Kaspar Hauser is the mystery of the century. Secret planet

The mystery of the life and death of Kaspar Hauser?

At the place where he tragically died, a monument was erected, on which the inscription in Latin is engraved: “Here an unknown person was killed by an unknown person.” “The Hauser Case,” which included testimonies of officials, experts and simply eyewitnesses, amounted to 49 volumes, but in history he forever remained a “European orphan.”

1828, summer - the local burgomaster, Mr. Jacob Binder, placed an advertisement in the newspapers of the city of Nuremberg. It asked those who knew anything about the kidnapping of a child between 1810 and 1814 to respond. This article was reprinted by the entire German press, and then spread to all foreign newspapers. In Europe they began to talk about a mysterious teenager. Sensationalist journalists dubbed him a “European orphan.”

The case was extremely curious. 1828, spring - a young man dressed in rags appeared in Nuremberg. He walked through the city with an unsteady gait, holding onto the walls of the houses. At the police station where the unknown man was taken, they could not get anything out of him except indistinct muttering. He behaved like a child, but looked about 16 years old. He probably saw fire up close for the first time, since he immediately burned himself on the flame of a candle, trying to touch it with his bare hand.

When the young man was given a piece of paper and a pencil, he was able to scribble only two words in unsteady childish handwriting: Kaspar Hauser. Most likely it was his name. The young man responded to all requests to write at least something else with a complete lack of understanding of what they wanted from him. When he tried to continue the questions, he simply burst into tears. As far as the police could judge, the detainee behaved absolutely sincerely, so their initial suspicions that he was playing an idiot for some secret purpose were not confirmed.

Subsequently, Kaspar Hauser faced more than one examination. It turned out, for example, that he could see perfectly in the dark and had a very subtle sense of smell. His stomach only accepted bread and water. The soles and palms were tender and soft. Doctors, examining Kaspar’s body, made interesting discovery– traces of the vaccination were visible on the young man’s body, and in those years this was a rarity, the privilege of aristocrats.

The news about the strange young man spread very quickly. At first the whole city took part in his fate, and then the whole of Germany. The mayor of Nuremberg himself instructed the gymnasium teacher Georg Daumer to give the boy lessons every day.

As Kaspar Hauser adapted, he learned to connect with people mutual language. After repeated questioning, he finally told the story of his misadventures more or less coherently. From the little that he remembered, it could be concluded that his life was spent in some kind of basement with an earthen floor and a small window through which almost no light penetrated.

He slept on straw. When I woke up, I always found a mug of water and a piece of bread next to me. His only clothing was pants and a shirt; he had no shoes at all. Every few days he was visited by a “black man,” whose face he could not see, since it was hidden by a mask. Gradually this man taught him to write the words “Kaspar Hauser” and to somehow walk. Then he led us through the forests to Nuremberg and, pointing to the city, ordered us to go to the “big village”, and he left. That's all, actually.

The more details emerged in this incredible story, the more mysterious she seemed. In those days, this kind of mystery could only be explained by serious political reasons. The president of the Royal Court of Justice in Ansbach, a prominent German criminologist Paul von Feuerbach, became seriously interested in the case of Kaspar Hauser. As a result of the investigation he carried out, Hauser's sincerity was proven.

Version o noble origin teenage boy acquired new confirmation. Only the high birth of the “prisoner” could explain such careful observance of secrecy. Europe of that era was no less greedy for sensations than modern society.

Many versions of the young man’s origin immediately appeared. The most famous of them is the one according to which Kaspar Hauser is the son of Stephanie de Beauharnais, Grand Duchess of Baden. After all, then Kaspar could call him his grandfather.

Feuerbach was also a supporter of this version. 1832, on January 4, he wrote in his diary: “I discovered that Kaspar Hauser by birth is probably the prince of the royal House of Baden...” The criminologist outlined all his considerations in a secret memorandum, which he sent to Princess Caroline of Baden von Bayern.

If Feuerbach's theory is correct, then Kaspar Hauser was born on September 29, 1812 and was the son of the Grand Duke Charles of Baden and his wife Stephanie de Beauharnais. Stephanie de Beauharnais was the cousin of General de Beauharnais, Josephine Bonaparte's first husband.

Bonaparte's desire to become related to European monarchs, thereby strengthening his position on the world political stage, dramatically changed the girl's fate. On her 16th birthday, Stefania was surprised to learn that the emperor was adopting her. At the same time, she received the title of princess, and in addition to it - marriage with the Crown Prince of Baden.

1806, March 4 - a poor orphan, whose father's property was confiscated, became the daughter of the emperor. The Empress taught her a course in a month palace life, and the girl appeared before the future groom. He turned out to be a rather nondescript young man. He made no impression on the pretty Stefania. “He’s even uglier than I expected,” was all the future duchess could whisper. True, this did not stop her from subsequently giving birth to her husband five children.

But it gives me something else to think about. All the girls in the family of Stephanie and Karl were in excellent health, while the boys died in infancy. It would be worth thinking about. But how can an inexperienced French girl compete with a family in which the most sophisticated intrigues have been woven for centuries. Who benefited most from the death of the heirs to the Baden throne?

The fact is that the marriage of the Grand Duke Karl Friedrich, who ruled Baden, was morganatic. The children of Louise Geyer, the Duke's second wife, could not inherit the throne. The only legal heir is the son from his first marriage - Prince Charles, who married Stephanie, and subsequently his children. There were rumors that the Duchess was ready to do anything to secure the throne for her children.

The overthrow of Napoleon deprived Stefania of any hope of protection. Her first son, born on September 29, 1812, grew up as a perfectly healthy child, but suddenly, overnight, he caught a cold and died. It should be noted that, according to Feuerbach, the direct heir to the throne of Baden was secretly abducted and replaced by a dying child, whose death was reported some time later. Another son also died suddenly at the age of one. The son of Countess Hogsberg (a title granted by the Grand Duke to his wife) ascended the throne of Baden - and then the Nuremberg foundling suddenly appears.

