"Mistake" is an interesting way to say 'cops wanted to placate a rich family so they stole a poor woman's kid from her'.

Man: "This is my friend's son"
Friend: "That's my son"
Police: There's just no way to be sure they're telling the truth

I read a book written by one of Bobby Dunbar's children.  It's really crazy how the cops kidnapped a child from another woman and gave him to the grieving mother.  The children didn't find out who their father really was until after his death.

I remember seeing a documentary show about the Dunbar case and the granddaughter working with a descendant of Julia to learn the truth through DNA.  It’s so sad that Julia lost her son because being poor meant that she couldn’t possibly tell the truth about her boy.

The second case is an example of upper classes looking down on poor people like they're animals

The police in the Dunbar case, finding a random child: "THIS CHILD MUST HAVE BEEN KIDNAPPED BECAUSE EVEN THOUGH HIS MOM CONFIRMS THAT HE IS NOT KIDNAPPED, WE DETERMINED THAT HE LOOKS KIDNAPPED. LET US THEREFORE KIDNAP HIM FOR REAL THIS TIME!"

Genius.

Crazy how if you're wealthy and established you can claim another child as your own, the law would back you and then you can raise them.

If Kaspar had indeed been raised on bread and water, he would have been severely malnourished.  There would have been evidence of that in his stature, and in other aspects of his physical appearance.  If his remains were examined today, they would tell a story.

I mean, he did actually kidnap the kid, it just wasn’t Bobby 🤔

Trafficking in the misery of children has a long storied tradition in this world.

Sometimes the creepiest part isn’t that someone disappeared… it’s what happens when they come back. That’s somehow even more disturbing.

It was a marsh and the kid was 4 or 5. It’s a no brainer what actually happened to the child. Yes the hat might have blown with the wind. I feel bad for the kids real mother that lost her child only because the police didn’t want to believe a poor man and woman’s story, despite the amount of evidence to support the story, with over a dozen witnesses. Just some “wealthy” people being “satisfied” with just being given a random child to replace their dead one. The kids looked nothing alike but a grieving mothers desperation can accept any kid as their own if it means going back to “normal”

I first knew about Kaspar Hauser when I watched his biopic filmed by Werner Herzog many years ago. That case still puzzles me to this day.

Caspar does sound like a person who is developmentally delayed, and hard to tell if this was from neglect or if he was born with something like autism, or a bit of both. it's always difficult to determine where neglect, abuse or environmentally caused developmental delay ends and something like an in-born condition begins, even with people today. to a layman they look practically the same and only a specialist could determine with intensive testing, (and even then may get it wrong!).

even the compulsive lying and fanciful thinking is extremely consistent for people with this kind of history. usually a combination of being perceived as lying because of misunderstanding and communication difficulties, actual lying out of shame or desire for privacy, actual lying out of attention seeking or as a creative outlet, and some suggestibility and self delusion. in some cases this includes more spiteful, malignant or parasitic forms of compulsive lying. which are notable by how the lies don't just exist to protect the liar while leaving others uninvolved and unscathed. these double as self preservation while actively harming, slandering, exploiting and victimizing others. some have limits and won't take the habit that far but it really runs the range, depending on the individual and their levels of compassion and empathy if it ever gets that dark. still this sense of unreliability is a common marker throughout

I suspect many core aspects of his story were true. it seems reasonable a child born with special needs such as significant autism that his family might not be able to care for him, and his caretakers might have devised an understandable but less than ideal environment where he could be safe and calm. especially in cases of autistic children who often run into the woods or traffic, who like to eat and choke on inedible things, and who may be destructive or even violent when trying to communicate or for stimulation, it starts to make sense why he was so often kept in doors and in isolated and barren environments. even eating plain foods because he didn't enjoy or tolerate more complex flavors. this could have taken a more extreme form of cruelty and callousness, or a more complex form where the caretakers still tried to give him a normal childhood, education, play and company, but he still had to live outside of normal society because they didn't know what else to do.

I also suspect the more mysterious and fanciful details of his origin were made up by him and partly suggestions from others he was easily swayed by and began to believe himself.


regardless I have my developmental issues too and have a lot of experience with childcare for severe autism and feel a kind of kinship with him lol.

Years ago, I read a fascinating book about so-called feral children. It presented a whole number of cases, including this one and other historical cases as well as more recent ones. They are equal parts disturbing but also puzzles because it’s often unclear what exactly really happened.

For the second case I’ll admit I haven’t been away from my daughter for more than a couple days at a time but how could someone not recognize their own child? That to me is the weirdest part of it all.

Going to disappear creepily so I can be on my fav channel😮

Bobby Dunbar definitely died at the lake, then the parents used their influence to kidnap a replacement.

Pointing the finger at William and saying that he kidnapped Bobby makes me think of something similar that happened to a member of my family. Years and years and years ago, a boy went missing in my area. Search parties went out and tried to find the kid for days before it was finally called off. But my Grandpa didn't want to quit, he was a teacher at the kid's school and decided that he couldn't give up on him, so he spent a few more weeks searching the woods with a lantern almost every night before finally giving up. Then a few years later, some people on a horror podcast pointed the finger at him and said that HE kidnapped the boy, and that him going out every night was him covering up evidence. The boy was never found.

Nothing really came of that accusation, as it was a small podcast and most people knew that he wouldn't hurt a fly (literally) but it hurt my grandpa real bad, and even all these decades later he still sometimes mentions that he feels awful that he never found the boy and that it kind of eats away at him. He brought it up a few times around me, how guilty he feels that he let the kid down as a teacher and a protector.

The 2nd story reminded me of the movie "Changeling" starring Angelina Jolie .It was kind of the opposite tho, where it was based on a true story of a boy abducted in the 1920s was 'found' and brought back by the police to his mother (played by Angelina), who was adamant that it was not her son but police (LAPD) tried to make her accept that it was and take him. When she refused she was put in a mental hospital. Ppl then started to find out all the dodgy dealings of the LAPD and someone (I forgot who) started fighting to get the mother out of the asylum. It was a pretty interesting story, give it a go if you're bored lol.