Karoly Hadju

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Karoly Hadju (1920-1981) was a Hungarian-born impostor.

Karoly Hadju was born near Budapest in 1920. After the World War II in 1948 he moved to England and begun to use the name "Baron" Carl Hadju. In 1956 he began to collect money for "Hungarian freedom fighters" that supposedly fought against Soviet occupation. In fact, he kept all the money for himself, was eventually sentenced for fraud in 1957 and went bankrupt.

Next he took the identity of author and hypnotherapist Michel Karoly and rented a posh apartment in Mayfair. He was popular in high society. He continued in this role until 1965 when his wife and his lover died both and he again went bankrupt. In 1966 he was sentenced for two months in jail for taking a loan even if he was bankrupt.

In 1968 he adopted the new and the most successful role of Dr Charlotte Bach, a supposed former lecturer of the University of Budapest. She lived in this role full time until she died, and is therefore a non-op transgendered person. In 1971 s/he announced her new theory of evolution, which she claimed to disprove Darwinism in behalf of Lamarckism. She was invited to speak at Darwin College, Cambridge but her theory was not popular.

She assumed that people experience a pull towards becoming the opposite sex, and that this pull can be either 'denied' or 'asseverated'. Gays and femme lesbians are women in men’s bodies or vice versa, but transvestites and butch lesbians are not. This gives eight permutations, on which she built her theory of evolution.

"Bach" attracted interest of British writer Colin Wilson who began to support her theory. Bach became a cult figure with a small group of following who gathered in her home in Highgate. She continued to add details to her original thesis. At the same time she sometimes worked as a dominatrix.

The truth came out in 1981 when she died and the autopsy revealed that she was a male.