Unsolved: Murders at the Hinterkaifeck Farmstead

So about these these topics that you know usually try to avoid. I'm gonna ask you on, Michelle, do you go to church? No, I grew up in Echincar, which is an alternative Eastern religion. What not where you were expecting to go? Yeah? Yeah, it's like if white people still meditation from like Tibet or something like that. How you explain it is like it makes sense. Okay, welcome to Scary Mystery Surprise, where we talk about scary things that surprised us around the Internet. I'm Edwin, I'm Michelle. Okay. Well, in this story, you are going to a church, okay, and you're a member of the choir, and it's just saying for story's sake, you're hewing. He see everybody can harmonize it, Hugh. And then you see colors when you all harmonize. So wow, I just try you. Isn't that beautiful? Isn't that a beautiful prayer? Sure? Yeah, I saw colors. Uh. I'm excited to see what comments appear for this episode if we leave that. Okay, So you're in church, you're German. Mm hmmm. So the melodies imagine Hugh but like angry. So you are with this this woman named Victoria, right, Victoria. I don't know how you would say it in German, but Victoria. Just Victoria's let's make it Victor. Nope, that's Italian. Remember when I couldn't go Italian? Yeah, you were gonna go Victoria? Yeah, Victoria, which then I could only do a German accent when I was trying to do Italian. What's going on? Do I have a brain tumor get checked? My accents are so wrong lately that I okay. So Victoria is your neighbor and you think she's good times, like she's chilled, you know. But one day on April first, nineteen twenty two, April Fool's Day, so you're in church and you keep looking towards the door because Victoria never misses a day. So you're like, that's weird. So you look around and as you're looking, you see that the whole family isn't there. Normally they're there, right, So you're like, eh, devils. You think like it's no big feel. But that following Monday, like when you know, kids go back to school, word goes around town that a young girl seven year old hasn't shown up to school either. Her name was Cecilia, and you think, well, you know, just a ditcher, you know whatever, no big deal, everyone does it. And Cecilia happens to be Victoria's daughter, right, So the following day she missed again. This is already like April fourth or something like that, and she's not there. Now something's up. Yeah, the male starts piling up for the family at the post office. So few and a few neighbors, like they round you up and then let's go search to see what happened. So you start walking up to this. Yeah, you start walking up to this farmstead and this is like this empty, like this is a small town. It's by the woods, like it's cold, so this might be some dirt and snow and you're just like you're stepping up towards the farm stead. By the way, this place was outside of the Bavarian town of Growburn. It's called Bavaria Bavaria hinter Kaifak, that's what it was called, hinter hinter Kaifex, hinter hinter hin ter, hinter kaiek hinter means behind or something like that, right, so, and and it's because it is behind the town called Kaifak. So the place again it's lonely. You're walking up and then for some ambient let's just add some like crows and some rings. Oh yeah, that's good stuff. It's some good foreshating drudging in the snow. Oh yeah. And then you guys open up the barn and you see bodies piled on top of each other. Shit, well, look, you knew something was wrong. You knew something was wrong. Yeah, they're all beat up, they're covered in hay, I guess just it's this horrible haunting scene. Right then you start walking around and into the house to see like, oh, man, like where are the kid and the maid? And then you see them also, well, they're in like one of the rooms and they're covered up in like dresses, like in all the dresses imagine from the closet, just powl on top of them. That sucks, you think to yourself, You're right, it does suck. You See, this thing has been a mystery, Michelle for over one hundred years now, right, It's happened in nineteen twenty two. Some backstory here. The previous maid that was working for this family had quit. And this is after like some very like shallow searches on the internet that I found this, Like she had quit six months before, and her reasoning was that she said the house was haunted. She didn't want to be there. But this maid, the one that got killed, actually was her first day on the job. But it was her first day. Yeah, So when I when I when they say in the story, when you're reading it, and it just tells you like, oh, she died, and what happened to be her first day? Like I think of that, I'm like, wait, wise, was that her first the family just decided to hire someone help or what happened? Yeah, I mean it probably took a while to find someone and then to die at work command that fucking sucks. Yeah, work sucks and then you die there. Yeah, And I'm trying to imagine like what she would