Throughout Hitler’s time in power and during the Second World War, there were many men
who formed his inner circle, and these were responsible for large amounts of the atrocities
and crimes of the conflict.
One man who benefitted greatly from his friendship with Hitler was Hermann Goring, who became
the Reichsmarshall but also the Head of the Luftwaffe.
Goring when he joined the Nazis cause was seen as a celebrity, as he was a former First
World War fighter pilot ace, and his support for Hitler was seen as a major coup.
He was an eccentric who often invited ridicule from other Nazis due to his flamboyant uniforms,
and the fact he kept lions, and despite being able to laugh at himself at times, he was
one of the biggest art thieves of World War 2.
For his crimes he would be sentenced to death and was scheduled for execution at the end
of the Nuremberg Trials, but Goring would escape the hangman noose.
However what isn’t as well documented is the death of his first wife, and the shocking
exhumations that occurred to her remains after her death.
Carin Goring was the Swedish first wife of Hermann Goring, who died tragically, however
her remains were not left to rest as they should have been.
Join us today as we look at her death, and also what happened after.
Remember to support our channel, please make sure to subscribe.
Carin Goring was born Carin Alexina Hulda Fock on the 21st October 1888 in Stockholm
in Sweden.
Her father was a Baron, and was a colonel inside of the Swedish Army, and her family
were of part Germanic origin.
The family had a number of links to other countries including her grandfather who was
a Coldstream Guard.
But in 1910 she married a Swedish army officer named Nils von Kantzow, and the pair had a
child named Thomas.
She was married when she met the ex First World War pilot Hermann Goring, who at the
time was trying to make money flying mail and passengers between Germany and Sweden.
He was also working as a pilot for a commercial airline, and he was visiting the castle where
he had flown Carin’s brother in law.
It was said that it was love at first sight, despite Carin being married, and thew couple
would meet up in Stockholm.
She was a separated woman with a young child, and following her divorce in December 1922
she and Hermann married on the 3rd February 1923.
The couple then moved to Germany, and Carin then became involved in her husband’s political
life.
She followed her husband in being a member of the Nazi Party, and Goring was heavily
involved in the early days and foundations of the party.
He was part of the Munich Putsch and was injured when he was shot at, and Carin smuggled Goring
out of Germany, and took him to Austria and then Italy and nursed him back to health.
However Carin was not the most well woman, and she was rather sickly.
The stress of the political landscape in Germany, and also the struggles she and her husband
experienced following the Munich Putsch, led to her suffering with her health.
She had chronic asthma and it’s believed Angina, and in 1925 she was diagnosed with
tuberculosis, a terrible disease which throughout the centuries had killed thousands.
But Carin and Hermann’s relationship was used by Goebbels as the ideal German love
story, and the couple went on trips around Germany to rally for the Nazi cause.
However in September 1931, Carin got a call saying that her mother had died and then she
travelled to Sweden to attend the funeral.
She was greatly upset by the news, however she was not well and her health was fragile.
But the next day after her mother’s funeral at the age of 42 she had a heart attack and
died days later of heart failure on the 17th October 1931.
Her husband Hermann was devastated, and in the years after her death her older sister
wrote a biography on her life which sold around 900,000 copies in the following years.
It was a best seller in Germany, but after her death Carin was buried in the Fock family
plot at Lovo Churchyard on Drottningholm Island in Lake Malaran to the West of Stockholm.
However in 1933, Goring commissioned the building of Carinhall, a huge hunting lodge which he
named after his first wife.
Following the Nazi seizure of power, Goring visited Sweden in earl 1933 and he visited
his wife’s grave and he laid a wreath of red roses in the shape of the Nazi swastika.
This was criticised in the media, and anti-Nazis removed the tribute.
But Goring was furious by this, and was outraged at the removal of the tribute he somehow deemed
was fitting.
Because of this, he decided to then order the removal of his wife’s remains and body
from Sweden.
His plan was to exhume Carin’s remains and then have her buried at Carinhall, and this
ie exactly what he did.
He began to construct an ornate mausoleum which would be underground to hold Carin’s
remains.
It’s believed Goring eventually dreamed that this would be where he was laid to rest.
On the 19th June 1934, Carin Goring’s coffin was exhumed from Lovo Graveyard, and despite
being in the group 3 years, it was draped in a flag containing the swastika, and was
transported then to Germany and to Carinhall.
The following day a huge Nazi ceremony took place, and the ceremony was even attended
by Hitler and many other senior Nazis.
She was interred inside the mausoleum for 11 years, and during this time Hermann visited
her every day when he was living at Carinhall.
Despite being remarried, his second wife Emmy did not seem to mind living in a home dedicated
to his first wife, and she did not seem to mind Hermann paying his respects to Carin.
However as the Second World War waged on, Hermann Goring would become one of the most
infamous Nazi war criminals.
His home would be adorned with art stolen from Jews and others, and he would go on to
be responsible for many other war crimes.
These crimes would later see Goring sentenced to death at the Nuremberg Trials, however
before this on the 20th April 1945, the Soviet artillery was encroaching on the area near
to Carinhall.
Because of Soviet advancements, Goring saw it as dangerous to go to Carinhall anymore,
and because of this he abandoned it, and left for Berlin.
He gave instructions to the guards to plant dynamite in the house and all the other buildings,
and outbuildings.
There were no instructions left to destroy the mausoleum, but Goring also made no provisions
as to remove Carin’s body.
He must have believed that the Soviets could have looted her tomb, which they did when
they reached Carinhall.
They would have entered the mausoleum and caused chaos, and broken into Carin’s coffin,
and it’s possible some stole some of her remains or bones.
But five years after the war, a Swedish priest began to investigate what happened to Carin
Goring and her remains at the end of the war.
He travelled to Germany, and then he went to Carinhall.
This was very dangerous and he risked arrest doing this.
This priest then allegedly found the mausoleum and he entered where her tomb was, and he
then gathered as many bones as he could quickly from the tomb, and placed them in a potato
sack, and he then had them taken to Sweden.
These bones were then cremated, and were then reinterred in the churchyard.
However the story of Carin Goring’s remains in 1991 then took a shocking twist.
The previous remains had been described as ‘nothing more than a human torso,’ however
in 991 treasure hunters found a zinc coffin with skeletal remains in the Forest near to
the location of the destroyed Carinhall.
The men excavated it, and then these remains were handed over to the Swedish church in
Berlin, and were then sent to the Swedish National Board of Forensic medicine for identification
and examination.
26 bones from the cranium and upper body were received, and they showed different signs
of postmortem trauma.
This meant that her bones had been broken after death, and the arm had been shattered.
Testing using DNA on the remains showed that the bones were from a female, and DNA analysis
supported the theory that the bones found inside the Schorfheide Forest in 1991 were
the remains of Carin Goring.
What is strange is what must have happened to her remains in the final moments of the
war.
It’s possible that German guards moved her remains and buried them to make sure they
stayed out the hands of the Soviets, but what is curious is the fact that the Soviets did
break into Carin Goring’s tomb.
But her remains may have been moved, or part of her may have into the forest to keep her
out of Soviet hands.
But Carin Goring was the wife of Hermann Goring who was buried a number of times, and was
reinterred and exhumed also a number of times.
Her death devastated her husband, who would during World War 2 become one of the most
terrible Nazi war criminals, and he was incredibly close with Hitler.
Carin’s husband would later have the last say against the executioner on the day of
his execution, and he would escape the hangman’s noose.
Thanks for watching
To support our channel, please make sure to subscribe
Thanks again for watching.