Kaspar Hauser's life in Nuremberg was quiet and calm. Living with Professor Daumer, he practically did not communicate with anyone, becoming addicted to growing flowers. A little more, and the “European orphan” would have begun to be forgotten, but in 1829 the first attempt was made on his life. The man, “whose face was black, as if covered with soot,” struck the young man on the head and disappeared. The investigation was unsuccessful.

As Feuerbach wrote: “All levels, all heights and depths cannot be reached by the hand of civil justice due to the boundaries beyond which the investigation is forced to stop.” After the unsuccessful assassination attempt, King Ludwig I of Bavaria ordered permanent guards to be assigned to the young man. This fact gave reason to assume that Kaspar may be the heir to some European throne.

Strange events continued to occur around Hauser. At the end of 1831, a certain Lord Stanhope suddenly announced that he would take care of his education and, for this purpose, intended to take the young man to Britain and even adopt him. The municipality of Nuremberg, which paid for the boy’s upkeep for 3 years, readily agreed to transfer the “European orphan” to the Englishman’s care.

But Stanhope limited himself to transferring Caspar to the neighboring city of Ansbach, where he placed him in a boarding school under the tutelage of a teacher named Meyer. There was no more talk about traveling to England or adoption. After some time, Lord Philip Henry IV tried to take Hauser to England. As a result, the local authorities became alarmed and sent a secret dispatch to Ludwig I, which stated that "Kaspar Hauser is the rightful heir to one of the thrones of Europe and has been placed in prison to enable another to seize the throne."

Who Kaspar Hauser really was has always remained a mystery. 1833, December 14 - he returned home covered in blood with a huge stab wound in his chest. “He killed me...” was all the young man could say. The words turned out to be prophetic. Three days later he died.

The young man wanted to know at least something about his origin so much that he agreed to go to the city park at night on a date with absolutely stranger. All he had to do was promise to give him some information about his parents. Instead of the long-awaited information, the young man received a blow with a dagger. Duke Ludwig of Bavaria placed 1,000 ducats on the head of the murderer Kaspar Hauser. This step immediately aroused the curiosity of the European public: perhaps we're talking about about the murdered heir to the throne?

49 volumes of the criminal case could not shed light on either the mysterious life or the even more mysterious death of the “European orphan.” More than 2,000 articles and books are devoted to his fate, and even Paul Verlaine dedicated poetry to him. None of the Grand Dukes of Baden received such an honor.

The story of Kaspar Hauser is one of the most romantic in history. European history. It reminds me of the story "". Thousands of tourists flock to Ansbach, where Kaspar Hauser Days have recently been established. Surprisingly, the mysteries around this name are only multiplying.

On the grave of the strange young man there was an inscription carved: “Here lies the mystery of the century. His birth was shrouded in mystery, and his death was also mysterious.” Recently it turned out that the grave of the legendary Ansbacher is empty. There is information that the body was stolen almost immediately after the funeral. But this fact did not at all reduce the flow of tourists. On the contrary, the mysterious story of the life and death of Kaspar Hauser continues to arouse great interest.

On May 26, 1828, a strange young man appeared on Nuremberg Town Hall Square. Dressed in rags, he walked as if he had recently learned to walk. Attempts to question the boy were futile. He could only utter the phrases: “I don’t know” and “I want to be a cavalryman, like my father.”

This strange young man had with him a letter stating that the boy was a foundling. For a long time he lived in the family of a poor day laborer. His name is Kaspar Hauser.

No one knew about his existence, and the boy himself did not see him while growing up white light. The letter also stated that Kaspar was born on April 30, 1812. His father died, and his mother was unable to raise her son.

It was clear from the letter that the day laborer who had sheltered the foundling, due to some circumstances, simply decided to get rid of him. He led the weakened boy to the city and disappeared from his life forever.

The foundling was taken to the police, where he was interrogated for several hours. But the 16-year-old boy behaved like a child: he constantly cried and answered “I don’t know!” to everything. The police, because they suspected that the young man was lying, sent him to prison, where the head of the prison, Andreas Hitlel, took him under his wing.

Hitlel was very kind to the boy, he sincerely believed him. The warden began training the foundling. Kaspar learned quickly and soon learned to walk confidently.

The doctor who examined the boy at the insistence of the city court made his conclusion: “This man is neither crazy nor stupid. But he was clearly forcibly deprived of all human and social education.”

Examinations of the body and study of the teenager’s psyche led the doctor to conclude that throughout for long years the child was in a tiny confined space in which it was impossible even to stand up or lie down full height. Moreover, the boy obviously did not see daylight. He couldn’t really talk or walk and lived completely alone.

Suddenly Kaspar Hauser becomes very famous, he has influential trustees. And the Bavarian king even appointed a prize of 10,000 guilders to the one who would reveal the secret of the foundling. Rumors began to circulate throughout Germany: Kaspar was born as a result of an illicit relationship; is he the son of a clergyman or noble lady; the foundling is a victim of some intrigue over an inheritance.

Kaspar comes into the care of famous philosopher Friedrich Daumer, who during the entire time the boy was with him, became very attached to him and considered him a friend.

And finally, Kaspar’s normal life is disrupted by a strange incident. One day, an unknown person stabbed the young man in the head with a sharp object. After which he was sent to the house of the municipal head Johann Bieberbach, where he was under guard. But there, too, an extremely unusual incident occurred: a gun fired from a gun hanging on the wall!

The result is another move. The new patron, the English aristocrat Lord Stanhope, does not have warm feelings for his ward, but, on the contrary, forces him to lie and play the fool. He did everything to prove the low origin of the foundling.

