My Life and My Efforts

afterwards. Some aspects of this story plainly contradict the few facts from her life which could be pieced together from old church documents. These facts are: On May the 1st, 1803, she married C.F. May, while both of her parents were still alive. Five months later, their daughter was born. In 1810, her son Heinrich, Karl May's father, was born. The records of his baptism state that Heinrich's father was not his mother's husband. He was baptised under his mother's maiden name. On February the 4th, 1818, C.F. May died due to a "disorderly way of life" (whatever this is supposed to mean). In 1820, the mother of Karl May's grandmother died. In 1822, she married C.T. Vogel. In 1825, her father died. In 1826, C.T. Vogel died. Later in the same year, a church document lists her son Heinrich with the surname May.

There are indications that Karl May was not just aware of the fact that some things he wrote about his grandmother were not literally true, but that he had also invented some of it himself