at this time since I paid no attention to his warning. A full year after my marriage I saw Rasputine for the second time. It was on a train going from Petrograd to Tsarskoe Selo, he being on his way there to visit friends who were in no way connected with the Court.

But, asks the bewildered reader, when and how did Rasputine acquire the dreadful, almost unprintable reputation which classes him with the arch-fiend himself? To answer the question satisfactorily I should have to reveal at great length the strangely abnormal and hysterical mentality of the Russian people of that epoch. I shall try to do this as I go farther, but here I shall give, as a sort of illustration of the lunacy of the hour, a little experience of my own. It was on the first occasion after my arrest by Kerensky in the spring of 1917, when I was brought before the High Commission of Justice of the Provisional Government. Weak and ill from my long imprisonment in the gloomy Fortress of Peter and Paul, I found myself facing an imposing group of something like forty judges, all learned in the law and clothed in such dignity of office that I gazed at them in a kind of awe. In my distracted mind I asked myself what questions these grave magistrates would ask me, and in what profound language would their questions be clothed. My heart almost stopped beating while I waited for the words of the chief judge. And this is what was said, in a deep and solemn voice: “Tell me, who was it at Court that Rasputine called a flower?” Sheer amazement held me speechless, but even had I been given time I could not have answered the question because there was no such person. The judges whispered together for a moment and then the same man, handing me a piece of cardboard, demanded impressively: “What is the meaning of this secret card which was found in your house by the soldiers?”

I took the piece of cardboard and almost instantly recognized it as a menu card of the yacht Standert, dated 1908. On the reverse side were written the names of war vessels present at that date at a naval review held near Kronstadt, Russian vessels all, among which the position of the Imperial yacht was marked by a crown. I handed the menu card back to the judge saying merely: “Look at it, and look at the date.” He looked at it and in some confusion muttered: “It is true.” One more question those giant intellects found to ask me. “Is it a fact that the Empress could not live without you?” To which I replied as any sensible person would have done: “Why should a happy wife and mother be unable to live without a mere friend?” The inquiry was then hastily closed and I was ordered back to prison, to be watched more closely than ever, because I would not answer to judgment.

This is a perfectly fair sample of the madness and confusion of the Russian mind, or rather the Petrograd mind, before and after the Revolution. That this madness, this unreasoning mania for the destruction of all institutions might have something to justify itself in the public mind, it was absolutely necessary to find and to persecute individuals who typified, in popular imagination, the things which were so bitterly hated. Rasputine, more than any one other individual in the Empire, did typify old and unpopular institutions, and I can readily see why some intelligent and fair-minded persons thus accepted him. Dillon, for example, in his book, “The Eclipse of Russia,” says: “It is my belief that although his friends were influential Rasputine was a symbol.”

Russia, like eighteenth-century France, passed through a period of acute insanity from which it is only now beginning to emerge in remorse and pain. This insanity was by no means confined to the ranks of the so-called Revolutionists. It pervaded the Duma, the highest ranks of society, Royalty itself, all as guilty of Russia’s ruin as the most blood-thirsty terrorist. What had happened in these dark years between 1917 and 1923 is simply the punishment of God for the sins of a whole people. When His avenging hand has so plainly been laid upon all of the Russian people how dare any of us lay the calamity entirely at the doors of the Bolsheviki? We Russians look on the appalling condition of our once great country, we behold the famishing millions on the Volga and in the Ukraine, we count the fearful roll of the murdered, the imprisoned, the exiled, and we cry weakly that the Tsar was guilty, Rasputine was guilty, this man and that woman were guilty, but never do we admit that we were all guilty, guilty of blackest treason to our God, our Emperor, our country. Yet not until we cease to accuse others and repent our own sins will the white dawn of God’s mercy rise over the starved and barren desert that was once mighty Russia.

Rasputine, it seems to be generally assumed, having been introduced to the Imperial Family, took up his residence in the palace of the Romanoffs and thereafter held in his hands the reins of government. Those who do not literally believe this are nevertheless persuaded that Rasputine lived very near their Majesties, saw them constantly, was consulted and obeyed by the Ministers, and with the aid and connivance of adoring women attached to the Court, ruled by fear and superstition the whole governing class of the Empire. If I denied that Rasputine ever lived at Court, ever had the smallest influence over governmental policies, ever ruled through adoring and superstitious women, I should not hope to be believed. I will then simply call attention to the fact that every move of Rasputine from the hour when he began to frequent the palaces of the Grand Dukes, especially from the day he met the Emperor and Empress in the drawing room of the Grand Duchess Melitza, to the midnight when he met his death in the Yusupoff Palace on the Moika Canal in Petrograd, is a matter of the most minute police record. The police know how many days of each year Rasputine spent in Petrograd and how much of his time was lived in Siberia. They know exactly how many times he called at the palace at Tsarskoe Selo, how long he stayed and who was present. They know when and under exactly the circumstances Rasputine came to my house, and who else came to the house at the same time. The police know more about Rasputine than all the journalists and the historians put together, and their records show that he spent most of his time in Siberia, and that when he visited Petrograd he lived in rather humble lodgings in an unfashionable street, 54 Gorochovaia. Rasputine never lived in the palace, seldom visited it, saw the Emperor less frequently than the Empress, and had among the women of the Court more enemies than friends.