Soon another move, already to Ansbach to the shoemaker Johann Gregor Meyer, who also did not favor the guest and even beat him.

Suddenly, Hauser receives a letter from an unknown person, informing him that someone wants to reveal the secret of his origin! On December 14, 1833, filled with conflicting feelings, Kaspar runs to the palace garden to meet with unknown person. But instead of confessing, he is stabbed four times. Three days later, Kaspar Hauser died in the same environment in which he was born, where no one needed him.

On January 4, 1832, Anselm Ritter von Feuerbach wrote in his diary: “I have discovered that Kaspar Hauser by birth is probably a prince of the royal House of Baden.” Feuerbach came to this conclusion after studying the history of the oldest German royal families.

It is known that the child of Grand Duke Charles and his wife Stephanie died three weeks after his birth. Although the child was completely healthy at birth, at some point his condition deteriorated sharply. It is interesting that neither the prince’s nanny nor his mother were allowed close to the sickly child. In turn, Countess von Hochberg had constant access to the nursery.

This information suggests that perhaps the prince was replaced with a dying baby. The suspect is considered to be the same Countess von Hochberg, who wanted to see her son on the throne. Naturally, the main obstacle to the fulfillment of her desires was the prince born in marriage.

It is worth noting that Feuerbach was poisoned after the countess was exposed. Many believed that he was dealt with in this way for the truth.

Indeed, the birth dates of Kaspar Hauser and the Crown Prince coincide. Historians also found out that the Blochmann family, who worked for the countess, had a son at the same time. But, by a strange coincidence, in the parish register there is no date of death next to the date of birth.

Although there is a postscript: “On November 27 (1833)... Caspar Ernst Blochmann, soldier of the Royal Hellenic Corps, son of Christoph Blochmann, a judicial minister... died in Munich.” But it has been officially proven that this postscript is a complete lie and has no documentary evidence.

The place where Kaspar Hauser was imprisoned was called Beuggen Castle near Laufenberg in the Upper Rhine. This was facilitated by a note from a bottle found in the Rhine in 1816: “I am a prisoner in a dungeon near Laufenberg, on the Rhine. He who is on the throne does not know the location of my prison.” Historians believed that she was sent by one of the guards guarding the boy. In addition, Kaspar often remembered some castle and drew a picture similar to the Boiggen family coat of arms.

At the site where Kaspar Hauser was mortally wounded, there is a monument with the inscription: “Here, unknown who was killed by unknown whom.” Indeed, his whole life is a complete mystery. His birth and death amazingly were so similar: mysterious and tragic. Who was he really, and why did fate treat him so cruelly? Kaspar himself probably asked himself these questions more than once, but he never found out the answers.

In the summer of 1828, an advertisement was placed in the newspapers of the city of Nuremberg by the local burgomaster, Mr. Jacob Binder. In it, he asked those who knew anything about the abduction of a child between 1810 and 1814 to respond. This article was reprinted by the entire German press, followed by many foreign newspapers. In Europe they started talking about a mysterious teenager. Sensation-hungry journalists dubbed him a “European orphan.” The case was extremely interesting. In the spring of 1828, a young man dressed in rags appeared in Nuremberg. He walked through the city with an unsteady gait, holding onto the walls of houses. At the police station where the unknown man was taken, they could not get anything out of him except indistinct muttering. He behaved like a child, but looked about sixteen years old. Apparently, he saw fire up close for the first time, since he immediately burned himself on the flame of a candle when he tried to touch it with his bare hand. When the young man was given a piece of paper and a pencil, he scribbled only two words in unsteady childish handwriting - Kaspar Hauser. Most likely it was his name. The young man responded to all requests to write at least something else with a complete lack of understanding of what they wanted from him. When he tried to continue the questions, he simply burst into tears. As far as the police could judge, the detainee behaved completely sincerely, so their initial suspicions that he was playing an idiot for some secret purpose were not confirmed.

In the future, more than one examination awaited Kaspar. It turned out, for example, that he saw perfectly in the dark and had a very subtle sense of smell. His stomach only accepted bread and water. The soles and palms were tender and soft. Doctors, examining Caspar's body, made an interesting discovery - traces of the vaccine were visible on the young man's body, and in those years this was a rarity, the privilege of aristocrats. The news about the amazing young man spread very quickly. At first the whole city, and then the whole of Germany, took part in his fate. The mayor of Nuremberg himself instructed the gymnasium teacher Georg Daumer to give the boy lessons every day. As Hauser adapted, he learned to connect with people. After repeated questioning, he finally told the story of his misadventures more or less coherently. From the little that he remembered, it could be concluded that his life was spent in some kind of basement with an earthen floor and a small window through which almost no light penetrated.

He slept on straw. When I woke up, I always found a mug of water and a piece of bread next to me. His only clothing was pants and a shirt; he had no shoes at all. Every few days he was visited by a “black man,” whose face he could not see, since it was covered with a mask. Gradually this man taught him to write the words “Kaspar Hauser” and to somehow walk. Then he led him through the forests to Nuremberg and, pointing to the city, ordered him to go to the “big village”, and he left. That's all, actually. The more details emerged in this amazing story, the more mysterious it seemed. At that time, such mystery could only be explained by serious political reasons. The president of the Royal Court of Justice in Ansbach, a prominent German criminologist Paul von Feuerbach, became seriously interested in the case of Kaspar Hauser.