say, like was she told the family to quit, they just like, hey, I'm out, Like this place is haunted, you know, because I always imagine like back then, the maids or you know, the service people that help out of the farm, they were like very loyal. That's what I imagine. I mean, that's how I see it small towns, like you just work for them, Like where else are you gonna work? Right? So, but also like how haunted. Did it have to be for her to be like? Right? Peace? Yeah, peace out. I'm out you guys are haunted. Good luck. I don't know. But the conditions of how they were found are fairly graphic, so I'll keep it mild as always. But first let's get some more details here so we can get the whole picture right. So where already know, this is a small town, not much to see, basically just surviving, socializing, the typical stuff. The family that lived in this farmstead were Victoria. Here's the mother, her two children, Cecilia and Yoseph. Let's just say Yoseph. Victoria's parents Andreas and Tetilia. The woman the older grandma, so it was there's a young girl, so they lived together. The grandma was found strangled and beaten like on the head. This is really bad. I'm just gonna I was gonna say that her skull was cracked. Andrews was was left with cheekbones sticking out of his face. Geez. Victoria was also beat on the head. Little te Celia was also hit on the head. Inside the house where little Josef and the maid were, they were killed in a similar manner, just beat like they just beat them in their faces and their heads and everything. It was just this this bad thing. A dog, a Pomeranian was fine. The animals, the animals, Oh my god, oh the relief. All of the farm animals were also saved, like they didn't kill anybody there. But the weird thing is that they were also fed and taken care of after the murders, like they were found fine, like being fed and watered and everything. This thing, all the stuff that I'm reading right now comes from an article by Sonya Votomsky from Mental Flaws. This is an excellent job. I always find like really cool detailed articles that are just like the whole thing. It feels like I'm plagiarizing the whole thing, but this one was just so like boom, It just gives you everything that people know so far. Anyway, So again I kept thinking about the whole like the haunted thing, like what was this maid talking about? Like why was this haunted? Right? So the police also thankfully thought that this would be a good thing to investigate. They were like, what do you mean haunted? So they went and they talked to the old maid and they're like, what happened? And she said that she would hear sounds in the attic and would feel like someone was watching. Of course, Yeah, she told the boss Andreas about it, and he was like, that's fake. Go to word, like stop, this is not right. However, the neighbors also came forward to tell the police that's something that Andreas had experienced that he I guess, you know, he was not necessarily embarrassed to say, but he was like, this is weird, a weird thing that happened around my house. You know, when you're talking with neighbors, you're like, this is something weird happened. He had discovered footprints in the snow leading up to this farmstead. Also, these footprints were coming from the woods, and apparently the guy whoever was walking carried a newspaper with him, because there was a newspaper that the owner Andreas hadn't bought himself. But he was inside the house. So somebody came here to me, somebody was you know, came from the woods and they were just standing in that house. Yeah, one hundred percent, they're living in the walls of that fucking house. It would explain the haunted part. I think from the made maybe I don't know agreed either that or it is whatever his name is, the head of the house, just watching her. You know, you know we're in that weird creepy way. Okay, so up until now he noticed that I mentioned that Victoria was like, there was no like I would for I was saying, man of the house, Am I allowed to say that still? Or is it my two old fashions? You know, all allow it today? Okay? Either way, Victoria there was no There was no husband back then. Like the man. She was a strong, independent young woman who needed no man. That's who she was, right, But the truth is she was in a relationship actually with one of the neighbors. In fact, the neighbor and her both said that Joseph was their son. This is how they would, you know, but not the other girl. By the way, Victoria's husband had been killed during War one, so she had That's where ce Celia came from. And then the apparently after that's when she got with the other guy. And that's supposedly that's when Yosi was born. He happened to be the neighbor that led the search into this farmstead. His name was Lawrence Schlittenbauer, German. But anyway, they didn't actually stay together because Andrews, the father here, was like, no, that's not gonna happen. So they ended their relationship, actually listened, and Lawrence