a-study-in-crime:Carl Tanzler: The Man Who Lived With A Corpse For Seven YearsThe obsession and life
a-study-in-crime:Carl Tanzler: The Man Who Lived With A Corpse For Seven YearsThe obsession and life with the corpseOne of the weirdest and most disturbing cases of someone being obsessed with another person is that of Carl Tanzler and Helen Milagro de Hoyos. Carl Tanzler was born in 1877 in Germany, but he moved to Australia just before World War I. Tanzler later returned to Germany and married a woman named Doris Schäfer, whom he had two children with. In 1926, Tanzler moved to America with his family, but he later abandoned his wife and children in 1927. In 1930, Tanzler worked at a hospital where he met a beautiful woman named Elena “Helen” Milagro de Hoyos (born in 1909). Tanzler immediately became infatuated with Helen, and he believed that she was his one true love. He based this on a dream he had years prior, where a ghost had shown him the face of his true love; this woman looked like Helen. Helen was diagnosed with tuberculosis, and Tanzler tried to treat her with various medicines. Tanzler professed his love for Helen and gave her clothes and jewelry, but it is unknown if Helen felt the same about Tanzler. Helen died in 1931, and Tanzler paid for her funeral. What could have been a tragic love story ended up being creepy and disturbing. In 1933, two years after Helen’s death, Tanzler dug up her grave and took Helen’s corpse home with him. Tanzler then lived with the corpse for seven years. He tried to preserve the body by attaching Helen’s bones with piano wire, replace the decomposing skin with silk soaked in wax and plaster of paris, replace her decomposing hair with a wig, filled her abdomen with rags and he dressed the body in clothes and jewelry. Tanzler also sprayed the body with perfume and disinfectants to mask the odor stemming from the corpse. Tanzler spent time with the corpse in various ways; he slept with it and also danced with it. In 1940, seven years after Tanzler took Helen from her grave, he was confronted by Helen’s sister who had heard rumors about Tanzler having Helen’s corpse in his home. Helen’s sister contacted the police, and they soon arrested Tanzler when they found him with Helen’s corpse inside his home.AftermathCarl Tanzler was found to be competent to stand trial, but the charges against him were dropped after the preliminary hearing since the prescriptive period had passed. Tanzler was set free and moved to a new house in 1944. However, Tanzler refused to let Helen go. He used a death-mask to create a life-sized effigy of Helen, and he lived with it for the rest of his life. Carl Tanzler died in 1950 at age 75, and his body was found around three weeks after he passed away.The corpse of Helen was examined by various pathologists and physicians. In the early ‘70s, two physicians claimed that they had seen a vaginal tube had been inserted in the corpse’s genital area to allow penetration. It is not known if this claim is real since this was never mentioned at the preliminary hearing after Tanzler’s arrest in 1940. Regarding the public response to Tanzler’s obsession with Helen, it seemed like most people were sympathetic toward Tanzler. Many people viewed Tanzler’s obsession with Helen as romantic. Helen’s corpse was displayed at the Dean-Lopez Funeral home before almost 7000 people. The corpse was later placed in an unmarked grave in a secret location. -- source link