The Kaspar Hauser Mystery: Don't Be Coy, Name the Suspects!

Factual Questions
1

Kaspar (or Caspar) Hauser, the guy who popped up out of nowhere in the 1830s and who had apparently been kept in a dungeon without being taught a language until 17 then dumped on a city street in Nürmburg, was generally held to have been born to a noble family and then hidden away to allow someone else to succeed to the throne or title or whatever.

I’ve run across a fairly decent number of recaps of his story, and many of them either note that certain people involved with Hauser came flat out and said which family he had probably been born into, or else make such a statement themselves (the author’s assertion). The way it is usuallly described, Kaspar Hauser was born the son of Stephanie of Baden and Grand Duke Charles of Baden. They did have a son but he was thought to have died quite young. The allegation is that a female person who was a “Morganatic” relative of Charles wanted the title to go to her sons, and that is where the title would go if Stephanie had no sons of her own, and that therefore she arranged for Kaspar Hauser’s abduction. For unknown reasons he was then not killed but imprisoned for 17 years, then for equally unknown reasons released in a public square after having been taught to say (but not comprehend) the words “I want to be a soldier as my father was” and to sign his name.

I would like to read more about Charles and Stephanie, and this mysterious unnamed woman whose sons apparently assumed the throne or title or whatever a Duke has in Baden. The Kaspar Hauser story got a lot of attention when it was current and presumably most of the principal players would have been alive, and yet there are no descriptions of their reactions or discussions of their circumstances and how things all played out in the ensuing years.

In fact, the “Morganatic” relative is always described in very vague terms and never named. C’mon, cut to the chase! Who was this Cruella de Ville woman, and in plain unsophisticated terms even an American can understand, who the hell was she to Chuck and Steph such that her kids would be in line to inherit the title if Hauser disappeared?

Oh, and BTW, did this missing kid ever have an actual name of his own? I assume he was not named Kaspar Hauser. Were they not in the habit of naming their kids until they were older or something? He’s never identified as “His Not Really Dead Royal Highness the Prince Joe Blow of Baden, that’s who he really was”, just as the male heir to Charles and Stephanie.

Incidentally, I also ran across a site in German which I could not read effectively (even with Alta Vista translation help) but it seemed to be describing DNA testing and asserting that Kaspar Hauser was not in fact biological kin to Charles and Stephanie of Baden. No mention anywhere else. If anyone knows more about that, I’d like to know that as well.

2

Hey, I first read about Kasper Hauser in Frank Edwards’ book Stranger than Science, and HE said Kaspar was abducted by aliens.
Yeah, I know. But it sounds like even more fun than the alternatives.

3

Well, according to this page http://www.btinternet.com/~allan_raymond/Baden_Royal_Family.htm Grand Duke Karl Friedrich of Baden (1728 - 1811) was married twice.

The first marriage was to Landgrafin Caroline of Hesse-Darmstadt (1723-1783); the second was to Luise Karoline von Geyersberg (1768-1820).

Grand Duke Karl Friedrich had nine children. The eldest was Prince Karl Ludwig (1755-1801) and he would, of course, have inherited the title had he not died before his father. Succession passed to his children. He had eight children, but six of these were female, and so excluded from succession. Of his sons, Prince Karl Friedrich (1784-1785) died in infancy, so the remaining son, Karl Ludwig (1786-1818), succeeded to the title on the death of his Grandfather in 1811.

Karl Ludwig was married to Princess Stephanie de Beauharnais (1789-1860). They had four children (three daughters who, as females, would have been excluded from succession) and a boy, Prince Alexander, who was born and died in 1816. Had he survived his father, he would have inherited the title in 1818.

As it was, to find the heir in 1818 we have to go all the way back up to Grand Duke Karl Friedrich. His second son, Prince Friedrich Ludwig, had died in 1817 and left no children, so the title passed to his third son, Grand Duke Ludwig, who lived until 1830. He died unmarried, and the title passed to Karl Friedrich’s fourth son, Karl Leopold (1790-1882) who was married to Princess Sophie of Sweden (1801-1865) who, disturbingly but perhaps significantly, was his great-neice. The title then passed through Karl Leopold’s descendants until it was extinguished in 1918.

Significantly, Karl Leopold was the son of Karl Friedrich’s second wife, who appears to have been a commoner – a “morganatic marriage”. His marriage to Princess Sophie of Sweden may have been an attempt to strengthen his dynastic position, since she was a descendant of Karl Friedrich’s first wife.