As a result of his investigation, Hauser's sincerity was proven. The hypothesis about the noble origin of the teenage boy acquired new confirmation. Only the high birth of the “prisoner” could explain such careful observance of secrecy. Europe of that time was no less susceptible to sensations than modern society. A lot of versions of the young man’s origin immediately arose. The most famous of them is the one according to which Kaspar Hauser is the son of Stephanie de Beauharnais, Grand Duchess of Baden. Indeed, in this case, Kaspar could call Napoleon Bonaparte his grandfather. Feuerbach was also a supporter of this version. On January 4, 1832, he wrote in his diary: “I discovered that Kaspar Hauser by birth is probably a prince of the royal House of Baden...”. The criminologist outlined all his considerations in a secret memorandum, which he sent to Princess Caroline von Bayern of Baden. If Feuerbach's theory is correct, then Kaspar Hauser was born on September 29, 1812, the son of Grand Duke Charles of Baden and his wife Stephanie de Beauharnais. Stephanie de Beauharnais was the cousin of General de Beauharnais, Josephine Bonaparte's first husband.

Napoleon's desire to become related to European monarchs, thereby strengthening his position on the world political stage, dramatically changed the girl's fate. On her sixteenth birthday, Stefania was surprised to learn that the emperor was adopting her. At the same time, she received the title of princess, and in addition to it, marriage with the Crown Prince of Baden. On March 4, 1806, a poor orphan, whose father's property had been confiscated, became the daughter of the emperor. The Empress taught her a course in palace life for a month, and the girl appeared before her future groom. He turned out to be a very homely young man. He made no impression on the pretty Stefania. “He’s even uglier than I expected,” was all the future duchess could whisper. True, this did not stop her from subsequently giving birth to her husband five children. But it gives me something else to think about.

All the girls in the family of Stephanie and Karl were in excellent health, while the boys died in infancy. It would be worth thinking about. However, how can an inexperienced French girl compete with a family in which the most sophisticated intrigues have been woven for centuries. Who benefited most from the death of the heirs to the Baden throne? The fact is that the marriage of the Grand Duke Karl-Friedrich, who ruled Baden, was morganatic. The children of Louise Geyer, the Duke's second wife, could not inherit the throne. The only legal heir was the son from his first marriage - Prince Charles, who married Stephanie, and subsequently his children. According to rumors, the duchess was ready to do anything to secure the throne for her children. The overthrow of Napoleon deprived Stefania of any hope of protection.

Her first son, born on September 29, 1812, grew up as an absolutely healthy child, but suddenly, overnight, he caught a cold and died. It should be noted that, according to Feuerbach, the direct heir to the Baden throne was secretly abducted and replaced by a dying child, whose death was reported some time later. Another son also died suddenly at the age of one. The son of Countess Hogsberg (a title granted by the Grand Duke to his wife) ascends to the throne of Baden - and then the Nuremberg foundling suddenly appears. Kaspar Hauser's life in Nuremberg was quiet and calm. Living with Professor Daumer, he practically did not communicate with anyone, becoming addicted to growing flowers. A little more, and the “European orphan” would have begun to be forgotten, but in 1829 the first attempt was made on his life. The man, “whose face was black, as if covered with soot,” struck the young man on the head and disappeared. The investigation was unsuccessful. As Feuerbach wrote: “All levels, all heights and depths cannot be reached by the hand of civil justice due to the boundaries beyond which the investigation is forced to stop.”

After the failed assassination attempt, King Ludwig I of Bavaria ordered permanent guards to be assigned to the young man. This fact gave rise to the assumption that Kaspar may be the heir to some European throne. Things kept happening around Hauser mysterious events. At the end of 1831, a certain Lord Stanhope unexpectedly announced that he would take care of his education and, for this purpose, intended to take the young man to England and even adopt him. The municipality of Nuremberg, which had paid for the boy's upkeep for three years, readily agreed to place the "European orphan" in the Englishman's care.

However, Stanhope limited himself to transferring Caspar to the neighboring city of Ansbach, where he placed him in a boarding school under the tutelage of a teacher named Meyer. There was no more talk about traveling to England or adoption. After some time, Lord Philip Henry IV tried to take Hauser to England. As a result, the local authorities became alarmed and sent a secret dispatch to Ludwig I, which stated that "Kaspar Hauser is the rightful heir to one of the thrones of Europe and has been placed in prison to enable another to seize the throne."

Monument to Kaspar Hauser "Child of Europe", old city center of Ansbach, Germany

Who Kaspar Hauser really was will forever remain a mystery. On December 14, 1833, he returned home covered in blood with a huge stab wound in his chest. “He killed me...” was all the young man could say. The words turned out to be prophetic. Three days later he died. The young man so wanted to know at least something about his origin that he agreed to go to a city park at night on a date with a complete stranger. All he had to do was promise to give him some information about his parents. Instead of the long-awaited information, the young man received a blow with a dagger. Duke Ludwig of Bavaria placed a thousand ducats on the head of the murderer Kaspar Hauser. This step immediately aroused the curiosity of the European public: maybe we are talking about the murdered heir to the throne?

Forty-nine volumes of the criminal case could not shed light on any mysterious life, nor to the even more mysterious death of the “European orphan.” More than two thousand articles and books are devoted to his fate, and even Paul Verlaine dedicated poetry to him. None of the Grand Dukes of Baden received such an honor. The story of Kaspar Hauser is one of the most romantic in European history.
It is reminiscent of the story of “a man in iron mask».

Thousands of tourists flock to Ansbach, where Kaspar Hauser Days have recently been established. Surprisingly, the mysteries around this name are only multiplying. On the grave of the mysterious young man there was an inscription carved: “Here lies the mystery of the century. His birth was shrouded in mystery, and his death was also mysterious.” Recently it turned out that the grave of the legendary Ansbacher is empty. There is information that the body was stolen almost immediately after the funeral. But this fact did not at all reduce the flow of tourists. Against, misterious story The life and death of Kaspar Hauser continues to arouse great interest.

This seemingly insignificant event occurred on May 26, 1828 in Nuremberg. In the Old Town, near one of the houses on Unschlitt Square, local shoemaker Georg Weichmann came across an unfamiliar young man who looked somewhat unusual. To say that he was poorly dressed is not enough: he was wrapped in some rags and had no shoes at all.

