What was the fate of Matryona, the beloved daughter of the “elder” Grigory Rasputin

Grigory Rasputin was a controversial personality, and even a hundred years after his death, debates about his person continue. Some consider the favorite of the imperial family to be a holy elder-seer, while others see him as a clever and arrogant charlatan. At the same time, when discussing Rasputin, his family is rarely mentioned. Few people know that Grigory Efimovich was a father of many children. Of the 7 children of the “elder”, only three survived to adulthood: Dmitry, Varvara and Matryona. It is about Matryona Grigorievna that we want to talk today, because this woman had a particularly interesting fate.

Grigory Rasputin married a simple peasant woman, Praskovya Dubrovina, in 1887. As was common among the people at that time, offspring began to appear in the family one after another. Only three of the children of Gregory and Praskovya survived childhood - the rest were taken away by illness.

Especially for his family, Rasputin built a spacious two-story house in the village of Pokrovskoye. Having arranged the life of his wife and children, he immediately set off to wander. After this, Grigory Efimovich was rarely seen at home. But when he appeared, he brought many gifts and substantial sums of money. On one of these visits, he told his wife that he wanted to take the children to St. Petersburg.

Praskovya never contradicted her wife, so she agreed to let her son and daughters go with their father. But Dmitry did not want to go, and Rasputin went to the capital with Varvara and Matryona. At that time, the “elder” was already an influential person and the trip was as comfortable as possible. Later, Matryona, who was only 10 years old at the time, enthusiastically recalled the luxury carriage and the unprecedented dishes they were treated to along the way.

A fabulous life awaited girls from a Siberian village in St. Petersburg. Receptions, theaters, generous gifts from dad's friends - it all took a long time to get used to. Rasputin wanted his daughters to become real aristocrats. But at the same time, he wanted to protect them from the corrupting influence of high society.

Varvara and Matryona went to the theater only with their father’s friends, and at 10 p.m. they had to return home. In her memoirs, Matryona Rasputina wrote:

Not everyone was happy with the company of village girls. Behind their backs, Matryona and Varvara were actively discussed and ridiculed for being overweight and lacking manners. But in the emperor’s family, Rasputin’s daughters were treated very warmly. Matryona recalled with delight the first dinner in the family of Nicholas II and meeting Empress Alexandra Feodorovna and the children. Later, the royal daughters became Matryona’s friends, and the empress replaced her mother in difficult life moments.

Over time, Rasputin's influence on the emperor grew and many did not like it. A circle of people began to form who wanted the physical elimination of the “old man.” Several attempts were made on Grigory Efimovich’s life and he miraculously managed to escape death. Some of the conspirators tried to ingratiate themselves with Matryona in order to get closer to her father. Some even confessed their love to her, but, having received a refusal, immediately disappeared.

One day, on the train, Matryona was approached by a man who introduced himself as journalist Davidson. He inspired trust, and the girl had a nice conversation with him all the way. Later it turned out that this was one of the conspirators and he used the information received to prepare the murder of Rasputin. That time, Khionia Guseva tracked down Grigory Efimovich on the pier in Pokrovsky and stabbed him in the stomach. The wound turned out to be non-fatal, and Rasputin quickly recovered. This incident forced Matryona to become extremely cautious and distrustful.

The assassination attempt, which almost became successful, greatly influenced Grigory Efimovich. He began drinking heavily and showing signs of paranoia. The daughters carefully looked after their father, without leaving a single step from him. One evening, Rasputin gave Matryona an envelope and told her to open it only if something happened to him. And three days before his death, he deposited a large sum of money in the bank in the name of his daughters.

On December 16, 1916, Grigory Efimovich Rasputin was killed in the basement of the house of Prince Felix Yusupov. His mutilated body was found in the Neva under the Petrovsky Bridge. Matryona came to the morgue for identification.

The trials for Rasputin's daughters did not end there. Soon the February Revolution occurred and Nicholas II abdicated the throne. The money left by the father miraculously disappeared from the bank account, and influential friends of the family disappeared somewhere. Matryona was summoned several times for questioning about her father. They were conducted by some soldiers, who were most interested in whether the “elder” was in an intimate relationship with the queen.

Having survived all these shocks, Matryona took her sister Varvara and returned to Siberia. Just before the October Revolution, she married officer Boris Solovyov. He was a passionate monarchist and even tried to save the family of Nicholas II from Siberian exile. This was not a marriage of loving people - the couple got together rather because of a common outlook on life and the need to support each other.

The couple had a daughter, Tatyana, and the couple decided to leave troubled and dangerous Russia for Europe. There they had a second daughter, who was named Maria. As it turned out, escaping abroad saved Matryona’s life. Her sister, who remained at home, died of typhus, and her brother and family were exiled to the north, where they all faced death from cold and dysentery.

Life in exile was not easy. Matryona and Boris settled in Paris, where they opened a small restaurant serving Russian cuisine. But their clients were mostly poor migrants who ate their meals on credit. Soon their business went bankrupt. After this failure, Boris fell ill with tuberculosis and died in 1924. Matryona was left alone in a foreign country, with two children and no means of support. In order to somehow make ends meet, the woman worked as a governess in rich families.

The killer of Grigory Rasputin, Felix Yusupov, also lived in Paris. But unlike his victim’s daughter, he was not in poverty. The prince opened the IRFE fashion house and devoted his free time to writing books. In one of them, he described in detail and cynically the murder of Rasputin.

The publication of this book, which immediately became popular, deeply shocked Matryona. She sued Yusupov, demanding compensation for moral damage. This case caused a great stir among Russian-speaking migrants. The woman counted on the support of society, but the majority turned out to be on Yusupov’s side. The trial took place, and Matryona lost it. Her father's murder was considered political, and since it took place in another country, it was considered outside French jurisdiction.

Due to financial difficulties, Matryona had to get a job dancing in a cabaret. The dance lessons received before the revolution in Russia came in handy. During one of the performances, she was noticed by a circus entrepreneur from Britain. He invited the woman to work in the circus, promising a good salary. “If you enter a cage with lions, I’ll hire you,” he told Matryona. She crossed herself and entered. Thus began the career of predator trainer Matryona Rasputina.

Her performances were a huge success. Everyone wanted to see how the daughter of the legendary “elder” pacifies lions and tigers with “Rasputin’s gaze.” On the posters they wrote things that were terrible for Matryona: “Marie Rasputin, daughter of a mad monk, famous for her exploits in Russia.” But working in the circus finally allowed me to start a normal life and get my daughters back on their feet.

With the British circus, Matryona traveled almost the whole world. The trainer made a brilliant career and, it seemed, life was getting better. But one day, while on tour in Peru, Rasputin was attacked by a polar bear. The injuries were too severe and the woman had to leave the circus. Financial problems started again. To feed seven. Matryona worked as a riveter at a shipyard, and after World War II as a worker at defense factories.

After retiring, Rasputina worked as a nurse and nanny, and also gave Russian language lessons. At the same time, she was writing a book about her father, in which she sought to tell the truth about his life and death. Her work was published only years after her death. In 1999, the book “Rasputin. Why?" was first published in Russian.

Matryona Grigorievna Rasputina died in 1977 at the age of 79. Her descendants live in the West, but sometimes come to the homeland of their famous ancestor. The great-granddaughter of Grigory Rasputin Laurence Io-Solovieva is a particularly frequent visitor to Russia. The woman is interested in the history of her family and Orthodoxy. She says she feels a strong connection with the Russian people.