Who Was Rasputin?

Rasputin was actually born as Grigori Efimovich and he lived from 1871-1916. Rasputin was only a nickname, it means 'the debauched one'.
He was famous for being the confidant and adviser to the Tsaress Alexandra, who was the wife of nNcholas ll, the last Tsar of Russia.
The eldest son of Nicholas and Alexandra, Alexis, was a hemophiliac and Rasputin apparently saved his life twice, which made Alexandra think that he was some kind of divine mystic. When Russia joined the First World War, Nicholas ll went to join his troops at the front. This left Rasputin in a powerful position at his Court. However, he was murdered in December 1916, by a group of nobles who were angry at the influence rasputin held over Alexandra.
Rasputin is often referred to as a monk, but in fact he was not. He had no religious training at all, although he had spent some time in a somewhat unusual monastery which believed that only through sinning could you repent. Rasputin appeared to have many sins he needed to repent and consequently embraced a life which was quite sinful... in order to repent presumably.

Rasputin was a hard man to kill.  This man was poisoned with cyanide with enough to kill 12 full grown men; he was shot more than 3 times; he was clubbed, beaten & kicked with steel-toed boots for 20 minutes; then after this he crawled into a river and eventually drowned underneath the ice (although he DID try to claw himself out).  But after being poisoned, shot, and beaten -- drowning was what killed him.  I believe there was a previous attempt on his life as well when a prostitute sliced him open.

He was a man that had a big influence on the lives of Russians.