European orphan

The young man walked hesitantly, leaning on the walls of the houses. Without thinking twice, Weichman escorted him to the nearest police station, where they began to deal with the stranger. What it's not local, it was clear right away, but where did he come from? The young man could not answer anything intelligible to the police’s questions. He spoke like Small child, although outwardly he looked 16 years old. In his pockets there were two letters: one, apparently, from his mother (it said that this was the child of an officer stationed in Nuremberg), the second - from a certain shopkeeper for whom the young man allegedly worked. The police believed neither one nor the other. However, traces of medical vaccinations were found on the young man’s body. IN early XIX century, this indicated that the police were not facing a commoner. The burgomaster of Nuremberg submitted an advertisement to the city newspaper, which was then reprinted by newspapers in many European cities: does anyone know about the kidnapping of a child between 1810 and 1814? No one responded to the ad, but rumors spread across Europe about a mysterious young man nicknamed the European Orphan.

Lived in the basement, slept on straw...

The foundling could not read or write. When he was given a piece of paper and a pencil, he somehow scribbled two words: “Kaspar Hauser.” It was decided that this was his name. When the police tried to continue questioning him about his past, the young man began to cry like a baby. The guards of order abandoned the suspicions that arose at first that the young man was playing an idiot with some secret, evil purpose.

It soon became clear that the “orphan” saw perfectly in the dark and had a dog’s sense of smell. He ate only bread and drank water. The local gymnasium teacher Daumer was assigned to patronize Kaspar, who began giving him lessons in various disciplines.

Kaspar absorbed knowledge like a sponge. Gradually, his speech became legible and meaningful, he learned to read and write, and his memory gradually returned.

Now he was able to tell the teacher that for a long time lived in a darkened basement, slept on straw. During sleep, someone brought him a piece of bread and a mug of water. Sometimes a man in black clothes with his face covered with a mask would come to see him. He taught the young man to write his name. One day he took Kaspar out of the basement and led him through the forest to the walls of Nuremberg. Then, ordering him to go to the city, he disappeared. Kaspar knew nothing more about himself.

Almost all residents of Nuremberg were ready to participate in the fate of the mysterious young man. Soon he acquired a normal human appearance and turned out to be good-natured and sociable, and also very attractive in appearance. But neither he himself nor those around him were haunted by the mystery of his origin. There were a lot of versions on this matter, sometimes quite fantastic.

One day, the famous German criminologist, chief judge of the Ansbach Court of Appeal, Anselm von Feuerbach, became interested in the fate of Caspar. As a result of his painstaking investigation and work in the archives, the hypothesis about Kaspar’s noble origin was confirmed.

Prince of the Blood

The most famous of the versions was the one according to which Kaspar Hauser is the son of the Grand Duchess of Baden. In this case, Caspar could be considered, although not direct, but a relative of Napoleon Bonaparte.

In January 1832, Feuerbach wrote in his diary: “I discovered that Kaspar Hauser by birth is probably the prince of the royal house of Baden...” The criminologist outlined all his considerations in a secret memorandum, which he sent to Princess Caroline of Baden von Bayern. The memorandum said that if Feuerbach is not mistaken, then Kaspar Hauser was born on September 29, 1812 in the family of the Grand Duke of Baden Charles and his wife Stephanie de Beauharnais, the niece of General Beauharnais, the first husband of Josephine Bonaparte.

Napoleon's desire to become related to European monarchs, thereby strengthening his position on the world political stage, dramatically changed the girl's fate. On her 16th birthday, Stefania was surprised to learn that the emperor was adopting her. At the same time, she received the title of princess, and in addition to it, she also received the groom - the Crown Prince of Baden. The Empress taught her short course palace life, and soon the girl appeared before her future groom. The homely young man did not make much of an impression on the pretty Stefania. But this did not stop her from subsequently giving birth to her husband five children: three girls and two boys.

All the daughters of Stephanie and Karl were in excellent health, while the boys died in infancy. It would be worth thinking about this circumstance. But the inexperienced Stefania had no idea that she found herself in the center of sophisticated intrigues.

The fact is that the second marriage of the Grand Duke Karl Friedrich, ruling Baden, with Louise Geyer was morganatic, which is why their children could not inherit the throne. The only legal heir was the son from his first marriage - Prince Charles, who married Stephanie, and subsequently his children. But Louise Geyer dreamed of seeing her children on the throne. Stephanie's first son, born on September 29, 1812, grew up as an absolutely healthy child, but suddenly caught a cold and died immediately, overnight. According to Feuerbach, the direct heir to the Baden throne was secretly abducted and replaced by another, dying child, whose death was announced some time later. Another son died just as suddenly at the age of one. Louise's son Geyer was already ready to ascend the throne of Baden - and then, unexpectedly and inopportunely, the Nuremberg foundling appeared...

Victim of palace intrigue

Living in his teacher's house, Kaspar rarely met people. He became addicted to growing flowers and mastered playing the clavier. Their house was located on the eastern outskirts of the Old Town, not far from the fast Pegnitz River that cuts through the city.

Little by little they began to forget about the European Orphan and left him alone. However, in 1829 an attempt was made on his life. The man, “whose face was black, as if covered with soot,” struck the young man on the head and disappeared. The investigation was unsuccessful. After the assassination attempt, King Ludwig of Bavaria ordered that guards be assigned to the young man, which gave reason to assume that Kaspar was indeed the heir to some European throne.

Meanwhile, mysterious events continued around the young man. At the end of 1831, a certain Lord Stanhope unexpectedly announced that he would educate the young man and, for this purpose, intended to adopt him and take him with him to England. The municipality of Nuremberg, which had been paying for the boy's upkeep for three years, readily agreed to place him in the care of an Englishman.

