Do you know the story of Blanche Monnier? We tell you all about Who was Blanche Monnier: a woman locked up for 25 years and his curious life. Sometimes it can be difficult for us to believe the stories we read/hear in movies, books, newspapers, etc., since we tend to associate them with dysfunctional families or falls from grace due to social or economic problems, perhaps the most common problems in our times to be able to develop activities that we could classify as out of the ordinary.
However, life was not always the same: when we approach a reality from the past we must understand that their conception of society, economics, about life, family, friends, politics… was totally different from what it is today. premium over the rest.
Now, does this justify the confinement of a young woman for approximately 25 years by her own family? To better explore the story, let’s look at what happened to Blanche Monnier.
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What we know: 25 years of confinement… at home
The family disappeared Blanche as if nothing had happened: her absence was excused by the fact that, theoretically, she was in a boarding school in England, then her family would assure her that the young woman had moved to Scotland. In short, the family followed the course of their lives in the most normal way possible, yes, with the complicity not only of the mother and children (Blanche’s brothers), but also of the domestic servants of the house, since the Monnier family He belonged to the Parisian aristocracy. Her father died in 1882, so she “only” participated in the initial phase of the deception.
Both the father, Charles-Émile, and his brother, Marcel, worked at the faculty of letters at the University of Poitiers. It is important not to forget about Marcel, since he will be the only one who will be judged a posteriori.
Surprisingly, on May 23, 1901, although of course, after the various suspicions about Blanche’s absence (how was it possible that not even a visit to the family in 25 years?), an anonymous letter arrived at the Attorney General of Paris about a woman locked up in her own house in Poitiers who said the following:
Attorney General: I have the honor to inform you of an exceptionally serious event. I am referring to a single woman who is locked up in the house of Mrs. Monnier, half starving and who has lived the last 25 years in a rotten bed. In a word, in her own filth.”
Such a letter will not go missing, so the police will be sent to investigate such a situation: yes, it must be taken into account that the letter did not sit well with the prosecutor (remember that the family was well positioned in the city).
Once the police arrived at the Monnier family home (located at 21 Rue de la Visitation) everything seemed to be in place, nothing out of the ordinary, except on the second floor, from where a putrid smell emanated When the police track him down, they realize that he came from a locked room.
In such a room, without light or access to the outside (hence we speak of confinement), was an adult woman: it was Blanche Monnier, the beautiful daughter of the Monnier family!
It is clear that the Blanche they met was no longer young or beautiful: she was curled up on a bed of straw, covered with a blanket, without clothes (that is, completely naked) and in a fetal position, surrounded by an enormous amount of waste, including fecal material and vomit.
There are some sites where it is stated that the woman was held to a wall with an iron shackle.
It is said that in that room it was not possible to continue a search for clues or remains for a long time due to the horrendous stench coming from it, in addition, after taking Blanche, it was determined that her weight was around 25 kilograms, something that was really unusual for a grown woman.
Her brother, Marcel, will be the one who will identify her as his sister to the police. The prosecution: father and mother dead, brother Marcel remains
In reality, the mother was still alive after the terrifying discovery, what happens is that she died shortly after being in prison. Her father, as we had mentioned above, died shortly before the decade had passed since the date of the start of Blanche’s confinement.
We know that justice is not usually entirely fair given the legal loopholes among which lawyers can claim that a person did not commit an act or was only guilty of part of what happened: something like that happened with Marcel, Blanche’s brother, the only member who “paid” for what he did.
Of course, he was only sentenced to 15 months in prison for being declared an accomplice, but thanks to the fact that his lawyer argued that closing the door on a person in a room that he does not want to leave does not constitute a crime as such. Although did Blanche really never want to go out?
From our point of view, we do not think so, since one of the few words he shared during his transfer from the house to the psychiatric hospital where he will spend the last 12 years of his life, was that it was wonderful to be able to smell the fresh air.
Of course, it would be necessary to check whether these words are true, since a long series of consequences or consequences of the confinement were enunciated in court, including anorexia and coprophilia.
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But what led Blanche’s parents to lock her up? Causes
In several websites, as well as works, we find different versions or points of view about what happened to the young woman, we collect all these possible causes.
Falling in love with an older man, the one who was not to the liking of the family, some versions say that it is a lawyer, others a merchant. This lawyer would be Protestant and Republican, unlike the Monnier family, in favor of the monarchy and Catholic, just in a year of social tensions in France.
Gérard Simmat, on the other hand, affirms that it may be due to trying to hide the schizophrenia that his daughter suffered from, synonymous with public shame at the time.
Other versions speak of, instead of schizophrenia, anorexia. That said, do you think that, even in such a context, an action of such radicalism as the one they did to Blanche Monnier is justified?
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