was like, all right, and he just got married to someone else. He had a baby with his new wife, but the baby or the kid died and during infancy, and the police believed that in his sorrow and anger also because he didn't want to pay child support, he decided to kill them all. That was the theory here. He was just like so pissed that he was like, I'm gonna kill him. So it kind of adds up if you look at it that way, like if he was really angry, like no, I'm not gonna pay, but to kill the whole family, I don't know, it doesn't make sense. And it's it's a stretch. It's a real stretch. I mean, the haunted part was also stretch. And the police started looking into everything. That's what's it's good. Like if you're well, if you're like the haunted angle and then he's mad because he has to pay child to like they don't connect, you know what I mean they do, So it's like if you're looking at this one, this one doesn't make sense and then if this one, yeah, like it just I don't know, it's yeah, it's a little yeah, it's a stretch. But either way, like some of the reasoning here is because they saw that when he was talking about the bodies or you know, referring, he would just walk up to them like it's no big deal, like oh okay, Like he knew where everything was in that farmstead. He just knew. And I was like, well, maybe because he just visited often. Yeah, I like he just I don't know, but the police consider that normally. They were like Michelle's right, So they just they said, this is dumb. Let's use up our resources and something else. So we'll get some donuts or what's the German equivalent, I don't know, coolers crawlers. Another theory was that the husband wasn't actually dead but that but all they have to do is look up the records and they asked him of his buds and war and they're like, yeah, this guy was gone dead dead. I mean yeah, Mustard gassed and then like ran over by a tank and then uh and then blown up again and then run over by another tank and then blown up again. And we're talking about World War one tank, so we're not talking about his bunny was dropped when he was coming back. Oh yeah, yeah, this is going to help why he's dead. He's definitely dead. Guys, Oh no, we always take this too far. Well, you might be going to hell. I don't think e Cain Carr believes in hell, so it's fine. Another idea was that Joseph was actually the son of Andrews himself, which is again the I guess, yeah, the grandpa, so yeah. And the reason was because the neighbors were all like, this guy is all incesty and yeah and abusive, and so the theory was that he killed everyone and then beat himself up on the head. It just didn't make sense. So they were like, not quite doesn't quite work. There was also another idea where I don't know if I read this properly, but like it said that maybe two of them, like Vittoria and the father, hit themselves simultaneous. Yeah, that I say it out loud doesn't make It doesn't make sense like a suicide, just like beating, like a murder suicide beating. I am not quite sure that works either. It's like you go, I go, the other one dies and you're just like, oh no, yeah, once again we're running into a theory that doesn't quite have the legs to go all the way. But I feel like we're the actual detectives at the time where it's like, uh, well what about this? What if they just beat each other. It's like, no, let's think about this rationally. So they were like, you know what, this is impossible. Whatever, let's give up, so they close the case. It was reopened again in nineteen fifty five. But oh okay, so before before I continue, there was this book called hinter hinter Kaifek Traces of a Mysterious Crime, and it talks about how bodies are. The factamily and the maid were beheaded and taken in for some type of investigation part of the police. It was like the way to bury the lead when you're talking about the thing was though it was for metaphysical clues. What does that mean physical? Yeah, there really is the word metaphysical because that's like they wanted, like what a psychic to touch the skulls. Yeah, I guess, but obviously it didn't work, like they were maybe hoping to get some message out of the the heads the skulls or whatever. But anyway, the whole family was buried in Widthofen without their heads. God. Yeah. And by the way, those heads that were in some other place, how do you pronounce this, Munich? It was during actually World War Two that the heads just were lost, so oh god yea. And yeah, there was no way they could find any more clues on it. The house was demolished, you know, and there's nothing there. Clues are like impossible. You're not going to find any more things about it. Well, and also you're running into a thing where anybody who would have been a part of it would be dead at some point too, like, and they've had to go through a whole war, like a whole nother war. I mean, it's unfortunately, I don't know, like to this day, nobody really knows exactly what happened. But at the end of this Mental