In Ansbach, on the street where he spent his last years Caspar, a monument was erected to him, on which the European Orphan appears in the form of two figures at once: as he first appeared, dressed in rags, and as he looked at the end of his life - in a frock coat and top hat. At the site of the murder there is a small stele on which is inscribed: “Here an unknown person was killed by an unknown person.”

On May 26, 1828, he was seen on the Nuremberg market square weird teenager, 16-17 years old. He was dressed in peasant dress, but was absolutely helpless, could hardly walk and could hardly speak. More precisely, he could say “I don’t know” and “I want to be a cavalryman, like my father,” but clearly did not understand the meaning of these words. In his hand he had a letter addressed to one of the officers of the regiment stationed in the city, Captain von Wessing. The letter, marked: "from the Bavarian border", was written on behalf of a poor day laborer, burdened big family, to whom the boy was allegedly thrown on October 7, 1812 and by whom he was raised in deep secrecy. Attached to the letter was a note from Houser's mother, which stated that she a poor girl, the boy was born on April 30, 1812, his name is Kaspar, and his father, who served in the cavalry, died.

Kaspar was taken to the police, where it became clear that he lacked an understanding of the most basic things; however, he could write his name. It was clear from his feet that he never wore shoes. He could not eat anything except chl :) and water. They found a handkerchief on him with the mark “K. N." and several sheets of paper with Catholic prayers written on them.

First two months

Hauser spent two months in the city prison under the careful care of warden Andreas Hiltel. Hiltel was simple and kind person, who has gained amazing experience in observing and evaluating people. In dealing with swindlers of all stripes, he maintains purity and sharpens his powers of soul perception. Hiltel was the first to sense in the plain young man, who could not express himself clearly at all, a pure, innocent child’s soul. We are talking about touch with the whole being, about direct human perception of reality in relation to Kaspar Hauser. This event of direct human touch occurred in a characteristic way in a man of the people whose heart was open to it. Giltel kept the impressions of this event all his life.

Prison warden Giltel with his wife

Of course, he remained a direct witness in favor of Kaspar Hauser for the rest of his life. Nothing could make him mistaken; even Stanhope himself later failed to receive a single unfavorable statement from him. Daumer recorded a conversation with Hiltel, from which the unusual impression that Kaspar Hauser made on him becomes as obvious as his inner independence in relation to this event. His expressive words (in response to Kaspar's accusations of fraud and simulation) say: “Hauser, as Hiltel further asserts, was at first a perfect child, even less than a child. But to misrepresent such a phenomenon is against human strength. His innocence is so certain that he could confirm it even if God Himself asserted the opposite. When this man spoke like that, his face turned red with zeal.” Hiltel was not only sure that Kaspar Hauser was not a deceiver, he was also the first witness of a special childhood condition Kaspar Hauser, the state in which he was at his appearance. “His whole behavior was, one might say, a pure mirror of childhood innocence; there was no falsehood in it; whatever was in his heart, he said, as far as his speech capabilities allowed him. He also gave undoubted proof of his innocence and inexperience on the occasion when my wife and I dressed and washed him for the first time; his behavior was, like that of a child, completely natural and without any embarrassment.”

On May 28, 1828, Kaspar Hauser is brought to the doctor of the Nuremberg city court, Dr. Proy, who must find out whether he is a patient or a deceiver. This is how Kaspar Hauser first comes to the attention of a critical, scientifically educated observer. Dr. Proy is a careful, unbiased phenomenologist, primarily a skeptic by profession. Observations of Kaspar Hauser immediately force him to state that we are talking about something that has not yet been observed, one of a kind, special case. In his conclusion, Proy concludes: “This man is neither crazy nor stupid, but he has clearly been forcibly deprived of all human and social education.” Proy in his medical opinion is based on objective data. A significant phenomenon related to the knees should be mentioned here; Proy describes it as follows: “Both knees have a peculiar structure. The heads of the joints of the lower leg and thigh move back strongly and noticeably drop along with the kneecap; therefore, when Hauser sits on a flat surface, his legs lie in such a way that it is impossible to push a piece of paper through the popliteal cavity, while other people easily pass clenched fist. Another feature that was noticed in Hauser in the above-mentioned position should also be associated with this feature. This is that he keeps his back completely straight, extending his arms freely; any other person, on the contrary, in this position of his body and arms is forced to bend his back.” This observation is especially important because it substantiates Kaspar Hauser's further claims about his conclusion. In addition, you can do it this way again

determine the moment of his imprisonment in the above-described cage, in which he could only sit. It is clear that only small child, whose bones are still flexible, such an irregular structure may be caused by many years of sitting. It is significant in the Kaspar Hauser case that none of the opponents ever explained this phenomenon.

Proy once again summarized all medical observations in a later detailed medical report. He concludes that "Kaspar Hauser really early childhood was removed from human society and placed in a place where daylight did not penetrate, and in this state he remained until the moment when one day, as if from heaven, he appeared among us. And this anatomically and physiologically proves that Kaspar Hauser is not a deceiver.” His condition improved, he began to walk, was cheerful, and learned to speak. Gradually, Hitlel found out that from early childhood Kaspar was dressed only in a shirt and trousers and was kept in a dark kennel, in which it was impossible to stand up or lie down at full length. Bread and water were given to him every day by a person during natural or drug-induced sleep - so that Kaspar could not see his face. The only toy Hauser had was a wooden horse. IN Lately this man began to come more often and, leading his hand, began to teach Kaspar to write his name, walk and say a phrase about the horseman.

This story became the source of all sorts of assumptions: they thought that Kaspar was born as a result of an illicit relationship, that he was the son of a clergyman or a noble lady; They considered him the victim of some intrigue over an inheritance. The fate of Hauser was taken up by the burgomaster Jacob Binder and the president of the Bavarian Court of Appeal Paul Anselm von Feuerbach. But despite all the efforts and the prize of 10,000 guilders appointed by the Bavarian king, Hauser’s origins were not clarified.

