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Strangest Deaths Ever
#1 Ra-Ra-Rasputin
If you were a child in the 90s, you'll have seen Anastasia, so you know who Rasputin was. What you might not know is that this guy was just as hard to kill in real life as he was in the movie. Now, since the eyewitness accounts vary, we can never be absolutely certain as to what happened, but the commonly accepted story is this: worried about Rasputin's influence over Tsarina Alexandra, members of the extended Romanov family potted to off him using cyanide. However, after consuming the pastries and wine containing the poison (supposedly enough to kill five men), Rasputin was still kicking. So they shot him and left him for dead in the living room. But when they came back in to check on him, he was STILL alive. So they shot him again (either two or three more times). And bludgeoned him with a rubber clubbed. And bound him and wrapped him in a sheet and dumped him in the river. And when his body was pulled from the river two days later, it revealed that he had somehow managed to free one of his arms.
#2 Moon River
Li Bai was a major Chinese poet of the Tang dynasty poetry period, and his, er, poetic death is a well-known legend in Chinese culture. The story says that Li Bai drowned after falling out of his boat on the Yangtze River while trying to - get this - embrace. the reflection. of the moon. Yeah.
#3 Dinner OD
King Adolf Frederick of Sweden's last meal consisted of lobster, caviar, sauerkraut, kippers, and champagne, plus 14 servings of his favorite dessert, semla (buns in a bowl of warm milk.) We mention this because it was his last meal that killed him. He is known in Sweden as "the king who ate himself to death."
#4 You Must Acquit
The case went something like this: Ohio, 1871. A man was shot and killed in a bar fight. The defendant's attorney, Clement Vallandigham, argued that the victim had actually killed himself while trying to draw his pistol from his pocket while in a kneeling position.To prove the plausibility, he demonstrated this act to the jury, grabbing a gun he believed to be unloaded. He killed himself in the process, and in doing so, proved his own point. The defendant, Thomas McGehan, was acquitted.
#5 Death by Irony
Garry Hoy, a Toronto lawyer, had a habit of demonstrating the unbreakability of the glass in the Toronto-Dominion Centre by throwing himself against it. While the stunt proved successful every other time, this one particular day, the glass gave, and Hoy fell 24 stories to his death. It should be noted that the glass did not in fact break (well, except for when it hit the ground) but rather it popped out of its frame. So really, Hoy was right.
#6 Saw VIII
You may remember this one. Quick recap: pizza man, insane plot, bomb collar, bank robbery. Longer recap: in August 2003, Brian Douglas Wells, a pizza delivery man, was killed by a time bomb fastened around his neck after he was apprehended trying to rob a bank. Wells claimed that while he was on a delivery, three people forced a bomb-collar on him, gave him a homemade shotgun, and gave him a list of tasks to complete (the first of which was the bank robbery). However, it turns out that Wells was actually in on the plot, but he did think the bomb would be real. Insult to injury #1. Police figured out that the list of tasks Wells was given could not have been completed before the bomb went off anyway. Insult to injury #3. Oh and the whole purpose behind this half-baked, straight-outta-an-episode-of-Bones, scavenger-hunt-of-death was so a prostitute would have money to pay someone to kill her father so she could collect an inheritance. A) The amount Wells stole was nowhere need the cost of a hitman and B) the would-be inheritance was pretty much already gone. Insult to injury #3.
#7 Fatal Hilarity
Although it seems like a gimmick in a Comedy Central commercial, "death by laughter" is actually something that happens. One of the most well-known instances is that of Chrysuppus, a Greek philosopher who died c. 206 BC. (This is the guy you have to thank for all those logic questions on the SATs.) Story goes that a drunken Chryssuppus saw a donkey eating some figs, thought this was the most hilarious thing ever, and died laughing. That's it. That's the story.
#8 Curse of the Mummy's Tomb
A few months after opening the tomb, Carnarvon died, most likely due to blood poisoning from a mosquito bite that became infected with erysipelas when the Lord cut the bite with a razor while shaving. So to be fair, this death has a legitimate explanation...but that explanation is so unusual that you have to wonder.
#9 Dance Till You Drop
Believe it or not, "dancing mania" is a thing. A thing that is not a Wii game. The Dancing Plague of 1518 occurred in what is now eastern France and is the most notable example of a form of mass hysteria in which people literally dance for literally days until they literally die. There is no agreed-upon medical explanation.
#10 My Goodness, My Guinness!
You might think a flood of beer sounds awesome. You'd be right in the literal sense, but a more apt adjective might be "terrifying." In 1814, a huge vat of beer at the Meux and Company brewery in London ruptured, which cause a domino effect on the other vats.Over 323,000 gallons of beer flooded the brewery and surrounding areas, destroying two homes and claiming the lives of at least seven people.
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