n April 1845, Karl Marx’s mother-in-law sent to the Marx family a nanny named Helene Demuth, known as “Lenchen.” Marx’s long-suffering wife, Jenny, was thrilled. After all, she had long expressed the wish that Karl would “earn some capital rather than just writing about capital.”
But Karl refused to earn money. Just as he refused soap and bathing, which spawned boils all over his body. As the late historian (and close friend of The American Spectator) Paul Johnson noted, Marx’s boils “appeared on all parts of his body, including his penis…. They brought on a nervous collapse marked by trembling and huge bursts of rage.”
All the more reason for Karl to refuse work. So, when Jenny’s mom sent Lenchen, Marx’s wife breathed a huge sigh of relief.
Then again, it isn’t quite right to say that Lenchen worked for Karl’s family, given that she toiled without pay. One Marx biographer described Lenchen as Marx’s “chattel to be exploited.” Karl, champion of the proletariat, never paid her a penny. The stumpy, frumpy, poor girl gave her everything to the Marx household, including her body — to Karl.
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