Daumer's observations

Kaspar became very attached to Hitlel, but soon he was given to the care of the famous philosopher, Professor Friedrich Daumer. Daumer has great importance not only as a teacher and friend of Kaspar Hauser. He is above all an unbiased, observational phenomenologist in the sense of Goethe, who finds the courage and strength to learn from phenomena, or at least to allow them to remain as such and to define them correctly. Even more important, throughout his life he was a courageous, unbending defender of Kaspar Hauser in his historical uniqueness. In a characteristic way, in order to defend Kaspar Hauser, slandered by the book of Julius Meyer (the son of that Meyer from Ansbach, to whom Kaspar later ended up) “Authentic Reports on Kaspar Hauser,” he writes his final final work, “Kaspar Hauser,” the significance of which can hardly be overestimated and which has become a bibliographic rarity. The responsibility that Daumer feels towards Kaspar Hauser and his belief that he is acting on orders from above are clearly expressed in the following words from the preface:

How the last word By this issue I am publishing this work. I believe that with this I have done everything that I needed to do in this moment; I am old and my end is near; in my physical condition it is a miracle that I am still alive. I think that I still have enough spiritual strength to be able to fulfill my duty and be prepared for such a conflict; an old warrior like myself, even when he retires, can still, on occasion, take up arms again and test the strength of his hand; he who is forced and obliged to fight will not lack the highest help. I solemnly swear that the truth is sacred to me, both before and now, and that nowhere in this work have I consciously and intentionally spoken a single false word.

According to Daumer, Kaspar at that time was distinguished by childish spontaneity and extraordinary, if not extrasensory, acuity of all senses. He was extremely inquisitive and remembered everything. However, all this weakened as the circle of his knowledge expanded. His feedback about the world around him allowed Daumer to make interesting observations about the nature of human perception. For example, at first it was difficult for Kaspar to recognize the distance and size of objects; he was convinced that all objects in the world (earth, trees, grass) were made by people; he had no ideas about the transcendental - etc.

At the same time, psychiatrist Karl Leonghart was surprised that the child could even survive under the conditions described by Hauser, much less not turn into a clinical idiot. ^Attempts and transfers

A year later, Kaspar was found one day wounded in the head, apparently by a sharp weapon; According to him, he was wounded by some man with a black head. The criminal, despite all the searches, was not found. This incident caused a lot of noise; Hauser was transferred to the house of the municipal head Johann Bieberbach, where he was guarded by two soldiers - however, even there he experienced a strange incident (he was shot by a pistol hanging on the wall). Caspar is transferred to the house of Baron von Tucher, and he falls under the patronage of the English aristocrat Lord Stanhope. Stanhope spends a lot of money trying to prove Caspar's low origins, and also to force him to lie, to stage manifestations of his extraordinary abilities, that is, to distort the moral character of the young man. However, his popularity among the people (Hauser became a living miracle, the secular public also came to see him) and unanimous testimony in his favor from everyone who interacted with him personally violate the plans of Stanhope and his secret mentors.

Death

Soon the “patrons”, having allegedly caught Kaspar in repeated lies, became disillusioned with him and sent him to Ansbach, in the care of shoemaker Johann Gregor Meyer, and assigned him to help in the local appeal court.

court Meyer also "constantly caught Kaspar in lies" and treated him rather poorly (using physical punishment). On September 29, 1833, Kaspar Hauser turned 21 years old. Daumer was 33 this year. After his birthday, Kaspar Hauser makes a trip to Nuremberg. He meets with Binder and Daumer and decides to return to Daumer when circumstances allow him. In his naivety, he hopes that Lord Stanhope will soon give him the opportunity to leave the teacher Mayer in Ansbach and lead an independent life.

But on December 14, 1833, some unknown person invited Hauser on a date to the palace garden with a promise to reveal his origin to him and inflicted wounds on him there with a blow of a long knife, from which Hauser died 3 days later. Meyer later suggested that "Hauser inflicted the wound on himself in order to attract attention again." Moreover, when Kaspar came staggering to Mayer at about four o’clock on this Saturday afternoon, he did not believe his story at all. He grabbed him, who, as it turned out later, received four mortal wounds, and forced him to return to the city garden. Amazing expression vitality overcoming death is what Kaspar Hauser was still able to overcome most way before his legs gave way and he had to be taken back to Mayer's house. Mayer considered Kaspar's story a fiction.

At the site where Hauser was fatally wounded, a memorial stone was erected with the words: “Here, unknown who was killed by unknown whom” (lat. Hic occulto occultus occisus est).

Version about royal origin

There is a version that Hauser is the legitimate son of the Grand Duke of Baden Charles and his first wife Stephanie de Beauharnais. According to this version, the second (morganatic) wife of the grandfather of the Duke of Baden, Karl Friedrich, Countess Hochberg, wanting to deliver the Baden throne to her son Leopold, replaced Hauser with a sick child, who died a few days later. This version is based on a meticulous forensic investigation conducted by Anselm Ritter von Feuerbach during the lifetime of Kaspar Hauser. Studying the German princely dynasties, Feuerbach comes to the conclusion that only in the Tsering dynasty are phenomena observed that make it possible to suspect a crime. Stephanie de Beauharnais had five children and among them two sons, whose health is clearly attested by doctors, but who both die suddenly in early age; the first heir to the throne dies on October 6, 1812, his brother, Prince Alexander, at the age of one year in 1817. The next three contenders for the throne die under more or less strange circumstances, as indicated by Hermann Pies, that is The striking fact is that although there were five entitled to the throne, the dynastic Tsering branch in the male line is dying out. Thus, the son of Reich Countess von Hochberg Leopold in 1830, that is, during the lifetime of Kaspar Hauser, became Grand Duke of Baden. It would be too naive to consider this an accident. In addition, Feuerbach points out that the dates in the letters that Kaspar Hauser had with him when he appeared refer to the dates of the life of his also murdered brother Alexander. He rightly believes that here, ten years later, a certain confusion occurred between the two sons of Stephanie de Beauharnais. In 1875, the debate about Kaspar Hauser's succession to the Baden throne ended with the publication of documents from 1812 on the birth, illness and death of the crown prince. This later led to a curiosity. The then Kaiser of Hohenzollern Wilhelm I himself ordered the publication of these documents. The uncritical nature of the Kaiser and his entourage is characterized by the fact that they did not know at all true meaning these documents. They in no way create a picture of the harmlessness and correctness of what happened; rather, it becomes clear that the actual identification of the deceased