Floss article they say that the police again opened the case in two thousand and seven, and they came up with a theory that they could actually agree on, like all of them. However, they didn't want to disclose it because yeah, in part they said, is due to respect of the suspects descendants, Well who did it? It's like but if eli they're saying that like out of respect, we do not want to disclose our theories. And then you're just like asking, yeah, but who, yeah, but who you know that? But who did it? I understand what you're saying, but but who? Yeah, Yeah, you take all that time, all that deduction, there's no more evidence. It's just like made up, which is probably why they aren't going to reveal it, because it is just oh I can see that. So they're just like they're like, oh, well this seems like the most likely. Now, yeah, it's just the way for them, an excuse for them to just finally close it and just say never mind. Like, yeah, there's been countless investigations on this, books, there's a documentary on it. There's all these things, like people are trying to figure out who killed these people, like what happened? Yeah, right, there was a few. Actually there's several let me see one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, eight suspects on if you look this up on Wikipedia. Yeah, out of all of these, honestly, it's a coin toss reading on all these, I'm like, there's no way I can I can. None of these to me seemed like they would have like more def like it's a more definite here you go, this is who did it. There was one interesting one though, This was about Paul Mueller. Says that there's this book called The Man from the Train with the author is Bill James, and he talks about this man who is known as Paul Mueller was a German, a German migrant who may have been responsible for the murders. And Mueller was the only suspect in the eighteen ninety eight murder of the Massachusetts family. I'm not really sure what case that is, but sounds very interesting. It also says that Mueller is believed that Mueller killed dozens of victims based on research and American newspaper archives. So imagine, so this person's writing on this guy who came from Germany and like, yeah, and the reason wise because some of the crimes, suspected crimes has a similar style of killing. Like, you know, you get a whole family in their isolated home, they use a blunt edge of a farm tool like a weapon, like a pickaxe or something. Yeah, and then stacking the bodies of the families. Oh, that's interesting. Also, I didn't mention this earlier, but there was no like, there was no suspicion that the person had gone into rob the house, like there was something some ill intent, like they wanted to either like revenge or something. They were like playing house. Yeah, they were like they want they just wanted to kill people or something. Yeah, and you know money was left there, like they didn't. It just didn't make any sense. So to this day, it's still a mystery. I don't know what it is. Nobody knows what it is. Like I think stranger. I think it's a stranger that wandered in and was living in the fucking house and watching them, And then of course you would take the creepiest, like most paranoia inducing Okay, of course, how else do I sleep at night? You know if I didn't do that? I mean, just a person watching them, reading there, reading his newspaper, like coming in from the woods, uh, watching the maid and then being like I live here now, and takes care of all of them, and then uh just goes and cares for the animals after he kills them all. But you know what makes me happy, he's a he's a dog lover. Oh no, a whole family. A little kid died, a two year old died, but the dog was fine. But the Pomeranian lived. Yeah, so that pome Onion knows what happened. It does know what happened. The only witness is the Pomeranian. My dad has a theory that dogs are going to be able to speak pretty soon because because of the those things that they can hit with all that too. But I've heard I've heard Frenchies voices and also huskies and they can say words like parrots. But I think I think they're smart enough to ask for water and actually make the sounds for water, yeah, or food or I mean, growing up, my cat could say mama and it would. You would go scratch at my mom's door and go, momma what I mean? He was a genius, the Larry David of cats, truly, but it worked. It was just like you bang on her door, like, just say her name. Always think they sound like old babies. It's really they do sound like old babies. Oh man, So that was your mystery surprise for Yeah, just unsolved mystery surprise. Yeah, creepy stuff. But what are you going to talk about next week? Michelle? I don't know, but I think it'll be a surprise. It will. It took me a second, I thought I forgot the line just because we had surprise so many times. I think it'll be a scary. I think it'll be a scary. I think it'll be a mystery. I think it'll be an Edwin and Michelle. Anyways, see you guys next week. Bye,