Feral Children: John Ssabunnya to the Wild Boy of Averyon

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Feral Children

Found in 1991, John Ssabunnya (pictured here) was reared by apes in the jungles of Uganda. Seeing his mother murdered by his father, John escaped into the jungle as a toddler, where Green monkeys adopted him and thereby saved his life. John learned their mannerisms, climbed trees, lived on fruit, nuts, roots, and berries.

To protect themselves, John and his monkey family made racket, and hurled sticks at John's would-be rescuers. When the villagers got the boy down from a tree, they found him covered with dirt, his eyes and body filled with fleas.

Raised in a Christian orphanage, John learned again how to speak and told his story. For those who were skeptical, he demonstrated behavior that put their doubts to rest.

The BBC tested John by taking him to the Uganda Wildlife Education Center. With a group of visiting children who harassed Green monkeys, John behaved differently. Crouched, and reaching an open hand toward the monkeys, he made a series of oblique glances and guttural sounds that left the humans in awe. In less than two hours he had been accepted by the monkeys.

The Hessian wolf-boy, found in the woods of Hesse, Germany, in 1341 and raised thereafter by local monks whose records indicate he was about 7 years old and kept by wolves. He soon died after capture but a second boy, about 12, was captured in the same region in 1344. This boy apparently died soon after being captured, but a second wild boy — this time a 12 year old — seized three years later (1344) in the same region but the woods of Wetterau this time and lived to the age 80. Records indicate both children as wild and immune to cold and discomfort, besides not being able to stand upright, consequently having to move around on all fours.

The Wild Boy of Hesse, captured in the woods near Hameln, Germany 27 July 1724, about 12 years old. He could not speak and ate only vegetables and grass and sucked the juice of green stalks; at first he rejected bread. Summoned to King George I (also Hanoverian King), he was briefly court favorite, dying in 1785.

The Wild Boy of Aveyron, captured near Lacune, France, 1797 and taken, kicking and screaming, by local peasants then displayed in the village square. He escaped and was recaptured in 1798. A widow fed and clothed him for a week, but he again escaped to the forest. Less wary of humans, in the 1800 winter, hungry, he wandered into Saint Sernin and was captured again. Dirty, inarticulate, he moved on all fours, grunting like a beast. He became known as Victor. Bonaparte's brother, Lucien, ordered Victor to Paris and exhibited him in a cage, wherein he rocked back and forth, dull, lifeless, apathetic. Jean-Marc Gaspard tried to educate him. Victor learned how to read, say a few words, and obey simple commands, but never spoke properly. He died in 1828.

Interestingly, this was Rousseau's age, the epoch of nature as pure and civilization as degrading. The boy put to the test such beliefs. Victor was no Garden of Eden child.

Kamala and Amala. Kamala, 7 or 8 years old, and Amala, about 1 and a half, were two girls supposedly discovered in 1920 living with a family of wolves in a cave-like den in the base of a huge abandoned termite hill in India. In an orphanage, they preferred the company of cats and dogs, and like wild animals, slept days and prowled nights on all fours. They bit and attacked other children if provoked. With acute sight, hearing and smell, they enjoyed raw meat. In 1921 Amala died. Kamala would not leave her sister's body and had to be removed from the coffin. Kamala learned a small vocabulary and died in 1929.