Posted on 04/03/2021 5:59:39 PM PDT by CheshireTheCat
On this date in 1936, a German immigrant went to New Jersey’s electric chair for kidnapping and murdering the infant son of famed aviator Charles Lindbergh.
The kidnapping of the Lindbergh boy in 1932 had touched off an outpouring of public compassion matched only by the clumsiness of the investigation. The circus that formed around a father desperate to retrieve his boy — and prone to rash decision-making thereto — pulled in underworld figures, military intelligence officers (including the founder of the CIA’s forerunner and the father of Gulf War General Norman Schwartzkopf), a meddlesome schoolteacher, and queer characters like “Cemetery John,” who somehow managed two meetings with Lindbergh’s intermediaries, making off with a box full of ransom cash without anyone so much as tailing him, much less having to fork over the hostage.
The boy, in fact, was dead, and would be discovered weeks later, a few miles from the Lindbergh house, in such a state of decomposition as to suggest that, by accident or intention, he had suffered a fatal head injury almost at the moment of his abduction.
Two years’ fruitless investigation ensued, with leads that frustratingly faded away and at least two suspects who committed suicide. The police job had been a hash from the start, between amateurish cock-ups like failing to measure footprints found on the scene and security breaches in the chaotic weeks following the kidnapping. Most damagingly, a newspaper laid hands on an early ransom note and printed it, making it impossible subsequently to positively discern the kidnapper’s real notes from hoaxes...
(Excerpt) Read more at executedtoday.com ...
Ironically, by 1941, Lindbergh would become probably the most hated man in America.
deservedly so. What a putz he turned out to be. One of the original cases of a celebrity thinking that being famous automatically made him a political savant.
Annoying to learn how many screw ups there were. Poor child, may he rest in peace. Strange the father would have taken such a shine to the Nazis even after a German man had been convicted of his infant’s son beastly murder. Never really thought about that before.
Were the Bolder Police any better in the case of Ms. Ramsey?
Were the Boulder Police any better in the case of Ms. Ramsey?
Lindbergh had a reputation of being a horrible practical joker. Some weeks prior to the kidnapping he had hid his son in the house and sat still while his wife and the maid went nuts trying to find the kid.
It’s likely the boy was killed in a practical joke gone horribly wrong.
How could the kidnapper have known just what window was the child’s nursery? And how could anyone open a shutter that was locked on the inside while standing on a ladder outside?
The same bunch of Keystone Kops are on the King Soopers murder cases. No wonder they can't figure out the motive.
Yeah. For one thing, they didn’t have Ramsey organize and command the investigation. They let Lindbergh do that.
What a putz he turned out to be. One of the original cases of a celebrity thinking that being famous automatically made him a political savant.
He was most definitely against our joining Britain’s fight against Germany and actively campaigned against it, saying that Britain was doomed to defeat. When war did come, he asked to be allowed to serve but F.D.R. refused.
As a civilian, he went to the Pacific where he taught pilots how to extend the range of their P-38s (flying was something he really did know about) and apparently shot down at least one Japanese plane.
As you say, his fame certainly went to his head and he was apparently blind to the evil the Nazis represented. But to be fair, many more of his contemporaries were equally blind to the evil of the Soviet Union.
I could understand being isolationist up to the point that France Fell, but it was absolutely clear then that Nazi Germany was going to have to be dealt with, one way or the other.
Saw a documentary on AHC network about Lindbergh. Said he was a big Nazi sympathizer, and may have killed his own son because he was defective. Weirdest thing I’d ever heard. I only walked into the room at the tail end of it, so I don’t know much else. Anybody else ever hear of it?
France fell in June of 1940. It certainly looked like Britain didn’t stand a chance. Lindbergh was aware of what Britain was up against in terms of the Luftwaffe (the Nazis had been happy to show him what they had). If Britain had fallen, as many thought it would, the U.S. would have had a very tough time in dealing with Nazi Germany.
It’s amazing to think of it now, but we didn’t have a draft until September of 1940 and that passed Congress by just one vote. Most Americans, rather disappointed with how the aftermath of WWI had turned out wanted no part of a second war. Both the left and the right were isolationists. It wasn’t until June of 1941 when Hiter invaded the Soviet Union that the left all of a sudden saw the need for us to be involved in a war against Germany.
As it was, Germany declared war on us after the Pearl Harbor attack. I often wonder how FDR would have been able to persuade America to fight the Germans had they not done that.
The Brits love or loved to chide us on how we were late to both wars.
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