the crown prince was not a mother or nurse at all. Further, what is striking is that in the illness and death of the prince we are clearly dealing with a complicated situation, and at that moment no one really fully understood conscious situation. The autopsy was also clearly not carried out with the necessary care. But first of all, it should be noted that the prince, born on September 29, was clearly attested to be in the best possible health, and this led to the fact that in the following days the publication of further medical bulletins was stopped, since the state of the child’s health no longer gave rise to this. The phenomena that were observed in the deceased child and which led to his death are simply incompatible with these data. From these documents it turns out that there could be no question of reliable identification of the deceased child. Moreover, these documents do not dispel suspicions that the crown prince was replaced with a dying child.

Now, naturally, the question must arise who was this substitute and what relation he had to the persons interested in the crime, and in particular to the Reichsgrave von Hochberg. The researcher of the life of Kaspar Hauser, Fritz Klee, in 1929 actually managed to establish this connection and find out who the child who served as the replacement was. Among the servants of Reich Countess von Hochberg was the Blochmann family, into which a child named Johann Ernst Jacob Blochmann was born on September 26, 1812. This child was clearly not viable, like other children born into the Blochman family. The medical report on the child who died on September 16, 1812 fits well into this picture. Klee set himself the task of finding the dates of life of Johann Ernst Jakob Blochmann, born on September 26, 1812. At the same time, he is faced with a truly surprising state of affairs. He first noticed that, unlike the other nine children of the Blochman family, there was no date of death next to the date of baptism; on the contrary, he discovered in the Protestant register of the dead from 1833 an entry stating that on November 27, 1833, the soldier Caspar Ernst Blochmann died in Munich. Naturally, it immediately catches the eye that here the Blochmans’ son was mistakenly given the name Kaspar. Even more striking is that Klee was able to establish in the register of the dead of the Protestant parish of Munich that Ernst Blochmann died there on November 27, 1833. The corresponding entry is also available in the cemetery service book. So, the middle name Kaspar appears only in the register of the dead in Karlsruhe. Since these records can be assumed to be based on false data, Klee had to check whether the soldier Blochmann actually served in the Bavarian army. Surprisingly, based on the soldier lists, it can be proven that there was no soldier Blochmann in the Bavarian army at that time. Thus, Klee rightly believed that he had provided proof that in 1833 the people standing behind the scenes

crimes, the idea came to mind to document the death of the child who served as a substitute. This makes clear the gulf that opens up in the whole affair, and the subtlety with which everything was done; after all, we are talking about nothing more than an attempt to commit a well-thought-out crime. If the Blochmann child, born in 1812, really died in 1833 in Munich, then he, of course, could not be the child who was used as a substitute. The murder of Kaspar Hauser in December 1833 was obviously planned in the autumn of 1833 and carefully prepared. This also included an insidious plan to make sure that 17 days before the planned assassination attempt, the child to be replaced was already listed as dead according to the documents.

Thus, forensic analysis together with historical research leads to the clear conclusion that Kaspar Hauser, born on Michaelmas Day in 1812, was the Baden heir to the throne. Even if, being very skeptical, one considers any of the given grounds to be unreliable, then in the interrelation of the presented facts, another possibility is unthinkable. And the fact that the fact of the Baden succession to the throne in a number of indexes and other books is still called into question has an obscuring effect.

In this regard, let us turn to a short time to Prince Max of Baden. He came from the Hochberg branch of the Zähring dynasty, therefore from the branch that led to the throne through the elimination of Kaspar Hauser. As the last Reich Chancellor of the German monarchy, he had to induce the abdication of the German Kaiser Wilhelm II on November 9, 1918. From Prince Max of Baden there was a statement that he wanted, after his ascension to the throne, which then did not take place, to transfer the mortal remains of Kaspar Hauser to Pforzheim, to the Baden princely crypt." From this testimony of Prince Max of Baden it follows that he - as, indeed, and many other representatives of the German nobility - adhered to the belief that Kaspar Hauser was the rightful heir to the throne of Baden.

In 2002, the Institute of Forensic Medicine at the University of Münster analyzed mitochondrial DNA from the hair of Kaspar Hauser, comparing it with the DNA of one of the descendants of Stephanie de Beauharnais. The analysis did not confirm their relationship. The House of the Dukes of Baden does not allow researchers to work with the DNA of Stephanie de Beauharnais herself.

Two DNA tests were performed several years apart: the first test gave a negative result. In the second analysis, carried out several years later, traces of blood on the camisole, locks of hair, hair from the headdress, and other genetic material were examined. A comparison was made with the DNA of a descendant of Stephanie de Beauharnais who agreed to provide her genetic material for comparative analysis. The analysis established that the bloody stain on the camisole does not belong to Kaspar Hauser (if we consider the rest of the genetic material to reliably belong to Kaspar Hauser). Match noted genetic code with the code of a descendant of Stephanie de Beauharnais except for one parameter. Accordingly, the relationship between Kaspar Hauser and Stephanie de Beauharnais cannot be unequivocally rejected, nor can it be confirmed. Maybe further development Science and interest in this matter will bring greater clarity to the riddle of Kaspar Hauser.