Peter Kurten: The Vampire of Dusseldorf





When the press discovered that investigators believed that the attacker might be drinking the blood of his victims, he was immortalised in print as the “Vampire of Dusseldorf”.




Peter Kürten was born into extreme deprivation and poverty in Köln-Mullheim, a suburb of Cologne, Germany on 26th May 1883. The eldest of thirteen children, his father was an alcoholic with sadistic tendencies, who brutalised both wife and children, in the one room apartment that they all shared, for the duration of Kurten’s childhood.

Kurten claims to have drowned two school friends at the age of nine.

This daily subjection to sexual violence must have had an immense influence on the boy who, aged 9, formed an unhealthy relationship with a dog-catcher living in the same building, who introduced him to the practise of bestiality, carried out initially on dogs.

Kurten claims to have drowned two school friends at the age of nine. Having pushed one overboard, the second dived in to his rescue: Kurten held both under water until they had suffocated. At the time the event was dismissed as a tragic childhood accident.

As Kurten matured sexually, his bestiality extended to sheep, goats and other farmyard animals, with the teenager discovering particular pleasure when the animal was stabbed during intercourse.

By 1899, at the age of sixteen, Kurten had progressed to petty crime, and ran away from home to escape the continuing violence. Shortly after his departure, his father was arrested for incestuous relations with Kurten’s 13-year old sister, and he was jailed for three years.

His petty crime soon led to the first of many prison sentences, mostly short-term, for various misdemeanours, that punctuated his existence over the following years. The appalling conditions within these prisons confirmed his sadistic tendencies, which he now transferred from farm animals to humans.

With each successive sentence, Kurten’s rage against society, and his capacity for depravity, increased; he discovered a fascination for brutal sexual acts whilst in solitary confinement, which enhanced his fantasies: so much so that he began to break prison rules to ensure the maximum time in solitary confinement.

During his periods of release between prison spells, Kurten was responsible for various sexual assaults, but his first documented murder victim was 10-year-old Christine Klein, who was sexually assaulted and stabbed in her home in Cologne, on 25th May 1913, whilst her parents worked in their pub below her bedroom.

Her uncle, who had had an argument with her father, immediately came under suspicion, and Kurten, who returned to the scene of the crime the next day, was enthralled by the horror the killing had invoked in the locals, especially when the sexual assault came to light. Fortunately, the innocent uncle was cleared of the murder, given the lack of evidence, but Kurten followed his trial with interest, whetting his sadistic appetite for suffering in others.

Kurten was called up for military service following the start of the First World War, but military discipline did not suit him, and he deserted from his barracks. He was jailed when captured, and remained in prison until 1921, his longest sentence to date, and his rage at this injustice intensified.

Following his release from prison, he moved to Altenburg, where he met and married a former prostitute, who had been jailed for the murder of her fiancé. He spent the next four years living a life of relative normality and found work as a moulder, (his father’s profession) even becoming active in the trade union.

Sensationalist German press covered the attacks extensively, and when they discovered that investigators believed that the attacker might be drinking the blood of his victims, he was immortalised in print as the “Vampire of Dusseldorf”.

This normality was short-lived, however, and Kurten found himself inexorably drawn to Dusseldorf, where his criminal tendencies escalated, from petty crimes to arson attacks, and then to sexual attacks, four of which are certainly attributable to him in the period up until early 1929. One unlucky victim, Maria Kuhn, survived repeated stabbing by Kurten that caused 24 individual wounds.

This crime escalation reached its peak in the killing of 9-year-old Rosa Ohliger, on 9th February 1929. She was stabbed thirteen times by Kurten, who climaxed during the brutal attack, before he dumped her body under a hedge, then attempted to set fire to her remains to destroy the evidence.

Rosa was the first of a number of victims that included young girls, women and even men, over the next 15 months. A 45-year old mechanic named Scheer followed, five days later, the victim of multiple stab wounds. Kurten again returned to the scene of the crime to relive the moment, even speaking to detectives about the murder.

Sensationalist German press covered the attacks extensively, and when they discovered that investigators believed that the attacker might be drinking the blood of his victims, he was immortalised in print as the “Vampire of Dusseldorf”. The search for the killer received a major setback, however, when a learning-disabled individual, named Stausberg, accused of similar crimes, inexplicably admitted to all of the Kurten/Vampire killings. He was committed to an asylum, and the police were convinced that the case was solved.
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By August 1929 it became apparent that their conviction was premature; a series of strangulations and stabbings occurred, culminating in the brutal fairground murder of foster sisters, 5-year old Gertrude Hamacher, and 14-year old Louise Lenzen. The next day Kurten assaulted another woman, Gertrude Schulte, who survived the attack, and gave police a description of her attacker as a pleasant-looking male aged around 40.

