Was there something mysterious about the death of Goering's wife

Q. And how did they meet

A. Carin was married to a Swedish officer called von Kantzow when she first met Hermann Goering, a First World War fighter pilot. He was on hard times, trying to make a living ferrying mail and passengers between Germany and Sweden - but it was apparently love at first sight. They married on 3 February 1923, and were devoted to each other.

Q. In politics, too

A. Yes. Carin encouraged Goering's deepening involvement with the National Socialist German Workers' Party. She nursed him after he was badly wounded at Hitler's side during the so-called Beer Hall Putsch of November 1923. Carin was sickly at the best of times and the political atmosphere probably ruined her health - together with worries over her husband's increasing addiction to morphine. She contracted tuberculosis and died in Stockholm on 17 October 1931.

Q. And where was she buried

A. In the Fock family plot at Lovo Churchyard, on Drottningholm Island in Lake Malaran, west of Stockholm.

Q. What was so mysterious about that

A. Be patient and I'll tell you. Goering was elected to the Reichstag in the election of September, 1930, and he became deputy speaker. The Nazis seized power in January 1933. Soon afterwards Goering returned to Sweden for his niece's wedding and visited Carin's grave, decorating it with a wreath of red roses in the shape of a swastika. Anti-Nazi Swedes removed it - and a furious Goering decided to take Carin's body to Germany.

Q. So...

A. That summer, Goering began work on a grand house in the Schorfheide Forest north-west of Berlin. He called it Carinhall, and decorated it with crystal chandeliers, Flemish tapestries, old masters and opulent gifts from around the world. Nearby, on the shores of the Wuckersee, he began an elaborate underground mausoleum for Carin's coffin and, eventually, his own. On 19 June 1934, Carin's coffin was exhumed from Lovo, draped in a swastika flag, encased in a pewter sarcophagus and taken to Carinhall, where it was reburied the next day in an elaborate ceremony attended by Hitler.

Q. But she didn't rest in peace...

A. For the next 10 years, Goering visited the tomb daily, whenever he was in residence - even though in April 1935, he had married Emmy Sonnemann. On 20 April 1945, with Soviet troops advancing, Goering decided Carinhall was no longer safe. He fled - after leaving orders for the house and all outbuildings to be blown up.

Q. Including the mausoleum

A. It's not clear. However, the Russians finished that off. Red Army troops looted the tomb, scattering Carin's bones.

Q. And there they stayed...

A. ...until 1950, when a Swedish priest became curious. He managed to get into the ruined tomb and gather as many bones as he could find. He then put them in a potato sack and sent them to her family in Sweden, where they were reburied... in Lovo Churchyard.

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By Steve Cunningham