On Whit Monday in 1828, a teenage boy appeared in Nuremberg carrying two letters. He spoke only a few repetitive phrases and claimed to have been held in a tiny, dark cell his entire life, fed only bread and water. Calling himself Kaspar Hauser, he quickly captured the imagination of Europe.
Jurist Anselm von Feuerbach and British nobleman Lord Stanhope took a deep interest in him, providing education and protection. Rumors soon spread that Hauser was actually the hereditary Prince of Baden, born in 1812 and swapped at birth with a dying infant to alter the royal line of succession. Over the next five years, Hauser survived mysterious knife attacks, heightening public suspicion of a political cover-up.
In December 1833, Hauser returned home with a deep chest wound, claiming a stranger had stabbed him in the Ansbach Court Garden after handing him a purse containing a cryptic note written in mirror writing. He died three days later. Modern DNA testing on alleged bloodstains has yielded inconclusive and conflicting results, keeping the mystery alive.