Attacks became more frequent, and were widely publicised, throwing the population of Dusseldorf into a panic, as the victim count rocketed. Ida Reuter was raped and killed in September, and a servant girl named Elizabeth Dorrier was battered to death on 12th October 1929. Two other victims, named Meurer and Wanders, were fortunate to survive brutal hammer attacks, but the very nondescript appearance of Kurten, as described by his victims, made it difficult to narrow down the list of potential suspects.

Kurten enjoyed the mass hysteria and horror enormously, feeding off the press attention, even going so far as to contact a newspaper, on 9th November 1929, with a map detailing the position of the body of his latest victim, Gertrude Albermann, a five-year-old he had stabbed to death two days before, dumping her body under some builders rubble.

Kurten’s attacks continued into that winter, and the spring of 1930, but none were fatal, which served only to escalate the horror, as harrowing survivor attacks provided lurid copy for newspapers, an antidote to the growing economic deprivations being inflicted by the Great Depression. Public condemnation of the authorities, for failing to catch the killer, was widespread.

14th May 1930 saw the start of a chain of events that resulted in the eventual capture of Kurten. He offered a young unemployed woman, Maria Budlick, somewhere to stay, and took her to his apartment, hoping to have sex with her. When she refused, he agreed to find her somewhere else to stay but, on returning her to the train station, he took her into the nearby forest, where he raped her, then let her go.

Initially ashamed, she had no intention of going to the police, but a letter which she had written to a friend about the attack, and intended for her information only, was incorrectly delivered. The recipient called the police, who tracked down Budlick and persuaded her to press charges. She recalled Kurten’s apartment clearly, and returned there with the police on 21st May 1930, where Kurten saw her, and made a quick escape.



Throughout Kurten’s reign of terror he maintained a fond attachment to his wife and, recognising that he would eventually be caught for the rape of Budlick, now that the police knew his identity, he devised a plan to ensure her financial security following his arrest. He confessed to her that he was the “Dusseldorf Vampire”, detailing all the killings and attacks, and he insisted that she would be paid a large reward for turning him over to the authorities.

On 24th May 1930, Frau Kurten reluctantly did as he had advised, and took the police to their designated rendezvous site, a local church, where Kurten surrendered quietly.

Once under arrest, Kurten provided an astonishingly detailed account of his string of crimes to Professor Karl Berg, a distinguished psychologist, who later published the confession in a book entitled “The Sadist”. He claimed 79 individual acts of crime in all, and went to great lengths to convince the authorities of his guilt, perhaps in the hope that his full cooperation would ensure the maximum financial benefit for his wife. His memory was near eidetic, and his own “action-replay” of each offence obviously provided him with great pleasure; less so the attending stenographers.





Born
26th May 1883

The Victims
1892 - Claimed to have drowned two school friends
25th May 1913 - Christine Klein, 10
9th February 1929 - Rosa Ohliger, 8
14th February 1929 - Herr Scheer, 45
23rd August 1929 - Gertrude Hamacher, 5
23rd August 1929 - Louise Lenzen, 14
September 1929 - Ida Reuter
12th October 1929 - Elizabeth Dorrier
7th November 1929 - Gertrude Albermann, 5

Arrested
24th May 1930

Trial
13th April 1931

Convicted
21st June 1931

Died
2nd July 1931


Kurten’s trial commenced on 13th April 1931, on charges including nine murders and seven attempted murders. To outward appearances the successful businessman, in well-tailored suit, he initially retracted his extensive confession, claiming that he had sought only to ensure his wife’s financial security.

However, exhaustive questioning by the examining magistrate, and a damning litany of evidence, over the subsequent two months, caused him to eventually admit guilt whilst under interrogation. In an emotionless voice, Kurten claimed that his childhood, and the German penal system, was responsible for releasing his sadistic tendencies, and he showed no remorse for his crimes.

The jury took only 90 minutes to return a verdict of guilty on all counts, and Kurten received nine death sentences. He was executed by guillotine on 2nd July 1931.

Mark F






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