Rasputin and the Russian Revolution

by Princess Catherine Radziwill

“As a faithful and devoted son of our Holy Orthodox Church, I consider it my painful duty to mention once more what has already been discussed here, by so many orators better than myself, and to recur to a subject which is at present talked of at the corner of every street, in every town and in every village, no matter how distant and how far from any civilised centre in our vast Empire. We find ourselves compelled to look upon this unexplainable influence of a common adventurer, belonging to the worst type of those sectarians, whom until now we have known by the name of Khlystys, and despised accordingly. We are obliged to reckon with this influence of a man upon whom all the sane elements in our society look with contempt.”

On that same day another deputy belonging to the group of Ultra-Conservatives, Prince Mansyreff, also spoke about Rasputin, with perhaps even more energy than any one had ever done before in the Duma. Said the Prince:

“The adventure of Illiodore ended in ridicule, but we have now in his place another adventurer, with the personality of whom are connected the most nefarious and disgusting rumours, the most unnatural and contemptible crimes. It is useless to mention his name; every one knows who he is, and of whom I am talking. He has been let loose on our society to acquire some influence over it, by men even more shameless than he is himself; he has been used to terrorise all those who have dared to express their opinions against the currents which prevail at present in our administrative circles. This adventurer, whenever he travels and whenever he arrives in St. Petersburg, is met at the railway station by the highest dignitaries of the church; before him pray, as they would do to God, unfortunate hysterical ladies of the highest social circles. This individual, who only seeks the satisfaction of the lowest instinct of a low nature, has introduced himself into the very heart of our country and of our society, and we find and feel everywhere his disgusting and filthy influence.”

A few days after this memorable sitting of the Duma the Government issued instructions to the press never to mention Rasputin’s name or to speak of any subject connected with him in the newspapers. As soon as this became known the Octobrists put down on the order of the day in the Duma an interpellation on the matter, and Mr. Goutschkoff in moving it exclaimed:

“Dark and dangerous days have arrived, and the conscience of the Russian nation has been deeply moved by the events of the last few months, and is protesting against the appearance amongst us of symptoms proving that we are returning to the darkest periods of the middle ages. It has cried out that things are going wrong in our State, and that danger threatens our most holy national ideals.”

Prince Lvoff seconded the motion, and asked the Government to explain who was this “strange personality who had been taken under the special protection of the administration, who was considered as too sacred to be subjected to the criticism of the press, and who had been put upon such a pedestal that no one was allowed to touch or even to approach him.”

I would not have quoted these speeches but for the fact that they all bore on the same point, the one that I have tried to make clear to the mind of my readers. This point is that the danger which Rasputin undoubtedly personified in Russian society at large did not proceed from his own personality, but from the character of the men who surrounded him, who had made out of him their tool and who were trying through him to rule Russia and to push it into the arms of Germany. There is no doubt that Germany had been carefully following all the phases of the drama which culminated in the assassination of the “Prophet” and had been helping by her subsidies the underhand and mysterious work of men like Mr. Manassevitsch-Maniuloff and his satellites, and like Mr. Sturmer. Sturmer believed quite earnestly that he would secure immortality for his name and for his work if he contrived to conclude a peace which every one knew that Russia required, but which no one except himself and the adventurers to whom he owed his elevation thought of making except in concert with Russia’s Allies, and only after Germany had been compelled to accept the conditions of her adversaries.

The whole Rasputin affair was nothing but a German intrigue which aimed at discrediting the dynasty and perhaps even at overthrowing the sovereign from his throne.

Thanks to the infernal cunning of the people who were its leaders, the Imperial circle and even some of the Imperial family were represented as being entirely under the “Prophet’s” influence. And thanks to the solitary existence which the Emperor and Empress were leading, and to the small number of people who were allowed to see them, these rumours gained ground, for the simple reason that there existed no one capable of contradicting them or of pointing out their absurdity. Calumnies as stupid as they were degrading to the authors of them were set in circulation, and the revolutionary movement which Germany had been fomenting grew stronger and stronger every day, until it reached the lower classes. These classes by a kind of miracle were also kept very well informed as to everything that was connected with Rasputin or with the subterranean work performed by his party, a work which tended to only make the House of Romanoff unpopular, and to represent it as incapable of taking to heart the interest of the country over which it reigned.

If we consider who were the people at the side of the “Prophet,” and who inspired all his actions as well as his utterances we find police agents, adventurers who had been sometimes in prison, and sometimes in exile; functionaries eager to obtain some fat sinecure in which they might do nothing and earn a great deal; stock exchange speculators of doubtful morality and still more doubtful honesty; women of low character and army purveyors, mixed up with an innumerable number of spies. Most of these last were in the German service and were working for all that they were worth to bring about some palace conspiracy or some popular movement capable of removing from his throne a Czar whose honesty and straightforwardness of character precluded the possibility of Russia betraying the trust which her Allies had put in her.