The conspiracy theory, I guess, is that Prince Alexander was spirited away so that Ludwig would inherit. According to the linked site, Ludwig was unmarried, but possibly he had a partner and children, and somebody (the partner?) hoped that he would marry, and pass the title to his children. Or else Karl Leopold and/or his wife did the deed so that the title would come in time to them and their children, as in fact happened.

But this is all speculation on my part; I know nothing except what is in the table on the linked site.

4

He could just as easily been a previously normal runaway, who suffered brain damage from a fever or a head injury, leaving him “simple”.

The rest could be “tall tales” added as the centuries went by, to make the story better over a few beers.

I’m inclined to dismiss the whole tale as rather unimportant, overall.

5

Hard to know at this point,Bosda. The people who interacted with him seemed to find him of good intelligence but akin to a blank slate, sufficient to convince them over their skepticism. Or so they say, as others wrote of them having said. But either those who said so or the authors who wrote of them having said so also tended to get really romantic over Kaspar Hauser, not so much as the lost prince but as the Rousseauian “natural”, “unspoiled” “innocent” boychild. On the other hand, whether he was the genuine article or a nut job or some kind of amnesiac, he was apparently sufficient disturbing for some folks to go to a bit of trouble to off him, which they eventually did after a couple of failed attempts.

Thanks, UDS. OK, based on the information you’ve provided me, the popular conspiracy theory of the time (with names now) was that Landgrafen Caroline of Hesse-Darmstadt, the “morganatic” second wife of Karl Friedrich, had Alexander, child of Karl Ludwig and Stephanie of Baden, spirited away and replaced with a dying child who was buried as Alexander. The real Alexander was kept alive in a dungeon somewhere in isolation and ignorance. Caroline’s motivation was to see the title go to her son Karl Leopold and his heirs. I guess the interim rule of Grand Duke Ludwig was considered no more than a delay–possibly she had reason to believe he would remain unmarried and wihtout heir, or at least the conspiracy buffs of the time thought she did.

Remaining curiosities: whether or not Stephanie of Baden was still around in the 1830s to react one way or the other to the “Kaspar Hauser = Alexander” rumors; whether Karl Leopold (by your chronology, just having finally inherited the title after the death of Grand Duke Ludwig) might have found them worrisome, esp. insofar as they made his Mum out to be the evil plotter and himself the intended beneficiary all along; and whether Karl Leopold was alleged by the conspiracy theorists to have been behind the murder attempts on Kaspar Hauser in the 1830s, the final one of which succeeded.

6

Actually you (UDS) answered the Stephanie-still-around part, since you indicate she lived until 1860. So either she ignored the conspiracy/Kaspar stuff, denounced them, or granted them some possible credibility, and it would be cool to know which. Would also be useful to know what spin the conspiracy theorists put on her reaction or non. Maybe they just figured she, being female and widowed and without a powerful descendant, was out of the picture and in no position to squawk.

7

There was a foreign film of the same name, “The STory of Kasper Hauser”.

Never saw it. Had dinner with the delightful usherette working that night at the theatre.

(Love that uniform)

8

Don’t worry, I turned up alive and well in Jersey City.

9

I mistakenly wrote:

when identifying the alleged culprit. That’s wrong, of course. That should be Luise Karoline von Geyersburg, the “morganatic” second wife of Karl Friedrich.

[/errata]

10

There have been a couple movies about KH but unquestionably the most famous and well-thought of is The Enigma of Kasper Hauser, alternately known as The Mystery of KH or Every Man For Himself and God Against All, made by German filmmaker Werner Herzog most famous for working on large epics with Klaus Kinski.

The film offers no answers to KH’s origins or the reasons behind his murder, but it’s quite beautiful–lyrical, moving, compassionate, and with an excellent performance by the equally mysterious Bruno S.

11

Hmmm…and I thought Anna Anderson was strange!

12

In 1996 the German magazine “Der Spiegel” (similar to Newsweek) organized a DNA test on blood on a garment that belonged to Kaspar Hauser. The genetic information was compared to that of descendants of the house of Baden. The result was that there was no connection.

However, these findings were heavily contested, as the blood on the garment was most probably not the original blood anymore but had been “refreshed” in the meantime in order to make the garment (a museum exhibit) look more real.

It was found out later that the blood was only app. 50 years old, much too young.

In 2002 new DNA testing on 3 of Kaspar Hauser’s hairs (it was a custom of his times to give a lock of hair to one’s friends and therefore some of his are kept) revealed that he was indeed a member of the house of Baden.

13

Busted! :slight_smile: