Blanche Monnier was kept locked in a Room for 25 years for falling In love with a commoner, her mother did the unthinkable in an attempt to stop it.

The picture shown here looks like a promotional photo for a horror movie, something along the lines of an exorcism film. But sadly, the image is real and the story behind it is much more frightening.

The Monniers were an upper-middle class family living in Poiters, France in the late 1800s, well thought of throughout the neighborhood, even being given the Committee of Good Works award, which honored the most virtuous of citizens. The daughter, Blanche, disappeared when she was 25-years old, arousing no suspicion whatsoever.

An anonymous letter was sent to the Paris Attorney General and read as follows:

“Monsieur Attorney General: I have the honor to inform you of an exceptionally serious occurrence. I speak of a spinster who is locked up in Madame Monnier’s house, half starved, and living on a putrid litter for the past twenty-five years – in a word, in her own filth.”

The police found her locked in a room, covered in filth and excrement, weighing a mere 55 pounds, never having seen the sun in 25 years. Her mother and brother had locked her away to avoid her marriage to a man they deemed unfit to join their family and kept her there for a quarter of a century. Although she did manage to gain a little weight, she never recovered her sanity, and died in a psychiatric hospital 13 years after being freed from her own personal hell.