Gottfried August Knoche

Gottfried Knoche

Gottfried August Knoche (born March 17, 1813, presumably in Halberstadt ; † January 2, 1901 ) was a German doctor and founder of the San Juan de Dios Hospital in La Guaira . He worked in Venezuela and developed a method of mummification.

Life

Knoche studied medicine at the University of Freiburg , where he received his doctorate in 1837 (renewed in 1845 at the Universidad Central de Venezuela ).

In 1840 Knoche went to Venezuela with his wife and two trusted nurses to work as a doctor in the then strong German colony in La Guaira. He is considered one of the founders of the San Juan de Dios Hospital there. Knoche gained a high reputation among the local population through his work during the devastating cholera epidemic of 1854–1856. He was also known for his charity towards poor patients, whom he treated without asking for money, while collecting double that from the rich.

In 1880 Knoche bought the Hacienda Buena Vista, located at 1015 m on the El Palmar de Cariaco mountain near Macuto. While his wife returned to Germany because she declared she could not bear the loneliness of Buena Vista any more than the heat of La Guaira, the doctor - accompanied by the two nurses Amalie and Josephine Weimann brought along - lived and researched in his' Schwarzwaldhaus' on the old coffee acienda.

mummification

Knoche had already found a serum for mummification during his time in the hospital in La Guaira, which he first injected into animals and later also into a fisherman and soldier of the Federation named José Pérez who had died in the hospital and whose body was not asked for by any relatives for burial. While the body of the so-called El Coriano was initially uniformed in the House of Bones on Buena Vista, the corpse of another alleged test subject - a rascal fisherman, known as El Pescador de Oro - disappeared without a trace.

The death and mummification of Bone's daughter Anna Müller came before Buena Vista was bought. A little later, the doctor and researcher - already owned by the hacienda - had a laboratory and a mausoleum built around 200 m from his courtyard. While he continued to develop his mummification formula - presumably based on aluminum chloride - in the former, the mausoleum was to become the grave for his daughter, her husband, for Doctor Bone's brother, the faithful nurses and ultimately for Doctor Knoche himself. On his instructions, the nurse Amalie Weimann injected him with the solution on January 2, 1901, and his body, like that of the relatives who had died before him, was laid out in the niche of the mausoleum intended for him. 25 years later, it was only followed by the body of Amalie Weimann. Knoche had taken the secret of his formula with him to the grave, but he had left an injection for his nurse and girlfriend.

People buried in the mausoleum

• Anna Müller (née Knoche, daughter of GA Knoche) June 10, 1840 - January 23, 1879
• Heinrich Müller (husband of Anna) November 2, 1822 - April 7, 1881
• Wilhelm Knoche (brother of GA Knoche) September 17, 1817 - September 7, 1874
• Josephine Weimann (nurse, sister of Amalie) June 29, 1830 -?
• Gottfried August Knoche March 17, 1813 - January 2, 1901
• Amalie Weimann (nurse, sister of Josephine) February 2, 1838 -? .1926

Post-history

When Amalie Weimann was buried in the mausoleum by the then German consul in La Guaira, the last of the six niches in the mausoleum were filled, Coriano , who was still in the library of the hacienda, was posted as a "guard" in front of the family grave and the massive iron door was locked . Contrary to the last will of the nurse, the key of the mausoleum was not sunk into the sea, but thrown back inside the building through the barred window, which had probably been left in the wall on instructions from Bones to observe the decay process . It did not take long for some of the numerous tourists and students, drawn to the story of the mysterious doctor to visit the mausoleum and hacienda, to gain access to the interior of the tomb. From then on, the estate began to deteriorate and, above all, the mistreatment of the corpses - primarily that of José Pérez. Eyewitnesses report that a little later no whole body, but only parts of the body, which were later buried by order of the authorities, were to be found. The majority of the mummies in the mausoleum disappeared without a trace and there is still speculation about their whereabouts today.

literature

• Eduardo Rosswaag: Por los Caminos del Ávila. E. Armitano, Caracas 1983.

Web links

• Tras el rastro del momificador del Ávila (es)